Argument over a £1

[ForGentleBeaker]

Years ago my best friend and her husband ran into severe financial difficulties and were going to lose their home. I was pregnant, hormonal, emotional, my head was all over the place, and I desperately wanted to help them.
At that time I had no money but we owned a property in an absolute rundown part of London - my husband purchased it with a gift from his parents and I was added to the deeds after we were married.
Long story short, my attempt to help my friend went awry, and my husband had to sell the property. The property is worth an absolute fortune now. The whole area has undergone gentrification, and we missed out on the crazy London property boom.

My husband doesn't ever want to discuss and I had thought we had put it behind us. I have immense guilt.

Last week, whilst grocery shopping with him, I exchange a premium product for a store brand, and he went ballistic. He started mumbling about why I was saving pennies when I happlynlissed away so much trying to help my friend.

In the car, I was called a jumped up bitch, and he spent the journey home ranting at me for making him sell the property; being a SAHM when the children were younger; spending money; and diminishing his role and magnifying mine.

He is refusing to speak to me because he doesnt want to listen to the verbal diarrhea coming out of my mouth - his words.

I don't know where we go from here. We have 3 children, and he is an excellent father, and husband, till now. It seems he has been harbouring this resent towards me but there is nothing I can do.

But then he would have lost the chance to see his kid grow up.

It was a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" situation for her DH.

Well, it sounds like that although you did everything with the best of intentions, your action has disadvantaged your family - and no, I can't blame your husband for feeling annoyed, not about agree about that.

I'm afraid you have a lot of work to do to repair this.

Here’s a suggestion: why don’t you show this thread to your husband? He might find it helpful.

It would potentially be one small but not entirely insignificant gesture towards something new and different from you.

The title makes your husband sound petty and to be honest it sounds like you lent this friend money a very long time ago. His grievance over this should have been discussed then rather than letting it stew for this long.
I get why he's pissed though by your comments you went ahead and made a major financial decision despite him not being on board with it. You took out a large sum loan knowing that you couldn't have afforded it yourself without your husbands income considering you had nothing yourself due to not working at that time. I get as a married couple finances are a household income for the entire family but that also means both of you should have agreed before going ahead and handing over a substantial amount of funds to your friend. Unfortunately your friends left you in a position where you couldn't pay your loan off due to them not honouring their promise to pay you back and it meant that you and your husband had to sell your property quickly to cover your bank loan. If this was the other way around I'd take a guess that there would be a ton of comments of how the husband would be called all sorts and accused of controlling and financially abusing his wife. No he shouldn't have called you all of those names at all and this matter should have been addressed a long time ago. There is wrong on both sides here and you obviously need to either move on from his grievance or part ways if you can't resolve your issues

Agree it’s a self pity party and me me me me me - not a hint of genuine accountability of remorse.

And of course there’s more and could have done - getting off her arse and earning money to contribute to the household would be a start.

How much did you borrow? It sounds like an absolutely stupid thing to do, did you tell your DH before you did it? Did he guarantee the loan and offer the house as security? If he was involved from the start then the blame is equal, but if you just did it and he had to pick up the pieces I'm afraid it's not something that could easily be forgotten, even if he has tried to forgive it's sure to be a lingering hurt that comes to the surface from time to time.

Bloke here.

I’ve had a similar experience, having to drop £40K to ‘save’ a partner, years ago, but I didn’t need to sell anything and soon made it back, so it didn’t matter and I can laugh about it now.

There’s only one explanation why the husband put up with this at the time: the OP must have been as hot as hell and a bloody good shag 😁.

Maybe that’s changed.

OP: I assume this was all years ago and the children have grown up. Get your lazy arse back to work and help with family finances. There is no other honourable solution.

" He should have walked at the time rather than harbour this resentment"

I can see why he didn't walk out at the time. Fathers to new borns if not with mum end up being the ones away from the day to day care of their baby and have to slowly build up overnight/alone contact...I wouldn't want to be in that situation with my baby. He probably felt like he would try and squash the feelings to be able to be an active part in his new borns life. Obviously, it hasn't worked but I can see why he tried

"Bloke Here"

🙄

... I feel particularly upset about how this will affect our children. I had to have therapy to deal with this but, there is nothing I can do.
You could have gotten a job to repay the loan, but you didn't.

I've asked already, but will ask again @ForGentleBeaker - do you work now?

I suspect she cared more about everyone around applauding her for her generosity. My exh was exactly like that, giving away stuff that we could have sold or flashing the cash regardless that we were living hand to mouth and he was contributing hardly anything to our finances.

You beat me to it, but I'll do it anyway.🙄

😅

Just saying this again….

I actually cannot believe your DH is still with you. You keep making it all about you, playing the victim, and not acknowledging your massive fuckup.

But London properties, even in deprived areas, normally end up massively increasing in value as the area becomes more gentrified. How long ago was this?

I'm still flabbergasted that you borrowed the money to help your friends. I could possibly understand if you had a lot of your own money in savings, that you could use to help your friend, but you didn't have any money. You couldn't afford to help them. You put your own family's finances in jeopardy to help 'friends' who never paid you back. Did you try to get the money back from them or did you just passively accept the situation?

OP you’re getting a hard time here as people are imagining the worst case scenario. I’m thinking a ball park of £20k max? And then selling the house to get enough equity to pay the loan back, but not that the ENTIRE proceeds of the house were used to cover the loan?

The fact that property prices have risen is neither here nor there. Presumably when your H decided that selling the house was the answer he had no idea of the future implications! How he can be cross at you for not having a crystal ball is a mystery to me.

Of course he can feel annoyed about the original issue, but magnifying it by factoring in what the property is worth now is stupid and cruel. He knows you regret your naïveté, he knows it affected you at the time and ever since. Bringing it up with bells on to make you feel shitty for trying to make a sensible purchase is unnecessarily cruel. And those piling on here and saying they’re angry at you too need to step back. Yes it was a foolish decision, but one made out of kindness not spite. Your friend (or ex-friend) should have gone out of their way to pay you back, keeping up with inflation. If they didn’t then by all means he should be angry at them. But to blame you for what he’s missed out on re property price increases is madness.

My XH turned down a job with a small start up business many years ago. He was offered shares as the salary was low. He declined. That company was EasyJet! We laugh about how rich he could have been but nobody is nasty to him for a decision he made at the time because we missed out on the future gains. Your H needs to put in perspective the actual money that was lost, not the potential he never realised.

Oh thank god! Otherwise how would us little women know anything.... especially that the H stayed with op because of her looks 🙄

Yep where would we be without the menz coming along to mansplain and bring it all back to sex

I would suggest counselling, he’s got a lot of resentment there, which as his job is now a little unstable is coming to the fore.

If you've minimised it to your husband the what you have done here - your thread title and some of your responses, it's extremely unsurprising that it's causing major resentment.

The fact that property prices have risen is neither here nor there. Presumably when your H decided that selling the house was the answer he had no idea of the future implications! How he can be cross at you for not having a crystal ball is a mystery to me.

For me, the monetary loss is irrelevant, especially the potential gain from property value rising. Going behind his back and the lack of trust that entailed is the issue I wouldn’t be able to see past

OP, I’m struggling to have much sympathy for you

I’m surprised if those figures are accurate - I sold a 2 bed terrace in east London in 2003 for close to £200k - I paid £45k in 1994

I chose a property in Acton and in Lewisham which sold in 2025 and also sold in 2000.

Ha ha!

Thank you ladies, but I always say that when posting, as believe it unfair to hide the fact on what is primarily a female forum.

It also helps by allowing a certain type of member to immediately find what I say is wrong, without going to the trouble of actually reading it. 🙄

x