Any valid reasons to 'fast-track' moving in?

[AnnabelsParrots]

TL:DR:
Separated nearly two years, moved areas, renting is making a dent in my savings, is two and a half years too soon to buy with new-but-not-new man if it means my kids are more settled/happier. I have kids, he does not. They know him and really like him.

Long version:
My children (7, 11)'s father ended our relationship during lockdown (spring 2020). We had moved several years prior to be near his family. I had no family support in this area, and it was better for me (and I truly feel, my kids) to move a few hours away back to my home area (I had never settled in his area nor been happy there). The children were happy to move, they are still home educated so school wasn't an issue, and they are happier in this area. Their father also moved to my home area (half an hour away) to be near the children, and he's happy enough as he got a better job and has a few friends here too.

We've sold the family home, so I have a small deposit now.
I am currently living in less than ideal conditions, the idea being to rent til the house sold, then work out where to buy/be in a good position not in a chain. I can only afford a tiny house with probably no garden in this area. Even if I move further out, I won't be able to stretch to much. In the meantime, I'm haemorrhaging money on rent, and am financially not thriving, and this doesn't feel like home as we know we aren't staying.

I have reunited with an ex-partner from 20 years ago (so I know him very well, he's not new.). We've been talking daily for nearly a year now. Then seen each other quite regularly since lockdown restrictions eased, as my childcare permitted. Things are going great, and we see a future together. He has no kids of his own, did want them but it didn't happen, and he'd love to be involved in some capacity with mine now. He's the brother of one of my best friends, my children have met him four times since we've moved back as part of a group with my friends and their kids, including one long weekend where there were 20 of us hanging out, and another weekend where there were a dozen of us. Then a day just the four of us doing an activity he and my kids are especially in to, that I'm rubbish at, so the kids didn't think it weird that I'd roped in some adult help. I know these holiday-style weekends/activities aren't real day-to-day life, but I feel it bodes well that they get on so well. My youngest has asked a few times when we are seeing him again as he's so fun.
I have other male friends and it's very normal for my children to know my adult friends.
My children do not know he and I are in a relationship; I have wanted to give them time to grieve their father and my relationship being over, and adjust to the current changes. I do believe they are in as good a place emotionally as could be hoped. They both really like him. He always makes a great effort to engage with them, he's fun and funny and really natural with them.

He does not live near here. He is willing to uproot himself from where he is, and move back here. (His sister/her kids (friends with my kids) also lives here, which is a bonus to him/her, but he'd be moving back for me.)

What timescales should I be considering optimal for the children? He is offering to wait as long as need be, and has been very patient with me and my situation.

The children come first. I would like to progress things soon, for them as much as me/him. He and I have discussed my talking with them after Xmas, maybe early spring, and planting the seed that we like each other as more than just friends. Does that sound reasonable? A good way to go about it? (I am absolutely sure that neither child suspects anything, they are both not wise in that sense.)

IF they take to the idea as well as possible (I truly think that they will), what timescales are good with a view to moving in together? I'm willing to wait as long as it takes for them to feel happy, adjusted etc. But. And here's the reason for my thread title. We really aren't very happy in the house we are in. It's way too small for us, causing a lot of stress. It's surely not worth me putting the equity I will get from my house towards buying a house of my own (even if I could; it's looking very hard to get a mortgage on my income plus my age) only to sell in what, two to four years to buy with DP. So I stay renting a little longer, but we don't feel settled here, it's not a great place, we all feel like we are living in limbo. Combining our assets feels like a wise move, that would benefit us all, especially the children.

If DP and I pool our resources, sooner rather than later, we will all be better off, both in a better property (a room each for the kids, a garden, nicer area), and have more money at the end of the month, and ease the stress of my current housing situation. Is it reasonable to think we should do this, and hope to be moved in, by next Xmas (so start house hunting summer 22)? That'll mean it's two years since I moved them out of the old family home. I'm convinced they will be happier in a better property. If, obviously, once they learn DP and I want to be in a relationship, IF they are ok with that (I do think they will be.). There's no huge reason for Xmas 22, but it feels reasonable to me, and I really feel we will all be happier and feel settled. The kids both say they don't feel settled in the property we are in.

Is two and a half years fast, to be living with a man that isn't their father (let's assume they are happy with him, and my relationship with him. Obviously if they aren't, that changes everything.).

Anything we should be doing?
Any reading recommendations?

Thanks

I also think financial considerations are weighing too heavily on you in this. So - let's talk a bit about the finances if you did as you plan.

With all the potential issues helpfully outlined above, you'll both need a way to realign your delightful instant family fantasies with reality.

Counselling helps, but it costs. Significantly. Factor in at least £100 a week to give you both a weekly session - and recognize that this could be ongoing for several years.

You could also both spend some months reading this forum, but that might put you off entirely....

I don't think that it's the timing as much as the fact your children have only met him four times and they don't even know that you are in a relationship with him. It is still very early days for them even though it isn't for you.

I think you should focus on improving your finances independently rather than banking on combining with him the future.

Honestly, OP, I think you need to remove all financial/property considerations from your thinking here, because they’re skewing your judgement. Sure, it might work, but if it doesn’t the fallout for your children, and for you, is huge. I know well someone with three children from her first marriage whose second marriage — to a lovely man with no children — ran aground in heartbreaking circumstances simply because, despite a longer timescale than yours, he simply couldn’t adjust to daily life with her children. Like your situation, distance meant it was difficult for him to spend extended time with her and her children, so they decided to pool their finances, marry and buy somewhere together — but family life was a big shock all round. They remained in love, but the situation just didn’t work at all, the children grew increasingly resentful of his attitude to them, and by the time they split, their relationship was too damaged to keep going even on a ‘living apart’ basis, and of course the children’s lives were disrupted again.

I’m the “childless” one in our marriage. We moved in together 3 years after I met the children and we stayed in the same property they already lived in for another 2 years, so that if it didn’t work out, the kids wouldn’t have had to move at all. This worked really well for us all. We just wanted to avoid the prospect of too many house moves for the kids, if things went south. Not sure if this is helpful to your experience in any way but just thought I would share. Good luck!xx

Hi Op,

You’ve had some very good, candid advice here. I think there’s certain things at play:

• It’s a deep biological imperative to want to securely house your kids and that feeling of transience you currently have is in part driving you (colouring your vision)

• You have a “roadmap” mindset. I understand that. You have a plan, a plan with some powerful draws, and now are sticking to that doggedly with tunnel vision as an anchor of security after a period of upheaval and transience. A roadmap / plan / timeline can feel very grounding, it’s hard to loosen up when you’ve fixed your mind on that

I do think you’re not looking at it all as laterally as you could however. And I also think increasing your liabilities (in any area of life not just property), is generally a very bad idea when you have DC as a lone parent. I think creating a small, but secure anchor of your own stability makes infinitely more sense. To create something untouchable … is well, invaluable.

My story as a single parent for the past 7 years (3DC): have rented 4 flats, bought a one bed flat, then recently used that to upgrade to a small but lovely 2 bed house for 4 of us. Our own front door, a garden. It’s lovely and it’s mine.

I have a DP of 3 years. If we pooled resources I could overnight reduce work hours, no longer be sleeping in a living room, get a 3rd/4th bedroom. But I won’t do it. DP of 3 years who I trust and after 7 years of being a single parent.

Because I know the value of minimising your liabilities and having something that is untouchably your own.

Try to look at risk and risk assessment more laterally. By moving in with your DP you move some “risks” (sharing rooms/ no garage and garden shed), but you also generate new and different risks. Which “risks” see you with more to potentially lose? I believe you can get to a point where you can creatively and resourcefully decide where to take a “hit” in life. Because there’s always a “hit.” Always. Will the be the elusive 3rd bedroom as it is for me? Or will the hit be the family dynamic as you know it? I’m not saying this guy can’t / won’t enrichen your lives, but also, I’d encourage you to feel “enough” alone.

As for me, we have 2 bedrooms for 4 of us. I sleep in the living room. Am saving for a lovely pull down wall bed. Eventually (very eventually) maybe a loft conversion. 2 DC share. I work long hours and have slowly and steadily increased my OWN lending and financial capacity. I could change all of this overnight by pooling my lot with a DP. But while it would add in some ways, what it could stand to potentially lose or risk in other ways is just too high.

When I walk down the stairs when DC are in bed at night (actual stairs - for 6 years I was in flats), the golden feeling never gets old. It’s mine. No one has a stake in it. No one has increased my liability. Do you not want that feeling? That feeling that you have housed your DC? Small can also be wonderful - with clever design and innovation - and within time you can add to what you have - and this will bring you a far deeper level satisfaction.

Your DP (or any of us) could get sick, no longer be able to work, and the liability picture could change. Minimising and mitigating risk is the smarter way I think. In your shoes I’d advise you to play a long game. Moving in with DP is a “quick fix.” Makes a lot of sense on paper but on a deeper level it side tracks huge amount of growth and personal achievement.

In your shoes I’d focus on growing what you can achieve alone. Buying within your means and taking great pride in making it as lovely as you can. Take pride in the small but wholly yours place. Increase your mortgage capacity over time through steady hard work and playing a long game. Then move up ladder. DP can add to and enhance your lives without being a necessary anchor to it. Risks are too high in my view and “risk” of being frazzled by managing alone are a question of subjectivity. You could also look at it as role modelling for your DC, having pride, managing your own show, being mistress of your destiny. Some days when I’m really tired I do consider the superficially lighter load of those who share their lives, but it still doesn’t make it compelling enough for me to risk my kids roof, and the beautiful intimacy of a haven that is theirs and mine.

See your partner from a place of added additional value not as a pivot to a better life that becomes very difficult to undo.

Fantastic post @FJKP

I hope things continue to go well for you

Before you agree to move in take a 2 week self catering holiday, and have a no strings attached holiday.
See who he is when it comes to chores cooking and your children being THERE all the time. Then talk to your child and LISTEN to them.

Thank you @Hotelhelp - I’m hoping to have my wall bed by Xmas and space for a large tacky xmas tree :)

I’d like OP to see the power of lateral thinking. When you’ve been through the turmoil of a break up / divorce, black and white thinking and the roadmap mindset can be very compelling. But it’s formulaic and doesn’t scratch the surface.

It’s like “he always wanted kids” + “I have kids” = let’s move in together. No disrespect at all to the OP. I think it takes years of reeling before we can plateau and stabilise and Op could do well to just take stock and take more time. But moving deposit funds into small but careful investment of her own will be almost certainly a good thing. A launchpad.

I also hated the idea that I couldn’t do one single neat move into the forever home! It just wasn’t and isn’t doable. The journey takes patience. :)

A man is not a plan.

If I were you I'd spend the next 2 years working towards providing a good life for my children all by myself. Not treading water in a shit rental waiting for a bloke to come along and rescue us.

@FJKP that is a fantastic post. If there is one post on this thread @AnnabelsParrots should read, it is yours.

Here was my fast-track timeline which mumsnet will hate!

Me - completely lone parent to DS 5.

DP - has two slightly old primary school age children, shares 50/50 custody, amicable relationship with ex as much as these things can be. EW already had stable partner the kids knew when we met. Our kids get on well.

We have just moved in together officially full time after 18 months, but we have spending every weekend together, along with the kids, for about a year. Also holidays, and local lockdowns, nursery/ school closures we would spend together. So moving in doesn't feel like much of a change or a big deal.

We are waiting to buy together and have a legal agreement in place so if anything goes wrong we get what we put in back.

We are moving in because we miss each other when we are apart. We love each other. The kids get on well and I miss DSC when they are not here. We want to grow with the kids - we think moving in will become harder when they are pre-teens. We like having support of the other, but we generally tend to focus our parenting on our respective children (getting them up, dress, school runs ect). We are in our thirties and want to marry and continue growing together, but we don't want to have more kids together.

Neither of us need the other at all financially. We both have good incomes and savings to get homes ourselves on our own (we were about to do so when we met.). If anything happened we should still be able to do so.

I think what I am trying to say is, timelines are different for everyone, just make sure you are doing everything because you want to, and because it brings more happiness to you both and your children, but don't do it because you feel you need to

You split with this man once OP, it could easily happen again. Personally I'd wait a good few years of your DC knowing him as your partner (in your own timeline, that would be roughly a year from them knowing him as your DP to moving in) before buying a house together.

As PP have said, the financial side seems to be driving this, which is the wrong focus. I'm currently buying a 3 bed house for me and my DC. If a met a nam with the same earning capacity, I could buy a mansion. It doesn't make it the right thing to do by your DC. Read @FJKP's post above over and over, so much of that could also apply to your situation.

P.S. Allowing a man you met the previous night to sleep in your house when you have DC, and especially a DD is sheer madness. Don't follow the advice of that poster, even if it worked out for them.

Why not try renting a place together before buying?

@FJKP That is SUCH a great post. @AnnabelsParrots you need to read and re-read it.

When someone asks "is this long enough to do XYZ" it's impossible to answer because every relationship dynamic is different and works at different paces.

I had a relationship for a year where I was nowhere near ready to let him meet the children and then I've met someone where I saw that happening sooner.

Every relationship is different and nobody on this forum or in your personal life knows exactly how you, your children and other half feel and how good it is between you all.

If it feels right for you, it does, so do it.

I hope it all goes well 🥰

@NoYOUbekind

Financial interdependence is literally the worst reason to fast track a relationship. This is a terrible idea.

This. As someone who had a parent who moved a partner in too fast I would say you are definitely not prioritising your kids.

From what you are saying, you don’t like the drop in quality of life- size of house and sense of financial strain- that being single parent gives you.

You talk about heammoraging money on rent, but this attitude is allowing you to think a fast track to financial entanglement is ok.

Is it that you are spending your equity from the house on rent? In which case, It sounds like you need to find a way to earn more, probably by accepting that home education is a luxury you can’t afford as a single parent.

Six months of being single after the split of a long term relationship with dc is not very long to be getting together with a new partner. I don’t think that’s always wrong, but allowing a longer phase of being together, developing relationships and not living together would protect you and your dc from the potential problems.

My first marriage was to someone from a different culture. We broke up due to differences in expectations. I then got together with someone who was much more aligned with my home culture. The relief was huge. 8 years later, there have been cracks. The contrast probably blinded me to some massive challenges that in hindsight I feel i did ignore.
We lived apart for 6 years, before moving in together, and this helped me to focus on my kids.
Accept that your living standards will be compromised and focus on the joy of being a lucky mum who has a bf who wants to be with you.

Another question which I don't think has been answered:
Do you work for money/work outside the home?
If not, your ex is presumably paying for rent/kids?
(If so, where do the kids go?)
How is that side of things going to work?
Will he want/be expected to help with home ed?
Are you also effectively relying on him to sub you (if you don't work)?
I can see why you are cramped with a two bed and home ed BUT you really must have him to stay. I assume you don't sleep in a single bed currently?
By the way you could rent a garage/lockup for bikes and other stuff.

I don’t think you’ve been with the new man long enough to consider moving in yet. You’ve been seeing each other not even a full year and most of your interactions have been holiday-style situations which don’t reflect real life.

I think opening up with your kids about starting to date in spring 22 is fine, but I think you need 18 months minimum of him being a consistent, regular presence in your lives before you even think about moving in together.

Home is what you make it. A less than ideal house is far, far less of a problem than the wrong man. And however well things are going so far, you simply don’t know yet if this guy is the right one.

Proceed with caution OP. So much of this arrangement seems driven by your lack of ability to secure a mortgage on a property you consider desirable. Take the blinkers off and see the situation for what it is: he's met your dc 4 times, they aren't aware you are in a relationship, you are incredibly confident your dc will be happy living with him.
If you read this board there were so many like you, except they were even spending every weekend together as a family. The man adored the children until they all moved into a new home together, then he started picking at their habits, not liking their manners, resenting their presence. It is very unfair to move your dc in with someone who has never stayed the night with them.

DS and me moved in with DP after about 18 months, however I was split from ex years at that stage so DS was used to us not being together etc. Similar to you, DP was someone I had already known and so we didn’t need to go through the getting to know each other phase of a relationship.
I had moved back to my home town to start life afresh and plan was to eventually buy my own place, however it became clear over time that our relationship is for keeps. No decision or talks of moving in took place until I was sure about DS and DP. DP is like a fun uncle to DS, they get on great, however me and DP as a couple would of come to a grinding halt if they hadn’t clicked. Only after their relationship had progressed did we seriously consider when to move in. I am financially better off living with DP, but it wasn’t part of the decision making process from either of us.
I would set aside to financial side of things and focus first on whether this man is for keeps or if you guys are in the honeymoon phase. Family life isn’t all activities and get togethers so you need to figure out how everyday life will go. You need to see what your DP is like when one of the kids are on their not so best behaviour. Will he be telling you how to parent, over step boundaries etc. One or both kids could go through a real clingy phase even though they might like your DP. There will be lots of little hurdles to cross before moving in is a realistic decision to make.

@MrsRobbieHart

Put it this way- if he didn’t exist you’d have to house yourself according to your own resources. And you’d do it. So do it now. Don’t fast track a relationship to get an extra bedroom or a garden. And don’t tie yourself financially to someone you really don’t know well enough to be tying yourself to. I’m sure you thought you’d never split from DCs dad either, but you have.

this!! do what you need to do for YOU and your child, buy a house now even small, and consider the rest later