DH and his bonus

[Docugirl]

Can anyone help me articulate why this bothers me so much?

This is not the first time money issues have come up with my DH.

I can’t figure out how to actually say this without sounding grabby and needy.

We pay for our family day to day expenses proportionally. DH earns over twice as much as me.

He gets a large bonus at the end of the year and as per previous years, he does not mention anything about it. He expects anything outside of our usual set up to be spit 50 50. This wouldn’t be a problem for me if our earnings were equal.

We have had some big, essential expenses over the last few years and I have no savings left after paying for my half. We have no joint accounts and he has form for being tight with money so this is a sensitive issue for me. I really have to work at putting some money aside and often go without myself just to have some savings. I have no visibility of his bank account, I know about the bonus payment from our online tax account, and can only presume he has substantial savings.

How does this play out in other houses? He is good at his job and deserves this bonus. I don’t actually want any of it from him but I can’t explain why it bothers me, I think it’s that he won’t celebrate it with me. Like he doesn’t trust me.

Years ago when I wasn’t working full time and our kids were little, he use to give me 200 from his bonus. I used to buy Christmas presents with it, often for him, it wasn’t for me to spend on myself. I actually posted about it one year as he mistakenly transferred me more than 200 and asked me for some of it back.

He really sees this as his own money. Is he right? Some years he has used some of it for household stuff but not recently. I would be happy for him if he treated himself or splashed out on himself. It’s the radio silence that bothers me. While I am always scrambling around looking for deals or trying to do things cheaply so the burden on him isn’t too big, he is earning almost 6 figures.

AIBU about this? I really don’t know

My ex husband was like yours and you're right it doesn't change. If you think they're all me, me, me when you're married, wait until you divorce them. As far as they're concerned it all belongs to them. Your contribution is completely dismissed, especially all the parenting and grunt work that allowed his big career.

My advice to you is to start gathering copies of information now, such as the tax returns, in case you need a forensic accountant to trace the money when he tries to hide it! You can also offset pension share if keeping the house is important to you.

However, a dozen years later with a decent settlement I am completely free of the irritant that is Mr Selfish. My partner could not be more different, generous, selfless and considerate. They are out there.

I guess to me what’s important is that you end up with a broadly similar amount of disposable income &, very importantly, free time. I don’t think how you get to that is important. For us money wise we pool everything & time wise we look at what’s available and split it so I get a couple of evenings out a week/DH gets a couple of weekend days a month to cycle and a couple of evenings a month. For others time might be split so everyone gets one day a month and a night a week or one has a week off once a year vs other having a regular Sunday morning or whatever worlds. Money wise might have one pay more bills but never actually pool money,

My impression is that in general women earning less often do jobs part time or ones demanding less overtime to be around more for household tasks, childcare, elder care etc. In that case they are contributing less money wise but more household/childcare wise (particularly covering everything childcare related when partner has work travel or frequent late finishes) & you can see why a couple would feel it balances out overall.
With men earning less/working less hours I see too many examples where there is still an expectation their wife/girlfriend will do a majority of all the household/childcare work. If I was the wife in that case I’d be pretty resentful about sharing my bonus because I wouldn’t feel like we were operating as a team and making an equitable contribution to our family/relationship. If you feel like everything else is shared fairly then you possibly are being a bit unfair not sharing money the same way.

So much of this is not OK.

You went part-time to birth & raise his children.

I presume you do most of the raising of DC and the housework, and the life admin. And I'm assuming he expects you to support HIS career progression.

Your earning capacity was damaged/set back by taking time off the career ladder to gestate, birth & raise DC.

And he expects you to pay 50/50 towards things?

He is totally unreasonable.

He sounds horrid. You would be better off on your own, having full control of yiur money and his child maintenance contribution.

For most of our working lives our earnings were unequal. DH earned significantly more than me. We always have had separate bank accounts. I have not always known his annual earnings.

For many years I didn't work and just told him what I'd spent at the end nifty each month albeit with a little account book and receipts, but that was more my anal behaviour than his. Admittedly, I am not the last of the big spenders but never, ever did he question a penny.

When I went back to work, initially for peanuts, we agreed he would pay me a monthly allowance for food and out of pocket spends rather than me keeping a detailed log. He viewed my meagre earnings as all mine. My pin money/pocket money.

I've never understood marriages that don't have joint finances. Anything else just isn't a deep partnership.

I'm a bit overwhelmed by all the responses. Thank you all again.

Just to clarify, it's 50 50 on the big expenses. Our mortgage and bills are split proportionally.

Of course you're not unreasonable. This post has made me angry on your behalf. What a nasty selfish man. Divorce him and get half of everything. Hopefully that will teach him a lesson.

This is not what a loving relationship is like. Why do people tolerate men like this. Ugh.

Totally agree, the way he is behaving is a like a single man. And I’m sorry.. but 200 from his bonus when you were on maternity leave!! Haha he is having a laugh. Time to stand up to him.

Are you sure? I am struggling to see how a 50:50 split of the house equity, his savings, pension etc and him paying you a pretty hefty amount of child maintenance on a 6 figure salary would be worse than what you have now.

@Docugirl

Well, DH and I have always had joint finances so any bonuses went in our joint savings. That being said our 'tradition' was (we're retired now) that if the 'bonusee' had something special they'd been wanting then they'd treat themselves and the rest went into savings. Neither of us were 'extravagant', we wouldn't have bought a car or a boat, think more along the line of a nice handbag or a piece of equipment for DH's hobby.

If I were you when it came to non-routine expenses I'd tell DH that repairs and things of that type will need to be paid proportionately and that holidays must be 'tailored' to the lower wage earner (that's you). If that means a caravan in Devon rather than a villa in Spain, so be it. If he wants more than that he can pay more himself.

Thing is, your current set up for non-routine expenses is really keeping you from building up your savings so that you can eventually leave. I know you say it would be devastating financially, but the day may come when things get so intolerable that you'd rather eat bread and dripping in a bedsit than dine on filet mignon in a house with him.

And remember that a house is only bricks and sticks. It's not worth you being miserable just to stay in it. If you can't afford to buy him out, assuming the house is a jointly owned marital asset, he will either need to buy you out or the house will need to be sold and the equity split. Chances are you won't walk away empty handed, and I assume there are also other assets that will have to be split in a divorce.

Maybe it's time to talk to a different solicitor.

In all honesty, most people are worse off after divorce, it's the nature of it. I was on my arse after getting divorced and used to a different lifestyle, but you adjust. It's never worth staying in a bad marriage for.

I simply cannot understand this type of marriage and I'm so sorry you don't feel you can raise this with your husband. How can he see it as his money ffs; you are married with children- it is family money.
All money in our house is shared. The children come first and we both get things we need according to what we have available at the time. We discuss trying to save/pay off mortgage and discuss how things are looking regularly so we both know whether to reign in spending if we have a big expense coming up etc. We are a team.
I don't know where you would start in terms of discussing this if it has been like this for years. Tbh I couldn't stay in a marriage like this but I realise that is v easy to say on the internet. What do his family think about it??

Leaving the money aspect aside OP - do you love him or even like him ? Do you want to stay married?

If not then I think you would be better separating - yes you might have to have a smaller house/flat or shared ownership or rent but you will I'm sure get by - don't forget you get share of all assets and that includes pension / house/ savings - I'm not sure if you have kids under 18 - if you do you will get child maintenance - ( doesn't affect any benefits either if entitled) - why do you think it would be disastrous?

If however this dissatisfaction is 'only' about the money then you need to just get brave and have the chat - because if you don't then it won't change

OP literally said she pays half of everything.

In a divorce she'd get decent CS, half his savings and possibly a larger share of the house/right to stay until kids were 18 depending on how good her solicitor was.

@Docugirl What does he bring to the marriage/children other than paying half the expenses (just like you do)? If the house was sold or he bought you out could you afford to live on your own in a smaller place? He's depleted your savings and doesn't care. You'd be entitled to half his pension too.

At the risk of derailing my own thread. A divorce would mean 50 50 custody of children. No maintenance.

I buy him out of the house. Except I can't because no bank will loan me that amount in addition to the outstanding mortgage.

He buys me out and I buy a flat, if I can find one nearby, which won't have enough bedrooms for me plus 3 kids.

Today's post was to validate my feelings about the bonus and be sure i wasn't completely in the wrong.

Big ticket stuff should be paid in proportion as well so I would be refusing stuff moving forward in the premise I have no money. Then I would save hard so I have my own fund

i would go back now and say you want some of that bonus to repay your extra proportion you have paid when you shouldn’t have

I am the big bonus earner, largest was £30k after tax (not annual - just a good quarter). I booked holidays, great gifts etc. I might be in the wrong as I didn’t automatically give DH half, didn’t occur to me tbh. When we moved I paid £75k off mortgage, to reduce payments. I also suggest that he orders nice clothes on my account periodically. I do however cover way more than 50% of household costs.

What do want to happen? Im thinking of pooling out entire earnings. See what happens - he genuinely doesn’t know what our outgoings are.

I'm on my lunch break and not got much time so I haven't read the whole thread - but this stood out for me on your OP

So anything out of the usual as an OUTGOING is to be split 50:50, but anything out of the usual as an INCOMING isn't shared at all. This is a total double standard and totally works to his advantage.

You put that beautifully. Thank you. This is why I'm posting here!

I know it's all wrong. I know he's mean. I will leave him. It will take a long time.

All this info and reassurance is helping me so much.

I couldn’t live like this. paying bills proportionate to your earnings is not a fair split. He will
always be left with more spare cash than you.

...and now that you know you are completely NOT wrong what are you going to do?

How old are your children?
Where did you get these figures from (50:50, not being able to house your children)?

Have the same issue, however, no children involved and no 6 figure salary so it is different.
I think if it wasn't for the children I would say fair enough, however, factoring the children totally unacceptable.
The reason it bothers you so much is because you want your husband to enjoy sharing it with you and your children and derive pleasure from the sharing, he doesn't and that hurts.
I don't think this will change, some people like spending, some don't, some derive pleasure from having the money in their bank account, your husband falls into the latter category.
Only you know if you have the emotional energy to try and change him.

why do you think he would 50-50 with the kids? can he logistically do that - does he do half the childcare now?

because if its not 50-50 then you may certainly be able to get a larger proportion of the household split, especially if your wages are lower as you took on childcare responsibilities and the hit to your career, so that he could progress up the career ladder himself.

and you dont actually know how much he has stashed away do you, with the secret bonuses?

plus the younger the kids when you leave, the higher the proportion of the house should he not be able to deliver the 50-50.

there are other things for bargaining chips too, such as his pension.