AIBU to be bothered that DH expects me to pay him back?

[Tuatara22]

I recently started a new job after being out of work for some time and I haven't yet received my first paycheck. DH has always been funny about money, for lack of a better word. We have completely separate finances (his preference) and he pays some bills and I pay others, and for some bills I transfer my portion to him and he pays it from his account. He has a spreadsheet that calculates the bills and how we split them, and I pay about a third of everything, since he earns 3x what I earn. Personally I find this strict and precise division of finances odd and pointless, but he gets his back up whenever I raise the matter, so I've let it be for the most part. He grew up working class and his parents struggled at times, and I think that's lead to him having some anxiety around money and seems to always feel a bit insecure about finances even though he earns a good salary. Drives an old car, never buys clothes for himself, purchases require long deliberation etc. I grew up financially comfortable and don't have the same anxiety about money. We don't have kids.

He loaned me some money this month (a few hundred) to buy new clothes and shoes for work and other bits and bobs like hair products, and he said he'll keep a tab to track what I owe him and I can pay him back over the course of a few months. That's fine. I don't expect him to buy everything for me like a sugar daddy.

I have very little left in my bank account and today I asked him if he could transfer me some money to buy a few plants for the garden and mentioned I won't have enough left to buy lunches for work so I'll have packed lunches until the end of the month. He sent me £50 and told me he'll add it to the tab.

I didn't think much of this in the moment, but a few hours later I'm sitting here feeling a bit off. I wouldn't expect or ask him to pay me back for lunch money or household/garden items, and I'm sure my father wouldn't make my mum pay him back for little bits either. I feel like he doesn't fully see our marriage as a complete partnership and sees his money as entirely his. Like there is no marital or household money. If I were to raise this it would probably lead to a fight and me being told I'm entitled. Am I?

Hmm well it's been true for me. I don't come up on credit checks. Like they can't find evidence that I exist. It's very annoying.

He sounds very mean.

My DH (working class, dirt poor as a child) was at one time earning 6 figures and I was a SAHM. All his money went into our joint account and I just took what I needed. It was our money, he has never questioned what I spend money on.

Does he buy you birthday and Christmas presents?

How did you meet OP, it just sounds like an arranged marriage where he’s making sure he keeps it as an arrangement whereas you want more of a healthy partnership, which will be needed when kids come a long otherwise you will be losing out financially. As someone else said, does he do 50% housework and cooking too? Probably not!

On divorce, whether you have access to that money or not at the moment it all becomes a marital asset and he would have to declare how much is in his accounts, his pension pot, the house would have to be valued (less the mortgage), the furniture, the cars. Every asset, cash and investment is added up and the total divided by 2 and you then choose what you prefer to have up to that figure.

If you can’t agree then either a judge decides or the asset is sold and divided 50/50. There are other things like length of marriage, children, whether one party was abusive which sways the percentages but pretty much the starting point is 50/50

Is he home right now? I’d walk into the room he’s in, look him in his beady eyeballs, and say show me all your finances, right now. Get off your behind right now and show me your finances. Stop hiding and stop billing me for plants, stop harassing me over my dental surgery, stop promising me you’ll clue me in on the finances, put my name on the mortgage, show me your bank details after I become a citizen or whatever other later date. Show me now, and we’re going to create a shared account, and you’re going to trust me or else we don’t have a marriage. You agreed you need to give me your bank details. Ok, do it right now.

Be bold. Sometimes you have to be.

Also, can you get a credit card to build up your credit rating? Or can he help you with this by adding you to a credit card or bills?

Do you have a bank account in your sole name?

Plants in the garden ? So he doesn’t live there ?

I do know the name of the banks, it's not a secret, and he likes to tell me the ins and outs of the deal he's getting and the new account bonus or interest rate or whatever it may be. I just don't know how to access the money if he was incapacitated. I'm sure the paperwork is in a filing cabinet somewhere.

That's the thing - I don't think he attitude will suddenly change once he meets his target. I think it's ingrained and he will keep worrying about money no matter what. His mindset is that he's saving as much as possible for our security, but he never seems to feel secure. For example, he's always worried that he's about to lose his job when there is no reason to think that.

Massive, massive turn off.

@Tuatara22 i cannot fathom why you’re together,it seems very sad & incompatible. I’m not sure you like him,you tolerate his idiosyncrasies but they vex you.

@Tuatara22, ok thanks for clarifying. Well, it is very easy for him to give you the various banks, his account numbers, and online passwords. This mythical paperwork that is in a filing cabinet somewhere…no, he can access this info in minutes and give it all to you right now. I jump on the computer and get on the bank website and access my acct in 15 seconds.

Just try it my way. Go up to him and tell him to show you right now. Why can’t he show you right now? There is no excuse.

Do you have sex with him?

Your husband is an addict, OP.

He's not addicted to alcohol or drugs or gambling, he's addicted to seeing his bank balance increase each month. Admittedly that's a healthier thing to be addicted to, but it is still causing and will continue to cause issues for you.

What is his savings target based on? Is it an arbitrary figure or is he saving for something in particular? Because I suspect that if it's the former, once he hits that figure he'll get a different, bigger figure in his head, and if it's the latter, as soon as he's got what he was saving for he'll want to save for the next thing.

Being frugal isn't a bad thing, and indeed in some cases it is necessary because it's the only way to make ends meet. Having a financial safety net is also a good thing, and I can see why that would be important to him if he grew up without financial security.

But he's in danger of throwing away other things that are important - his relationship with you and his enjoyment of life in general - by being so rigid.

I am also living in my husband's home country, having moved here to marry him. But in our case, I am the higher earner and he has actually been unemployed for 8 months, although he has still has an income due to a long period of severance pay which has only just ended. For this reason he hasn't needed me to financially support him so far, and he's just received a job offer. But if he had not got another job before his severance pay ran out, I would obviously have funded him because that's what you do when you're married, isn't it? For better, for worse, for richer, for poorer and all that.

Your setup does sound a bit miserable. If he won't even contemplate fixing the roof I doubt you do anything as frivolous as go on holiday, do you?

That said, if he was paying all the joint bills during your period of unemployment but you have nothing left in your bank account, how has that happened? I get that you only have half as much disposable income as he does once your respective contributions to the family finances are paid, but it sounds like he's building a huge rainy day fund for himself, but you don't have one. When you're employed, what are your spending habits like? Do you spend everything you've got once bills are paid, or do you save some? If you spend it all and don't save, you don't sound very financially compatible.

Do you want to solve this problem you’ve got, or don’t you? You can solve this in five minutes. Take advice from those of us who have been married for decades and don’t have these problems because we know how to do these things. You ask for help, we’re giving it. Take it and try it out. You might be surprised. Take charge. He’s not fit to be in charge of you.

I truly do not understand these threads, the women act like they can’t walk up to their husbands or boyfriends or partners and look them in the eyeballs when there’s an important issue to resolve. Clearly, he is disrespecting you. I mean, that is so obvious to any thinking person. Is he telling you all these things about your status? How do you know they’re true? Maybe you need to find expertise elsewhere.

Your name should be on the mortgage. You should have access to every single one of his accounts. You should have a shared account. So what if his credit score goes down a few points? That’s not the end of the world. I’ve been handling our finances for almost 30 years, and my own for 12 years before that. We paid off our 30 year mortgage in 9 years thanks to my noggin. You’ve already got the mortgage, that’s the biggest thing you needed the credit for. Now your name needs to be on it asap. You have your own bank account in your name, right? He’s talking a bunch of garbage.

I earn 31% of our after tax income. What should the split for the bills be?

Everything should be 100% shared. There shouldn't be split finances for bills. Marriage is not a romantic whim - it's a legal thing which means that everything you and he have is owned equally. If he didn't want this, he shouldn't have married you.

It’s more of a safety handkerchief than a safety net; he’s on minimum wage, I’m not on much more and we’re not big spenders. But he budgets down to the last few pence and is incredibly organised with our money, so we can usually have a lunch out if we fancy it, or treat ourselves now and then. Before he came along, I’d been known to borrow a couple of slices of bread from my pensioner mum in the week before payday, so it’s not anything I’ve achieved!

Sorry I misread the plants as costing £50 but see he just sent £50 and they were less.

I agree it’s not how I would do a financial partnership but hopefully he is trying to be a good steward of your savings.

I would be more concerned if he was spending lots of money on himself.

FWIW we did have a “frugal mindset” for the first 10 years or so. The next 8 were not so much (still savings and living in our means). This has put us in a much more stable housing situation, greater equity/lower interest rates. However the difference is it was a joint decision.

He's not a bad person at all. He's not scheming and hiding things from me

After you have just said you don’t know about any of the financial stuff because he keeps it hidden

Also if you are paying 1/3 of the bills and only earning 31% of the money it’s just another 2.3% extra he is getting.

Take home pay is masking other things like how much he is paying into his pension.
You should get the same amount as well.

If you want to be scrupulously fair you don’t even have to have a joint account.
You add up how much you need to pay all the bills each month (annual bills you divide by 12) you allocate an amount for food, petrol, commuting costs, going out together holidays etc Each person gets the same amount to spend and then the rest is divided by 2 and each person can invest/save that amount each month in their own name.

What happens if you have children. Who would pay for the nappies, clothes childcare, baby swim lessons. Or would all that fall to you whilst he goes to work and stacks the cash whilst you are running around trying to be able to make your inflated share of the bills.

Agree
The whole idea is bizarre
You're married
If you need secrecy, if u need to hide things from each other, if you can’t share why decide to share your life.

Fuck that for a game of soldiers. End it before you have kids.

Sorry meant to say dental care is not free

Jesus op this is awful. Im not sure I could live like that. But ours is joint. I guess if huge debits he might ask whats this payment. He sounds quite secretive about it.

The OP has posted that he begrudgingly paid for her emergency dental treatment and hasn't let her forget it.

So medical/dental....is there a big difference?

LTB