Should my boyfriend contribute to my bills?

[ILikePaperHats]

Hi, just need some advice really as I'm not sure if I'm being unreasonable. My boyfriend doesn't live with me but often comes to mine 1-2 days in the week and stays at mine most of the weekend too. He lives in a shared house with one other house mate and only pays about £300 a month plus bills. I am divorced with 2 kids (their dad has them 2 nights every week and pays minimal maintenance) and am self employed so my income fluctuates but usually only about 16k a year. My boyfriend earns twice as much as me and has no dependants. He buys food quite often although I regularly give him half the money, and he makes use of my shower (I'm on a water meter), gas and electricity. I am hardly ever invited to his house as he says there's nothing to do(!) there, and it's true that my house is nicer, more homely, near nice bars and restaurants etc. I have no inclination to ask him to move in as I like my independent life and don't want to rely financially on a man but AIBU to expect him to contribute a bit to bills? When he's at mine using my utilities he's not having to pay for his own. He bought me a hot tub last summer which was very generous of him but it's cost me a fortune to run and I'm currently £250 in debt on my gas and electric bill and with winter coming up I'm quite worried. Often he will turn up at mine and if the heating isn't on he will turn on my electric fire without asking. I have asked him to give me £100 towards my electric bill as he had lots of use of the hot tub this summer but he's making out I'm being really mean to ask and that he shouldn't have to pay that much as he doesn't think it's all because of the hot tub. Thanks for reading.

Sounds like you are supporting him, tell him to cough up or find another mug.

He’s going to pay you £100 at the end of the month. Wow. He owes you far more than that. A decent man would recognise you are struggling and why and wouldn’t have waited to be asked. He also wouldn’t make you wait til the end of the month. He is treating you like a naughty child and I bet he’s got a good chunk of cash in savings. He is possibly thinking about dumping you for being money grabbing if he’s gone quiet - the irony. Your instincts were right not to let him move in he’s all take. Not a keeper.

So he buys food--is it uncooked food? If so, who cooks it?

uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/is-it-normal-for-a-hot-tub-to-cost-600-a-year-to-run--164414689.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAK7z4NZExaXLuDdNYhMdj9lN6zq51aN1c6qH-V4c-3aMmwVOR3bU_tZ0QvWoq_qrtJ93bJwUpUP9Jh8sTwTpKqUKBpP-li0Cg-8h-kZ2_9ivabYwWtap6JuAYJ7W71PzFPcdB1H1i_uIq2QGNXkvKu5B6mKMUydeTQvXrUTyvKCX

Hot tubs are expensive!
uk.finance.yahoo.com/news/is-it-normal-for-a-hot-tub-to-cost-600-a-year-to-run--164414689.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAK7z4NZExaXLuDdNYhMdj9lN6zq51aN1c6qH-V4c-3aMmwVOR3bU_tZ0QvWoq_qrtJ93bJwUpUP9Jh8sTwTpKqUKBpP-li0Cg-8h-kZ2_9ivabYwWtap6JuAYJ7W71PzFPcdB1H1i_uIq2QGNXkvKu5B6mKMUydeTQvXrUTyvKCX

He bought me a hot tub last summer

Nope, he bought it for himself disguised as a gift for you. Sell it and dump him.

Hot tubs are shit, sell it and use the money to pay off your debt. I’d also get rid of him.

DH and I were together for three years before we moved in together and he always stayed at mine three nights a week. He always contributed towards food, bought take aways and spent money on trips out over the weekend too. Your boyfriend is a cocklodger, cut your losses.

He occasionally takes us out using his car, he will sometimes moan about how much it all costs and gets me to pay about 50% of overall costs which I think is ok as it's 3 of us and 1 of him.

So you have to pay for half of the costs of using the car for a leisure activity but when he uses the hot tub (another leisure activity) you have to pay all of the costs?

Cocklodger. Get rid.

And I had an ex who used to stay with me at weekends and he made sure he had as many showers as possible and then didn't bother the rest of the week.
When we eventually moved in together ... yeah, I know I shouldn't have, but hindsight is wonderful .... in another country he started of wanting to have a bath every day and a shower and pay half of the bills.
I said no way. In this country the water is very expensive and everyone is very careful with it. Told him he'd have to pay more than half the bills if he wanted to use that much water. So that put a stop to that.
Then he had a spreadsheet for working out who had spent what on shopping and spent hours going through receipts ticking off things that only I had eaten or only he had eaten and adjusting the spreadsheet accordingly. He didn't like raspberries and they were expensive so he didn't see why he should pay for them....

So yeah, red flags OP, he's a cocklodger and I agree with someone else way upthread who said he's doing the classic cocklodger moving in by stealth and establishing a precedent that he doesn't contribute to the bills.

Send him and his hot tub on their merry way.

Or he’s gone quiet cos you’ve immediately assumed he’s taking the piss rather than giving him the benefit of the doubt after taking the opinions of strangers off the internet who can’t possibly know the full facts. Perhaps he’s hurt.

What might the full facts be, Stephminx?

@Tiddlesthetiger

Read my earlier post.

No one can fully know the full facts or reasoning behind anyone’s actions other than those directly involved.

Most are assuming nefarious intentions but it could be the OP hadn’t really been clear. She also doesn’t appear to have told him not to do certain things such as putting on heating etc...

I have asked questions in my post which have not been answered. Perhaps the OP is somewhat responsible for the current situation.

If she’s gone in guns blazing based on a load of strangers goading her on the internet rather than discussing it in an adult fashion, then it’s perfectly possible he’s upset. We don’t know because the OP hasn’t given full details, only her side, ignoring some questions from posters.

As I said, no one can possibly get the full facts from these type of posts.

Tell him hot tub is no longer in use as you can’t afford to run it. Give him a month to remove it. If he doesn’t, sell it and dump him.

Or just sell it and dump him now.

Good luck. You know you deserve better.

He sounds a keeper.... Not.

He’s your boyfriend, he doesn’t have to pay your bills. You are responsible for your bills. You are responsible for your debts. If you don’t want the hot tub on, turn it off.

At the risk of repeating what has been said many times over, get rid of both him and the hot tub. He has a very cushy set up, living off you, and he is a tightwad.

Avoid nickle and diming with people you love, it’s stingy and mean-spirited.
Can you put some real targeted effort into finding a better-paid job?

The hot tub is the hot potato here! It was a 'gift' but he sees it as his? The purchase cost is nothing compared to the running costs!

If you don't feel you can sell it, just switch it off and drain it. Then tell him if he wants to keep it at yours and use it, he needs to fund the electricity to the tune of what it actually costs. Look back at old power bills from before you met him, from when he was staying over frequently and from when the hot tub went in.

A friend told me 10 or 12 years ago that their tub added £100 pcm to the power bill. It won't be less. Ask him how he'll feel about coming round to yours when the power company has cut you off. Ask him whether you and the DC will be welcome to shower and cook and generally warm up at his place the way he does at yours.

These things are invisible until the bill comes!

He's gone quiet because you've rumbled his game, I think. He's a parasite.

Tell him to piss off and take his hot tub with him. He is a stingy little taker

Up to you what you want to do, but it seems like you are not that into him?

@Kiwiinkits are you the cocklodger?

He’s sounds like yet another cocklodger searching out a single parent to take advantage of, there’s at least three similar threads on here at the moment, it’s all very sad. Just get rid of him and his hot tub.