Getting married will be one of the biggest decisions you’ll make in your life. Chances
are, you already know your significant other pretty well, but have you talked about
everything yet? It’s easy to get carried away in the romance and avoid the important
questions you should be discussing before getting too serious. Some of these questions
involve finances, future family planning, living situations, and communication around
conflicts you might encounter. The importance of having the hard talks before getting
engaged is to ensure you both have similar goals and values to limit possible future
surprises. Below are a few topics you may want to ask your significant other before getting
engaged.
1. Finances
Discussing your financial history with your partner can be a touchy subject.
Merging your lives also means merging finances and if you can’t bring up finances now,
it won’t get easier later. If you and your significant other are unaware of each other’s
financial situation, it will be challenging to plan for your future. You should go over all the
basic financial details, including:
● Income This should depend on your salaries, past financial history, and if
you have any investments such as stocks or retirement accounts.
● Debt Discussing credit card debt, student loans, or any other debts each
other has is important because according to a research study on money,
marriage, and communication, fights about money are the second leading
cause of divorce.
● Managing Finances This might depend on each other’s spending habits,
financial goals, and if you want to split bills equally or not.
2. Living Situation
Where do you want to put down roots? Validating that you and your partner are
on the same page when it comes to where you want to live is extremely important before
getting engaged. You don’t want to end up in a situation where your partner might have
to move across the country for their career and you don’t want to move with them.
Once you decide on a mutual location, you should then discuss if you want to
buy a house or rent an apartment. Planning to buy a house can be tough especially
when you are young. Many couples choose to live in an apartment together while
figuring out how to afford a house together. If you’re both in agreement on purchasing a
home but money is tight and credit scores are low you should look into loan options best
suited for you. One particularly attractive loan option for first-time homebuyers is an FHA
loan because they have looser financial requirements. Some benefits of FHA loans are
that credit score requirements are lower compared to other loans, meaning you can still
qualify even if you have a bad financial history or debt.
3. Family Planning
Talking about having a family before getting engaged is essential. When you
choose your partner you tend to think about different ways they would make a good
parent. Hopefully, you are both on the same page about wanting kids in the future, but
some questions surrounding having children should also include:
● How many? Do you have a preference on how large of a family you want? Did
you grow up with a big family and want the same? These questions may cause a
disagreement but laying out your preferences now will help you understand each
other’s wants and needs later on.
● What’s Your Parenting Style? Different parenting styles can be authoritative,
authoritarian, permissive, uninvolved, and more. The parenting style you choose
will impact your kids throughout their lifetime, so it’s important to be on the same
page about how strict or laid back you both want to be.
4. Past History
Choosing a partner is a big deal and before you get engaged, you should discuss
all the good and the bad of each other’s past. It’s fair to want to know all about your
partner’s past relationships. Having an open and honest discussion on failed
relationships should not be. If anything, being aware of one another’s past, good or bad,
will bring you closer.
Continuing to learn about each other will help build trust and intimacy, and lead
to other conversations such as sharing childhood memories. These memories can
regard family traditions or small memories of your childhood. No matter what the
tradition is, sharing those memories with your partner opens up a vulnerable side. Also,
sharing these family traditions you both had growing up will give you both an idea of
what traditions you would like to carry on in the future.
5. Communication
If there is no communication in your relationship, chances are it will fail. Although
opening up and having a healthy conversation is not the easiest thing in the world, it’s
crucial to the success of your relationship. Some communication questions you and your
partner should discuss are:
● How do you handle conflict? The 4 types of communication styles are passive,
aggressive, passive-aggressive, and assertive. The odds are likely that you will
have different communication styles, so when there is a conflict you need to
make sure you each validate the other person’s feelings.
● What are your pet peeves? Discussing things that bother you will prevent future
arguments. Examples of different pet peeves are being late, being interrupted
while speaking, an invasion of privacy, or not having your own space and alone
time. Understanding and communicating about each other’s pet peeves will
strengthen your relationship in the future.
Once you have a better understanding of the important discussions you should have
with your significant other such as finances, living preferences, family planning, the past, and
communicating effectively, you are ready to take your relationship to the next level. If you love
your significant other and want to have a future together, you will need to put in the hard work
and be patient with one another. Break out the wine and dive into the hard discussions because
it will help validate each other’s relationship goals and values for the future.