Money and MIL - advice needed (sorry it is quite long)

[shil0846]

This is more about my mother-in-law, however it is starting to affect my relationship with my husband and I would really appreciate some advice.

My father-in-law died last year leaving a lot of debt, but also a lot of valuable art work. My MIL also had a £15k credit card bill on which she was paying masses of interest. When she was widowed, she couldn't afford to keep paying the interest and was desperate. We therefore paid for the funeral and also took £15k out of our mortgage to lend it to her for 3 months to give her time to sell some of the art work. We are paying 4% interest on this.

11 months later she hasn't sold anything. I have sent pictures of items to auction houses to get them valued, but when I tell her what they say she tuts and says she paid far more than that and she wouldn't sell for such a low price.

The added complication is that I had a baby 6 months ago and we need the money back to buy a bigger place (we're in a tiny flat) and to fund my maternity leave. My MIL is aware of this (I have told her as plainly as I can without upsetting her). Her reaction is to apologize and say that she is ruining everything...yet she just doesn't sell anything. Most recently when I raise it she's started telling me how lucky I am to have had all this time with my DS, as she went back to work when my husband was 4 months old.

I generally have a good relationship with my MIL, but am starting to resent the fact that my family is suffering because we paid her credit card bill. I also feel duped. My husband gets really defensive when I mention it and reminds me that she's lost her husband and he's lost his father. So we end up arguing.

I know that the grief is still raw and suspect she doesn't want to part with any possessions she bought with her late husband, but I'm desperate to spend longer with my DS and could do so if she would only pay us back.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

Xx

he is a mummys boy and a coward and if you and your child don't, escape how your lives will be full of hate, misery, resentment and DEBT

Good lord I like my mil but we would stop getting on pretty fast if she took 15 grand from me. Sorry this is still going on OP.

jeez Louise i would get out of where.

*there

This is now very different from just being skint. Don't you think?

I think you need to tell him things have got to the point you want couples counselling. That not wanting his mother to bleed you dry does not constitute normal MIL/DIL tensions. If nothing else, the awareness you're that upset and angry may make him back off a tad.

But I do also think it's worth remembering (I mean posters here, not you OP) that this week is the anniversary of his father's death. While he is being outrageous, I think trying to set up a place where a neutral third party makes him properly listen to you and intervenes if he tries to play this off as in-law tensions might be really, really handy. And I think tackling this in a couple of weeks, when the anniversary is safely past, might be an idea.

Your BIL is also an entitled arse. Your DH funding him and MIL is one thing; bad, but at least he's willing, and at least he's their relation. Yet just expecting you to (and without the least gratitude!) is disgraceful, especially when you have a young baby and literally can't afford it. You married their son/brother, so your earnings are theirs to purloin, and your saying "enough" is somehow your bad behaviour?!

With my DH she's saying she's identified the items she's going to sell and keeps talking about the [2] items she's put into auction and how hard she's trying to pay us back. She's also in tears a lot. To me (when I suggests that she actually takes items to the auction house for sale) she fobs me off, says that the estimates they quoted are too low and goes off at a tangent.

But of course. Manipulative, greedy and ruthless - and it's her own son she's doing this to. No wonder the poor sod doesn't want to believe it.

Just read the entire thread.

Fffffffffffffuck.

The entire family, your DH included, are unhinged. I just cannot envisage an end to this. MIL will sit on that money - the house equity, the art, the car - and bleed your family dry. Because she CAN.

He cares more about his mother than about you. He is emotionally blind to his conniving selfish mother's ways. I am really sorry OP but he is not a nice man and his family are not nice people.

Your DH doesn't realize how serious it is- perhaps a visit to a solicitor by you to discuss ways of getting back your money might focus his mind.

I'm sorry but I can never see a happy ending to any thread where the husband hasn't realized his wife and children are his priority over his mum. This is a lesson I will be sure to teach my son, once he grows up mum should slip down the pecking order. Unless your husband stands up to your grasping mil, your marriage is in huge trouble.

What a mess what on earth are you going to do now.

Op - I don't think that your DH will ever make his mum re-pay you and he will finance her re-mortgage whether you agree or not. If he was going to back you up, he would have done so by now.

So the only option is for you to decide what to do for your future.

You can stay with your DH knowing where you come in his priorities, always wondering if he is going to give more money away, never getting the things you want or even need for your child

....or.....

you can leave and start a new life, financially independent, without the negative pressure hanging over you from him.

I think that even if you do stay that you will eventually split - maybe not for years - but you will, as the pressure from his family will keep coming and you will have a breakdown through financial and emotional stress. By then it will be to late for you to get your own home as you will be faced with so much debt that you will never be free from it.

And then where does that debt go to? On to your children. Do you really want them paying for their Grandparents selfish ways?

Your DH's relationship with his DM reminds me of my DH and his DM in the early days. Well, I say early days, but it was 10 years before he realised he ultimately had to give one of us priority. He couldn't sit on the fence, and say one thing to me, and another to her.

So, he chose me.

Her next gambit was to disinherit him.

You need to get him to go to counseling with him ASAP.

Because THEY are driving a wedge through your marriage. It won't survive unless you roll over and give all your money to him, for him to pass onto his mum. And you don't say anything about what he/they do.

OP - I'm so sorry this is still dragging on and your H is digging his heels in even more. MyBoys has it spot on ..... unless he agrees to counselling, and unless, as a result of that, he realises that his wife and child should come first, and sets about recovering the £15k (plus interest) as well as promising - and meaning it - never to bail her out again without your express agreement.

However, although I think counselling is a very good idea as a last ditch attempt to resolve this, I fear he may be too entrenched to change his attitude - and it's almost certainly going to be a long process if he eventually does. In the meantime, you'll be continuing to pay interest of course and having to face up to the real issues of going back to work earlier than you want and the prospect of remaining in a small property that's going to feel ever smaller as your son grows up. In other words, counselling is a gamble - and if it solves nothing, you'd be prolonging the agony of remaining in a relationship where you're not respected and where "agreements" you make with your H mean nothing.

I think it would do you no harm at all to seek legal advice for yourself asap - on the basis that knowledge is power. You need to find out where you stand should you split, and also about recovering your share of this loan, as I assume it was joint money. The prospect of divorce might just give him the kick up the backside he needs.

OP, can he remortgage his mum's house on his own? Are all your assets in joint names? Is he by far the bigger earner? Because if you own jointly, and both contribute, then I can't see the bank agreeing to lend money on the strength of a 50% share in a flat and serviced by an income which covers half of a family's needs already?

OP I think you now have the answer that you have been dreading from your DH, he does see the £15000 as a gift and is not worried about you or your DC. He will take out a mortgage or whatever he needs to keep his DM in her home whatever the cost to your family.

I would be furious in your position but even more I would feel so let down as he seems to care so much more for his DM than for you or his child.

I think I would be considering couples council but that I would also be suggesting he moves out (and possibly back with his DM) as he seems to wan to put her first.

When I started reading this thread I thought the issue was your MIL but it is now apparent that it is you DP who is giving away your family money without discussion.

He does realise, doesn't he, that he is not 'making MIL lose her home'?

She and FIL did that.

What he is doing is making you and your family lose your own chance of a family home.

I'm so sorry Op than your DH is turning this into a battle between you and your MIL instead of focusing on the real problem which is your MIL's woeful financial situation. He is not doing her any favours by sticking his head in the sand.
Unfortunately she probably is going to get less for her 'treasures' than she thinks unless she had an amazing eye for what was going to be hot in the antique/fine art market. This is often a problem with people, and especially the older generation, who believed that any antique they bought would be an investment.

Focusing on the small things like the art work or the car or even the £15,000 (and I realise that it's not small to you) is just detracting from the bigger picture. If that was sorted out then you would get your £15,000.

I would be worried that if she had £15000 on a credit card in the first place she would be running up more debts on it now it was paid off.

If she is anything like my mother when my Dad died, she maybe gripped with inertia. My Dad did everything and my mother found it too hard to start doing stuff she'd never done before. She kept saying she was going to do it and then getting cross and upset when I asked her. Turns out she was scared and I ended up helping her. Maybe if your DH took all the financial matters in hand for her you would get this mess sorted and she would be glad you did it.

Any point showing him this thread? Just a thought...

Your husband will keep his mother in a large house she doesn't need at the expense of providing adequate accommodation for his own family.

Your marriage is as good as over.

You figure nowhere.

I do think you need to emphasis the bigger picture. If you dwell on you wanting your money back as your prime motive, then of course he is going to get defensive. If you approach it where you want financial stability and prosperity for all the family then you are more likely to get somewhere.
Financial matters should be kept free from emotional affairs as far as possible, otherwise bad decisions are made.

I think perhaps the dh does not see it as prioritising his mum, as he does not really see what he is taking away from his wife and child: I assume he imagines he will finance his life through credit, as his mum has done, and that somehow everything will float along nicely.
He needs a reality check.

Well MistressIggi, that's it ... what, exactly, does the DH think ?

He's already had a go (or several) at the OP for being "nasty" to his mother. This must surely be in the wider picture context of the OP saying to him "but how can we afford for me to stay on maternity leave longer unless we get this money back?". They must have had discussions about how and when they can move to a larger property, and, at the time of the original "loan", they must have discussed and "agreed" terms since the OP refers to it being - supposedly - a short term loan for just 3 months. Her DH quite obviously must know that that 3 month period is long past and he must also know that his wife wants to stay on ML for as long as she can - and they must have discussed that long before now, probably before she became pregnant, and when this loan was first mooted, I'm sure the ML issue must have been discussed again then as it seems that money which would otherwise have been used to fund it has been handed over to MIL.

It seems to me that the DH has very conveniently chosen to either "forget" all the past conversations and agreements he's mad with his wife, which is unlikely, or, he has made a choice and he has prioritised his mother which he must know means puts the kybosh on extended ML and them moving to a larger place sooner rather than later.

It's all very well being concerned for his mother etc etc and perhaps his attitude might be more understandable if he was making any other suggestions about how their previously agreed plans could be afforded regardless of MIL paying the loan back (not that she should be let off the hook indefinitely) but clearly, he's come up with no alternative solutions or else the OP would be telling a very different story.

It strikes me that the DH is less worried about upsetting his wife than he is about upsetting his mother. He'd prefer her to go back to work earlier than assert himself with his mother - who promised she'd sell some art work (so it's not like this should be a shock to her after all). As for moving somewhere larger, he's either banking on the possibility of this promotion the OP mentioned to fund this, or perhaps worse, is muddling along with a "something'll work out" approach. Anything, other than reclaim their money from Mummy dearest. The promotion isn't a certainty and the "something'll work out" thing definitely isn't - yet what is certain is that MIL has had £15k (plus interest) from them and they need it back.

I think the OP has been duped not only by MIL but by her DH and she must feel like she's been kicked in the guts. I wonder if this talk of selling antiques was only ever a sop to the OP as otherwise her DH knew she wouldn't have agreed - and wouldn't have signed the paperwork needed to add £15k to their mortgage. Just like he "agreed" (albeit in an "absent minded" way according to the OP's post 25/9) that they wouldn't take on MIL's remortgage and now, 2-3 weeks later is saying that he will do this for her.

Oh yes, I think he's definitely made his choice.

I totally fail to see what's so horrific about a woman in her 60s moving out of the large house she (presumably) needed to raise her family in, to one more suited to her current needs. She should be able to afford somewhere nice, possibly nearer to her DS and his family so she can see them more often without anyone spending a fortune on travel. It's not flinging a poor old widow out onto the street, however she chooses to present it to her gullible son.

Look at it the other way round for a minute.

Let's say that this is a nice, ordinary family. FIL died last year; MIL has a low income; OP is on maternity leave.

Would OP and her husband feel obliged to buy this ordinary, not-wealthy MIL, to cheer her up:
a 6-bed house?
a classic car?
a roomful of artwork?
a Tory party subscription?

No? The why does she need all these things?

I'd say she needs a loving family, sympathy, a place to live, and contact with her grandchild.

Hmmm...

OP sorry but this would be becoming a dealbreaker for me. I could not respect a man who put the financial security of our family at risk because he can't stand up to his mother.

His mother is understandably trying to cling to the lifestyle she has enjoyed for many years. Your DH needs to step up and give her the unpalatable truth: she can no longer afford that lifestyle (if indeed she ever could) because her circumstances have changed. A great many people have to go through the pain of this further loss of family home after losing a spouse. Unfortunately it is part of life unless people have made adequate plans for the future.

Her selfishness seems breathtaking but ultimately she doesn't care about YOU. She cares about herself first and foremost and presumably cares somewhat about her son. He is the only person who will be able to tell it straight. She will have no concern about you, your marriage, even your DC - she's like a bear blindly defending her cave. Your DH needs to be on your side. He also needs to be the voice of reason.

For what it's worth, I would not allow any man - my husband included - to risk bringing me into debt for the sake of someone who doesn't give a shit about me. I would separate before that happened.