How honest are you with your Thai partner about your finances?

My wife knows approximately what my monthly income is.
This of course fluctuates due to the exchange rate.
She is also aware of what to do in the event of my death.
In the safe at home there is an envelope that she can open.
This contains all instructions as well as pin codes, passwords, etc.
This is to access my Thai bank account.
My sister is authorized on my NL bank account. So contact her
to arrange that.
Also instructions on how to contact my pension fund that pays my benefit (UGM),
and later pay out my pension.
Further put on paper what else needs to be done.

I have to admit that I wasn't open about it the first few years and she had no idea whether or not
had not hooked a “rich farang”.
I made myself seem less wealthy and just said it was enough for a normal life.

I am 56 and have been living in Thailand since November 2023 (I emigrated in October 2024).
So we are legally married in both countries and live happily in Isaan.

A woman knows everything, if you ask questions about her then you better not get married...

Well, if you've been married to a Thai for 15 years, and she keeps the family out of your household,
(If she is not sensitive to, or pressured to have you support the family) then you can slowly introduce her to your financial status.
That has to happen sometime in case you die before your Thai wife, right?

If you just met each other, it is obviously not wise to tell everyone everything.
When my wife came to the Netherlands, I went to a notary to arrange a few things.
Everything from before our marriage in the Netherlands was mine and the land and small house in Thailand were hers.
After we got married we had 1 joint account.
We worked hard together and saved a lot to be able to go to Thailand.
Now I have been living with her in Thailand for 22 years.
And we still do everything from joint accounts in both the Netherlands and Thailand.

Dear Ronald, dear Thailand bloggers,
Since the first day we met, now about 6 months ago, we have shared our financial situation in all its glory. She has a reasonable pension, not like my Belgian pension. Her pension is 25% of mine but nevertheless I have accepted her not for the money but for her thoughts, her actions, our mutual love for each other, it has come to the point that we are going to get married in the coming months.
In our relationship money is not an issue, we put our pension together, together we have more than 130K per month, she has an apartment and I currently rent a condo with 3 bedrooms, her son regularly comes to sleep with us, she does our laundry as well as that of her son who I have completely taken into my heart, he was only a few months old when her husband passed away. (illness) So he never knew his father but she has always continued to raise her son herself, which is a credit to her. In the meantime he had a relationship but that man also passed away from a rare disease.
Our relationship really started out of nowhere, now it feels like we have known each other for years, we have told each other about our mutual financial situation, I was retired just like her, we can live richly but she, just like me, likes cooking. If we buy something it comes from our joint account, her pension and my pension together. I have accepted her as she is, she me as I am, sometimes we have words together only because of language misunderstandings never about the money. We can easily put 50% of our money in a joint savings bank account. In the autumn we will go to Belgium together, because of my morphology I am obliged to fly business, now that will be together.
She wants to sell her apartment, said that the sales sum was only for her, again the reply NO we live together so we will also put that in the joint savings account.
If you tell each other everything openly and honestly from the beginning, and there is mutual respect for each other, life can be so beautiful Dear Ronald.
Be honest and trust your partner, that you are poor or rich, is accepted by your partner. HONESTY lasts the longest, we hope to stay together for a long time and so in every relationship there are sometimes words, keep communicating and usually it is settled in the bedroom.
Many greetings Ronald,
Andre

My wife knows exactly what I have
The reason why my wife has more money than me and I also know all her finances
That's why I'm lucky that I don't have to sponsor her like 90% of the men here

With us it is largely the same as with RobF. We know from each other what comes in and goes out. She gets a monthly amount from me and also has her own income. She decides for herself whether and what should be sent to the family. She does discuss this with me.
The instructions and information on what to do will also be in the safe after my death.

With us, complete openness to each other. We know exactly what each other is getting. No jars or secrets. I have been married for 28 years now and in the beginning there were sometimes white lies, sometimes with her children. From the beginning I made it clear that I would not accept that from anyone and certainly not from my wife. Where else is the boundary of what you do and do not tell. In our previous relationships, we were both hurt by lies and eventually came to the wisdom that a relationship in which things are withheld or twisted is not a real relationship.

Ultimately, we share responsibility for our income. It is also up to my wife to stay within a budget, or to decide together to consciously not do this once.

We are therefore not averse to speaking to each other if something is not going well or if too much money is being used.

So it's not the case that it's the same everywhere, that all Thais are the same.