Search icon

Life

17th Jul 2017

Study reveals the average time it takes couples to reach major milestones

How fast can things move?

JOE

The ultimate relationship timeline.

If you’re a couple and you have other couple friends, unbeknownst to yourself, you will start comparing your relationship to theirs.

If you haven’t bought herself flowers in three months but JOE buys them on a weekly basis for his missus, you could be in bother.

Sometimes it’s good to have other couples to base your relationship off, especially when it comes to meeting the parents or being able to know when it is the right time to consider moving in together.

Provident Personal Credit has pinpointed when, on average, major milestones happen in a relationship.

From meeting their friends to meeting their parents and from sharing a bank account together to sharing a life together, they have covered every possible milestone you could think of.

Milestone in the relationship

Time when it happened after the first date (in months)

Meeting the friends

2.5

Not wearing makeup

2.9

Quit the gym

3.2

Meeting the parents

3.6

Ditched the diet

3.6

Stopped shaving (men/women)

4.5

Break wind in front of each other

5

Netflix password

6.2

Phone password

7.2

Laptop password

7.4

Social media access

7.7

Email password

8.6

Online bank details

9

Moved in together

18.4

Opened a joint account

22.7

Got a pet

23.4

Bought a house

27.5

Had a baby

30

You will meet their parents and their friends within the first four months of being together and after almost half a year together, you will feel comfortable enough with that person to the point where you can fart around them without a care in the world.

After spending a year together, you will know every password belonging to your significant other and that’s when it gets into the serious side of things.

A year and a half is the average time it takes for couples to move in together and they will open a joint bank account before they even consider buying their first pet.

The average timeline for buying a house among couples was nearly 28 months, just two months shy of having their first baby together.

LISTEN: You Must Be Jokin’ with Aideen McQueen – Faith healers, Coolock craic and Gigging as Gaeilge