DH angry with me over debt - not sure it's all my fault

[tablemab]

Hi,
DH and I have both not been great with money in the past. We fell into the high income high debt trap, living well beyond our means for years. we earn well - joint income is £115K gross. We have a mortgage, 2 kids etc

For the last couple of years I have tried to take control of our finances. I am no expert, but I am good with a spreadsheet!! I have tried to manage things, and DH has let me get on with it, generally showing zero interest. We haven't accrued much additional debt, and I have tried to move debt around to better interest rates etc. I just get on with it and don't really speak to DH about it. Definitely a lack of communication on both sides.

Our debt level is massive - we owe £75K ish on top of our mortgage. Despite this, I have made sure that everything is up to date and that interest is reduced as much as possible. I also have a plan in place to clear this within the next 5 years.

On Saturday I showed DH the spreadsheet and he freaked out at how much we owe, telling me that I had deceived him and that he had no idea it was so bad. My issue is that he is treating it as though this is just MY debt!! He said that he knew we had a lot of debt but not that much! ( I haven't told him that the £75k doesn't include HIS car).

Now I accept that perhaps I should have tried harder to engage him the money management, but I don't really feel that it's fair to lay all of the blame on my for a situation that was very much a joint effort! AIBU??

@tablemab

I think that car disclosure will push him over the edge- I might wait a week or two for that!!

As the person responsible for monitoring the finances you need to pull your head out of the sand and tell him now, not in 2 weeks!

As an aside, surely your DH knew he was buying a car he couldn't afford to pay for

Thankfully it's fixed at that amount for 4.5 more years

This is someone who has completely ceded his responsibility to control his finances to his partner. Who knows what is going through his mind?

Good, at least you don't have that nugget of shit coming down the pipeline soon.

I agree in theory.

but 50-60 was probably based on the (erroneous) assumption that OP had managed to reduce the debt (or at least not add to it).

Now he’s found out that the debt that this wasn’t the case at all and that the debt has actually increased!

Which would come as a massive shock to anyone (I imagine).

OP’s DH should have informed her DH about their financial situation. She wasn’t “handling” it if the debt was growing.

and her DH should have taken an active interest!

I’m guessing you were trying to protect him from the stress by allowing him to ignore it, and that you felt it was ‘in hand’ as you knew the plan.

It’s an unreasonable burden to bear alone. He should be apologising for failing to think about it.

Don’t let him blame you. Ask him what solutions he has in mind.

At £4k spare each month, you can pay it off much sooner- and that is the priority, not the extras.

Imagine how affluent you’ll feel when that debt is paid off, and you actually have £4k a month spare. That’s the time to look at pensions and building a rainy day fund.

He definitely should have been asking about how you were both paying for the carpet and the holiday! Assume he does t think they came free?

But agree that you need to have the conversation and he needs to take a joint role in paying these off and getting the debt down. You need to agree that there are no more spends that aren't absolutely necessary.

MSE has some good forums for debt and I don't think it's that unusual but it needs to come under control before it impacts your credit score or your ability to remortgage.

Do you mean your mortgage is £600pm or £600k so presumably much higher monthly amount. If it's just £600pm I be taking a much closer look at your outgoings as £3,600 is an extortionate amount to spend on essentials if it doesn't include mortgage or childcare.

I would encourage you to sit down together and go through your budget together - ALL debt, ALL outgoings, ALL income. You both need to commit to massively reducing/cutting all unnecessary spending (caret & a holiday ) and getting this under control before it spirals even more and speaking to one of the debt charities is a good idea. You have a high income so the good news is you could get it paid off quickly - no idea why you'd need 5 years unless you keen spending or are paying vast amounts of interest. I'd also consider selling/downgrading the car if it's an expensive model or dear to run.

And if he thinks that includes the car it may be he thinks it’s not that much on top of the car loan. £60,000 in total including £30,000 or £40,000 on a car (which can be sold if necessary and which usually has a fairly low interest rate so long as the payments are kept up) isn’t horrendous on over £100,000 a year. £75,000, some at high interest rates (based on the monthly amount) plus the car is a significantly larger amount of debt.

The OP needs to speak to him now not in a few weeks. He can’t keep burying his head in the sand.

£7k income and a mortgage of £600. Where on earth is it going??

Hi OP I work for a well known retail bank and trust me on this when I say you're not alone. Credit has been very easy to get over the years and lots of people have spent beyond their means. My advice to you would be 0% balance transfer cards or if your husband is agreeable and you have the equity you could add some or all of this onto to your mortgage? You would obviously be paying it off over a longer term so you'd have to think about that too.. but you are definitely not on your own! I see people like yourself all the time..

I think in the long run, you will both benefit from a rock bottom moment. You really need this situation to blow up as it can't go on so put the car in the mix and don't sugar coat it..

You have 3k a month 'spare' and yet the debt has still increased overall.

I would go over to the Money Saving Expert debt free wanabee boards as you'll get better advice there and the mutual situation you are looking for.

Your budget is clearly not working and I suspect he is an equal in the frittering of money. You both need to be on board with this as it's going to require a major change of mindset as well as spending.

I'm going to out myself as a dave ramsey fan here, your salary is your best shovel for digging yourself out of debt, and you have a big shovel. With over 3k a month spare to throw at your debt, that's 25 months even if we round down your spare cash.

If you can work as a team, properly examine expenses, live like you're poor, and take into account that some of your existing 4k expense is tackling some of the capital, you could probably take that down to 20 months.

Imagine Christmas 2025 when you're debt free and that month's spare £3,000 went entirely on Christmas celebrations? That's your goal now.

3k every month (in theory)?

I am assuming that this doesn’t take all additional costs (savings quota for potential repairs, taxes, insurance deductibles etc) into account. or you’d be able to put 36k a year toward paying off that debt!

But I am honestly rather surprised that you’ve managed to add to this debt even taking the holiday and new carpets into account based on this information.

You need professional help tbh. I’m not sure you’ll manage to get out of this otherwise!

Yes, but it doesn't sound like there was ever any actual agreement between the OP and her DH that she would manage the finances. If they had agreed that it was "her job", they I agree that the onus would have been on her to make him aware.

I don't think that's what has happened here though. It sounds more like neither of them were taking any responsibility for managing their money initially, then the OP realised that someone should get a grip on it, and her DH continued to take no interest.

Sure, you can argue that the OP should have pushed him to take more of an interest when she realised how bad things had got, but unless she specifically agreed to take on responsibility for managing it, I don't see how his lack of engagement lets him off the hook in the slightest. He is an adult and he was equally responsible.

A holiday and carpets aren't 75k though. There is more underlying your overspending if your mortgage is only £600 pm. You need to break down your expenditure into essentials and luxuries . How much money are you spending on the debts each month compared to income?

You are both at fault but not alone particularly high earners who tend to be bury head in the sand people as they either think they earn well so shouldn't have to budget or assume they will never have a problem clearing it whenever they decide to sort it out. What I would say is you are one emergency away from disaster. Illness, death, divorce or redundancy can push you over the edge so I strongly suggest you sort it out now.

MSE have a DFW forum and there are loads on there with your level of debt. If you have £3k spare each month but presumably no savings you must be overspending a lot.

I'm not trying to apportion the right amount of blame to each party - I'm just saying that he might actually be so clueless as to automatically think that his car was included in the £75k figure and therefore he doesn't believe the cursory questions which you suggested would be natural, was worth his time or effort. I was just saying that this would tally with the kind of person who is a financial ostrich.

I absolutely agree.

the “car-issue” makes this considerably worse.

OP needs to speak to her DH and be open and honest. Not mentioning (aka concealing) additional debt is just as bad as lying in this particular situation!

And they require professional help.

Do not consolidate debt or put it on to the mortgage. If you have 4.5 years before you remortgage then use that time to sort out the unsecured debt as your monthly repayment will definitely increase unless interest rates come down considerably.

How much is the car finance? If you have a £7k income and only £600 mortgage how much are you spending servicing the debt? Is it on 0%? I suggest you both go through your bank statements and see where your money is going.

Some of it is 0% and some is in the form of loans. 0% offers are becoming harder and harder to obtain though. I think that our high debt level goes against us, as well as the fact that there are fewer offers available in general

OK, yes, fair enough.

He might indeed be lacking in any sense of personal responsibility and it might therefore not occur to him to ask any questions about the debt/ try to understand where it came from.

But in that case, the onus is still on him to investigate further. The OP is absolutely responsible for her share of the debt and for the decisions that she has made which have contributed to that debt, but she isn't responsible for what he does or doesn't know about their financial situation unless she is actively trying to hide information from him.

The fact that he seems to have unilaterally decided that it is her responsibility doesn't absolve him of responsibility himself. They both need to own what's gone wrong and jointly develop a plan to put it right.

I agree with this.
OP forget about trying to find comfort on the finding of how much debt people accumulate.
I would say you will find anything in the spectrum.
We don't have any debts but only money saved. Morgage just paid. I hate credit cards and rarely use mine, i hate the thought of owing money.
I'm in the same fortunate situation as you regarding joint income. It's possible to have zero debts (if you are well paid). You can set yourself the target to live debt free in 5 years time or earlier. You won't look back. Its possible. Best of luck.

How much is the car and what's the structure of the debt? Arguably it's just a monthly payment you're making for ongoing access to a vehicle. But that'll depend on a few things.

OP, I would recommend that you seek professional debt advice. It won't cost you anything, they won't judge you and they will help to to develop a plan. Depending on where you go, they may also be able to help you with some advice about how you can avoid getting into further debt in the future.