I feel that I shouldn't contribute to stepdaughters university fees (£13k)

[Mummy1106]

Husband and I have been married for 8 years. We have one daughter (7years old) and 3 children from his previous marriage. Only our daughter lives with us whilst youngest of his children (18years) stays with us now & then).
6 years ago my husband encouraged me to leave the company where I worked and start a company of my own.
In the beginning things were going slow and I was working on building my business.
He was made redundant and joined my company. We took it from sole trader to limited. As he works in the bank project management his contributions to the overall business income were 4 times more than mine.
We pay each other small salary and take the rest out in dividends.

We are both savers by nature and over time I built decent amount which I am planning to set against the mortgage (once the interest rates start rising).

My husband asked me to contribute towards his daughters university fees. (She hasn't been offered place)
He feels that the money we drew out of the company is proportionally his and that he is entitled to it. I feel that the money I saved is mine and I should spent it whichever way I feel.
I can not help but feel that I am being used as a tax break. He is laying on the guilt and saying that he encouraged me to leave the company and start the new one. He helped me get to where I am, without him and his financial backing I wouldn't be where I am now.

We have had a massive argument over it and now he wants to liquidate the company.
May I also add that step daughter has a mum which is poor as a church mouse (she spends more than she earns).
Our daughter is in the private school and I don't have any pension.
Am I being unreasonable for refusing to contribute towards his daughters fees?
We both feel disappointed and I love him but my priorities are with our daughter not my stepchildren.

Am I being unreasonable?

Is he thinking along the lines that he has put 4 times as much into the company as you, and so if he became a sole trader, her could take 4 times as much out and fund his own daughter as he wants?

From his daughters point of view, she sees your child getting the very expensive education but she'll be treated differently. Of course he wants to help her and why wouldn't you with education if able?

A man would be told to share every bit of income and that he knew there were children involved when he started the relationship yet knowing MN the advice to a women will be totally different.

As others have said, it makes financial sense to take out a loan.

BUT your attitude to your DSD stinks.

You are clearly treating her as a second class child. If you didn't fancy bringing up someone else's children, you shouldn't have married a man with children.

but he feels that paying for the fees is the only reasonable option
Well then he can find the bloomin' money and pay them.
He HAS to do some research.
It's obvious from this thread that many people are more clued up on this than he his.
If everyone is saying paying up front is daft and giving damn good reasons why, then why wouldn't he listen?
Is he ALWAYS right about EVERYTHING!? Yawn!!???

By the time my DD is Uni age I will have been with my OH for 5 years.
I cannot even begin to imagine asking him for his savings to pay for it.
It's just madness.

We did the same for all 5 dc there were 2 of mine and 3 of his. We treated all equally because when we married we became a family. I think you most certainly should contribute, not to her fees, but toher living expenses. Your dh's responsibility is to all his children and YABU not to see that your dd's private school should be offset by a contribtion to his dd's costs. I don't understand why you can't see that. I son't get all this mine and his stuff in a marriage. There should only be ours- our money, our children, our home.

We both take the same salary and the same amount in dividends.
He pays for all the house stuff: interest only mortgage fees, insurances, bills, council tax etc

I pay for everything to do with daughter: school fees (9k), school uniforms (very pricy), all her clothes, shoes, cleaner, gardener and after school care (when I need to work late)

He thinks that he is spending more per year than me but the reality is different. + he never contributed into any of her child trust fund. His argument is that he never did with any of his children.

I feel that stepdaughter hasn't got the grip on finances and spends more than she has (like her mum). Leaving university with debt will be a wake up call.
I was paying back my student loan until my 35th birthday it didn't harm me.

I feel like crying all the time over this.

Financial Reponsibility Matrix

DH-OP----xW
DD7----DD7
DD18-----DD18

We have joint income, and I do the finances. DH has not even thought about supporting his DD for university. I have however started putting away a monthly sum to assist with living costs/whatever at Uni. Technically it's both of our money, so we are both contributing, however, if I had my own separate savings, no way would I be contributing anything towards his DD. She has a mother and father for that.

dietcokefan - technically yes, but if you are not paying back then the amount sat 'waiting' is not factored into anything. It does not become a 'live loan' until you are earning x amount.

Oh, here, the man cover that as well
blog.moneysavingexpert.com/2010/12/17/will-new-student-loans-stop-you-getting-a-mortgage/

Have you read nomomas post ?

Issue sorted

I am the oldest of my fathers 5 children. I received no financial support from him at all - nothing for uni etc. He paid the minimum he had to to my Mum.

My younger 2 (half) siblings got the works - expensive hobbies, ponies, endless music lessons, overseas holidays, cars etc. And he could afford them in part because we got nothing.

If I am totally honest, yes it has affected my relationship with my family. As hard as that is to say it is true.

His daughter went to private school as well.
He has savings and he wants us to repay her fees, which will be 27k once she comes out in 3 years time.

So he pays for everything whilst your wage is pretty much just spent on your on child and a cleaner? And this is a partnership?

I hope for his children's sake, this makes him wise up. There is nothing worse than being treated as a second class citizen within a blended family.

He is quite right not to want a trust fund for one of his children only, who on earth does that?

I agree that she should take student loans but he feels that paying for the fees is the only reasonable option.

Have you asked him why he thinks it's the only reasonable option as, it's not the only option and it's far far from reasonable- it's financial madness.

It actually is lunacy. But, as I said upthread, some people will never believe the truth.

Its a stupid option - very simply - get your account to explain it to him in very simple terms

He sounds like an arse!

What would you expect for your dd? If you would want to pay the fees off for her, then it is reasonable to expect him to want to for his dd. Is there any compromise here? Could you jointly agree a set amount to be used equally for both girls - this money can then be used to pay off some of sd debts after uni and the same amount for your dd. If helping his dd was going to cause financial hardship it would be different I think.

you didn't take parental responsibility because you weren't allowed to berate her for messiness?
Wow.
Poor girl.

Interesting on the univ fees there. I didn't think of it this way and thought we'd contribute towards fees. It must suck to have that hanging over you though when you do earn the threshold and take years to pay it back.

I guess instead she can use the uni savings towards living costs. Beer money or whatever. At least it's something.

You can't always treat children the same, there is a big age gap between them, OP and DH could be worse off by the time their DD goes to Uni. If they have difference of opinion re the child trust fund, seems fair the OP is paying out for this from her salary. They obviously keep things separately.

Our oldest has a trust fund thing, but they were scrapped by the time DS2 came along. I make sure I put extra in his savings to account for it. His DD was born before the CTF came in, no idea if her mother saves for her, not my business. As it happens we have a reasonable amount for her saved monthly, but not the same as what I save for our DC.

You have to work out what is best for your family and what you agree on within it. Everyone has different ideas about how to do things, and it's NOT wrong, it's just different. The main thing is to be in agreement with your OH.

I also think that your money only going towards your own dd is slightly odd and may well be causing some of the friction. It would seem that your salary is mainly paying for all the luxuries which is a bit weird. Perhaps you need to have a conversation about what the expenses of paying for all the children's education will be and then working out what you can and can't afford to be fair to all of them.

OP – I think you have nil interest in any view that differs from your own I also think your attitude to your DSD is dreadful.

OP - I don't think you posted because you wanted to hear all sides of the debate. What you wanted was people to agree with your unfairness and unreasonableness.