Am I being unfair? Couple finances

[Cluelessfirstimer]

Me and DP own a home together (with mortgage) and have 1 DS.

We are not married. This is by choice for me. I dont want this thread to get into a back and forth if thats a wise decision or not but ive mentioned it as its relevant.

Ive always been very clear that everything has to be 50/50 in terms of bills and mortgage etc. Even before we purchased a home.

I have a good career and earn well - about £80k all in. DP has lost a few jobs for various reasons over the year and as such earns less. £40k.

He earns enough to cover his half of the bills and enough left over but I pay for almost all the food, any child care and basically everything else we do or need. Ive just paid for our holiday.

Anyway - we have had some work done on the house which I outlaid for. I have said DP needs to pay me back his half at some point.

Hes had an absolute shit fit this evening about it and started saying we should stagger the bills and mortgage to relate to salary. Im totally against this. We have been together a long time and although I dont forsee it I know if we split we would each get 50% of the house. I find it incredibly unfair that I should have paid more.

He CAN afford his half he CAN afford to pay me half for the work (ive suggested very small installments) so im pretty pissed off this has started now.

Am I being completely unfair here? My mum got absolutely shafted when her and my dad split up so ive always been nervous and keen to protect myself financially. I feel ive worked really hard to do that and have always been clear about wanting things to be 50/50.

Ah. No way would I also pay more for the Reno’s then. He got a baby for free with you looking after baby like you didn’t work and paying for baby like you did work, while he toddled along as usual. ‘The reason men support women financially is because women are doing the home and parenting load. You don’t flex your work to be a great present parent, you leave that all to me. I do pay more you didn’t even pay more when I wasn’t earning and it wasn’t because I lost my job it was because I was busy looking after our baby, all that time was for us. I want to stick to half on renos, you aren’t interested in pulling your weight at home and with parenting but also don’t seem to think you should pull your weight with any finances.

Yeah thats a fair point. I dont think he really sees what all the extras add up to. Food prices are ridiculous. Holiday is a large outlay for me thay im not sure he really understands.

I think if he really saw what they add up to he might see a little more how they stack up

Was coming on to say this.

Also, make sure your will means things are in trust for your child, and his dad can't spend it willy nilly.

Im in the process of sorting a will yes. @99bottlesofkombucha honestly I never even mentioned mat leave or the work around for childcare. Just kind of accepted it was me who would be sorting it. Thats not to fault him, I just took it on completely. Its a point though.

I'm with you, OP! Sounds like you've got a sensible and fair arrangement given you pay for loads of extra things. I would never share my finances with anyone again and would never marry again for that reason. I agree you want to protect your interests and why shouldn't you benefit from the additional income you have? You presumably work hard for it! The only thing I would potentially look at is the bills and extra activities - maybe you could split that proportionally to your income. But I 100% agree on splitting the mortgage 50/50

For what it's worth, one of those agony aunt Slate type articles was just like this, and said if you're planning to be together permanently, it should be scaled, so if I earn £30 K and my husband £60, I pay half.
I thought, while reading it, it should also depend on who does how much-for example if I earned half as much as my husband because I only work 50%, then I should do more housework to make up for it.
But those are only 2 opinions-sure you'll have lots more to consider shortly!

We went proportional until we had a child. It was roughly 55/45.

Now that we have a child we combine our income, pay the bills/save and take half each.

Having a baby meant one of us going part time, we value the time spent looking after the baby like it’s work, because it is. Nobody should be less well off.

I think your system is the worst of all worlds. If you want it to be “fair” then go proportional, if you want to be a mature partnership with children then consider halves.

I really appreciate all the different views.
Just to clarify a few points

Just mortgage and bills are 50/50.

I pay for everything else. Aside from DPs hobbies/own purchases.

Childcare is 95% me. DP will do 1 drop off and pick up once a month when I need to go to the office. School holidays are me or my mum if I have a lot of work on.

It was DPs idea for the renno. I was happy with it but was equally ok if it didnt happen.

During mat leave it was still the same set up. I have never even mentioned this to DP. I used the small savings I had to cover things.

I have never issue paying more. But I do? Food childcare holidays essentials etc.

I understand it earn more. I work hard for my salary. Ive only ever wanted to protect myself in the event things went wrong. With the house. And what I would get.

We generally have a good relationship. I was thrown by his absolute outburst at me asking for half the renno. As much as you are in love with someone it doesnt mean something can change.

As I said my mums experience has made me a little more paranoid about things. I dont come from money. Ive worked quite hard to ensure my family have a good stable life (mine always wasnt) which is why I appreciate thoughts on it

How did it come about that it was your DP’s idea for the reno work on the house, but he obviously didn’t have any funds available to pay for it?

I take it you’ve already paid for it, give that you’re asking for half back in instalments from him?

Who the fuck did he think was going to pay for it, just you… not him too?

Did he/does he think you should pay for it all?

You're not married.

50/50 is fair. He made you pay half when you were on maternity leave using your savings. Now that he's feeling the pinch he wants to change things to a wage proportionate split. So you are to subsidize him because he's at a lower wage because he's lost multiple jobs.

Those financial red flags are flying. You have a long standing agreement about sharing costs. He doesn't want to pay his share of home improvements and the mortgage yet keep 50% equity despite not putting that in.

Yes, you're already paying more for your child and you just paid for a holiday. Food, maternity leave, it's on you.

I think he's trying to screw you over financially and this would be a hill to die on. If he wants 50% equity, he pays 50%. Proportionate split means proportionate of everything and you've been paying more than 50% as it now stands.

I think you were smart not to marry this guy. I'd be checking out my options here.

I'm invested. Please come back and tell us what he makes of the spreadsheet once you've had the conversation, OP.

I echo the PP who said seeing it on paper might actually make him realise how much more you're paying, and how much better off (I suspect) he is in your current set-up.

It’s doesn’t sound like a partnership at all, more like two tenants that happen to share a child!

I will update for sure. Im pretty good with money. Rarely buy things for myself and still dont have a whole lot left each month so I do think it will be a shock to him when I break things down.

I honestly think he is under the assumption that because I earn double I take home double (sadly not true!) and all the extra food childcare and in-between bits and bobs massively add up.

Regardless of anything else, he should be paying half the childcare bill. It's shocking that he doesn't.
And it may be cutting off your nose to spite your face somewhat, but I'd stop booking holidays and say you can't afford them.
Seems to be you are more than paying your share and if the house is 50/50 then mortgage and anything house related should be 50/50. Perhaps bills and holidays proportional to income but house and childcare should definitely be 50/50.

The only thing with the holiday is that wouldnt be fair on my son. Which breaks my heart that he wouldnt have a holiday. Otherwise I really would

I do agree with the childcare though. I did mention this to him previously but he gave the waffle of how I earn more. It annoyed me but I just let it go to be honest.

Youre right though. We both work. We both have a child. Our bill is significantly reduced with the childcare hours (neither of us earn over 100k) but he should be contributing to that in some way.

It may be that if you end up with roughly the same amount of spending money at the end of the month, then you are already effectively paying in proportion for everything and you don't need to make a point of keeping the mortgage 50/50.

Let's say (for simplicity) the mortgage is 2000 per month and your household bills are 1000, food is 1000, childcare is 250, car/holiday pot is 250.

You can split it like this:
Him: 1000 mortgage, 500 bills
You: 1000 mortgage, 500 bills, 1000 food, 250 childcare, 250 car

Or you can split it like this:
Him: 666 mortgage, 333 bills, 333 food, 83 childcare, 83 car
You: 1334 mortgage, 667 bills, 667 food, 167 childcare, 167 car

He's paying (1000+500) or (666+333+333+83+83).
Either way it's 1.5k.
You're paying (1000+500+1000+250+250) or (1334+667+667+167+167).
Either way it's 3k.

You may even find that paying proportionally works out better for you if interest rates come down and the cost of living rises.

Interesting
so he wants a quality when it suits him, but not when it’s not working in his favour

Children cope fine without holidays. You'd be sensible not to spend your precious remaining salary on holidays that your partner isn't contributing to. If you really can't bear that, then reduce the cost of the holidays. Such a shame that you work hard for your salary - as everyone does - and spend a massive portion of it subsiding a man. You'd be no worse off financially without him. And I'd say the same if the sexes were reversed.
regardless of everything else - he should paying towards childcare for his own child.

Did you have to because that’s what HE wanted or because that’s what YOU wanted?

It all sounds so complicated. We created a joint account when we married, both salaries went into it directly, and all outgoings came out.
Over the years our salaries fluctuated, sometimes he earned more, sometimes I did. But no negotiations were needed about proportions as it all came out of the same pot.
We were a team.

Wasn't a huge discussion. I had a panic about money while I was on mat leave and he said we will be fine.

Still transferred half of the mortgage and bills and paid towards the general stuff. I did mention i was using savings maybe once? But that was the extend of the convo about it. We should have discussed it more. We didnt. You live and learn.

What we do is keep an equal amount for our personal spends (in our case £300 a month) and everything else goes into a joint account. That way no one is better or worse off, and bills are covered. If we want work done to the house we only do it if we have the money already saved from our joint earnings.

We are married though, I appreciate you may want to keep finances more separate.

I totally agree with this. In our household, all money is family money.

I agreed with pp who said it really should be proportional to wages until I saw he does fuck all else. It is costing you in time as well as money. When the genders are reversed, as people always like to scream on here, the higher earning man is never also doing all the housework and childcare. In fact the women, whether the higher or the lower earner of the couple, seems to always have the parenting expenses of both time and money.

I agree with many other pp. You need an accurate spreadsheet that covers on page one all house costs, page two all child costs, page three all childcare related tasks, page four all housework.

And I would not be saying he gets 50/50 in a split as he isnt acting as a 50/50 parent.