Little bit theoretical at the moment, but I'm thinking for the future and wondering what people see as fair in this kind of situation.
I have no children, high earner.
Partner is a much lower earner (currently about 20% my income, could get up to 40-50%) and self employed, so money is a bit erratic. He has 1dc and 50/50 residence. I'm early 40s, he's late.
I don't think it's relevant, but people always ask this kind of thing, so for background.
I've had long term relationships but never married. He is divorced. His dc's mother was a post-divorce girlfriend, they were together about 2 years. They're still friendly but fairly distant about co-parenting.
We've been together a couple of years, now thinking about living together, wondering what would be a fair split of costs and expenses. No plans to marry, no plans to have dc together.
On the one hand, I have way more disposable income.
On the other hand, we have both gone through large amounts of our lives separately, and made life and career choices separately, so I don't see why either of us should have to compensate for the other's choices.
My feeling is that 50/50 on all expenses for the house, food, utilities would be fair.
I don't mind covering a bit extra for his dc, but I don't really see any attraction in pooling funds or a proportional split.
I'm happy to pick up most of the costs for going out, holidays etc, including paying for both him and his dc, and even for extra curricular activities for dc, but I want it to be a choice whether I do so, or whether we do something cheaper that he can afford to contribute to equally. And from another perspective I can see that that could be considered controlling, even though it's money I earned that I would be making the decisions about.
What do you think is fair in this situation and why?