To sometimes want my Dh to ask if I need any cash?

[mrsmerton]

Yes, I know he pays the mortgage, and the bills.

I do my bit, scrimping where necesssary. I do not expect wads of cash to be flung in my direction. We don't have it anyway.

But never, NOT ONCE in the whole 20 years we have been together, has he ever said" Do you need any cash?" to take kids out, get a takeaway instead of cooking, buy presents for family. The nature of my job means I don't get paid during the 6 week summer break. So am broke. Don't feel I can ask, although he says he would always give if I did. I JUST WANT HIM TO ASK ME!!!! Rant over.

And Caroline, you are dead right, it is not about trust, as I wouldn't go berserk with he family funds. It is about control. I don't even know what half our bills are each month.

You're probably a very caring person which is why you're feeling it more. Remember it is also a lovely quality to have.

We don't, and never have had, 'his money' and 'my money'. I think it probably helps that at times dh wasn't earning (at uni) and at times I wasn't earning (SAHM). We've always put any income into one single account, from which everything comes - bills, savings, food, petrol, etc.

My general life doesn't often take me near a bank, so dh is more likely to have cash than me. So often if I'm going out he will ask whether I have cash in my purse or not, and give me some. But I don't feel awkward asking. It's not his money, it's our money.

We are very careful about money (not well off but want to be able to afford secondary school fees), and we do pay cc off every month.

MrsMerton ? this £70 he allows himself a week ? do you have the equivalent for you (not the kids!) per week? If not, there balance isn?t right and should be addressed in my view. You don?t have to spend it but at least you could save up for things or buy presents.

DH and I are about to go through a total upheaval. We have always (6 years) had a joint account for house costs including house keeping and personal accounts for our own credit cards/spending money. In recent years, my salary has been at least 30% higher than DH?s and we pay towards the joint account proportionally so that we each have the same amount of free cash (which isn?t much as we have a lot of debt at the mo for various reasons). Our first baby is due in January and all I get from work is the stat min and yet we both agree that I should stay at home until May at the earliest. Money is going to be very tight and for the first time ever, I won?t be the bread winner ? it is going to be odd and I have to learn to tighten my belt ? I?ve already bought all this year? Christmas presents and quite a bit for the baby to ease the hit when my salary takes a sky dive!

Sounds like he doesn't trust you with money.

If you have a computer, a handy thing to have is a program like quicken or Microsoft money where you can track all of your money (spending and savings). It allows you to break things down into categories and will geive you a historical breakdown of where your money is going. You can also have multiple accounts in the program. This is definitely more efficient than writing things down in a book. I think that it might be handy for you and him to do. If you are constantly overdrawn because you are spending on reasonable things for the household, you can give him visual proof that he is being stingy and should up your household allowance.

Ideally, you should have a joint account, and perhaps this would be a way to gain his trust and then push him to have a joint account.

Mrs Mcspooky, I earn approx £70 a week. I would be lying if I said that all goes on me. But I do have child benefit for 3 . Still not enough! I am going to have heart to heart with dh tonight about money and how we can be on the same page .

Tell him you need to know everything about expenditure, bills, insurances etc

My MIL's husband always took control of the money and when he dies she knew nothing about where any money was, about his bank account, his pensions or anything.

Ask him for full disclosure.

YANBU but you should not have to ask.You should have a joint accountDH and I have a joint account and we both just get money out when we need it. I also have a seperate housekeeping account foe food and household stuff.

We do NOT have a joint current account - closed it after a year (20 yrs ago)!

We DO have joint offset mortgage & all savings accounts (except ISA's) are joint. Our wages go into separate accounts. ALL bills come out of DH account, all kids club Standing orders etc from mine. I pass whatever I can to DH account once I have been paid (keeping back some spending money if poss) & if he has any left he sweeps into savings. We both use credit cards, have 1 account each but we both have cards on each, use one for Internet payments & one for shopping. Both cleared monthly (by DH account).

This way, we take our own cash out if required & pass to each other when needed. Whoever takes cash out shares it if one of us has empty pocket. AND I can buy him a present without him seeing the statement!

It's all our money, but no chance of going OD due to mistake of both taking the last £20 out the ATM etc.

Have had long chat tonight and dh has agreed to bin 'the book' where he writes every expenditure etc, for a while to see if he can relinquish a little control over the bank balance, and loosen up about money a bit.

This is a big step for him. He fears he may wake up in a cold sweat. I said he would feel FREEEEE!

Hoorah. You will both feel rejuvenated. Sometimes if you are on a budget it is nice to chop things about a bit. So shop/eat really cheaply during the week then splash out at the weekends with a nice bottle of wine, go out somewhere reasonable for a meal and a glass of wine once in a while. Go away for a weekend but stay only one night in a reasonably cheap B&B but eat somewhere really nice. It is the monotony that is so stifling and unromantic.
Good luck.

MrsMerton - I am glad you re feeling better about things I agree that a spreadsheet that you can bith see would be better than DH's little book

Thanks all