My husband wants me to pay more towards the bills…

[ZiggyNiko]

I’d really appreciate some outside perspective because I’m starting to feel like I’m being unreasonable, but I’m not sure.
My husband earns around £4,000 a month and I earn around £1,500. I only work 3 days a week because our youngest isn’t at nursery yet, so increasing my hours isn’t really an option at the moment.
We don’t have a mortgage, but my husband wants me to take over the council tax and electricity, which come to around £500 a month combined.
I already pay approximately £500 a month for groceries, as well as paying for our two children’s activities, days out, clothes, and various other expenses for them.
When we go on holiday, say a £4,000 holiday, I’ll usually contribute around £1,000. Even that is difficult for me on my income.
My husband says he runs out of money every month, but the problem is that I have no idea where his money is going. He doesn’t seem willing to sit down and go through the finances with me and explain what he’s spending it on.
What really bothers me is that he somehow has the money for an annual £1,000 golf trip, while telling me that he doesn’t have enough money and that I should take on more household bills.
I’m not saying he shouldn’t have hobbies or spend money on himself. But given the huge difference in our incomes, and the fact that I’m working reduced hours partly because of childcare, I feel like our finances should be looked at as a household rather than simply splitting bills.
Am I being unreasonable for thinking he should be contributing significantly more to the household expenses?

Tell him you will not pay a penny extra unless you have a full breakdown of each others income and current outgoings on the table, including personal spends.

Vapes and golf should come out of personal spends and you should have access to equal money for personal spends - that doesn't include what you spend on the kids. Their clothes and activities should be part of the joint budget.

This is bloody awful OP 😢
He‘s financially abusing you and I don’t think you even realise it.
Invoice him for your labour. That’ll balance it out. Organise an appointment with a lawyer yourself. And tell him you have.

Thank you for your kind words. My children are the best thing that has ever happened to me. It’s just such a shame that I had them with someone like him.
The reason I didn’t want a second child was because I wanted to go back to work full-time, earn more money, and build a successful career for myself. He really pushed me into keeping the pregnancy, I had even made an appointment at the abortion clinic. Feel really sad to say this as I love my son but obviously I didn’t think that way back then.
It’s all just so messed up, and sometimes I look back and wonder how everything ended up like this.

Then explain that he will need to find £500 a month to go towards school uniform, cub scout/football/cricket uniform and equipment, school trips, school lunches, school shoes, book bags, the termly ‘voluntary contribution’, the after school clubs and the summer holiday clubs…

Its reasonable for him to ask you to earn more, but your bills should be divided fairly according to what you earn. As others have said, pay nothing until you've gone through it all properly.

You can register a marital interest in the house, it is free and easily done. No solicitor needed.

Download form HR1 from government website, complete it and post it off to the Land Registry with a copy of your marriage certificate which they will send back after doing their bit. That prevents him taking out a mortgage or selling it from under your feet.

I used to think that until my exh emptied both current and savings accounts and left me with 3 young DC and a few pounds in my purse !

I’m married and it all goes into one pot. We look at income and expenses regularly. You need to see what’re his money is going!

He doesn’t sound very nice at all.
If you took him up on his suggestion It sounds like you’d have £300 left after the outgoings and he’d have £3000! What a selfish man. And he thinks you’re going to rip him off! You’d be financially much better off if you divorced him.

Yeah, I never understand why people say married people should join finances, like it's the law. It's weird AF to trust someone like that. People can change and clean you out on a whim.

Maybe because I grew up in a country where men are providers but F that!

I had a similar dynamic when I married young and was a sahm. We had separate bank accounts and I was spending my savings whilst xh was on a high wage.

When it came to divorce (I paid for it all), during the financial disclosure for the consent order, it became apparent just how much money he had.

I never went for any of it but it really was a kick in the face how he had taken advantage of my good will (I had been the one paying the majority of the bills and rent before dc was born).

Never again will I be in a relationship with a greedy man.

He sounds absolutely awful I'm sorry to say.

At least he's agreed to go through spending with you.

Weird comment. Sounds like you have been stung and are projecting.

It's weird AF to NOT pool finances when you're married, especially if one of you earns a lot less most of the time it will be the woman!

Im starting to put all pieces together and it makes me really depressed. We haven’t had sex since our second was born 2 years ago. Only blow jobs etc but not a full on sex.

Oh FFS it gets worse. I would really be getting my ducks in a row if I were you. This marriage sounds dreadful!

And there is just the risk that someone is crap with money, too. Many people on MN find themselves on the cusp of bankruptcy because the other partner has simply spent or mismanaged it. DH and I have separate accounts for this reason - because I was always running up credit card debts when I was single/working. He gives me any money I need without any issue, but I do not have full access because of having a past history of being an idiot and because I don’t earn it, he does. I’ve been utterly responsible with my finances for 20 years, but I know that this has meant money for savings and the mortgage etc have been protected from me having an ADHD or hormonal splurge. LOL

But the saddest thing is - even if he was cheating it wouldn’t even upset me, just annoy me as no one likes to be lied to. I think the way he’s been acting throughout the years made me fall out of love with him.

You need to get some advice on what you’d be due re house in a separation. Not saying you should separate but you should get some clarity and reassurance re the deeds.

People frequently forget pensions. If you’re working PT then your ongoing final security is also worsened. Of the £500 you’ll be ‘saving’ once LO goes to school, top priority should be your pension, ISA and a nest egg. Do you both save for the DC?

Having a discussion re household budget sounds good. Definitely do your homework before that though.

i simply don't understand why married couples don't have joint finances. He takes home £4k a month, you take home £1.5k a month - that means your household income is £5.5k a month. All essentials - and anything to do with kids - should come from that pot. Anything left over can then be split 50/50.

@ZiggyNiko

You are married

Legally what is yours is his and vice versa - IE - one big ( or small ) pot of money, no matter who earns what

Out of that pot, you pay the bills, you add to savings, then you decide on the split for what's left - go out and spend and enjoy the lot or invest some into pensions/shares, and live a more modest life style

None of this - you need to pay more

Go back to work full time and leave him - he is fucking awful!! he’s not even a ‘good Dad’ - he is a self centred prick.

Talk to a lawyer asap and get that mortgage sorted.

If you’ve been married 18 years wtf do you not have all of your money in one pot? Seems incredibly selfish of him

YANBU,

Honestly when there's that much gap between what you each earn - and especially when part of the reason you earn less is because you're doing more of the childcare - the whole "let's just split the bills" thing falls apart. You're not flatmates. It should be a household pot, not "who owes what."

The golf trip is the bit that'd really get me though. £1,000 a year, no problem, but he "can't" help more with the council tax and electric? Come on. That's not "I don't have the money," that's "I've decided what I want to spend my money on and you can have what's left." Big difference, and I think he knows it, if I'm honest.

But actually the bit that stands out most to me isn't even the numbers, it's that he won't sit down and go through it properly with you. Because if he's genuinely skint every month, why wouldn't he want to show you where it's going? People who are actually struggling usually want another pair of eyes on it, because two heads are better than one for sorting it. Not wanting to open the books up is what would worry me more than the golf trip tbh.

I'd stop agreeing to take on any new bills for now and just say something like "I'm not signing up to anything else until we actually sit down together and go through everything, in and out, properly." Not accusing him of anything, just... you're allowed to see the full picture before you agree to pay more into it.

And once you have seen it all, honestly a lot of couples with a big income gap like yours don't split bills equally, they split them proportionally - so you each put in roughly the same percentage of what you earn rather than the same amount in pounds. Might be worth putting that on the table too once the cards are actually on it.

So you’re married to a man who is greedy, believes he owns the house which you bought together, drives a flashy car for himself, has a wife and kids which he neither pays for nor cares for, blocks you from moving forward in your career. Is this really what you want out of life?

You don’t understand that some people do things differently ?
After my exh cleaned me out it took me ages to get back on my feet .
I have been happily remarried for 30+ years - separate finances works fine for us .

Well, then it's get the ducks in a row and plan for a better future for you and your dc.