AIBU to say it's difficult to know how to sort finances fairly in my marriage?

DH was earning more than me and still does, but less regular income. We have always had a bills account we pay into about equally these days. I couldn't have joint up finances completely because otherwise I know I'd have just felt guilty about spending 'his' money and never spent anything on myself

Yeah, I kind of think this is the answer.

It's harder at the beginning, feels more unnatural. But it's what a marriage is. What if one of you became ill or your child needed full time care - the other would then be the sole earner. Is the other spouse then supposed to just live on nothing?

The big complication here as I see it are the older children, and that could take some talking through and maybe even seeing a lawyer to make sure things are fair to them, especially with inhheritance.

But however you manage the logistics of bank accounts and such, you need to stop thinking of your incomes as "mine" and "his", because it's "ours".

But do you have kids and did you take mat leave?

The fact your name is not on the deeds is a red herring for divirce. It’s now a marital
assets ( on the basis you’re in England /wales). It doesn’t matter if your name is on it or not, that dies t mean you’d automatically get half it means it would be in the pot for division and you’d each get a share according to needs and other assets

he needs a will

if I was his adult children if not me happy that his assets go to you / he should imo make specific provision for them in his will.

What happened to the savings you had built up to buy a house pre child ?

OP isnt happy though. Thats why she started this thread.

You need to stop being so independent and thinking of yourself as "money grabbing". This doesnt work for you. Things like contributing half of the spend for luxuries/expensive food that you dont want is unfair and putting you under pressure. You have also given up the security of homeownership for yourself.

You are a married couple and you have a lifetime together...you need to both see that in this season, he is the higher earner with more assets and your access to that feels unfair. In the future, he will be retired and you will still earn, the 'imbalance' will be addressed then so you do not need to overcontribute now. You will likely as you said also provide care for him; this support would likely cost thousands if he were living alone.

In this set up you cannot make decisions together - for example it might be nice for you to retire early to enjoy time retired together before he is very eldery but at the moment you will have to keep working for financial reasons because he does not share.

You should be on the deeds to the house, you should get his pension if he passes away first. And day to day you need to find a fairer way to split costs. Many couples do it as a percentage of earnings - so say you both contribute 50% to joint account for monthly living, 20% to savings for house renovations, 10% to savings for a rainy day/holidays etc and keep the remaining 20% for personal spends (he could gift to his adult kids from this so this is not visible to you/he wont feel restricted). This gives you less for personal spends than him so an alternative is that you agree a sum for personal spends each month - just for example you both keep £400 and whatever the remaining income is goes into the joint stuff.

The point is that a marriage is a team not a you/me and you have entered into a committed life bound together, not individuals alongside each other as you are now.

Added to say, OP, your situation is much more complicated than ours, due to the age difference, kids etc. I think you need proper legal and financial advice re property, pensions and inheritance - it's not just about who pays for the supermarket shop.

I see joint account as for marriages that are on a firm footing. Your sounds precarious. He is happy for you to run down your savings on MT and expensive holidays, and worry about money day to day. I’d skip the holidays and build my savings back up. You might need them. What’s the set up with the house if he dies?

It doesn't matter what you do, OP, as long as you are both happy. I have been married for well over 30 years, and we have never had a joint account or "combined finances" (excepting a joint mortgage, when we still had one).
After the first few years, my husband earned a lot more than me, but we never bothered to work out who owed what. Loosely, I have always covered "the boring stuff" (mortgage, food, bills) and he does "the good stuff" (investments, holidays, cars, capital items).
So, yes, because of his much larger salary (now pension) he will have contributed more, but I feel that I have always paid my way. Crucially, separate accounts mean that we barely need to discuss money, and have never fallen out about it - it works for us.

Although it's still a fairly short marriage in the event of a divorce the aim would be to prioritise the needs of you child and then to ensure that as a far as possible both your housing needs were met. So I'm afraid he's already unlikely to be able to hold on to the house in any divorce unless he has sufficient assets to ensure you also have a roof over your head. For that reason I wouldnt personally fuss over investing in improvements, although I would keep a record.

Still if you wanted you could make him a loan, with interest, on the cost of the improvements, having the paperwork drawn up by a solicitor. This might satisfy both your insecurities.

@ViciousCurrentBun Why does it matter that you invest separately unless you are either planning the divorce, want to leave your assets to someone other than your partner or one is a spendthift?

If you jointly instructed a solicitor and asked them to put the infant and its welfare to the head of the queue, what plan do you think might be suggested?

There's your answer.

It doesn’t have to be complicated. Both put 50% of your income into the shared pot and both of you keep the other 50% to save or do what you want.

Your circumstances with a big retirement age difference, stepchildren that are adults plus him owning a house outright make it complicated.

We have never shared finances and it’s worked perfectly for almost 30 years but for complete transparency the amounts post bills that we had were quite substantial. Plus only a 2 year age gap means same stage of life, It did mean a lot of money movement over the years but it’s been to our advantage. DH covered maternity leave but I did have a very good maternity package from work.

@anyolddinosaur not insecure but we both invest and while risky especially in the past they were our decisions to make and as our money no consultation needed. We did this before we met.

I can see how you have got into this position. If you want to continue to contribute 50/50 then please say no to things you cannot afford (including being able to continue saving) and then he can choose to pay more, not do it or do it alone if he wants something expensive. You should expect however in this case that this 50/50 continues into his retirement and make that clear.
I would refuse to contribute to home investments if I am not in the deeds. If he can afford it himself why is he so keen on your contribution given he needs it to be ‘his’? I get his fear of losing his home in a divorce so I would continue to save and invest in a rental property instead so you also have housing security in case of a separation.
Just because he says he will leave you his home, he will almost certainly die first and could leave it to his children in a will and you wouldn’t know until too late. Your will should leave everything to your child only otherwise if the worst happens to you your assets inherited by your DH would likely end up eventually being split four ways. Protect yourself and your baby.

Op is your deposit now gone on the house you were saving towards buying yourself?

I'd honestly work on building that back up and keep that for yourself in case you need to bail out and end up with nothing and have to start over - at least you'd have your deposit then to find a place to live

NO WAY would i be paying a penny towards improvements on his house!

I earn about half what husband does too - i pay proportional for mortgage & Bills and i keep the rest of my money!

He pays for nursery & kids clothes & stuff and the car

I help pay for holidays

I think you are in a very vulnarable situation and something needs to change!

This is great - really positive! Just got to see it through now. Read @Wofflewaffle post above if you are wavering - YA definitely NBU.

I'm married to someone older, but we only have joint children. He is very on the ball with finances and wills. Unfortunately I'm not well enough to work, so there is only his income to deal with.
Your DH sounds a little naive about his approach to what happens when he dies. Without a will, everything will come to you as his wife (I believe!)
You both need to get some financial advice and possibly some counselling to work through this. It's not easy to talk about money but it will hopefully make things smoother for the future.
FWIW I don't think you should be paying 50% of costs when you are on a lower salary. Whilst he has paid off the house, effectively that just lowers the outgoings for both of you each month.

You are in a really vulnérable position, and only the fact that you are married gives you any protection.

Earnings and income : fair in a marriage is either all in the same pot / joint account and equal access to it, or proportional contributions relative to income. If that still leaves you with drastically different amounts of ‘fun’ money then I personally would push for all in / joint account. But that does depend on you having similar attitudes to spending, and a willingness to be generous to your partner.

Wills - your DH is being very selfish in not making a will. Dying intestate means a longer wait for the estate to be settled, and more legal costs. It’s a messy process to go through. Are his older children aware that he’s planning for everything to default to you ? Nothing for his children or grandchildren except what you choose to pass on? That’s asking for trouble.

Capital / property - you are barely married, have a young baby - and he’s already planning how he can screw you over in a divorce ? Charming. Either you are in this together, as equals who are equally important - or you are not. He needs to trust you, and he clearly doesn’t. I don’t understand why you are being so ‘understanding’ and accepting about this.

Marriage is always a leap of faith. We tie ourselves financially, legally and emotionally to another person and both commit to doing our absolute best to make it work out for both of us, and for any children. This requires trust, honesty, generosity and a genuine desire for the other person to be protected. Otherwise what’s the point ?

bring independent inside a marriage and with a child is different to being ‘independent’ as a single person. It means having a voice and a say in how your joint affairs are arranged, irrespective of who earns or owns what. It means standing up for yourself (and your child), making sure that you count just as much as the other person does. It means making sure that both of you have your needs met within the relationship. Compromise, kindness, generosity and respect. You seem to believe that because you earn less, you don’t deserve for your husband to share his wealth / assets / life with you ? Are you prepared to be the junior partner just because you are younger and earn less ?

Agreed! Plus he doesn’t want to put you on the deeds on a house worth £130k - I mean, that’s a very very inexpensive house given UK averages…..

Oh dear OP - no wonder it feels overwhelming as it is a complicated scenario.

I think the fact he has adult children that he likes to gift money too is probably what makes it harder, and then when he retires it will add another factor into the mix too.

The fact he plans to retire soon and has adult children whilst you have a newborn and still plan on working for another 30 years implies there is quite a large age gap so it’s likely you will end up as his career at some point too (which will no doubt save him and his sons a fair amount of money too).

Normally I would say everything should be in a joint pot but it’s not that simple here, but the current set up of 50/50 is certainly not fair.

I think you definitely need to talk to him about how he envisions the finances working when he retires. Do you know how much he’s going to get?

Also does he have life insurance that has you down as the beneficiary? I think this is very important considering what you’ve said about your concerns about inheritance/ people coming looking for assets and money after his death.

You have to protect yourself and your joint child.

As an aside, when I met my husband I moved into house (as opposed to getting somewhere together) and I STILL feel like it’s “his” house even though we’ve been together for 16 years! It’s definitely psychological 🤣

(You also need to consider who pays for care, if you want to keep working)

The work to the house should be paid for by him - presumably any equity in the house would be split between all kids with you having a life interest in the house until you die. If your DH pays for all the work, then any enhancement in value goes to all the kids who will inherit equally. If you pay, you are paying to his kids’ inheritance at the expense of your own. you need some financial advice that covers the basis - I’d go 50:50 if in the long term he will have less income to balance out the current and historic position.