DH not happy with equal split of money...

[StampHappy]

I know, another one of these chestnuts... (namechanger btw)

DH and I have just got married and we have a 2.5 year old DD. Up until now our finances have (probably quite unwisely) been separate. When I was on mat leave and working part time I had far less money than DH, so I would pay for a few bits e.g. groceries, and DH would sub me money. Then when I increased my hours I paid for the nursery fees. We never actually worked out what was fair ratio wise and just carried on like this, but I was permanently skint and DH would give me extra money if I needed it. Then when we got engaged a year ago I went full time and we both saved up the same amount per month towards the wedding.

DH's job became unstable during this time and it has now changed twice which has affected our finances, some costs spiralled close to the wedding date which we weren't expecting, and the upshot is that we have some debt to pay off now. I feel uncomfortable about this and want to pay it off asap, but I'm forever being made to feel guilty by DH like the reason I have debt is because of overspending. Whilst there have been unforseen costs that have come up, I don't think I have been irresponsible, though with the hindsight of the final cost of the wedding I would have reigned it in.

That's by the by now though, we are married and we both have debt (roughly the same amount) that we want to get rid of in order to start saving and move house. I have suggested to DH that we sit down work out finances as he was under the impression that he pays far more on bills etc than I do. He earns £15k more than me. Turns out, I pay £1400 on bills (nursery fees and groceries) he pays £1600 on the rest (mortgage, council tax, car etc). His disposable income is therefore more than double mine.

I suggested that we take both our disposable incomes and split it so we have the same, and can therefore pay the same off our debts so we can clear the whole lot in a few months. This would leave us with roughly £500 each to pay for our work travel, mobile phones and other personal bills (this comes to £230 for me). He is not happy at all and says this is a shit amount. This is far more than I have had to myself each month for a whole year (plus I'm the one who buys birthday cards and presents etc). If we leave it as it is, I literally end up with £0 after bills and debt payments. DH ends up with £1000! He's just telling me he'll have a think about it, but I can't see what other solution is fair? We both work the same hours and have equal responsiblity as a parent. I think £500 each is plenty and we are lucky to have it.

I'm so upset and hate having this conversation. Before DH and I got together I was not at all sensible with money and had a huge debt, which thankfully I cleared. But I always sense he doesn't trust me with money, which in turn I suppose makes me more wary of telling him when I have run out. All I want now as a family is to pay off the money and be sensible about this and above all for it to be fair. I'm not sure it does either of us any good if we can't pay it off but I think he feels like this debt is mine and he's being penalised because of it. The only reason I have this debt is because of the expense of the last year and the fact I have had such little money of my own.

What can I suggest that is fair? And yes, I know getting into debt was stupid but it was unexpected and we'll definitely not get ourselves in this position again

Thanks if you have managed to get the end of this essay...

He's being an arse
He clearly doesn't understand the true costs of living as a family and you have been cushioning him from it. You are one unit now, and no, no-one gets to have five times more disposable income than the other.
The only fair solution is for all money to go into one account and all essential bills to come out of it. Then debts are paid from it (they are your SHARED debts if they arise from the wedding). After that is paid for you have some money each to spend at whim.

IMO you have to insist on this. You can be sympathetic to him for being hacked off about his drop in disposable income but he is being unrealistic.

Both our salaries have gone into one account for years (we're not married, but have joint mortgage and 2 kids) and we just spend what we want out of that once all bills are paid. I used to earn more than DP, but now I'm part-time and his career has taken off a bit he earns about £1k more than me gross per month - we never ever assume that one of us has more money than the other - we're a family, we have family money

I would be horrified if my DH felt that way. Since we had DS1 all of our money has gone into a joint account and we are both free to spend from it

I was yourr DH. I feel shit admitting this now...but three years ago when DD1 was 3 or 4, I had FAR more disposable income than DH and when he realised it, I was so annoyed that he wanted some.

It was pure selfishness on my part...and the fact that I liked to be in charge of buying all the "nice" things for the family.... didn't wat to give up my money as it meant I wouldn' be able to buy so many nice clothes and house thing.

It took me a year to realise how wrong it was....all DHs cash was going on bills.

He is being selfish.

He earns more than you because he's a man and presumably you're doing the lion's share of wifework, which impedes your career opportunities and enables him to earn more than you, at your expense.

Sorry but a man (or woman) who wants more money than their partner, is struggling to understand what marriage/ partnership is IMO. It's supposed to be roughly equal. The person who earns more isn't supposed to have more - that only works if you're both single.

I earn nothing.

DH's salary goes into our joint account and all bills, food shopping, things for the DCs and other family expenses (savings, holidays etc etc) come out of that. We each take the same amount of 'pocket money' which we put into our own accounts to use for our own clothes, haircuts and whatever else we want to buy for ourselves. He has an additional amount each month to pay for his fuel costs to go to work (my petrol comes out of the joint account because it is either us going somewhere as a family or me taking the boys somewhere).

IMO this is the only fair way. He has hugely increased his salary over the last few years, and the only reason he has been able to do that is because I have been looking after his children, running our home and basically leaving him free to focus on his job.
Neither of us believe that he should be the only one to benefit from that increase in income.

How about going about it a different way if he doesn't like your proposal.

If the incoming money is 100%, what % does he earn and what % do you earn

Add up all the household outgoings, that makes 100%, you and he both contribute to the outgoings pro rate.

So if he earns 60% of the money, he contributes whatever sum represents 60% of the total outgoings, you cover the remaining 40% of the outgoings based on bringing in 40% of the income.

That seems more equitable than expecting you to hand over 100% of your income to cover half (or there abouts) of the outgoings, while he on a higher wage is handing over a far smaller proportion.

It is not a perfect solution, but might work as a compromise.

pro rata, not pro rate

Words of one syllable (for your husband, not you).

You are married. Neither of you now have 'your' money separately: legally, everything belongs to both of you. LEGALLY!

The good thing about being a family like this is that EVERYTHING is shared. Everyone BENEFITS from this, because no matter what the specifics, it ALWAYS cuts both ways. In your case, right now (note that this might well not always be the case!) one of your 'benefits' is that you have more disposable income than you otherwise might have done. One of his 'benefits', for example, is now having a child for which another person has been kind enough to take the pension/pay/prospects hit of going on maternity leave to raise so far.

Would you ever suggest that because YOU gave birth to your child, and YOU took maternity leave, thus making more of a financial 'contribution' to her existence, that you 'own' her more, or have more of a 'right' to decide her future?

No of course not. That would be silly. You're a family, right?

The bottom line is that the magic formula that keeps a marriage happy is fairness, and fairness about finances is a golden rule which you trash at your peril. Sorry, it ISN'T fair that your DH has more disposable income than you - no, not even if he is earningevery penny of the money, because both of you work for the good of the family, and there'll be plenty of times and plenty of situations where your contribution happens to be greater than his, and he 'benefits'.

If either of you get into the 'flatmates' mentality of 'well I did this so I get more of this, and you owe me that...' then I can guarantee you that you will have a less happy marriage than you could have had. And, unlike a couple of hundred quid more a month of disposable income, a happy marriage is beyond price.

Tell your DH to think about that and to have a good, good, very very long think about what he really wants out of life. Does he want a happy family? Does he want a long and happy marriage? Does he want to put his all into supporting his wife, and having in return the priceless feeling of love and security in the knowledge that if times get tough, she'll be right there behind him? Does he want his children to grow up respecting him and his generous heart, and being proud to model his behaviour themselves?

Or would he rather squander that for the hollow victory of having a few extra pounds stay selfishly in his own pocket? Is there actually any point to that? - err, don't you spend your time and your leisure money mainly together as a family anyway?

This is one of the most important mental 'watersheds' to truly embracing marriage and family that there is. Many fail at this. Hope your 'D'H doesn't!

I do not get the logic of his and her money either.

You are team now.

I earn a fraction of what DH earns but we pool all our money and we spend as and when we need to. DH does not give me housekeeping money. I can spend freely at the supermarket but that is because he knows I wont go crazy and spend £200 a week on booze or ready meals or whatever.

He sorts the DD and moves money from the current account to the savings account. If we wanted to spend a big amount then we would talk about it.

Did you take vows when you got married? What about 'all I am I give to you, all I have I share with you'? (that's in the C of E vows anyway)

DH earns all our money at the mo but it all goes into our joint account and we both spend what we like (though obviously we consult eachother on any major purchase)

In terms of the debt, have you pointed out to him that the only reason you have it, is because you didn't have a more equitable financial set up? If you had had the same amount of disposable income as his at that time, what would the situation be? Would you have debt? Would he?

I know you've said that he wasn't purposefully putting you in that position, that you just hadn't organised things - but he is equally as culpable as you for having allowed this situation to arise.

I am going to show him this thread as you guys are saying much more coherantly what I want to say to him. How does it help us on the mortgage front if he has zero debt but I've hardly paid off any of mine?

I am a SAHM. My labour is therefore unpaid.

We have a joint account. All bills are paid from this account (I take responsibility for running the home so order oil/coal/wood, do grocery shops, pay bill that come through the post, set up direct debits etc.)

Once all financial responsibilities are met (including small amount of savings) we have very little disposable income. For personal expenditure we are very thrifty and usually discuss any big purchases. I trust DH and he me and we work with what we've got.

Fabulous post Hamster.

Perhaps if we had more disposable income things would be different but we don't. We tend not to buy on credit.

Your debt is his, his is your's. You're married now. It's that simple.

Did he think marriage was just a big expensive party? It isn't. It means you've pooled all your resources and everything you have is jointly owned.

could I add, that I have "housekeeping" because when we moved to this house we took on a much larger mortgage and it was imperative that I stuck to the budget (not because I might overspend, but I prefer to know what money I have got) - it works for us - if anything comes up that we weren't expecting eg. new washing machine we talk about it and it would come out of our savings

It is a difficult one and I'm stating the obvious I suppose in saying that you should have discussed this pre-marriage. I know that what DH and I do would not work for everyone but I have a very strong "you only rely on one person and that's yourself" ethic so DH and I do very much keep separate incomes, each putting in the same to a joint account each month for the mortgage and bills. This is largely because he is not the most reliable with money and work in general so I feel it's important to keep the vast majority of my income separate, reading between the lines (and I'm not saying it's fair or accurate in your case) your DH may feel the same.

The flip side of my way of doing things is that when I was paying £1000 a month in childcare, I paid every penny of it because we run our finances so separately, it's only now that the childcare expenses are much lower that I am in a relatively comfortable position and can go out and buy a nice car which DH could never afford because I keep my income separate. I know many people will think that's horrid and mad but I just don't think that getting married means you should lose your financial autonomy.

As I said, there isn't a right and wrong on this but you and your DH need to sit down and talk calmly about what will work now and in the future because your circumstances will change and you need something that is flexible.

When I was married to my XH, I funded him through university as the sole wage earner. Once he graduated he got a job but throughout our time together I earned at least double and often more like quadruple the amount he earned.

Our money was paid into a joint account, and it simply never even occurred to me that we shouldn't share it equally between ourselves. We were a partnership. If he wanted a new guitar, or I wanted a new dress, then that was fine (although we would each check with the other before spending large sums of money, as a matter of courtesy rather than anything else).

Sadly, our relationship faltered, and one of the main reasons was that he was secretly ashamed of my greater earning power and felt it dimished him as a man. Although I'm happier now with my new DH than I ever was with XH, I still wish that XH had been able to tell me how he felt. It might have saved a lot of heartache.

Yes thanks for all the post, and hamster I think I am going to email your response to him as you seem to have hit the nail on the head

Vicky if you earn more, do you contribute more?

But the OP's H hasn't lost his financial autonomy, he will still have money to spend. If anything, it would enable him to gain more autonomy because he can do what he likes with his equal share - save it, spend it on a car, whatever he wants. The OP has been subsidising his lifestyle up until now.

The morgage debt isn't "his" or "yours" if it relates to a house you both own and live in. It is "our" debt, and it goes in the household outgoings.

Same for any residual debt relating to your wedding."Our" wedding, "our" debt. See what I mean ?

It is better for the FAMILY to get these debts dealt with and paid off as a FAMILY, because that way the total incoming goes futher, far sooner and less community money gets wasted on interest.

Do you know how his parents manage their money and have you ever got a vibe from them that they regard you as a bit flighty with money ? It might be worth knowing what factors above and beyond your coupledom are influencing his thinking.

wonderful post shouty hamster