To ask him to borrow some money?

[dogaibu]

Feel like I might BU but I want to check.

My dad died in Feb 21 and I received an inheritance of around 20k. Since then, it appears I've been footing yhr bill for everything. I have Ds11 and he has dss9 and dss12 and it seems that every time they need anything- clothes, bedding, computer games, anything at all- I've been paying for it. We have a dog and a cat and the cat had cancer recently- I footed the entire £1,000 bill.

The house desperately needs painting, the carpet needs shampooing, the deck outside needs power washing, the boys need some new bedroom furniture. It's looking like I'm to foot the entire bill again.

Dh has very little spare money as he pays nearly £450 a month for his Dc, child maintenance, our rent is also pretty high. I obviously have more money than him due to my inheritance but AIBU to ask him to either get a bank loan or use his credit card to pay half of all these household expenses?

If you have got 20k to use as a deposit for a house why are you renting?

I have Ds11 and he has dss9 and dss12 and it seems that every time they need anything- clothes, bedding, computer games, anything at all- I've been paying for it.

Nope. He needs to pay for his DC and you pay for yours.

We have a dog and a cat and the cat had cancer recently* - I footed the entire £1,000 bill.*

The house desperately needs painting, the carpet needs shampooing, the deck outside needs power washing

I think one off things like this are not unreasonable to pay out of savings (that came from your inheritance). In fact that's what I would expect to use a windfall for ie stuff that you haven't got round to doing because previously you didn't have the funds.

But honestly, if you are having to dip into savings to pay for every day things like clothes for children then you both need to rethink your finances and look at your income and expenditure!

Another day and another thread about partners keeping money for themselves. This is not a partnership. Oh well op, if you keep renting and not investing together as a partnership my family will keep becoming more wealthy and my children will have more opportunities. Can you imagine if it was the other way around and it was DH had inherited and asked you to borrow money and get into debt? You don't even seem to care about your step children either. I would tell your DH to move on from this relationship.

If you don't want to spend your inheritance, put it aside and don't spend it.
But if you don't want to spend it, and DH has no spare money, then you as a couple just can't afford the things you mentioned such as new furniture. No, I definitely don't think he should go into debt to pay for things he can't afford.

So if you amalgamate the information from your threads; you had a £45k inheritance. You earn £21k, and he earns £29k. Your rent is £1,000 a month; and he pays £450 a month in maintenance.

So he's taking home around £1,900 a month; and you take home around £1,500; so £2,400 all together. Rent takes that down to £1,400; his maintenance to £950.

What other costs do you have that are using that?

Has the missing £25k gone on a house deposit; or has that already been spent on other things, and you're trying to protect the remaining £20k?

If it has gone on a house deposit, is the painting/carpet cleaning for the new house, or to make the current one look better before you move out? To be honest, either of you could easily clean the carpets, and I'm not sure you'll need to paint the house unless you've caused a lot of damage to the paintwork - in which case it might be possible to touch it up?

@NoSquirrels

There’s a lot going on in your post.

You shouldn’t be using your savings (inheritance) to pay for day your day things for DSC.

Your landlord should be responsible for repairs and maintenance (including decorating) to the house.

Most of all, your household budget should cover everyday spending without needing to go into debt. I can’t believe you think that’s a good idea!

If you want to save for your DS, lock some money away in a bank account for him.

Then have a sensible discussion about day to day spending.

Do you work?

A lot of posters saying don't pay for things for step children. If I ever divorced, I would never remarry anyone who didn't treat my children as if they were their own. I'm starting to realise there are a lot of terrible step mothers in the world.

In a previous thread, OP said she currently has 35% residency of her DS and is in the middle of a court battle with her ex to raise it to 50/50 so I’m assuming a good bit of the original 45k inheritance has gone on legal fees.

OP also made an offer on a new build that was due to complete in March but I’m assuming she’s backed out of that as she wants to make improvements on her current rental now.

He's on 29k but our rent is a thousand pounds a month

How much do you earn?
How much do you contribute to rent and household expenses?

The above comment sounds like he pays all of the rent - in which case he’s spent a lot more than £20K.

YANBU - you should not be subsidising your partner's maintenance payments from your/your son's inheritance, which is effectively what you're doing if he doesn't pay his share.

Depending on your DS' exact age, you could get him either a Child Trust Fund or a Junior Isa and put some money in there for him to keep it safe and separate.
www.gov.uk/child-trust-funds

@Jvg33 I said don’t use your inheritance (savings) to pay for day to day stuff for the DSC.

Not never pay for day to day stuff for stepchildren as part of a normal family life.

Just don’t spunk your savings on clothes, bedding and computers games.

I’d say the same to a woman spending her savings on her own children on this stuff. It’s day to day expenditure, it should be coming from a household budget.

@TakeYourFinalPosition

So if you amalgamate the information from your threads; you had a £45k inheritance. You earn £21k, and he earns £29k. Your rent is £1,000 a month; and he pays £450 a month in maintenance.

So he's taking home around £1,900 a month; and you take home around £1,500; so £2,400 all together. Rent takes that down to £1,400; his maintenance to £950.

What other costs do you have that are using that?

Has the missing £25k gone on a house deposit; or has that already been spent on other things, and you're trying to protect the remaining £20k?

If it has gone on a house deposit, is the painting/carpet cleaning for the new house, or to make the current one look better before you move out? To be honest, either of you could easily clean the carpets, and I'm not sure you'll need to paint the house unless you've caused a lot of damage to the paintwork - in which case it might be possible to touch it up?

You've lost a grand a month of income in there - isn't it £3400 net between them?

If he's paying £450 a month in maintenance (and presumably he has shared care as well) then he (you) shouldn't need to be paying for anything else for them (except food etc while they're with you). If he has the money spare then fair enough, contribute towards school uniforms etc, but it doesn't sound like he does have money to spare at the end of the month.

But most importantly, you need to sit down together and make a budget plan between you.

@Jonnywishbone

If you have got 20k to use as a deposit for a house why are you renting?

Maybe because that's not enough for a deposit in much of the country?

@dogaibu

He's on 29k but our rent is a thousand pounds a month

29k but pays over £400 in maintenance? Doesn’t sound right, unless it’s a private arrangement.

@altmember Dammit, sorry - I'm blaming the newborn

Missing the point a bit but I wouldn't do any work on the house as you're renting it.

If a woman came on here saying her husband had inherited money but wanted to keep it all for himself while she put expenses on a credit card, he would be torn to shreds.

If you’re married it’s his money too.

How much do you earn compared to him, out of interest?

I'm in a very similar situation after the loss of my sister. The money has been spent on a number of things:

-We paid off both of our credit cards
-We paid our council tax in full for a couple of years to help ease other financial pressure monthly
-We invested in self building a camper van so we can all enjoy holidays together and it brings me a bit of joy to think that my sister facilitated that
-We have separate savings accounts in our credit union to allow us to maximise savings (ie a joint account we could only save half as much)
-I use it to pay the occasional garage bill etc that would otherwise put us in an awkward financial position
-I got a new (new to me, second hand!) car.
-It helped me take a longer maternity leave.

So basically I haven't really treated this inheritance as being mine, rather it belongs to our family and if using it to pay for things that need done around the house eases other financial pressures then I'm happy for it to be used in that way, but I have got a few things out of it that were just for me.

I'd suggest that you put X amount of it to savings and leave what you're happy to spend on the family (and maybe buy yourself something too, if you want to). I agree that running up extra debt isn't really in anyone's interest.

How were you affording to live before the inheritance??

Powerwashing the deck doesn't cost anything, neither does shampooing carpets unless you have to hire the machines but it's not much. The landlord should be decorating, so that just leaves he furniture. Get on facebook marketplace and pick some stuff up second hand.

Every day, there's another thread about financial difficulties caused essentially by married couples who continue to regard their finances as separate despite being married. WTF do they do it?

An inheritance would be a good way to go about buying a house, not renting.

These threads also remind me why I have not gone down the 'blended families' route. No need at all for it unless you are planning to have further children together. In fact, a billion good reasons not to.

Well yanbu to be frustrated however you can’t expect him to take out loans and run up debt on his credit card. How did finances work before the inheritance? Also, stop paying for his kids.

I doubt the OP would be able to finance the purchase of a property with £20K (unless this is another Kirsty Alsopp thread where they have to quite the Costa Coffee and Netflix subs as well!). They'd still have to save for a lot longer to get onto the property ladder. They've got 3 DC between them so they wouldn't be able to live in a shoe-box.

@daisychain01

I doubt the OP would be able to finance the purchase of a property with £20K (unless this is another Kirsty Alsopp thread where they have to quite the Costa Coffee and Netflix subs as well!). They'd still have to save for a lot longer to get onto the property ladder. They've got 3 DC between them so they wouldn't be able to live in a shoe-box.

It depends where they live but a 20k deposit here with a combined salary of 50k (judging by another posters advanced search) would comfortably get them a 3 bed semi

What do you contribute to the rent and bills? You really can't be paying for EVERYTHING on £20k, it would be gone by now

It's a terrible idea to use debt to pay for day to day expenses. You need to sit down together and look at your income and outgoings, and see what you can afford and what you need to cut.

I appreciate you want to keep some of your inheritance as savings for your DS.