To tell DH he can't buy something?

[SassehMonsta]

We're expecting our first child in Dec. Been married for 2.5yrs and living together for much longer - Im 24, hes 22. I've always been in charge of finances as he is rubbish, and when we started out together he didnt have any money/income etc. Now hes the higher earner (I only work 2-3 days a week, hes got a full time contract) he has it in his head he can go out and jist blow all our money on gadgets. I didnt mind too much at first, he invested in a pc he'd been after for ages with his first pay check. But now he wants a wii U. Hes beem bugging me about it since last year and each time Ive said no, we have more importnant things to spend our money on - getting a deposit down on a place to live (renting), paying bills, household items like a fridge, dishwasher etc. Month before last he went out one.day after work and convinced me to buy a 3DS & a couple of games and a memory card etc. This month we've bought a dishwasher.
Today, after saying no to a wii U once again (we.have a wii that he never plays, nvm an xbox 360, xbox, ps2 etc) hes.said that maybe he will stop working becaise whats the point of working if you dont get to spend your own money.

I mean, its not like we have bills to pay, rent to pay, a dog who requires medication every day, and several other things we need to get (current list includes turf & a new.mattress)! No, apparently he.wants to spend all our money on a stupid games console, and when he doesn't get his own way he.has a childish strop.

I probaby wouldnt mind so much if we could afford it, but i've been off work with Hyperemesis and Im still trying to get back into the rhythm of things again, so my incomes down too. Aaaarrggghhhh

so tell me, AIBU?

Tell him to sell the old consoles and games and put that money towards a new system.

Many 22 year old men are still pretty immature. He still sounds like a child tbh. If he can't cope with not spending like he's young, free and single now how on earth will he cope with when the baby comes...? He should rein himself in now because he won't have a choice when the baby comes...babies NEED stuff...it's not optional to buy prams, nappies, food, cots, etc etc
I absolutely don't want to sound judgmental but 22 is very young to be married, especially when a man still wants to behave like a self-indulgent, stroppy teenager!

kate it did read like that at first, but then I got what she meant by "family present", at least I hope I did and she isnt getting her DD to pay for the family Xmas pressie!

I absolutely don't want to sound judgmental but 22 is very young to be married,

I agree. My dad was 22 when he and mum had me (2 years after their wedding) and he was no more use than ornament. Mum says often that she wishes she had waited until she was 30 ish before getting married and having children, not because she wasnt ready as she was, but because Dad wasnt. She was effectively a single parent for most of my childhood. But they married in 1970, living together was not an option. The swinging sixties might have happened in London and San Franscisco but they didnt happen in the East Midlands!

Rule number 1.

Don't have a baby with anyone who thinks playing computer games is an acceptable way for an adult human being to spend time.

I think me and DP have a strange money situation so I won't give advice on how to split money, btw we're both happy with the aarrangement. It's basically I pay my bills, he pays his. His wage is his and he can do as he pleases with it except for a certain amount that is sent to me for baby. I then pay my own bills and living costs. I am poorer than DP because of my divorce but ah well that's life, DP often buys luxuries but IMO he's worked bloody hard for them so deserves them.

I do think however in your situation, as you have basically agreed everything is shared, and he says no to your spending from the joint account that it is only fair you can say no to his spending. So Yanbu.

Yes and no, we live together when he is home on weekends, but he also has other accommodation linked to his work that he lives in on a weekly basis that he finances. He has no fixed abode shall we say, sometimes it's a tent in a field haha

My DH is very like this. He spends money for the sake of it sometimes. So what we do is agree an amount that we both take out the bank, in cash, and that's our spends for the month. The cards are used for fuel and grocery shopping and that's it- if we fancy anything over and above (like a takeaway, gadget, or day out) then we spend our cash on it.

Of course, DH being so crap with money spends all his the first week after pay day and has absolutely nothing to show for it. And I then have to put up with him looking longingly at the latest game, saying 'it looks great, but of course I have no money...' Or 'I fancy a takeaway tonight, but I'm skint'

But by spending carefully for 2 months I managed to buy some fabulous £80 boots, so it's not like the amount we have is that low!

Thanks for the advice all! We have joint account that he pays rent into (when.we earnt about the same we did 50/50 each) and then all bills are DirectDebited out of my account from when I had the only income. Food and petrol come out of his account, and then the rest is available for "us" to share. We live together in a 3bed house cheap because of the lovely area!

I think I shall draw up a.budget to show him, which we troed before but we wer e inthe process of moving and werent sure how much bills etc would realistically cost in the new place. Now we've been here a year we have a much better idea. He has.no savings, and my savings end up going on dog medicine every 3 months, as we always forget to budget that in. At the end of the month there isnt always much left over to share out, but we do what we can. The 3DS was a frivillous purchase but I have to say he has used it every day for 2 months so far and is great for long journeys, taking to work, waiting around for appointments etc.

Still putting my foot down over the wii u though, as he seems to think it will benefit us both, and I reckon he will want us both to contribute, when I know full well that I will play ot once or twice to test ot out and never touch it again.

He sounds really immature and it's not a good sign for when you have your baby. Are his priorities really going to change?

FWIW I was married at 21, and have always been sensible with money and prioritising the important purchases, so being young doesn't always mean being a twat about it :o conversely my parents are both completely useless with money. It's an attitude thing not an age thing IME.

DH and I have always shared all money (we've had him working FT and me SAHP, and the opposite, with various combinations in between) but the reason it works for us is because we are TOTALLY on the same page with financial priorities and attitude.

What works really well (I have posted this before) is having our own budget for stuff like DVDs, games, books etc. It's £20pcm each but obviously depends on income and outgoings - we could afford to increase ours a bit now and did discuss this recently, but decided we were happy with it as it is and putting any extra in our savings accounts is more important.

Anyway, the reason it works so well (been doing it 2 years now) is that it gives a bit of leeway for frivolity and we don't need to justify what we buy to each other (where our tastes differ eg movies) - but we know we can always afford it because it's already been accounted for.

I was desperate for an iPod touch for aaaaages. But did I rush out and buy one (or perhaps worse, get one on HP with huge interest etc)? No, I saved up my £20 for 10 months. DH did the same for 5 months when he decided he wanted a £100 android tablet. So we have our gadgets but we didn't suffer financially for it (and neither did our children) because we made sure we could afford it.

And FYI the Wii U is SHITE apparently. We love our Wii but if we get another console it will be a PS4 IF they do the PS1-3 game back catalogue online thingy (that's the technical term :o) - not decided yet. If so it will be a family Xmas present but including any Xmas/birthday money DH and I get (that's how we got our Wii - 7 years ago!)

Drawing up an excel spreadsheet was great for us, really made us see EVERYTHING that was going out and coming in each month.

You married a 19 year old and he doesn't sound like he's grown up much since then. I know you're young too but women tend to be socialised to be more responsible and less selfish than men IMO. Of course he should grow up and stop being such a whiny twat but I'm not sure whether that's something anything other than time and growing up will fix.

We allocate frivolous money from joint money that can be spent on anything. He could save this up for wii u.

A dishwasher is no more essential than a games console. You need to work on joint priorities.

Any reason you are only working 2 - 3 days a week? Not saying he's not been immature though.

Jay, a dishwasher is highly beneficial to a couple about to have a baby, in that it will save time and labour on household tasks. It's not essential but it's beneficial. A wii is entirely frivolous. There is no comparison here!

The 3DS was a frivillous purchase but I have to say he has used it every day for 2 months so far and is great for long journeys, taking to work, waiting around for appointments etc.

OP this really does sound like you are talking about a six year old child. I think that once the baby is here you might come against a lot more problems than money. For example, he might not even have time to play computer games, how will he cope with that?

For example, he might not even have time to play computer games, how will he cope with that?

He will probably play them anyway and the OP will be back here in a year, on her knees with exhaustion and asking how to get him to do more in the house :(

I've never understood how joint current accounts could work in low income households?

Surely the easiest and most fail safe way is to get wages paid into a pills account then (budgeting monthly for the annual and occasional bills) transfer a fixed amount into personal current accounts. That way, each person is under no illusion how much they have to spend.

Why cant it work in a low income household? As long as everyone knows how much is available to spend it is no worse than a high income household.

If you have £200k a year but spend £250k a year then you are in a worse situation than someone with £12k a year who spends £11.9k.

"“Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery.” - Charles Dickens

And actually Joys the implication that people on a low incomes may just spend it anyway, so therefore are too irresponsible to have a joint account with blowing the lots is quite insulting. We are on a low income due to redundancy, we both understand that and we are careful. We have, shock horror, a joint account!

I didn't read that Joys was implying that, at all Bogeyface.
I actually think it was FAR more important that we had the one joint a/c for everything, then a small standing order going into both our a/cs when we were short of money, than it is now (although we have continued as it suits us both that way). When we were skint, it would matter if one of us had spent a fiver that hadn't been accounted for - now, we wouldn't notice that kind of amount been spent without the other one noticing.

Just because a young man has sperm doesn't mean he is ready to be a father. It is up to the discerning woman to work that out. He is obviously NOT ready is he?