To expect SAHP to make more of a financial contribution?

[6hearts4humphrey]

Just want to check this out before I broach with DH. He is a SAHD, has been for 7 years, DC’s now at primary school, youngest is 8. Had a really bad month money wise and had to clear out what savings we had, think emergency house repairs, white good needed replacing, birthdays to name a few.
I’m fed up of always watching the pennies due to only having one wage coming in. He does earn a little bit of money (maybe 100-130 a month) making things but the hourly rate is probably half minimum wage. He has always wanted to take us on a big family holiday so that money is being saved for that, usually we go camping.
I don’t think it’s unreasonable now to expect him to work 10-15 hours a week to bring in around £400. This amount would just be the difference in making things a bit less tight. He doesn’t really want to, I think he quite likes his life as it is. AIBU?

Our setup sounds very similar - DH is a sahd, I work full time. Youngest child is 7.

We looked at DH finding a job school hours only, they don't exist here. There are before and after school clubs the boys could go to but 1) I wanted the boys to have a parent at home after school 2) it would cost us more than DH would potentially earn having been out of the workforce for so long - so we'd be worse off and the boys would barely see either of us in the week.

Practically while more money would be nice (my car is 15 years old, has 220k on the clock and should go another 5 years, I'd love a newer one!) the reality is we can manage without "stuff", the car goes fine and I never have to worry about school closures or taking time off for sick children, DH picks up all the slack.

YANBU he obviously doesn't wAnt to go out to work and I think you will struggle to change his mind. Sounds like a very nice life why would he change it?

UsIng his office skills:
Work from home doing typing, essays, PA, admin.

Out of house: Retail, catering, bar work, local hotels etc 2 evenings per week.
Two night shifts in supermarket, delivery van. Courier.

Cab driving

Ironing service, gardening.

But i imagine that most of the above are not 'interesting' enough and beneath him and many posters.

Is your house big? Can you put children in one room and rent a room? Take students from abroad?

I get this. This life is just not good enough for you anymore, and you want more money in for the stuff you value, like house repairs and holidays and peace of mind. He values his leisure and freedom and time doing domestic stuff over all that. You do need to have a talk, because right now your goals are so far apart. But you need to be very clear that the current situation is not sustainable and that you want more. I hope you can find a compromise that suits you all.

That's why you need to ask your dh - "What do you see us able to cut back on", he needs to be able to tell you in black and white where these miraculous savings are going to come from.

He needs to be more involved in the finances so he can see that the numbers no longer stack up and his business needs to start bringing in money or he needs to find some other paid employment.

Perhaps he could do the family finances on a Monday whilst enjoying his tea & cakes?

TBH if you're not able to save up money and instead are dipping into savings you're living beyond your means and you need a 2nd income generated from him.

LTK, peace of mind for sure as all the financial stuff is down to be and he does not want to hear about it. if I say we spent £xx on the credit card this month he tells me he doesn't want to know.

The thread has really got me thinking and the bottom line is that I haven't been happy for a while now and some things have happened over the years which have upset me and are still upsetting me.

I'm not into stuff really, but he likes his gadgets and over the years I've been juggling to find the money for them. For that reason IABU!!

Also our wedding, which was done on the cheap (but still lovely). He wanted to get married sooner than me, I was happy to wait. There was also some pressure to do it so that some elderly relatives would be around. The whole cost went on the credit card and the wedding present money we got from our DPs paid it off (we didn't know about that until the day). IWBU for not asking him where he thought the money was coming from.

DH loves a big Christmas, no thought on how to fund it. My bonus in Jan usually covers it luckily.

DH's business. Didn't advertise as couldn't set up a facebook page from his phone and laptop was broken. Bought a laptop at Christmas so no more excuses. Is the facebook page set up yet? No!

Also been living ever so slightly over our means for a while, got a small windfall that cleared the credit cards. However now if I mention to DPs that things are a bit tight I get "oh what about such and such money last year". Too ashamed to admit that we'd relied on credit cards for stuff.

However I am now insisting we are not using the credit cards if we can't pay them off the next month. Luckily we've stuck to this so far, but I am worried as savings are depleted for any further unexpected expense.

Lastly (sorry for the rant!!) we are being sensible with the big holiday. Just his earnings and ebay money, birthday money being saved for that. Again I feel under pressure to make this happen, also he wants his DP to come with us and be young enough to enjoy it.

Argh! That's it off my chest now. So in conclusion, IABU not to get this sorted!!

As a SAHP can I just say that watching an awards ceremony at school is likely to have been incredibly boring and the tea and cakes would have likely involved standing around struggling to make polite conversation.

In all honestly if it was a choice between going into my previous job (tbf which I loved) and what your DH did (and what I do often) I would pick going into work every time! (If I did work I would have a good excuse not to go -and I would use it as often as possible!)
And if your DH did work would that mean that you would take the morning off to go to the ceremony for your DCs? Or would you expect your DH to go? How would your DCs feel if neither of you went?
I agree if money is tight your DH need to get a job...
But that comment about the awards and tea and cakes makes me think it may well be a case of the grass is always greener...

Hmmm I think you need to insist that family finances are now discussed and gone through as a couple.

He needs to accept in black and white the truth of the financial situation.

Usually I would be able to get to things like ceremonies (got a good boss who is also WOHM so she understands these things). That time I didn't get to hear about it until the day before when my DC mentioned it to me, so couldn't get the time off. But I am sad that I have to miss those things from time to time, and so are my DC. When I say to them that daddy will be there I hear from them that all other mums will be and you won't. Now I know that is not quite true but that is how the DC see it.

I don't want DH to miss these things either, I'm not expecting him to work FT too and miss everything. He would hate it too.

I do the washing + sorting, gardening, money side, change beds, bathrooms, help with homework and muck in where I can.

You do this ^^ yet he's a (almost) ft sahp with the youngest aged 8.

I think most patents would fall over themselves to have his cushy lifestyle!

I think he is taking the piss. You are struggling financially and he need to step up and start bringing in some money.

You work one day at home per week so that will cover quite a lot of holiday or sickness for children aged 8+. Also you have family that can help out.

It is very doable and he needs to stay making a better contribution

Start making not stay making

The more you post OP, the more it does sound like he's taking the piss a bit. I'm not of the school of thought that the SAHP should take on any NMW job they can get whenever the WOHP decides they've had enough of being sole earner, but he should at least be attempting to build up his business. As you have grandparents locally who'd assist, there's really no excuse for him not to be at least in meaningful part time work with earnings to match (I would say £25 from two days work is a hobby not a job). I can see why, with three children of what sounds like junior school age, some couples might still feel the need for a SAHP because covering wraparound care, school holidays and sickness is unaffordable, undesirable or impossible. But none of that applies here.

I do think you are both to blame for the creation of a scenario where he's been able to SAHP for several years longer than initially agreed without even discussing it, and where he gets to bury his head in the sand over the finances. This situation wouldn't be able to happen if you hadn't both allowed it to. It's good you've identified this I think.

He's got his head in the sand, hasn't he? If you've got childcare help, it's a no-brainer. Most people would have bitten someone's hand off for the job you mentioned upthread. He needs a reality check.

Thing is, if his skills need updating-and they probably do-it's unlikely he will get a "proper" job anytime soon anyway. The youngest will probably be in senior school by then. What's going to be his justification then?

I think it can help to think of all the time spent on home stuff as one account and all the time spent on money earning stuff as another account, and reckon that you can swap one for the other but both partners should contribute equally. So if you have one working parent who earns absolutely all the money, then I think it is fair enough for them basically never to lift a finger at home and have a SAHP who does it all. Equally, if you have two partners both working full time, then surely it is fair that the home chores are also split 50-50. For most of my parenting life, my husband has earned much more than me, and I have done much more home stuff than him, but he has done a bit of home stuff and I have earned a bit of money - say a 5:1 ratio in each case. It sounds as if you are splitting the home chores much more equally than the money earning chore - that you are doing maybe 30 or 40% of the house stuff and yet also earning about 95% of the money. Clearly this is unfair, and he either needs to do more home stuff or earn more money to make it more fair. Whether your total income is sufficient is, of course, also important but a slightly different issue from how responsibility is divided between you, in my view.
Also, if he is evading responsibility for an equal say in controlling your finances, he is in effect adopting the traditional 'dependent wife' role, and that means he forfeits his right to be treated as an equal in terms of spending decisions. If he wants you to do the nasty stuff of thinking what you can afford, that means you get to decide what can be afforded. He can't have it both ways.

Chicken, totally agree I have facilitated this.

Alice, last year I got a new account, had our old one for all the direct debits, and transferred any left over into another account for shopping and day to day spends. This didn't work out at all. I think we'd be doing ok but then would see money had been spent on a credit card, DH lost the new cards twice so had to go back to the old account, in the end it created more aggro than it was worth. DH refuses even to check our account balance before he spends so unless I tell him we running short he'll carry on. He does want me to make all the big spending decisions. If I said we could afford a loan for a new car today he'd go and buy one! However it's more the day to day stuff that catches us out, £20 spent here there and everywhere!

I think the only way to manage our money would be to withdraw all the money left over each month after direct debits and when that runs out that's it!

I think I will sit down the next pay day, go through what will be paid and how much we have left over. I can't make him get a job but I can at least make sure he knows how much money we have/haven't got. I may be living in hope that he will at last see we don't have as much money as we'd like!

Hmm. While I don't agree with alice that the SAHP should do all housework, I do think she's right that there are two sides to the money management coin. He refuses to educate himself about how the household budget works and insists on devolving the responsibility entirely onto you, to the extent that he won't even learn how much money you have left over after essentials each month. So the flipside is that he doesn't get to make any of the decisions- it's impossible for him to be able to do that if he doesn't have even the most basic of information.

I think you need to have a brutally honest conversation with your dh about household budget/repairs.

He can't keep his head in the sand about all of what you are saying on here. He is not an extra child he is an adult and needs to be treated as such. He doesn't get option to want to know.

I think this is about a lot more than him getting a job - there seems to be some incompatibility around money.

A practical tip I can give you is a budgeting software package called You Need a Budget (YNAB for short) which I saw recommended on mumsnet and bought. There's a free trial for 30 days, so you can see whether it's for you.

For us it has fixed the issue of slightly overspending each month, and underestimating our outgoings. It might be worth having a look at. It was certainly easier to talk to my DH (who is the spender out of the two of us) and show him the screen, having a conversation along the lines of "so, if I put this amount into the new TV pot this month, how am I going to be able to afford the new uniform?" It was a good way to demonstrate we did have a problem that he had to face up to.

Callme, thanks for the tip, will certainly look into that app.

I think your situation is just so wrong. And not just because you're working so much harder than him. But, because he's quite happy doing basically nothing, whilst the person he apparently loves, works their arse off. That's bad manners, arrogant and disrespectful.

In the car today, DH mentions it's Father's Day next week.

DH: Father's Day next Sunday
Me: yep
DH: wouldn't mind a digital radio for the car
Me: how much is that?
DH: were 200 will have come down since then
Me:
DH: then again it might not be worth it.. As we are getting a new car next year
Me: really are you planning on getting a job then
DH: in 3 years
Me: what job or car?
DH; car?.

Not going to be easy!

If he is spending money without checking that there is money available then he needs a huge kick up the arse. Can you work out a budget and give him an allowance?

My friend was in the same situation as you. Was supposed to get a job when the DC were a certain age. This didn't happen and then the youngest started senior school and still no job. She left him. He is still not working and one them has left school now

OP, I think your situation sounds intolerable. I would seriously struggle to respect someone that had created a comfortable little bubble away from all those 'stressful" money conversations am decisions. Modern life, with kids, is a two horse cart and 8 year old school children do not require a SAHP. What the hell is your life going to look like in 10 years time? He sounds like he is NEVER going to work full time.

Op, you're making a joke of it, but it's utterly utterly unacceptable.
If it were me, I would tell him to pull his socks up, or he's out. And I'd mean it. I would enjoy living with a user.