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Dear Quentin,

My husband and I work on building a good, egalitarian relationship.

I’ve been married 41 years — I was in my mid-30s — and I have held assets in separate property (and always filed separate tax returns). We did not have a prenuptial agreement. I should have had one, although my financial firewalls are great. I believe in self-sufficiency, financial independence and occasionally taking money out of the marital “boxing ring.”

I was a stockbroker (from age 26 to 50) and my husband has a successful insurance agency. When we married, I had assets (stocks and bonds, and two small houses). The houses merged into our family home. I titled the stocks as sole and separate property (unheard of in the 1980s and I wasn’t sure it was legal). But it was enough to keep his lazy sister away.

When I was a young stockbroker in 1975, a man joined the firm from Omaha and convinced several of us to go to the Berkshire Hathaway BRK.B, +0.07% annual general meeting. There were maybe 35 people there. Warren [Buffett] and Charlie [Munger] were young. I drank the Kool-Aid: value investing, pay with cash and drive old cars. I honed long-term thinking. It changed my life.

Advice for today’s kids

The biggest surprise when we got married was that my husband’s family saw me as a paycheck, even though they are all educated. It was a firm “no” from the start, but had I not said no, I’d be broke now. I see my greedy in-laws as misogynists: they are very demanding and condescending. And no, I don’t support somebody else’s adult kids who can’t manage themselves.

At this point, we jointly own a home in Marin County. I also own a house and vineyard with our adult sons in the wine country. They make wine and I’m up early reading the Wall Street Journal. Here is some advice to today’s kids: Get a second job, cut up your credit cards and learn to stand on your own two feet. In other words, grow up.

My husband is more of a spender; he loves Costco COST, +1.56%. And me? Not so much. I’ll save for travel, long-term stuff. For me, the work of marriage is building a supportive, cooperative relationship — it’s much harder than it sounds, especially with kids. How can we work these differences out, and not just have one person concede? What do you think of our approach?

Related: My mother-in-law will leave her house to her five grandchildren rather than her two sons. But her elder son won’t move out of her home. Is this a bad sign?

Dear No Sour Grapes,

You were ahead of your time with separate accounts and firewalls.

You don’t need me to tell you: You were an outlier as a female stockbroker in the 1980s. Even today, while almost half of people who work in the financial-services sector are women, only 15% hold executive positions. And overall, women continue to earn 84 cents on the dollar compared to men. Progress usually happens at a glacial pace.

You fortified your financial independence and protected your earnings and investments from both divorce and cash-strapped in-laws. Less than a decade before you married, under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act of 1974, lenders were prohibited from discriminating against people when making decisions on credit based on gender, race, national origin and age.

For younger readers, believe it or not, many banks in the 1960s and early 1970s still refused to allow women to open a bank account without their husband’s permission (until the aforementioned 1974 act was signed into law). Given the social mores of the time, you were a salmon valiantly swimming upstream to ensure the survival of your nest egg.

I understand your and Warren Buffett’s reticence about credit cards, but when you use a credit card, you are effectively borrowing money rather than spending it. They also come with fraud protections and, if your card is stolen, it can be replaced lickety-split. Finally, rewards and air miles are a nice bonus (if you pay off your card every month and track your spending.)

Prenups are no longer taboo

Recent research suggests that among those American couples who are married, in a civil partnership or live together, 23% exclusively have separate accounts, 34% have a mixture of joint and separate accounts, and the rest (43%) exclusively have joint accounts. You may lie somewhere between holding separate accounts and a piggy bank for joint expenses.

Such decisions are based on our formative experiences with wealth — or lack thereof. If money issues triggered fear and instability, I may be more likely to opt for separate accounts. Conversely, if I grew up with private schools, European vacations and the funds allowing me to attend college, I may have less money-related anxiety (or I may decide it’s mine, all mine).

The latest episode of MarketWatch’s new podcast, “On Watch,” discussed this issue. Two married MarketWatch reporters had a “financial face-off” over whether it is better to operate as a “team” and have joint accounts, or keep accounts separate. Jeremy Owens, the host, saw advantages in both, but did not care as much for the possible tit-for-tat nature of the latter.

Joint bank accounts do not make or break a marriage. This couple told me that they never fight over money and they’ve never had joint checking accounts, although they split their living expenses, mortgage and maintenance. Meanwhile, MarketWatch reporter Charles Passy said he never fights with his wife over money because they pool their finances.

More married couples — especially among the millions of Americans who end up getting divorced — probably wish they had your firewalls, which I assume involved beneficiary designations, not commingling property and setting up revocable trusts for certain properties and accounts. But most long-term partners usually find a healthy balance.

How not to fight over money

Which brings us back to you and your husband: There is no right or wrong. You are keenly aware of each other’s differences, spending habits and lifestyles, but you share the same outlook and values. You love each other, I presume, work hard and raised your children while maintaining separate bank accounts and one “marital boxing ring” for joint expenditure.

Once upon a time, prenups were for celebrities and the jet set. Now most people who take planes could be considered part of the “jet set,” and young people — particularly women — are far more financially literate. Nearly half of millennials say they sign prenups before getting hitched. They were taboo among ordinary mortals, even though they go back a long way.

The earliest known prenup goes back 2,500 years. An ancient Egyptian scroll decreed the wife would receive 1.2 silver pieces and 36 bags of grain a year for the rest of her life if the couple split. But that would have petered out pretty quick: The average life expectancy in Ancient Egypt, scholars estimate, was mid-20s for men and mid-30s for women.

Happily, you’re now septuagenarians who built a rich life together. That richness is based on mutual respect, allowing each other to be yourselves, maintaining strong boundaries, teaching your adult children to be independent, and giving each other space to enjoy your money without judgment. And if you would like your husband to travel more?

Gently encourage him to buy some nice luggage at Costco.

The Moneyist regrets he cannot reply to questions individually.

Previous columns by Quentin Fottrell:

My late aunt gave her husband a life tenancy in her home — but her attorney won’t even let us see the will. Is this a bad sign?

‘We were all set to enjoy our retirement’: My son invested in startups and we bailed him out with $100,000. What now?

I don’t want to end up with stalkers’: Should I tell my heirs that I’m writing a will and how much they can expect to inherit?

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