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?

So he doesn't want to pay for things jointly.
He didn't even make his DD live by the same rules in your house.
He decided that your DD goes to private school.
He decided to take the job where he gets to travel first class and live basically the single life.
And he wants YOU to pay for HIS grown up daughters uni fees when really it doesn't even make financial sense?!

Well he was the one who promised this money and he can pull it out of his arse if he wants.

I almost think he is financially abusing you tbh.
Foul you buy him out of the company?

As people have said, don't pay the fee's (that's not how the system should work), instead he can give her some money for rent/food/books etc.. NOT as much as the fee's would be though!

Unfortunately my husband already promised that he will contribute towards her uni fees

Yes, your husband, it's at his cost, not yours!!

For the record the maintenance part of the loan is means tested , unless she gets the maximum it has to be subsidised because in many cases the loan isn't enough to cover hall fees let alone living costs.

This is not really about whether paying university fees or not, it is about whether you feel you have any financial responsibilities for your step children or not. Going on about the intricacies of uni fees just clouds the matter.

The question is what would you do and expect your husband to do for your daughter? Would you begrudge him doing the same for his other children? Is he able to things for his children if you take out the same amount of money from the business but he has to use his his for all the family while yours is only for your daughter?

Do you think this is fair in the circumstances? I know I would have issues with spending my money beyond my own kids or depriving them to make things fair. Since I know this is my weakness I do not go for blending families. If you take this on I believe you have to be fair to all children involved.

" basically I'm more or less a single mum"

What a load of rubbish. You have a husband! So he's away working on your joint business away from his children and you are getting the raw deal as you have to cook! Words fail me. You have a gardener and a cleaner, it's not really that big a deal that all you have to do is cook and presumably you eat too not just the children. Swop then, you go away and let him have time with his children.

It has nothing to do with step parenting, it's about treating the children equally. Am pretty sure the OP will be helping her daughter come uni time but it's not good enough for her half sisters.

Some don't like student loans. They can encourage people to stay under the threshold or not even pay them back at all. I'd not be comfortable taking out a loan I may never pay back or seeing DS start his adult life in so much debt if I could help.

the DSD has TWO parents to help her, just as the OPs DD has TWO parents to help. Whether or not the DSD mother can help is neither here nor there. OP should not be expected to contribute also, DSD would have THREE "parents" helping her at that point.

Thank you for the uni fee advice. I will research this and present him with it. No doubt it will spark up another argument.
I am grateful that he brings in this much money, sometimes flying first is cheaper than the business.
I love our family and I don't want to upset anyone however if I say yes to the fees, I'll be upsetting myself.
Will We be able to give the same to our daughter? I doubt it. I don't think We can go at this pace for another 14 years. It will kill us. I did mention this in our discussion, and his response is: we'll cross this bridge when we come to it.
We are both very selfless but I can not feel that this is unfair.
My resentment is not with my stepdaughter. She never asked for her fees to be paid.
All the opinions are very powerful, wow

OP, YANBU. Not even a little bit. Your DSD is her parents' responsibility. Your DH should treat all of his DCs equally. He is being extremely unreasonable to threaten the business because you will not let him dictate what you do with your money.

I think you have 3 years to save this money at least, nobody's savings need to be used. Make cutbacks or expand the business or pay as you go. If you think dsd is financially irresponsible, get dh to sit her down and make it clear this is the last help she gets and then she's on her own so to make the degree pay with a good job at the end. Is there a middle ground where you can give her some help paying as you go but not the full amount?

I thought the student loans were for this so can't see why the fees should be paid for her. And if her mother is as poor as a church mouse won't she get some sort of help with fees or extra money. I don't think you should feel obliged to pay unless you want to contribute.

Martin Lewis, in the articles linked to in a previous post makes the point that if you pay for fees upfront, you are potentially going to waste 10's of thousands of pounds.

I don't know if anyone has mentioned it but what is to stop her taking the loan anyway? I don't know anyone whose parents paid their tuition fees who didn't take the loan anyway and blow it all on having fun. Could be a little irritating if that happens op!

Personally would suggest she takes the loan for her fees and you give her some money each month, that way you wont feel like it is your savings that is taking the hit but instead it can come out of family finances over the time she is in uni.

Dubious. I reckon he wants the money for something else.

DD hasn't got a Uni place. In fact I can't even tell from the post, whether she's even applied. Wonder why he asked for that particular amount? & he's threatening to liquidate the company if you don't play ball. I think Id let him do that.

She's not part of your household she lives with her mum. Student finance will take into account that her mum's not working. & unless DD earns £25k+ at this moment in time, then she's not going to have to contribute either.

Ive 1 DD already at Uni, the other due to start this year. I divorced their dad donkey's years ago...there aren't any questions about him on the form; why would there be?! Student Finance ask about your household income, and thats all.

I just think this is dodgy and I don't believe the money he's seeking is for his DDs education at all. Sorry.

'Im like a single mum' yet you have a husband AND a cleaner and a gardener, have I read that right?

TBH this isn't about the fees - this is about the situation within your business and how you see each other, and that age old chestnut of what happens when money is kept separate within a committed and (presumably) loving relationship.

If he's contributing 4 x more to the business than you and you're both drawing the same salary and dividend then I can see why he feels 'your' money is partly 'his' - he does see you as a tax break imo. And to be fair, he may not be wrong - if you both worked for someone else, you both wouldn't earn the same amount of money in this situation.

Equally the work you do at home with your DD (and DSD) enables him to go out and earn this, and can't be discounted from the equation either.

It's all a bit of a mess, isn't it? You need to really, really talk through your finances, maybe with the help of a third party. (If I had a bent for counselling, which I do not, I would set up as a financial counsellor given the amount of stories like this on MN).

You sound massively discontented with your lot. So it seems that this goes a lot deeper than just about your DSD's student loan. Money does cause rows even when people have more than most.

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

Because the labour government made me take one for ds. I had already opened a bank account etc when he was born exactly like his sister.

I see it differently, Queen. If you take away that this is about university fees and apply it to anything, it's really clear.

OP and her husband have one child, husband and ex have three children. OP's concern is therefore for one child, husband's concern is for four. That is going to hit the family budget somewhere, isn't it?

If somebody doesn't like that premise then they shouldn't have a child with somebody for whom that applies. That really isn't bullying either.

It drives me mad when posters keep crying, 'bully' everywhere. Stop it because it's making a mockery of the bullying that really goes on elsewhere. If you really think posters are bullying then report them.

I fear that she will take the loan, blew it and drop out. She has an amazing drive but no money spence. I can not teach her to save and be frugal. I tried. She goes regularly to hairdresser and spends (£30) while we've been telling her to go to our hairdresser and pay £20. I know it's a small saving but it soon builds up.
What she spends her money on is her decision and what I spend my money on is my decision.
I think the root of the problem is not her or uni. This post has made me see things clearly.
The root of the problem is that he feels my money is ours.
I told him that he should take more money out of the company, pay himself bigger salary but he doesn't want that as it has massive tax implications. Like I said: he sees me as a tax break. It feels horrid.
If I take all of it and pay some of our mortgage, then there won't be any mooney to argue about

He feels financially abused and so do I. He tells me that I am unreasonable and that my attitude is f..... You, it's my money and you are not having it. I told him I want to spend it on mortgage repayment but he feels that's stupid as interest rates are so low.
When I said that his ex and he should pay for her fees, he tells me not to be stupid, his ex doesn't have any money.

My whole being is against repaying her loans in 3 years time. If I win on lottery, than that's ok.

YANBU