Shared finances woes

[strawberryfluff]

What do other stepparents do in regards their finances? I have hit a stumbling block with DH and am looking at how we move past it. Please don't come at me saying I resent my DSC or whatever.

So at the moment we put a set amount in a shared account to cover bills, food for everyone and our shared DC costs. This is proportionate to our income (our take home pay).

The rest of our income goes into our own personal accounts to spend however we want.

He is arguing that his maintenance payments should be taken off the income before the split is calculated. I have said if he does this then I will be effectively subsising his maintenance payments. As it is I pay the higher mortgage etc due to the extra rooms etc and all food is paid from joint account.

Other possibly relevant info:
I get paid the child benefit and use this to pay for things for our shared child before using joint money pot.
I work part time at the moment as this keeps nursery cost down. But means I earn less. We want a system in place now as im looking for full time work which will increase my salary considerably and I will be the higher earner at that point.
There are two DSC. They both have hobbies that require funding - he pays for half of this from his "discretionary spend" pot which we both agree should be how it works.

No he is not. But I will be higher earner when I return. It is a hit I agreed to take as he is currently contributing more to the childcare costs etc and there's only so much money in the pot! But yes I'm now thinking 🤔

Do you pay a smaller portion of bills, rates and food shop to account for SDC? If not you could point out to him that you already share some of their costs. It's a tough one deciding what pot CM comes out of. If you work a similar number of hours a week (including childcare, house work, mental load etc) then having equal personal money after paying everything feels fair to me. Adding CM to the equation neither the option where he has a lot less personal money (CM out of his account) or you having to contribute more and effectively subsidise the child maintenance he pays, feels fair. At the moment I'd say status quo, but if my income rose significantly I'd want to readdress that to even things out a bit.

@strawberryfluff to expand on what I said - while you're still pt you should be taking the child benefit to top up your pension payments since DH isn't compensating you. All spending on DC should cone out of the joint account. This can of course change once you're back to full-time.

Before you had a joint dc, did he fully fund his dc?

Ahhh. That would have been a good idea. I guess I kind of saw it as their money. Should have asked before we had DC!

I agree with you as well. Not thinking about this is how so many women end up completely screwed financially.

He has got more outgoings because he has three children.

Yes for maintenance and things outside bills/food.

We paid into joint account an equal amount for everything else. Then once DC came along we split according to income.

op

In a normal house if money was tight you would be forced to look at your outgoings and that includes what you spend on your kids.

This is a situation he has created and therefore he should not make those problems your problems. This is his situation and his ex’s.

Why should that child benefit from 3 incomes to support her life?

Is your child going to benefit? No

God no. Keep it all separate. I have never subsidised CM - we split mortgage/bills etc but everything else is separate. Eg I pay rent for mt daughter at uni - I don't expect her stepdad to subsidise that, just like he doesn't expect me to subsidise his kids. If that means one of us has less disposable income, so be it. We're the ones who brought the kids into the world.

Do you pay a smaller portion of bills, rates and food shop to account for SDC? If not you could point out to him that you already share some of their costs no. I pay a smaller portion based on income.

Sorry there's lots of questions hope I've got yo them all!

My husband drives me mad at times but I will be forever grateful that he never viewed my kids like this. It sounds utterly miserable.

Iwasafool

They don’t pool their income - they pay a contribution that is proportional to their income which many couples deem fair

asking the op to suddenly contribute towards his other child who has a mother and father who pay for her is not fair

as a pp said if her kids need things she does not expect the step dad to pay for them and why should he?

the child obviously has access to the ops home and food it’s maintenance that she doesn’t want to subsidise

Thank you, it seems you side more towards the we should both pool everything approach? Is that right? If that is right then I'd be paying his maintenance - especially when I'm a higher earner. How did it work with you and your husband? Were you the higher earner?

At the moment it's not really miserable- once we work out the percentage we just carry on like any normal couple I'd say.

I think you are being perfectly reasonable as you pay towards sc food whilst they are with you and have a higher mortgage to get SC an additional room. It really is up to your DH to pay to support his children when they are not with him. Also fair he pays out of his spending money if he wants to take them out or for their activities. They are after all his children. You are already sacrificing your income by looking after a joint child. Once you go back to work you will no doubt be paying a higher portion into the pot as you say you will be earning more than him. It is up to him to pay his ex for his children. I'd not be dragged into paying an ex for him.

Dad here with DC and a wife who isn’t their mum.
It should be coming out of his own money, as my payments to the kid’s mum does

I'm with you op. He wants you to contribute more so he is better off, so his ex continues to get her money and the only person who suffers is you and your kids.
You're already paying for their food and care via your contribution, it is not your responsibility to pay for his kids when you can't afford to. You have made your own cutbacks ie part time so he needs to find his if he is struggling

Ask yourself do I want to pay ££££ towards his daughter or do I want that ££££ to go towards my life/my child/my savings?

Yes exactly this. I have DC to look out for. He has to look out for all 3 of his kids.

if he's not happy with how much he has left at the end of the month he needs to look at all his outgoings and this should include his spending on the DSC (outside maintenance amount which absolutely mustn't be reduced). But if he thinks he can't afford to pay for their hobbies or he doesn't want to any more then he needs to take that up with their mum

I think that’s OK, except that you then also have to expect it to mean that he pays less towards things you also want your joint DC to have/do/experience. He’s got 3 DC so can only contribute 1/3 of his spare cash towards their ‘nice to have’ stuff. That will probably mean you end up contributing more anyway, if you don’t want your DC’s life restricted.

Taking the DC out of it, it’s basically just an income discrepancy issue. If you’re a higher earner and you’re in a relationship with a lower earner, someone has to compromise - either the higher earner agrees never to go on that expensive holiday/buy that thing/eat out frequently to match the other person’s reduced budget, or they agree that they pay more overall to have those things, subsidising the other person.

I’d also have a think about how presumably the DSC are older and thus currently more expensive with hobbies etc (if you exclude childcare and/or the hit to income) but that depending on your age gap between them
and your DC, they’ll have aged out of needing to be paid for by the time your DC needs more expensive activities etc.

You’re married, so effectively all income is now family wealth creation regardless of who earns it. It’s tricky to feel that you are subbing someone else’s children but OTOH it doesn’t sound like your DH deprioritises your joint DC in any way by his choices?

also I suppose it depends as well how much he pays? If it's a little amount and equating to not much each I'd pay it for arguments sake if I could. But if its a lot I think he should fund his own kids

Not a chance in hell would I be paying essentially half of his maintenance payment. As PP said, he does have more expenses because he has 3 children not 1 like you.

Id honestly make this my hill to die on. Women get shafted enough when it comes to finances, housework, childcare etc.. without having to take it on for DSC too. Absolutely not.

Exactly. So out of the children's actual parents one received the same as always and the other gets more disposable cash because he has someone subbing half of his maintenance payment and you, the person with the least amount of responsibility for these children, are the only one worse off. No. It's an unfair suggestion.

Our finances are separate save for bills. And it's precisely because we are a blended family that I choose to keep it that way. He has more outgoings than I do because he has more children. Simple.

If this were a debt he accrued before he met you, I highly doubt any posters would be telling you that you should be paying it as a household expense because you knew about it when you met. They'd say it's his responsibility to pay for and if he wanted more disposable cash he shouldn't have gotten into debt in the first place. I.e. if you don't want to pay for 3 kids, don't have 3 kids.

3 kids! Ouch. Just no op. Believe me when I say as they get older they get more expensive

If you do give in and pay more you know what will happen? He will continue to spend more on them as they will need it - phones, classes, the latest trainers

Is your property large enough to fit them in? Did you have to purchase somewhere big enough for them all?

Is your salary lower than childcare expenses? Just seems odd to me that you’re happy for him to subsidise you working part time and therefore not pay an equal share of bills, but when you’re the higher earner you want him to cover his bills out of his spending.