I don't want to drip feed so here are the facts (relevant or not)
- We have been together for 3 years
- We both had been married before
- We both have children from previous marriages, his is an adult but still financially dependant, mine has become a teen pretty recently so still dependant as well.
- I am 46, he is 58
- I am an administrator, he has a senior managing position
- I earn 16k a year, he earns nearly 60k
- I drive a 12 year old £400k car which is falling to pieces, he changes car pretty much every 12-18 months and never spends less than £20k on each of them.
- I own a beautiful 3 bedroom period terrace house (medium courtyard, no garage) in a relatively expensive touristic area (Still mortgaged) and have about £6k in savings. He owns two houses (no mortgage), has a substantial retirement fund and in addition, about £300k in savings.
- we have always gone mostly Dutch on expenses, if we are out to a expensive place, he pays (I pay the babysitter). If we are eating in a cheap place I pay.
- if we go on holidays we go halves.
We have started thinking of moving together and he has come with the idea that I should sell my house and put the profits towards our "together" house. He will match the amount I pay towards it.
For him, that amount would be a small part of his assets, while I would be putting EVERYTHING I have. Which puts me in a rather dangerous financial position especially when it comes to pay for future expenses of DS.
He also expects that we should share the new house improvement expenses 50-50. All the houses he has suggested are slightly more expensive than mine, but they are either miles away in small villages, in need of extensive refurbishment or/and smaller than mine. He thinks that doing them up will cost a couple of thousands, I know (after doing up 3 houses) that we are looking at a possible bill of several £10,000s.
The additional problem is that he wants a detached house in the countryside, with a big garden and a place to keep his car safe. The problem is, I have lived in the countryside and I found the experience extremely lonely, most of my friends do not drive, I had to put up with a rather big share of racism, I hated having to spend so much time/money preventing the garden from becoming a jungle, and in general I was extremely unhappy. I love being surrounded by people and close to where things happen. He wants peace and quiet and hates the idea of city living.
I tried to explain yesterday that it isn't fair from him to expect me to put everything I have into a house that would eat all my assets, most of my income and where DS and I would feel isolated. I also mentioned that considering he earns far more than I, that the 50/50 divide would not be fair.
He looked at me with an incredulous face, and said no. He told me I was acting as if I was with him for his money!
Apparently, my request makes me look like a gold digger.
I ended up telling him that if it was money what I was interested in, I would be still enjoying the high life with my exhusband.
Am I being unreasonable or is he?
I think he is going to expect and demand all the power and control because he has more money.
not