love & romance  
What makes someone financially un-date-able?
by Nina Koske | 4.9.10 | 5 Comments
What if Jack hadn't drowned? Could he have held a job?

What if Jack hadn't drowned? Could he have held a job?

Should you date the spendthrift? How about the eternal mooch—you know, the guy who uses deli napkins as toilet paper until his roommate breaks down and buys the real thing? We’re all for penny-pinching, but too much of it can doom your relationship. That’s what the excellent personal-finance site LearnVest says, anyway, in a post this week on the dangerous spending habits (or lack thereof) that should make you want to put your sweetie-pie, honey-bunch back on the shelf.

While… divergent financial tendencies, let’s call them, might not seem like reason enough to call it quits, LearnVest gives a few warning signs they say spell financially un-date-able in bold. Picking up every penny, anytime, anyplace? No problem. But that toilet-paper game of chicken with the roommates? Could mean a lifetime of mooching ahead. Then there’s the “the not-just-by-omission liar” who’s worked hard to hide that $80K in student debt. Keep them away from your credit and heart.

Read the entire story here on what to watch out for. And we want to know: What are your warning signs of the financially un-date-able?

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  • Tim Donnelly

    SPOILER ALERT in the cutline of that foto. Thanks Brokelyn.

  • Liz

    I agree with everything written in that article, especially the “Spendthrift” one — it drives me completely insane with friends when they complain about having no money to buy groceries or pay bills but can go out drinking every night and buy new clothes, etc..

    I think the one thing I couldn’t do is date someone who
    A) Complained constantly about finances and then wouldn’t do anything. Fine, you can’t afford tickets to see Lady GaGa, but you CAN afford the free summer Jelly concerts. Don’t sit around moping about being broke, just do something on the cheap.
    and/or B) Didn’t care about racking up debt. Student loans? That’s fine. But be concerned about paying them off. Don’t just keep adding more debt because “you can”. Again, it seems really common in my circle of friends to add credit-card debt to the pile or borrow lots of money from family members that they will “totally pay back” since they’re “already in debt anyway, so what’s the harm?”.

  • Belljg

    Just a note – most men would never, ever approach a relationship from a cold, money-based approach like this. Thanks to increasing equity in wages, we’re no longer expected to pay every bill – an important change. But we are expected to be flexible and inviting when it comes to our partner’s finances. As a woman, imagine a man dumping you because you didn’t earn enough – you’d want to kill him. Of course, you only have to imagine it, because it will never, ever happen to you. I love and respect women, but the fact that this kind of cold calculation continues to appear in women’s magazines and websites only serves to reinforce and perpetuate the worst stereotypes men hold about women (that they’re gold diggers, that every man is judged by the size of his wallet). If you want parity, if you want equality and respect, judge your partner by their morals, ethics, and character – if they take your money, that is a failure in character, not in finances. Some of the most caring and ethical men I know are also some of the poorest – they deserve the same respect as anyone else.

  • Nina

    Um Hi, did you even read this post? Or the actual article? Because not one reason Learnvest listed that makes someONE un-dateable was lack of money. None of the reasons even came close to saying that. Yes, how a person handles their finances reflects on their character, like the person who lies about their huge student-loan debt. Learnvest’s article did nothing to perpetuate the “gold digger” stereotype, nothing in that article even hinted at dating someone who makes more than you.

  • Tim Donnelly

    ooo, so THIS is why I haven’t had a date in months….