Should I use savings to cover my share of bills during maternity leave?

[isitlunchtimeyet89]

I’m going on maternity leave soon, for the second time.

The first time, I took a shorter period so I was either on full pay or half pay the entire time. I therefore continued paying my half of mortgage/bills/living expenses as usual. My husband was self employed and his business was badly hit by Covid at the time, but he continued paying his half of all costs too.

This time I am taking a full year. 6 months full pay, 3 months statutory and 3 months unpaid. I’m then taking a lump of accrued annual leave when I go back, so the baby won’t need to go into childcare until he’s 14 months old.

I have been saving up so that I can use my savings to continue to pay my half of the mortgage/bills/living expenses during the low/no pay period. This is quite high (£1650 per month) due to a large mortgage. I was just wondering whether this is normal or whether my husband should be also funding my maternity leave in some way?

This is our last baby so I wanted to take the maximum time with him and also with my daughter, which we both agree is the right decision. We’ve also both had a really tough time the past few years and I in particular have struggled quite a lot mentally/emotionally, so I’m hoping to use the time to get some therapy and hopefully be in a better place before I go back to work. So taking less time isn’t really an option.

He not a stingy person, and is generally pretty generous. We earn a similar amount and split everything equally. We both have our own savings accounts but we don’t really spend large amounts on ourselves, so those savings are mainly for family holidays and future house renovations anyway.

I’m just interested in others’ thoughts on how maternity leave should be funded. Should I be asking him to contribute in some way? Or would you just leave as is?

Sorry if I’m being dumb and missing something. So as an example, say we paid £1500 each per month towards joint expenses normally. During the non paid/SMP period he would pay £2250 and I would pay £750. Does that not seem a fair split?

Is this a joke ? ?
You are married and having a baby together.
Why is he allowing you to carry on as if you are unrelated flat mates and you a single parent ???
What kind of a man is he?
And what are you thinking of too...

Why not share some of your maternity and use shared leave; he can use his savings when he's s on leave?

Why are you paying anything if you're not earning and he is?

I did ask if he wanted to, but realistically because he runs a very small service-based business where he is one of the few people providing the service, taking an extended period of time off just isn’t feasible without the business taking quite a significant hit. He’ll take 2-3 weeks when the baby is first born

His actual monthly take home is very low, and any extra comes from dividends which are occasional and the amount can unpredictable. So realistically he’d need to use his savings to cover any extra too

So, he should do that then.

So the issue is that his income wouldn't stretch to it?

In that case, it's about practicality. Feeling as you do, the better starting point would be that the difference between the costs and his income be split 50/50 between your savings and his.

Not really. Say that even with him contributing the extra £750 and you're also contributing £750, he can still save but you are depleting your savings.

Say he can still save 250. You're savings are going backwards by 750 but his are going up by 250. He's now 1000 a month better off than you. Is that fair?

Or even if he's dipping into his savings by 250 a month but you're dipping into yours by 750 a month. He's still 500 a month better off than you. Is that fair?

And that's not even considering your missed pension contributions.

My DH would happily go through childbirth if he could and not me.

I'm not going to hold biology against him

My situation is a bit different to yours as my take home pay is 4x our monthly bills whereas DH could cover our bills with his salary but wouldn’t have anything left over, not even a £1.

People would probably be up in arms as we split our bill contributions 50:50 and I use the bulk of my disposable income to save for maternity leave. My disposable income is far more than DHs so this would not be fair long term as without that money going into savings, we would live very different lifestyles.

I will self-fund my maternity leave using my savings which have been saved off the back of contributing a very small amount of my disposable income (albeit 50:50) to the household bills.

Once baby comes along, we will just pool funds into one account and all bills will come out of that account but as two young adults, it’s made sense to have separate accounts for “spending money”.

Why should anyone hold biology against anyone? That would be very strange
Stranger still that a married woman seems to take on most of the fiscal responsibility here when she's having a joint child.

I think this is fair. It what we’re going to do and I’m comfortable with it-we both have to use the same amount from our savings to cover the shortfall.
Many mumsnetters seem to have partners that earn a very high amount so they can cover the shortfall easily but I think it’s different if usually each partner splits cost 50/50.
Each to their own though

Does this mean your 50% is coming from your savings, while his 50% comes from his wages?

It should be: all his wages go on living costs, then anything more that comes from savings gets split 50/50.

I'm clearly too invested in this, but I'm so cross you think this is ok!

To continue my thought experiment. Tenish years time from now you have 2 kids in school. Your husband's business has taken off. He's always working. He's earning seriously good money.
Your career has been put on hold. You've turned down a promotion because you couldn't see how you'd be able to take on the extra responsibility and workload. There's homework to get done, clubs to taxi the kids to. They're in wrap around care in the morning and evening. You don't see them enough. Your youngest's class teacher has endless requests of your time. There's craft mornings, assemblies, handwriting practice every Wednesday at 9am. You miss all of it because you're working, so you drop down to 3 days a week. Your income is a fraction of your DH, but you still pay your half of the joint expenses because that's somehow mind bogglingly "fair". Your DH has 1k a month spending money to have fun with and you're wondering if you can afford to buy the kids a ice-cream at the park. You have no savings and a crap pension. Your DH has been investing, he's going to retire when he's 55. You'll have to work until you get your state pension.

Is this a weird pride thing that stops you from seeing you and your DH as a team? Feminism gone wrong?

There's no 'fair split' - all his wages should go on bills while you're on mat leave.

Even she had been inseminated by her flatmate he'd be responsible for contributing to the costs of the child.

Public Service Announcement Ladies: Men are legally and morally financially responsible for the children they father.

Men who try to opt out of this are shits.

Men who are married are meant to offer this support with love.
It's kind of what the marriage thing was about.

OP you seem to be struggling on how to organise this because of the whole my money/ his money thing.

Start regrading it as our money and your problem is solved.

Sounds like 50/50 worst case with him taking on more split in the last 3 months....

Right.

Particularly when she's not earning.

He should be covering all of the expenses while you have no income. You are still contributing - it is just not a financial contribution. It is still valuable and allows him to continue earning.

If his income is not high enough to cover all expenses then for sure split the balance between both of your savings. Don't forget to take into account pension contributions as a joint expense during your mat leave

@ICanLiveWithIt I agree. It's so peculiar.

@ONTHEPREMISES , I agree, unfortunately the problem is there appears to be a lack of "our" money.
The OP has already said that her DH "doesn't plan ahead".

Going against the grain here but I used ‘my’ savings for part of maternity leave.

We have separate accounts (current and savings) and transfer money over (50:50 for mortgage/bills even though I earn nearly twice as much)

BUT we very much see all our money as joint even if it physically isn’t. So anything major that needs savings to pay for we look at whose account is most healthy at the time. I have some in a LISA which is ring fenced for the kids in the future so part of it we can’t access at the moment but his is all in an ISA

I earn more (and have got promotions since returning from mat leave after two under two) so pay for more stuff day to day. We are lucky in the far that we earn reasonably well and feel like we both have the same ‘fun money’ without a joint account or detailed spreadsheet.

We’ve been married over 10 years so if we did divorce everything would be a joint asset anyway. We are definitely a team without needing a team bank account.

No during the 6 months you take your total joint income that is received, pay out all expenses etc and if you are short you then split it 50/50 out of savings. You shouldn't be paying £750 out of savings when you have no income if he is still able to keep some of his income back