He isn't skint.

[AmIbeingUn]

NC for this as personal/outing. Am wondering AIBU? Or WWYD?

Began seeing a local man met on OLD. We matched so perfectly: same age, local, some mutual acquaintances, similar hobbies, outlook, politics, music taste, humour etc. Found him incredibly sexually and emotionally attractive and vice versa.

We became very close and cosy very quickly: daily contact, usually in person, in and out of each others' houses for coffee and a chat, sleeping over at each others houses often, meeting each other's friends and family. Talked loads, for hours, about a wide range of subjects and very frankly. Within weeks we were so close and comfortable with one another it felt like we'd been together for ages.

The only thing that wasn't perfect was that he had no spare spending money. He had gone part time at work to give him the time to renovate his house, singlehandedly, and those renovations also ate up all the money he had left over after paying mortgage and bills. He warned me that, until the house was finished and he returned to full time working, he could not afford to spend much on going out, going away, buying me gifts, unless it was cheap and we split the costs. I am not materialistic so I did not care and to be honest I am a homely person who is more than happy to have dates at each other's houses, cooking each other a meal or watching a film. For Xmas he saw something in a charity shop window which he knew I would love and he even admitted it had cost him only £2 and said he felt guilty and mean and sorry and hoped I would tolerate his being skint until he got back to work and could treat me properly and take me to a swanky restaurant now and again.

Whilst chatting and being in his home whilst things were happening in his daily life he would mention now and again that he was down to his last few pounds, or that the purchase of some essential building materials or an emergency dental problem or vet bill had wiped his bank account. I am not wealthy but I do have a couple of hundred pounds left over every month which I usually just put into a savings account. He never once asked me for money and in fact when I offered to lend him money once or twice he absolutely refused. When I offered to treat him to a fancy meal out or a theatre ticket he also refused, saying that unless he could pay at least his own share, he would not go. I saw these refusals as a confirmation of his honesty and integrity.

One day I was at his house reading the paper after breakfast and he was opposite me on his laptop. As he went to answer the front door I took the dirty plates to the sink and as I turned round to walk back to the table I could not help myself, my eyes were drawn to the screen which had some kind of spreadsheet of figures. I was absolutely staggered to see that he had stocks and shares and an ISA totalling £1.5m. When he came back into the room I just pretended I had not seen anything because I knew I should not have been snooping but I went home and was literally in shock and also really angry that he had been lying to me the whole time.

Next time I stayed at his I deliberately snooped when he was in the shower, and read an open letter about the sale of a flat he owned (which he had never mentioned to me). £250,000 from the sale had been deposited into my boyfriend's bank account about a week before, and yet that very day he had been saying how broke he was.

Am I in the wrong for snooping or is he in the wrong for telling me for a whole year the lie that he is struggling financially from month to month?

What would you do? Confront him and admit you snooped? End it? Tell yourself his finances are none of your business?

How on earth has he managed to get £1.5m in a stocks and shares ISA?

By being the type if person who's so proud of spending only £2 on a Christmas present for a partner that they'll gleefully brag about it.

Bin him off OP. He's intrinsically a skinflint and that won't change.

@LizzieLazzie - but to use a phrase I’ve seen here, he “future faked” they’ve talked about travelling and doing more together once he’s finished his house renovation, the renovation that is leaving him temporarily skint, but he’s not temporarily skint. If he hid his wealth but also said from the outset that he’s a saver, not a spender and that he’s not really interested in spending money on travel and experiences then it would be less devastating and OP could have chosen whether that was the life together she wanted with a romantic partner. I would equate this more to when someone pretends they want marriage and children but gives an excuse as to why not yet, only for it to later materialise that they didn’t actually want those things but just said what their partner wanted to hear.

They don’t split everything fifty fifty—gifts and hosting don’t reflect 50/50 as he limits his spending and spend less than she does. He has also borrowed money from her.

She was happy with a £2 gift because he had droned on interminably that he had no money, was broke, couldn't afford more.

Brilliant he found something she liked in a charity shop for £2. But any normal non tightwad person would buy it, then buy something else costing a little more than two quid! Or take her for a meal. Or a weekend away. Or some perfume. Buy her some flowers. The list is endless but the reason for the £2 present was because he couldn't afford more. He lies.

"But if a gift has been given because he knew the OP would like it, and she did, why does it matter if it cost £2 or £200?

Surely the thought and intention counts and not the cost?"

@YellowphantGrey don't be ridiculous. He has been training the OP from the beginning to not expect anything from him, and he'll have found something at the charity shop that suits him to buy and badged it as being thoughtful because he thought she'd like it. I like crisps but I'd be furious if my partner bought me a £2 multipack of crisps for my birthday because she knows I like crisps. Can you genuinely not see the issue?

I suppose it’s just possible that he wants to be sure you like him for himself, not for his money, before getting properly serious.

On this theme, I once read of a bloke who used a dating agency, but neglected to disclose (except to the agency manager) the info. that he was the MD of his own very successful company. Instead of using his own car for dates, he’d take an ordinary one from his own company’s car pool.

At least one of the women he dated, when asked afterwards how she’d got on with him, replied, ‘I thought he was really nice, but I won’t be seeing him again - I couldn’t date anyone with car like that.’ (Related later by the manager of the dating agency.).
TBH a friend of a dd had exactly the same attitude to men’s cars. If he didn’t have a flash one, she wasn’t interested.

If that was the case he could have pretended to be an ordinary man with an ordinary job and a standard income, rather than lying and pretending to be on the bones of his arse. Their dates could have consisted of standard dates to the cinema or the pub etc. The OP wasn't expecting to be whisked away to Paris and be wined and dined in New York was she?

He could be a millionaire who wants to be loved for himself and not his money. Or he could be part of an elaborate scam..he pleads poverty who "accidently" leaves signs of his "wealth" around the place as lure. He turns down small amounts to build trust then will then go in for the big "bridging loan" to tide him through - and the he scarpers?

The trouble is once the lying starts, anything is plausible.

I see that misogyny is alive and well on this thread. So many posters going on about gold diggers and not being "materialistic" etc. have really swallowed the incel kool aid Totally agree, @StewartGriffin

The whole concept of being a 'gold digger' is a bit redundant when the OP is financially mortgage free herself, with a good wage and financially independent.

She's been working off the assumption she might have to compensate him for not having money in old age, and continuing on anyway. She's the absolute opposite, spending her own time and money on his restricted life to help him finish his house which is looking increasingly unlikely.

No-one can be a 'gold-digger' unless someone else allows it, by spending the money or marrying the 'gold-digger'. This is something men say to justify why they feel aggrieved they have to pay out for their former wife and kids, or to justify why no women like them.

Don't marry, it's easy, you can't be 'gold-dug' if you don't, and this man knows that. If she suggested marriage, he'd choke on his Ribena!

Why are women castigated for the sin of materialism when its just accepted that men will only pursue women of exceptional hotness, sexuality (or chastity) who can give them children and have big earning potential? Men definitely have standards for dating, why can’t women?

Although he was describing himself as skint, this was in the context of also revealing that he was a home owner, undertaking renovations on what sounds like a much more substantial property than he needed as a single childfree man, and with a relatively wealthy elderly parent. Also that working part-time was a lifestyle choice he'd made to undertake the renovations himself.

So, I don't think he was lying, as such, as the context that he didn't hide from you, implied that he was short on cashflow/day to day spending money, rather than actually poor. He even helped you set up investment accounts, which disclosed his savings ability/knowledge. I'd be interested whether he was clear about all that context from the start, or whether it was a drip drip drip as he came to love and trust you? Also, and sorry if I've missed it, did he claim to have a large mortgage? (even if he technically did, it sounds like he could immediately pay it off if he chose to, so this would be a lie.)

The additional context, which he kept from you, is that he has substantial savings. However, you don't know everything. He could have debts or liabilities - or even more savings than you're aware of. But on balance of probabilities you probably saw the big picture from his spreadsheet, and if so it seems to me that he has mentally discounted his wealth as irrelevant to his day-to-day life, because he's decided only to live on what he earns, and save it for the future (or to donate to charity or godchildren or whatever).

In your shoes, I would start to counter the 'skint' narrative any time he said it, and gage his reaction. 'You're not though. You're a property owner who has made the lifestyle choice to go part time and do expensive renovations.' His reaction to that could be very informative. I wonder if he'd be prepared to reframe himself as wealthy-but-frugal rather than skint (which is a bit offensive, frankly)? And if he directly lies in doing so then I'd finish the relationship.

I would also think about what you want, given what you now know about his frugality. Maybe that's an annual holiday, that he books a theatre ticket or similar when it's of interest to you, not just him, and that the penny-pinching with gifts ends. And then I'd raise those as things you want for the medium term onwards, leave him a little time to digest that, and then ask if he can compromise on those things or if your futures are too different.

I suspect that if you ever tell him you snooped on his finances, he'll end it.

This. I think you were very wrong to snoop too

Just end it.

I missed the part where he has been having money off her and that he didn't go 50/50, I only saw this part

He never once asked me for money and in fact when I offered to lend him money once or twice he absolutely refused. When I offered to treat him to a fancy meal out or a theatre ticket he also refused, saying that unless he could pay at least his own share, he would not go. I saw these refusals as a confirmation of his honesty and integrity

I’ve just had a vision of being out with a date and he got a warm, probably battered carton of Ribena out of his pocket. Trying to get the straw out of the plastic and poking it, and then making that slurping noise.
That on its own is just awful.

He maybe testing you. Seeing if you pass the Money Grabber test - however, he doesn't have to be that stingy to make out that £2 is a lot does he? He always comes up with the money for repairs etc and vet bills was it? Any how, he could just sit in the middle and not bring up money at all. Very odd.

Investigate more or bin him off, because he is using you for something.

Exactly. And if we're going to use that term, he is actually the gold digger here. He's the one accepting expensive presents from the OP, letting her subsidise his life (he made her pay for her own tickets to a band HE wanted to see) and so on. It's a bit rich using the term gold digger to describe a financially independent middle aged woman-it's utterly ridiculous.

He sounds mentally ill! I would honestly suggest he get some professional help. This is beyond frugal or stingy, it is totally mad.

And deeply unsexy.

Mind you, I find tight wadness (sp?!) one of the worse traits you can have.

Cannot believe people are actually defending this lying cheapskate miser

My first reaction was that I would distance myself from someone living like this. But if you have a good relationship why can't you tell him you'd like to do more enjoyable things even if they cost money? This could lead to a bit of discussion on finances - he may pick up that you suspect he has more money than he admits without you necessarily saying you had "snooped." Or he may have a reasonable explanation (seems a bit doubtful from what you've said). You don't have to know his full finances - just enough to be able to enjoy things together.

He may be concerned that the elderly mother's money could get swallowed up in care costs / inheritance tax / whatever. Perhaps not counting on that as much as you think?

If he can't compromise I suppose you'd have to question how much this relationship matters to him. Or maybe he does have issues over finances which need addressing.

such an interesting discussion, nothing to add just to follow.

He has constucted an elaborate lie. He doesn't have to tell you how much money he has, but he actually went out of his way to pretend he was skint. He's lied a lot of times.

End the relationship.

Don't bother telling him why, just say you don't think it is working out.

Am dying to know the outcome to all of this!

She liked it because she thought he had no money at all so had scoured charity shops to find something that she might like. In the same way that a parent would think that a £2 gift from a charity shop bought by their small child with their pocket money was lovely, i.e. you lower your expectations. A handful of crushed dandelions given by your toddler is wonderful. It would be less appreciated from your husband.