How to Throw a Money Party with a Partner or Friend
By: Frankie Calkins
Tags: Financial Planning, Personal Finance, Financial Freedom, Money Management, Financial Independence

Talking about money with someone else can be fun! That’s an oxymoron, right? It doesn’t have to be.

Our second money party!

Money is a taboo topic. Unfortunately, it’s even taboo to discuss for many couples. In fact, depending on what study you read, money is typically cited as the #1 or #2 leading cause of divorce in the U.S.

Even if it’s not taboo in your household, talking about money can be VERY stressful and often leads to fighting. It’s rarely productive.

However, recently I created a fun solution for that. It’s something my girlfriend and I have been doing. I’ll walk you through it and provide tips from experience so you can do it even better! Funner, if you will. (Bonus tip: You can do all of this with a friend too!)

I call it throwing a “Money Party”.

Here’s how it works:

Step #1: Schedule your party.

It might already sound like a boring money meeting check-in where you balance a checkbook together (whatever that means). It’s not. It’s much more fun than that because it’s a party! This mindset changes everything.

Making it a party makes money something you’re both excited to sit down and talk about.

Although I don’t support splurging on most purchases, when planning your party (especially your first one) it’s okay to splurge a little to make it fun and get your partner or friend on board. Parties need supplies after all! Decorate if you want! Have fun hats? Bring them! This brings us to…

Step #2: Bring delicious food and/or fun drinks.

We viewed our first party as a happy hour at home. You could leave the house but it’s not necessary. I actually suggest you stay home so you have access to your computer if you need it.

For us, we planned fun cocktails for our first party. We almost never buy liquor or make cocktails so this was a special treat! We also ordered take and bake pizza so we didn’t have massive kitchen clean-up, for once.

I snagged all the supplies we needed and she played mixologist. Divide and conquer when it comes to planning.

Step #3: Commit to talking about finances for at least an hour and stay on topic.

I recommend you actually set aside an hour and a half. We did this and chatted for almost 2 hours. Anytime the conversation veered off into standard life things, one of us was good about pulling it back to the focus: our money.

Anytime it veered into feeling stressful or frustrating, we took a beat, said cheers, had a sip of our cocktail, or took a bite of pizza, and regrouped.

It’s critical that you’re honest, positive, and stay on topic.

Bonus Step: Plan to do something you both enjoy after.

We played Overcooked and rented a new movie release, which we don’t normally splurge on. Popcorn? You bet! Extra melted butter? 100% extra.

This step is optional but recommended because who doesn’t love a good after-party? But don’t go crazy. Play a board game. Take the dog to the park. Watch a trashy comedy. Dance like robots and sprinklers. You do you.

Admittedly, we reflected on our first money party and realized a few things we wanted to do differently.

Here are a few tips and ideas to make your first money party even more successful than ours:

Tip #1: Set a reasonable budget going into it and don’t go over it.

We both agreed we spent a little too much on food and drinks. We bought 5 ingredients for those cocktails and the liquor tax in the state of WA is brutal. Plus, we didn’t have a coupon for the pizza. What were we thinking?! All told, we spent around $65 in total.

In preparation for our second party, we still did drinks but kept it simple. I filled up a small growler at a brewery nearby. She baked cookies with things we had in the cupboard. $8 and done.

Tip #2: Think bigger picture.

During our first party, we focused a little too much on the short-term. That’s totally okay, but it felt like we fell into comfortable conversations we typically have anyway:

What do you want to do for a Christmas present budget for one another? How should we celebrate our anniversary without going overboard? How can we cut back on our grocery bill?

And so on.

After, we agreed to think bigger picture, as in all of 2021 bigger. We also agreed to take some time to write down a few thoughts beforehand. She did it with pen and paper. I did it digitally in my notes app. If you want to fill out a digital PDF, I made one for you here.

Tip #3: Come up with a conversation theme or themes.

I suggest you come to the conversation (see also: “party”) with your own topics to discuss or theme it around one topic if you’d prefer. Themes could be about: making money, saving more money, getting out of debt, investing towards retirement, or even goal-setting.

We spent the first hour discussing my partner’s savings and investing goals for 2021. Plus, she recently received a raise and holiday bonus so we talked about the best use of that financial windfall (hint: it’s not more holiday presents!)

We spent the second hour talking about the side business I’ve been working on for the last 2 years. I’ve written 2 books, I have a YouTube channel, and I recently created my first finance course. I wanted to share results and talk about how to scale it all in 2021.

Doubling down on a side hustle or business requires more time. More time on my own projects means less time together. If you’re in a similar situation, this requires a conversation!

Tip #4: Schedule your party on a Friday or Saturday night (like real parties!)

We scheduled our first party for a Saturday night. We scheduled our second party on a Friday night. Why?

It’s because spending a little on supplies to make it a party didn’t make us feel guilty since it’s the weekend.

If you live in a big city with lots of fun happening around you like us, staying in is one way to avoid going out and spending even more.

Results: It was fun, productive, stress-free, and kept us excited to keep talking after.

We’ve had 2 parties in the last month and a half. It was a random idea that came to me and, to my surprise, our first one went well enough that just days after we both started nudging each other to have another party soon.

Our second party was particularly successful. So much so that we’re considering having money parties bi-weekly.

Because of that, I made us a super simple (but very useful) interactive one-sheet PDF to help us create our topics and jot down a few notes for next time. This will also help digitally document parties and conversations.

You can download my one page interactive PDF guide for free here. Grab your guide and get to party planning!

I hope this idea resonates with you and that my one page PDF is useful. It’s an excellent way to get your partner or friend on board with a legitimately fun way to talk openly about money.

Final tip: Listen well, don’t be judgemental, and be supportive — the golden rule of money talk.

What do you think of this idea? Is it something you’d try? Do you have any tips to make our next money party even more successful? Please share.

And share this article with a friend or your partner to introduce the idea. You can also watch the video version on YouTube. Cheers!