A maths question - shared finances

[lemonyaid]

DH has 3 kids, one of who is also my kid.

We have seperate accounts and pay into joint account to cover everyday expenses, mortgage, bills etc.

Previously this has been split according to our incomes. His has been higher. Mine is now higher.

I don't feel I should be paying more than him into the shared account as he has more children to pay for.

The 2 DSC live here every other weekend and half of the school holidays.

I propose making a % adjustment based on this. Eg. He pays 5% more for each child.

What % do you think we should use?

I had a friend who if her husband asked her to pick up a case of beer or some deodorant for him at the supermarket she'd ask him to transfer her the money. That always seemed extremely odd to me.

I guess everyone's different and some people might have their reasons for keeping finances separate. Previous financial abuse or if their partner is a gambling addict or something.

I agree, nothing wrong with keeping finances separate. This isn’t what is happening here.They are children who don’t earn an income and therefore all costs should be 50/50 by their caregivers.

Thank you. We aren't that extreme but it works for us to do it this way.

No you're right, we are semi blending the finances

So if he pays 7% more, does that mean the house is 7% more yours?
What happens if your child goes to visit grandparents, or is away on a school trip, and it messes up the algorithm. What about when his kids get older and eat more or heaven forbid, charge their phones or have longer showers? Will you be negotiating down to the pound?
Of course he should pay for his children, but it seems that resentment is underpinning this who’s isn't healthy.

Also- how sad that he pays via CMS. Does that mean he pays the bare minimum? His choice, or yours?

I'm not their caregiver..

Bloody typos!

I think tbh op wasn't asking for any opinions on how or why she does finance the way it works for her family.

She's asking what the maths is. Ffs.

If she wanted advice on why they keep their money separate I'm sure that she might have mentioned that. That's not a indicator that op didn't realise her dh had children or a indication that she hates her DSc ffs

One - no it's not that detailed. He pays school trips with their mum.

No resentment

He doesn't pay via CMS. He pays the CMS. Which is my shorthand for He pays their mum maintenance

I also think it’s a bit petty to work it out like that.

Just get him to buy the extra stuff the kids cost and maybe the occasional extra shop.

Thank you very much. Yes this was it. I'm thinking that the amount worked out by the maths does seem a bit high.

But isn't that more petty to work out what the kids cost each time?

I didn’t mention a rule book as of course there are different ways but I can give my opinion on what the OP is suggesting. It is after all an opinion site.

So kindly I ask you to not be so rude and aggressive.

It's amazing to me how so can be classed as caregivers when it comes to finances and childcare.

But if you mentioned weddings, graduations or nativity's the word care giver wouldn't be mentioned more like dads wife and not close family to speak of sp.

Ah the ties that bind. Anyway op much to same peoples chargin, back on the real world people would be more practical. Maybe more a 60/40 split on all bills.

Oh and if anyone's wondering- my DSc is kept under the stairs, given breadcrumbs and name is Harry Potter.

Oh dear….poor SC is all I can say really.

@R4ID "I can’t actually believe this is a serious post and people are working it out. Don’t marry someone who has kids if you don’t want to treat them as your own. It’s petty beyond belief."

Right so you thought ah this op is asking for maths and you decide to offer no advice and make a dig suggesting what she was asking was so abnormal. I personally found your comment rude, unhelpful and petty tbh so it's amusing to me that you called me rude
You reap what you sow.
There isn't any hard and fast rules with blended families regardless of what your above comment applies.

The SC are fine. They don't need me being a caregiver they would find that patronising.

I was never DSS’s care giver, but when I married DH we decided to work as a team financially

My post did contain advice which was to treat all step children as your own if they are living with you.

In my reply to your earlier post I stated there is no rule book.

I can see your earlier post swearing at me and being extremely aggressive has now been removed by Mumsnet at my request.

These DC already have a mother and a father who sound perfectly capable of providing for them. OP has her own DC to think about. Why are they poor SC? A lot of DC only have one parent, so these DC are doing relatively well to have 2 parents to care for them.

Yes, it’s likely looking high because it gives the children equal “weighting” for bills etc as adults. And it depends what bills are likely to be more affected by them being there. So have a think about which of the “household bills” you think are the ones being more affected by the presence of two kids for 25% of the year. Then see how much difference it makes. What has the biggest impact on your finances - the additional cost of the DSC or your larger salary? It might be that when you work it out with actual numbers, there’s not as much in it as you thought, and it just needs a small tweak. I get a sense that you’re just trying to work out how it might actually calculate, then work out what you want to do and what feels fair - not just blindly go with a number.

Yes that was the plan, this was just the starting point and then we'll look at it. We always rojnd it too so its never ooh you pay 33.8767% etc Thank you ever so much.

I think you might have to consider each bill in turn to do this fairly. For example, does your water get billed on a meter or on a fixed rate? If it's a fixed rate, I don't think it's fair to charge a higher proportion because the children are there ¼ of the year, because even if they weren't, the bill would be the same.

However, electricity usage may factor in their presence. Have you actually done an audit of how much electricity you use on the weekends they are here Vs the weekends they aren't? It would be fairest to establish if the electricity usage does actually go up or not, and if so by how much.

Similarly, check out how much you actually spend on food when they're here Vs not. I don't think it's as simple as ⅖ of the food bill, because they could be ravenous teenagers with fussy food requirements, or small children who will happily eat budget meals with small portions.

Fixed costs such as TV licence, insurances, road tax, MOT, shouldn't be increased for their presence, IMO. However, I guess if you have Spotify or similar, then if you take out a higher subscription because you need more users, you could apportion the increase to them.

It all sounds pretty hard work, tbh, but that granular analysis would be the 'fairest' way to do things, so that your DH isn't paying a higher proportion for things that your DSC don't influence.

@Decideforme Yes that seems a bit extreme but I think it's probably just the food and energy and water bills that go up. We have a smart meter. Given its the standing charge that's so high I think just leave those bills out. And the water would be hard to work out (they use A LOT). So yes looks like just the food needs looking at. As you say they eat looooads.

I'm thinking perhaps if he just buys the food when they are here that might be easiest. But then we'd just split into the pot according to income still.

Tbh I'd split it based on how much you earn and not add any extra for your dsc as they are only there eow. Maybe on the holidays he pays a bit more for food and also things like days out, holidays etc he pays 100% for the dsc and 50% for his shared dc.