These guidelines are compiled from the successfully married and from experts on psychology, divorce and finance:

TALK AND SHARE GOALS Before walking down the aisle, couples should have a talk about their financial health and goals. They should ask each other tough questions: Do we want children? When? Who will care for them? Will they go to public or private school? What kind of life do we want? When will we retire?

“In my ideal plan for couples, they would have a meeting every week on their finances,” said Karen Altfest, a financial planner who runs the New York firm L. J. Altfest & Company, with her husband, Lewis. “That way, they are in sync with each other’s goals.”

Set those goals together. Jerry Ballard, 58, a former insurance executive in Houston, said that he and his wife of 36 years, Susan, also 58, managed to avoid money clashes because they share a savings philosophy. “The cardinal rule was that we don’t interrupt our savings,” he said, adding that they saved between 10 and 20 percent of their salaries each year. As long as they did that, they were less likely to disagree about spending.

Image Credit... Robert Stolarik for The New York Times

Eric Gundlach, 53, of Owings Mills, Md., who has been married for 29 years, said he and his wife, Ann-Michele, “made our expectations explicit.” These included sending their son to private school and having big experiences, like traveling, in lieu of purchasing things.

RUN A HOME LIKE A BUSINESS Make a budget and keep track of earnings, expenses and debts. And structure your business as a partnership; when it comes to making big financial decisions and setting goals, do it together. “When they are making the decisions together, they really have ownership of those decisions and any results of those decisions,” said Mary Ann Sisco, national wealth adviser at JPMorgan’s private wealth management division. “Even if you have negative results, you tend to weather the storm better.”

Share responsibilities, too. Though one partner tends to control the finances, advisers recommend rotating tasks. One person should handle investments for a certain period, while the other pays the bills; rotate and repeat.