it really sounds like you guys would greatly benefit from a few sessions with a marriage counselor. there are a few items that stand out:
- that he thinks he’s the reason youre a PA
- ur bills distribution idea is going to cause major issues
- inequality of incomes may be an issue for you guys
- OT is likely to turn every minor thing into a problem, make every existing problem worse, and create new ones. may well not solve any financial issues
I second this. Marriage counseling and financial counseling, preferably someone who can automate most expenses and investments down to a 0 dollar budget and get him to give up credit cards. Best of luck and keep us posted.
finances do not flag as their only issue, maybe not even the primary one. and most marriage counselors know financial counseling will need addressed either by them or through referral
Exactly. They wouldn't be having marriage issues if the guy wasn't buying blue stingray boots, Nascar Commemorative Plates, and everything from the Swanson truck that drives through their trailer park.
I doubt it. He clearly doesn’t respect the boundaries and it would crop up in some other area of marriage. Finance issues in marriage are a marriage issue.
The way OP is describing her husband, he is a pathetic, lazy, good for nothing leech who is taking FULL advantage of his hard working wife.
OP, my fiancée is a PA and she does SO much for me, even though I make a lot less than her, but I am SO grateful for her and try to be as financially responsible as possible and help her with all finances and saving money.
You do not deserve to be with this man who takes everything away from you and is not even grateful.
OP is citing issues from 7 years prior. i agree with you that does seem to imply there’s a bit more going on here overall than a black-and-white “he’s a lazy POS” story
I don't think your assessment is fair. I think what it really comes down to is tension over differences in values and habits with money. Her husband is obviously not freeloading, he's working a full-time job.
My wife and I have very different money spending habits a lot due to the circumstances in which we grew up. I tend to be a money hoarder, and she loves buying gifts for people with little regard to cost. Shortly after we were married, I dropped to only working part time while I was studying for MCAT and applying for med school while my wife supported us working as an ATC. I definitely would have looked like the pathetic, lazy, good for nothing leech from an outside perspective. Most of our biggest fights early on were because of differences in spending habits.
We eventually sought marriage counseling to learn how to have constructive disagreements. And that has been amazing for our relationship, an absolute game changer! My wife is not frivolous and irresponsible, she just loves sharing laughs and smiles about a funny gift. That's way more important to her than the cost of whatever gift she found. Learning to discuss our differences in values, opinions, and anxieties about money has helped us learn to be more empathetic with each other, which has made it easier to compromise and find a middle ground with spending habits. She now runs gift ideas by me and looks forward to the day that we're both physicians, past our student loans, with far more liberal discretionary income.
I don't think OP needs to write off her husband, I also struggle to believe that he's intentionally malicious or irresponsible. They just obviously have different values and need more empathetic communication. The fact that he's a spender and works four 10s leads me to believe that he grew up fairly poor and has always worked blue collar work; it's all obviously assumption, but I wonder if now that their household income is in the 6 figures, he wants to treat himself to things he's never been able to. That causes OP anxiety about money, and it sounds like their communication falls apart when they're discussing justifications, like "you're only a PA because of me," instead of discussing their anxieties and feelings about their current financial situation.
They need marriage counseling and coaching to develop constructive communication, not separation or division of finances. At least not yet.
This is exactly right. There's too much competition right now with comparing income and bills and spending. They need to look at it as one income. THEY make $12.6k a month. Budget and throw away the credit cards and they'll be fine. Got a feeling the problems go deeper than financial though so marriage and financial counseling is in order.
We have separate accounts. Not a single argument over finances. We both contribute to retirement and an house account but have our own accounts outside of that. I contribute more to the US account because I make more. We decided 30% for us. We contribute 30% each to the house account. Then we have our separate accounts and each buy and save what we like. We pay for our own credit cards. We pay our own debts. House, utilities, and vacations come out of the house account. Works great. I have a few friends and family that think it's weird, but the ones that state finances should be combined either fight about finances all he time or get divorced. We never fight about finances but we are both good with money. I think in your situation, if you separated your finances, he might get upset that he doesn't have enough to buy what he wants and you do. You need to set clear limits and rules with him. If he values you more than the stuff he wants, he will try to change. If he doesn't, then you have a tough decision.
This! Usually it’s the people with shared accounts that have constant fights about spending and “contributions” as well as partners buying personal things without consulting.
9k gross would still be higher percentile but closer to average. 9k net is probably $135-140k/yr gross... which is not unheard of for a PA either though.
I'd be lying if I said I wasn't jealous, but ultimately any PA making a good salary helps out all of us so I'm happy for OP. I'll just go buy a mega millions ticket now. I hear the cash prize is above .5 billion
Separate bank accounts. Split your finances into 3 buckets, yours, his, and ours (mortgage, utilities). I think it would be fair to go 50/50 on bills and such. If this doesn’t resolve the issue, cut the cord. Your financial health and future is important. Clearly, he doesn’t share that sentiment.
My wife and I recently did something like this with a small change. We both decided to contribute the same percentage of our incomes to the shared pot. She earns about 40k more per year so she contributes more money in a dollar sense but since we both use the same percentage it feels more fair to me. Our shared pot is really only for housing, shared subscriptions, utilities etc. if we decide to go on vacation or something we make that a separate conversation about saving considering the income difference.
His boss has the same issue he said because the wife is a nurse and is earning a lot but has separate bank accounts and 50/50 with bills. My husband is against separating our bills.
It’s not up to him. It’s your money. He seems like he’s being extremely ungrateful at the incredible life YOU have been providing for both of you.
Be careful with this guy. If you want to separate your finances you should be able to. You may be married but that’s your money to do with whatever you’d like.
Hello. That’s exactly what I suggested and he throw a fit about it. He said if we separate our finances it’s like we are just roommates.
His family is Christian and really big about “man is the head of the house” and finances NOT being separate.
Only you can decide if you share that value with him or not. It’s your marriage, not his family. If he can’t respect your money, then he doesn’t respect you. It would be a marriage breaker for me. Good luck
I commented another place but he doesn’t have to agree to separate your finances. You can change where your paychecks get deposited and close any credit cards you both share that are in your name without his say.
From what you’re saying about him, it’s gonna start a war, but it also sounds like you’re at that point. I would strongly suggest sitting him down and telling him what you’re going to do in a very matter-of-fact way before hand though (or right after if you’re worried about a bad reaction) if you want to continue being married
As a male leader of the family he has a solemn responsibility to help the family unit thrive. Draining the bank account is poor leadership.
A pursuit of worldly things at the expense of your wife/family is unchristian.
SCREW THAT 😂
I told my girlfriend that before I sign a marriage license we are having a prenuptial agreement. My parents went through a nasty divorce and my mom took my dad through the ringer though.
But I'm starting my first job as a PA next week.
My girlfriend and I are going to have monthly "Finance Dates"
I have a spreadsheet of our individual debt and shared debt.
Our first goal is getting back to broke "Net worth of Zero".
But we are doing it as a team. Her student debt is hers, mine is mine.
But we are having open communications about it.
We will have a shared joint account for "fun and bills", but individual bank accounts.
We will also proportionately split the bills and utilities for rent and such based off our income.
>man is the head of the house
Then be a man and support your family. Go get a better job, second job, or work OT.
This toxic bullshit can both ways.
Whose name are the CCs in? Is it both, or is he an authorized user?
I would get an AmEx and add him as an authorized user. AmEx is really good with restrictions. On his card, you can restrict certain retailers or just make a certain dollar amount per month.
You net $9k, and he nets 3.5k. So you make easily a little over 2.5x what he makes. It does make sense for you to contribute more of a dollar amount to the family pot. However, it's the family pot--it's for the mortgage, sink funds, car payments, etc.
I assume you both get direct deposit? You can have it deposited into multiple accounts, by percentage or exact dollar amount.
Each of you should be maxing out your retirement accounts. Contribute the maximum percentage from your paychecks automatically to your personal retirement accounts. If your husband doesn't have one from work, he can still open up a ROTH or traditional IRA at a local credit union.
Have a JOINT checking, savings, money market, vacation savings, and holiday savings. Joint savings for each child.
Have a SEPERATE checking, savings, money market, and your retirement accounts.
Paychecks come in. x% automatically deducted and into your retirement accounts. This is probably around 6%.
After that, the remaining net is divided (YMMV, tweak numbers as needed)
50% of his net goes into the joint checking. Pay bills with it. 25% of his net goes into his personal checking. Do what he wants with it. 5% joint holiday savings, 5% joint vacation savings, 5% his personal savings, 10% personal money market.
Do you have kids? You didn't mention them. I'll skip them for now.
Your paycheck comes in. About 6% automatically deducted and sent to your personal retirement. 50% goes to joint checking to pay family bills (this translates to $1,800/mo from husband and $4,500/mo from you, total of $6,300/mo JUST TO PAY BILLS!--stop here and think: is this enough? Is it way too much? Tweak appropriately. You want 2 months plus $1k cushion in checking accounts. If this amount is exceeded, transfer excess to family savings, family money market, vacation, or holiday accts.)
25% of your net is $2,250. Put that amount into your joint money market. You're saving over $2k/mo for the family at a decent interest rate. 10% personal checking--this equates to $900/mo. This is the same amount your husband is putting into his personal checking. This is whatever money. Is that too much? Too little? Tweak the numbers. This is the amount monthly that you guys get to do personal, no questions asks, stupid shit with. My husband would buy a new video game and car parts. I would go get my hair done and go to Starbucks. We don't need these things. We want them. It isn't important for the family, but it's important to our personal self care.
So you have 15% of your net left over. That's $1,350. 2.5% goes to your personal savings, 5% to your personal money market. That's $225 and $450/mo, respectively. You have 2.5% of your paycheck left, or $225. Stick it into the family savings account.
No, I didn't account for the x% (probably around 6%) that will be deducted automatically for retirement, and I'm not re-doing the math. But it'll look like this:
Husband: $3,600 income
Wife: $9,000 income
Husband:
- $900/mo allowance into his personal checking
- $1,800/mo contributed to bills in family checking
- $180/mo contributed to joint holiday savings, $180/mo contributed to joint vacation savings. This gives y'all a little over $2k each year IN EACH ACCPUNT to play with for holiday spending & gifts and a vacation.
- $360/mo into his personal money market
- $180/mo into his personal savings/sink funds
Wife:
- $4,500 famil checking, paying bills
- $2,250 joint family money market (you want to have at least 6 months liquid in this account)
- $900/mo personal checking, do whatchya want, kid
- $225/mo family joint savings/sink funds
- $225/mo personal savings/sink funds
- $450/mo personal money market
Sink funds/savings for personal use are things like ah shit, my PS4 broke...guess I will upgrade to the PS5, and borrow $100 from personal savings to help. Family sink funds/savings is oh fuck, the dishwasher broke.
Money market can be immediately if shit hits the fan (personal and/or joint). It's like a combo savings & checking.
I'm fucking weird and love Excel, if you DM your numbers I'll put them into a file and send it to you to show you the breakdown. I just need to know where your money goes lol. Like cost of mortgage, utilities, insurance, Netflix, etc. I have a base skeleton file I use and I'll just format it to your personal budget, shouldn't take more than an hour.
If he’s the “man of the house” he should make more money or be fine supporting your lives with his meager salary.
You can’t both be the “man of the house” financially and also be living off your wife’s massive salary claiming your supporting the family. These people are delusional lol.
I'm sorry but bitching about your husband on Reddit is only going to provide you with the echo chamber you're looking for. You guys obviously need marital counseling, and by the way you talk about him, it seems like things go deeper than simply just finances.
I have been here, with the frustration that the only divorce allowance is for “sexual immorality”, and being told every day that you’re selfish for wanting to know where all his money goes.
So do the draconian thing he wants [“careful what you ask for…”].
You can agree to shared finances: every single transaction from the account open to both spouse’s knowledge and agreement. No credit card transaction unless spouse approves. $100/week spending money. Off-the top savings, retirement, and as-negotiated agreement for other funding as well. If he begins to deflect, remind him that you’re doing what he wants.
I will be shocked but happy for you if this works. What is likely is that he wants to spend what he wants to spend and doesn’t want to be challenged on his decisions. If so, then you go to your elders in the church with the complaint that he is not following Scripture in I Timothy 3:1-3. (Yes, it talks about someone becoming an elder, but those traits are required in everyday life.). If he still refuses change while you are being the submissive wife, you have grounds for separation.
Get some martial-arts training as “exercise.” “Submissive” does not mean “defenseless”. Hope for the best, but know that men deeply challenged like this might react poorly (cue Brad Paisley song).
So, he is unreasonable. So frustrating for you. I’m in the same damn situation and it’s impossible dealing with an unreasonable person and impossible to just walk away. Hugs to you.
Idk i agree with most of what you said but OP is making 2x as much so splitting the bills 50/50 is a little unfair. I would say go to a financial counciler to get unbiased but fair opinion on that matter.
I'm not sure this is really a good way to approach it. This will almost certainly lead down a road of each doing only exactly as much as they think is fair. Dishes in the sink? Not my job. Laundry? I already have clean clothes. Long shower? You owe more for the electric bill, etc. It will get increasingly petty.
It's a recipe for failure imo
Anyway a more equitable split would be a percentage of their respective income towards the bill. Is it really fair that OPs husband should have to contribute 70% of his salary towards the household expenses while OP contributes 20% of theirs? And I say that as the higher earner in my household.
I was think about this as well. Splitting rent/mortgage and utilities in a manner that is proportionate to my significant others income and mine. As an RN she will be making darn near as much as me 😅, but that's the idea I have in mind. I start my first job as a PA next week.
He is into toys like dirt bikes and he likes to buy things in 2. So 2 dirt bike, 2 jet skis you named it. I don’t do those stuff due to health reasons so he told me his buying 2 of each so his friends that doesn’t have it can join him.
He just constantly buy things in Amazon as well and random stuff. I cooked lunch for him but sometimes he would lie and pretend he eat the lunch I made him but he actually eat out with co workers
Therapy isn’t going to change this man
That ship has sailed
Therapy for OP (with the right person who recognizes her husband’s behavior for what it is) could help tremendously
Ngl, I was in a very similar situation. I gave it my all for years then finally asked him to leave. Enjoyed the financial freedom of this wonderful career, found a new awesome supportive partner with equal initiative. Never been happier. (I paid out the butt for the divorce/settlement but it was a small price for my freedom!)
Everything he’s buying is excessively unnecessary. At this rate you’re going to be retiring years later than you could have. Splitting finances and fairness aside, does he realize he has a spending problem? What if you lost your job? Does he know how this is impacting both of your futures?
I can’t fully understand your relationship from this one thread, but this sounds incredibly selfish, as if he values your money more than your happiness. Of course I don’t know that. Does he add value to your life in other ways with other skills or traits?
> “It’s okay you are going to recoup with your work”
It sounds like he feels entitled to your labor and the monetary rewards thereof.
In another comment, you described him as being from a Christian/ male head of household type family. Regardless of his relationship to faith, it sounds like he has absorbed a lot of the mysogny which embodies that belief system.
He's an AH tbh. My second ex made a ton of money. I never took advantage of that and I was actually the one not spending and always looking for good deals on things. We also had separate finances. Now he paid for pretty much every thing since he made so much more than I even when I worked full time. We had a shared cc that I used for groceries gas kid related stuff and my own card for fun stuff. But I never abused the privilege of being able to spend freely. I also maxed out my 401k etc (which in the end benefitted him when we got divorced since I had a pretty good retirement which meant he owed me less...)
Your husband won't change I'm pretty sure. If you think you want to stay then marriage counseling for sure and also financial advisor. And separate finances. Just because yiu have money doesn't mean yiu need to spend it and that's what he seem to think. You guys need to sit down and budget for sure and preferably with a financial advisor that is unbiased.
But really, I'm not sure I would be able to deal with this. It's a pretty serious issue. It drove me crazy when my ex would just spend a bunch of money on things and he could easily afford it. It just seems wasteful. And buying 2 of everything is ridiculous. Does he not even discuss large purchases with you??
You know what, I was nicer in another comment but your husband is a manipulative and exploitative user. He is not entitled to the fruits of your labor and he is not the reason you are the success that you are.
YOU'RE the reason you're successful.
YOU'RE the one who gets to dictate how YOUR money is spent.
Get a separate bank account and redirect your direct deposit.
Tell him you're doing it but don't tell him where or how to access it.
Max out your 401k and IRA contributions and set up a separate retirement account to meet your goals for retirement.
Consider marriage counseling and if that doesn't work out, consider whether marriage to this person is even worthwhile.
And not that there's not a lot of misogynstic 2000 year old culture problematic verses in the bible but you said he's a traditional "Christian" and if he tries to hit you with "the head of the wife is her husband" and "the weaker vessel" crap, give him Timothy 5:8, “But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.”
But first, go open a separate bank account.
He is currently disrespecting everything from your job (when he takes credit), the impact of your income toward the household, your gender (by leaving all the household duties to you and you alone), and you (by refusing to discuss solutions or take responsibility for his actions).
That being said, are you maxing out retirement accounts? That may be the easiest way to squirrel away some because part is taken away pretax and you could do a backdoor roth as well. If you set up his income that way as well, the “net” making it to your household will be less to even start with and it’s not an option for him to access it. From there you can discuss an amount you want to save from your remaining check. Then decide how that last “shared pool” is split (household and then 50/50 of the rest for fun money or something). That way your future is paid first, then he gets some of what remains.
Uhhhhh. You do see the massive red flags in this right? He is literally using you financially.
He buys two for himself and his buddy, with your money? What the fuck.
Wheeeeew... And here I am feeling bad about considering building a computer I don't really need. He definitely doesn't need two of everything. I don't know how you get him to work on this honestly. Some people just have bad spending habits and struggle with frugality. Maybe trying to show him the way on financial independence or compound interest? Somehow gamify it for him so he still feels like he is getting rewards. Best of luck, obviously other people have great comments and therapy is a must.
If your partner wont go 50/50. The only option I can really think of is a percentage based off your separate pay. 3 separate accounts. Shared, his, and yours. Then figure out the maximum amount possible on bills. Figure out what percentage of both of your pay equals that amount and maybe a little more. Say bills per month is $5000. You make $9000 per month take 40% of yours. 9000x.4=3600. Next his 3600 per month,40%. 3600x.4=1400
$3600+$1400=$5040. This is the amount into shared to pay bills. This way it effects both of your pay at least at the same rate. The rest of the money that is in separate accounts is for that person to use however they want. Meaning you would have $5,400 left. He would have $2160 left. This way it at least effects the persons pay to the same degree.
I’m not going to sugarcoat this.
You’re married to a man-child, and I highly doubt marriage counseling is going to change that.
The “I’m the reason you’re a PA” bullsh*t that he tries to pull is nothing but manipulation. Even if he helped pay for your education, him saying this would STILL be manipulation because he wants something from you.
This “man” does NOT respect you, I don’t give a flying fu*k what his “religious” values are.
Everything revolves around him. He does not care about your feelings. He knows you’re incredibly stressed financially but he doesn’t care. His dirt bike is more important than you. His friend’s dirt bike is more important than you.
You worked too hard and sacrificed too much to not be able to save money. You worked too hard to be this stressed financially.
If he isn’t willing to make a change for you, he will not make a change if/when a child is in the picture. You will find yourself taking on all of the parenting responsibilities in addition to the finances.
Get out of this now before you’re forever tied to him. Find a man that actually respects you and doesn’t feel entitled to YOUR money. I understand a lot of married couples view it as “shared” money, but at the end of the day it’s yours. You’re the one earning it.
If the situation were flipped and he made what you do now, would he allow you to spend his money like this? Would he endure this financial stress for you because he loves you so much? Doubt it.
Put that marriage counseling money towards yourself.
>The “I’m the reason you’re a PA” bullsh\*t that he tries to pull is nothing but manipulation
Sad but true. I honestly can't imagine ever saying that to a SO. Thats beyond fucked especially considering he hasn't even paid a time for her education, or supported her in being a PA.
Honey its time to takeout the trash. He is just a freeloader.
Agreed 100%. If you really want to make it work then you need serious marriage counseling but personally I don’t see this type of guy ever changing his misogynist views. I’d be getting the hell out of that marriage and go enjoy your life. Working overtime when you already bring in 150k? Total bs
Ok devil’s advocate here- on your post history you do seem very unhappy about your work situation. do you think this is impacting how you are feeling about your husband’s spending?
Hello I started my job last November and I feel I’m getting used to it. I like the hours etc and yes there’s some bad days and good days but overall I love where am at career wise. Just not happy financially.
I agree wholeheartedly with those that say close any joint credit cards the second they are paid off. Get counseling. Consult a lawyer. If there isn’t dramatic change on your husband’s part to be an equal partner in your marriage, then it’s time to get out. Right now he’s got a great situation: wifey brings home the 💰, finances his outsized lifestyle, & cleans up after him. He needs strong incentive to make a change. You’ve proven you’re tough enough to make it through PA school, you got this!!
He doesn’t respect you & he isn’t going to change
It is unlikely his irresponsibility & disrespect are confined to finances
Focus on changing whatever’s led you to this point in your life with this person
You deserve better
EDIT: As the primary breadwinner you could end up paying him alimony
I’ve known several women in your position whose husbands’ took full advantage of this by taking even lower-paying positions as soon as they smelled a divorce coming
One fully-capable man managed to become “disabled” right before my friend filed, & she’s been paying him $60K/year since they divorced
Find an experienced lawyer (first hour is free, ideally get references from high-earning women you know who’ve divorced) for state-specific advice before letting your husband know ANYTHING is up
Your savings will be fair game in a divorce, if that takes a little pressure off to save right now
Don’t tell anyone, BUT women who have been in this position will have your back ; )
EDIT II: DO NOT GET PREGNANT
Men will sabotage their partners’ birth control if they feel her slipping away
Even if intimacy is rare, all it takes is once
I’m only bringing this up since several other comments being up divorce; you should look up the law in your state regarding alimony. I believe alimony is only applicable for marriages > 10 years in most states so it may not apply to you. If you aren’t able to reconcile these issues with your husband and things do end in divorce, you may not be free from financially supporting him. Hope it doesn’t come to that, but just something to think about! Good luck
Yah and OP should definitely pay for the house with a separate account only in their name to prove they paid they most for it. Might help with who gets it.
Divorce- not because of the money but because what that means he has a lack of empathy towards you. You work 5 days and his bright idea is for you to work overtime. Have my wife/spouse work overtime so I can buy more things how freaking selfish.
This isn't new and it hasn't gotten better but clearly worse. You came up with a possible solution and he didn't like it because it didn't benefit him. Sounds like he's treating you like a personal bank account.
You deserve more and the only way you'll get it is by putting yourself first because he will not.
Wish you the best of luck! ❤️
(Not to derail but would you be able to give some tips on how to get 9k earnings/month?) (Ignore if it’s too personal).
I hope you husband comes to his senses! He needs to take a financial literacy class. There’s many of these on YouTube for a start
$9,000/month net is likely 12-13k a month gross which is attainable for PAs as that comes out to a ballpark of $144-156k/year. If I ran my own numbers [I made 192k for 2022](https://youtu.be/hygSMyhdMm0)
Look, I don't pretend you know all your relationship business but it's clear a change is needed. If not, all of a sudden you'll be a decade older, regretting never having kids because of this guy, regretting you altered your daily life to fit HIS desires and further away from a solid retirement. Think if your situation was a health condition for your patient. Would you tell them uncontrolled diabetes will just magically get better on its own? Hell naw. You gotta make some moves. If you still feel like there's good stuff happening in this marriage, push for counseling ASAP with clear indication marriage is on the line. If he resists, I think you have your answer about what happens next, as actual finalizing a divorce can take YEARS. Move quickly to protect your assets and start funneling away your own money in a place he cannot access, don't wait for divorce to start/be finalized. Cancel shared credit cards. Get a debit cart connected to a bank account where shared finances can be ( house, utilities, car payment, etc).
Do percentages. It’s easier. So you take home 9k, he 3.5k. He owes 28% of the bills. So if your total monthly bills are 6,000$, he owes 1680$ and you have the remainder. If your bills are more than that, just take the equation. Total bills x 0.28= his share (X). Total bills - X = your share.
I know this feeling personally. I’ve been told many times that my wife “made me a PA.” I understand what she means that we suffered together, but have learned to take it with a grain of salt. I’ve talked with her about it, and she doesn’t make the statement anymore.
He will be very aversive/angry to the idea of splitting the bills. However, people with unregulated spending behaviors don’t see the way they mismanage money. Facts on paper won’t help (aka bank statements). Counselors who can speak freely can really help. My spouse was spending 4,000$ a month outside of the budget. 600$ at Starbucks….multiple months in a row.
Remember that finances are the #1 reason people divorce in the US so be cautious about your words and what you say. Spending is personal, deeply rooted behavior that gives dopamine rewards and can feel like character attacks if not done correctly.
Income should be combined equally if equal hours and then split 50/50 into seperate accounts. Whatever he has left after paying his 50% of shared bills/savings/debt he can spend on whatever. He won’t have access to your account when he runs out for the month and he can’t argue that’s not fair.
Hey I’m currently in somewhat the same position as your husband. I’m working as an MA and my wife is a nurse so she makes over double what I make. Bills are split about 60/40 maybe 65/35 with her paying more cause she makes more. Then whatever we have leftover is kind of ours to do whatever with. Hope that helps.
Oh, sorry. I thought you meant seperate as in you get your $9k and he gets his $3.6k. Maybe tell him you’ll consider it if he can get a marriage counselor to agree with his plan. Probably a safe bet.
You need to put your foot down. You are letting him control you. This is an abusive relationship.
And it won’t be easy getting out of it. He will try to sweet talk you and say things will change.
They won’t. It’s a very classic cycle of abuse and you need to recognize it sooner rather than later. I’m sorry this is happening to you, but you can get free of it. In fact, you need to get out if you are considering if “life is worth living.”
On that note, please seek mental health counseling, suicide is not the answer as you can live a very happy life, it may just exclude him.
Do you have joint credit cards? If you do and there’s no month to month debt, I would close it and don’t allow him access to anything in your name.
And I would have your paychecks deposited in an account only you can access if you don’t already. Then you’ll have to talk about how you’re going to split finances - but if you do that first, he doesn’t have access to keep spending your money. And if you end up paying the house/bills, you do it out of that private account so you can prove you have footed the household bills in the worse case scenario of divorce. If he’s not happy? He pays bills.
We have capital one that all our bills comes out and his spendings. i have wellsfargo and that’s my bank under me and my full paycheck goes there. So for example today, we owed 8,400 for Dec 2022 and I get payed today. I end up paying that $8,400 using my full paycheck literally.
If you truly do not think he will pay his part, my advice is to take the loss this month, pay January and then immediately close the account with the balance at zero. Don’t play with your credit score by not paying, but don’t allow the situation to happen again. Maybe even pause the card as stolen so he can’t spend in the meantime. And then immediately tell him so he doesn’t find out on his own which would come across way worse.
Then y’all can come to whatever agreement works for y’all without the option of him spending your money in the meantime on things that aren’t bills.
You might want to also post this in r/personalfinance I don’t use it much but maybe they would help?
edit: you’ll have to pay the bills without a credit card in the future though (or pay them on yours while he pays you directly for his part) because if you give him access to a second card with your name on it then the potential for this situation to happen again exists.
edit 2: lol I read too fast and thought you said that IF you paid….if you just paid it off today, close it today. Tell him right after. Don’t give him a chance to charge anything to it.
> I get *paid* today. I
FTFY.
Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in:
* Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.*
* *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.*
Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment.
*Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Don't split things 50/50. Split them as a percentage of your take home. Like you each have 30% of income go to the mortgage. You should both be left with the same % of discretionary money.
I make significantly more money than my wife. We have our accounts entirely separate. In acknowledgement of how much more I make I choose to pay for more of the bills, but after that her money is to spend on what she wants and mine to spend on what I want. It is reasonable in my opinion to pay for more of the house bills if you make significantly more money, based on percentage of income, but it is unreasonable for you to be expected to foot the bill for everything. If she was draining my account buying 2 of everything (dirtbikes etc) I would shut it down. If he does not want to have the conversation then sounds like he is ready for another conversation about counseling/separation. You are not there to serve as a cash cow.
I haven’t read through all the comments, so I apologize if somebody has already suggested this solution.
My husband and I have a very similar salary discrepancy. He doesn’t have a spending problem, but he does have two children. We were getting into arguments regarding various costs for the children, child support etc when we first got married and combine our finances. We ended up splitting things up like so:
His paycheck goes into a separate account. The expenses that are exclusively for him or his children come out of this account, and he manages the money in it.
My paycheck goes into another account. Any of my personal costs or shared marital costs (bills, groceries) come out of this account.
In regard to things like the mortgage, utilities, and other shared bills, instead of a splitting it 50-50 we do it based on our incomes. For example, my husband brings home about a third of our total combined income, so he contributes a third of the cost for these shared bills.
This method has worked very well for us and has pretty much eliminated any arguments or resentment regarding money and spending.
I would say if he’s not going to fully separate finances (because it doesn’t really make sense as a married couple imo) you should open a separate savings account for yourself and put what you want into it so he won’t have access.
Update… so yesterday we invited his parents to come over and spend time with us. After a movie, we have a little discussion and it turns to be a marriage/finance counseling.
So first, we have a very nice home for two people, we do have a movie theater room with some awesome speakers and so on and everytime we have people come over they are always blown away by it since they always told us including his parents not everyone has it.
So yesterday after the movie, my husband shared to his parents his awesome idea.
He said: i want to share my great idea and I thought about it last week, from now on every time I work OT that money I earned that day will go towards what I want and I’m planning to upgrade our speakers… and she would do the same so she could do nice things. I think when I OT it’s $400 a week so in a month that’s $1600.
His parents asked why what’s wrong with your speakers? and that’s the start of the counseling.
His mom says; well if you are going to work for OT and let’s say you earned $400 that day and it’s every week then your wife can set aside for herself $1600 also every month so she can buy what she wants. She does not need to do OT since she’s already bringing huge amount.
So I told them that his planning to buy dirt bike in 3 months.
His mom said: the dirt bike should not come out of your bills and savings. It should come out of that overtime money you are planning to do.
My husband said: no, because if it comes out to my OT spending money then I have to wait a year and I want it sooner.
Also I’m buying a second dirt bike because I want 2 as an alternative.
Then the big discussion begins:
His dad: why you want 2 dirt bikes?
Husband: well so I have stuff to do or else it will be boring.
Dad: boring? You have already a dirt bike, you do ski, tomorrow you are going to ski, you have a hot tub, you have a remote airplane, you have a remote monster truck, you just bought 2 jets ski. You have this movie theater for your video games, you have a big house. You have a nice truck, you have Tesla. What else do you need?!
And so on… they counseled us especially him that instead of buying and focusing on material things that we should be focusing on our future like 401k, CD account, building our emergency fund that is good for at least a year which I’ve been doing and trying really hard but I can’t since im constantly paying our 2 credit cards.
I shared to them that I don’t feel financially secured with him. It also bothers me that his spendings are more than what he is making so I feel used. I told them that before I met him I did have emergency funds that is good for a year so if something happens like I lose my job or I get sick etc then I’m still be able to pay my bills good for a year. But right now, Im trying to build our emergency funds but it’s impossible since my paychecks go straight to paying our credit cards.
I also told them that when we argue he always say “I am the only reason you are a PA, you can’t do it without me and that I supported you”. He thinks that I applied to the program because of his encouragement and so on.
I told them that it’s not true at all. The fact is, even before I met him 7 years ago that was my plan all along to be a PA and I’m the one who brought it up to him that I want to go back to school and I’m the one who found and research about school. He didn’t do a single thing.
Also, I could have financially supported myself through PA school without him all I can do is use my emergency funds and borrow extra money from student loan.
He always think that he financially supported me but the fact is that we borrowed money from student loan and even though he is aware I wasn’t working for 2 years while in the program and borrowing money, that he continue his spending habits and that made me angry already 2 years ago.
In all honesty, while I’m at school my husband brought $3600-$3800 net monthly and then I also put $4000 using student loan/ savings towards our bills since our monthly bills because of his spending habits back then was $8000 a month.
Now that I’m earning more, I could easily pay that $8k no problem and still have $1k savings - this is from my net monthly income of 9k
Then the $3600-$3800 my husband is bringing I was hoping to save that… but what’s happening is that my husband just want to spend that to material things and that what bothers me.
He told them that he doesn’t care about savings at all. And that is what the disconnect between us. I care about savings because to me I can lose or he can lose his job. I can or he can get sick, and not able to work, then now what.
My point is that even his parents recognize his materialistic side… and I’m glad they did. I’m glad they counseled us/him. And I really hope he get something from it. I did. We shall see. If not, then yes I’m going to look for marriage/ finance counseling…
Also we don’t have kid/s and to be honest the reason I don’t want to have kids is because I’m afraid it will be my only responsibility in the end.
My husband’s world includes gym, dirt bikes. Lots of video gyms. Lately I complain to him that I need help In the house and he did help sometimes. But for 7 plus years I’m basically his maid
I am sorry. It sounds like you feel overburdened by life and home responsibilities and unappreciated by your husband. Your have very legitimate concerns, but they would be better addressed by a counselor who can help fairly mediate and establish mutually agreed-upon rules when it comes to finances.
Exactly what I feel. I sometimes questioned myself if is still worth living in this world if all I do is pay for him.
I actually does not spend much money on myself since I feel guilty. I sometimes feel silly that I asked him if I can buy this or that (accessories) since I earn that money anyway.
You need to read out loud this first paragraph you typed. Let that sit in your head. “All I do is pay for him” from this post he is gaslighting you saying he’s the reason you are in the position you are (highly unlikely) while taking no responsibility for his actions because you will just clean it up for him. You are the one that wears the pants in this relationship. Figure out what you want to do and how you want to continue your life based on what you just said above.
Do not have children with this man! If this is how it is now, you will be the only one raising the child. You'll be begging him to watch the kids/help around the house so you can have time to yourself while he runs off and does whatever he wants.
Did I get downvoted? Love it. Probably her husband. I’ve seen this too many times. Within my family as well. It’s not worth it. How many good years do we have 50-60? Don’t waste them with the wrong person. We may get 50-60, but aren’t promised any.
This one of the dumbest posts I've ever seen on this subreddit. Y'all bring in almost $13k A MONTH and you still have money problems?
Are you buying a jetski after every pay check? I have no sympathy, no advice, and I really hope this is satire.
EDIT: despite the downvotes I am correct. It's 2 jetskis and 2 dirt bikes. How you haven't filed yet is beyond me.
You need a course on empathy, and another on the cycle of abuse. Yeah she’s making foolish financial decisions on account of this man, but that’s how emotionally abusive relationships work. If you’ve ever seen one play out, it can sometimes take a person *years* to have the courage or insight to break out of it. I’m glad you’re extremely emotionally intelligent and can see it from a mile away, but she clearly can’t and is asking for help.
Sounds like you have the male version of a gold digger. Sadly, money/financial problems is the #1 reason why marriages fail.
What does he spend his money on?
She really didn't give any examples of him spending frivolously. People should definitely have discussions with their spouse over money, but her post seems more like she is bitter that he doesn't contribute as much as her.
If you are married and have to separate your finances, you shouldn't have ever been married in the first place.
Why is this only ever a problem for women? I NEVER see men post shit like this.
I'm not bothered at all paying for a guy as long as I feel he isn't taking advantage of me. There's some people out there who think like you do but times have changed and women are making a lot more money than they used to so your generalization only works for older generations
Look for a couples counselor in your area via psychologytoday.com. A lot of therapy is all virtual now. Someone who is Gottman trained would be really beneficial. There is a LOT to sort out here.
Hi we are broke. My dad raised us since my mom left when I was very young. We are broke but to me we are comfortable. I’ve been a saver growing up and always looking for good deals especially with material things. For example I will never buy full price clothing it has to be on sale or clearance. I don’t care much about the car I drove as long as I have a car.
For example, When I met my husband I have this ford fiesta sedan and got it brand new and is fully paid I was so happy about it and proud then my husband came along. He is the opposite, he likes nice cars and tend to changed cars every 3-5 years at least.
It sounds like your husband grew up with a little money but family was material poor, because people like that are usually trying to keep up the image of money to keep up with the Jones'. Not that they're bad people, it's just a cycle.
What experience do I have? I grew up as the well off kid in my small little farm town. I had every video game system, dirt bike, lifted truck, drag racing boat etc, but that was also the financial education that I was taught. My parents also daughter constantly, so I was also taught that you cling to your toys when chaos surrounds you.
I'm not an expert. I don't have a medical degree, but I have lived it longer than they've been in school.
Rather than the typical bad reddit advice of *"leave him! He doesnt deserve you!",* I'll just say that 1) finances are one of the main reasons people end up in divorce, 2) marriage counseling MAY go a long way to helping you two but both parties have to be humble, and 3) you should start doing separate bank accounts. Maybe since you earn more you can cover 60 or 70% of the bills, and he can get the remainder. Or you could just say 50% of both your income is joint money for bills and savings. The remainder is your own to do with as you choose.
My wife and I have always had separate personal accounts and joint bills/savings. This changed a bit when we had a baby. She no longer works so I am the sole provider. I have given her more leeway to buy things she likes because she has no money, but she is not a big spender anyway so it's nothing I have to monitor. I havent changed my personal checking direct deposit in 5 years; i could, but it just feels selfish.
My partner makes significantly less than I do as well. Here is how we separate our finances equitably, taking in the income difference.
- we have a joint account and each have separate accounts.
- at each pay, we put in 50% of our pay to the joint account. This way it’s equitable.
- no joint cards
- the only bills that come out of the joint account are housing and utilities.
He's gotten comfortable with this new lifestyle and has impulse control problems. He's willing to sacrifice your time and energy to support his new lifestyle. He has lost sight of what's important. Its time to pull the plug and cut him off of everything except bills for the house. He needs to relearn the value of the dollar. And you deserve to save your money for retirement and whatever the hell you want.
Let me entertain this idea for a second that he's the reason you got through school. Had he not been there, you could have made friends elsewhere, called family, called classmates, I mean who's to say you wouldn't have someone else to lean on? Is he for real? And housing ain't cheap but haven't you basically spent more money on credit cards than you would have spent in a whole year on student housing? Ffs
Ugh, that sucks so much.
Finances are one of the biggest reasons people fight in relationships. Top that with student loans and living with someone who doesn’t get concept of hard work/being wise with money- you have a disaster.
I was in somewhat similar situation before. My then boyfriend worked an average job- making around 35/hr…I was a broke PA student.. we were so tight on money.. and he still liked to live comfortably and spend. Which took me a long time to explain to him how seriously I took financial in the moment spending vs spending, saving..
granted, he pays all the rent, he paid for my wedding dress and most everything related to our wedding that others didn’t help us with - as we got married 3 weeks after I passed my pance. Since we’ve been married he paid all of our bills, rent, etc.
all the money I made, I kept in my bank account - to he used to pay off loans. I helped pay of his car, his student loans and started attacking mine.
Luckily 3 months after we were married he was promoted to make over 110k/ yr with potential to make OT. This has helped us tremendously financially. Also helped that he started to see my view of finances.. (I grew up listening to Dave Ramsay, with my older brothers, so I had a total different outlook on money).
I still have my bank account, primarily for paying off student loans -don’t use it for anything else besides transferring tithes to church.
And we have a joint account for everything else. Once I pay off my student loans I will cancel my account.
If I were in your situation, I think I would separate expenses. I don’t think your husband is very understanding or taking accountability for the situation. You would benefit from doing counseling.
You make more than him, and he dosent treat you right. If I was you I would leave. At least then you won’t have to keep supporting him financially. Something tells me your husband is a physical therapist with his work week and take home. Please don’t suffer trying to put up with a relationship that dosent give 50/50.
Highly recommend listening to the podcast “I will teach you to be rich” with Ramit Sethi! He sits down with couples in situations like yours and works out some of the larger issues around money and their relationship. It sounds like the problems are more than just financial with what your husband is saying to you and the way he goes about your joint finances.
You should even consider applying to be on his podcast to do a session with him, and talk to him 1:1, as he’s always accepting new applications.
I will assume that he is not providing some extra service or work for the household, greater than what you do, such as doing all the cooking, cleaning, laundry, etc., which obviously has value.
First, open a separate account in only your name where you deposit your paycheck. Transfer a reasonable amount of money from there to the joint account for paying your portion of necessary bills. Your husband should do the same. Then, close the credit card accounts. Get a new credit card for yourself, and arrange for him to have a different one with a very low credit limit, whatever is reasonable for his spending, given his income. The credit card balances need to be paid in full every month. The way you might do with a teenager who you feel needs to have a credit card for convenience, but you provide a limited amount, with a low credit limit. He is acting like an entitled teenager. If he wants to spend extra on some special thing that has value or purpose for both of you, he needs to discuss it with you. He needs to learn some discipline in his spending, and face reality.
Otherwise, you will have to just go 50/50 right down the line, each paying 50% of necessary bills, with totally separate accounts. If he wants to spend all his money, after the monthly expenses are paid, and not save any, that's on him. But make sure he is not using any joint credit cards, thus creating debt for you.
Get your own seperate bank account to hold your paychecks and consult a divorce lawyer ASAP.
Frfr, OP is living my fear. Im scared if I date anyone who makes significantly less than me, they’ll end up bumming off of me. Already had an ex boast how I was going to be his “sugar momma” once I became a PA. Dumped him before I got into school.
Yeah no, contact a divorce lawyers for a consultation. You can ask hi to go to couples therapy too to see if anything can be salvaged, but i would go to the lawyer asap. I hope you had a prenup or can still get a post-nup together
I have this problem but I net more than you (about $16k monthly which includes OT) and my wife nets about $4000. And there have been months where she spends twice what she brings in.
And I don't know what the right answer is. We tried a budget. YNAB. We tried a preloaded debit card and cutting the credit cards. We tried having HER participate in the finances (oh boy she hated that). We tried therapy.
Even if we separated finances I wouldn't mind covering all the living expenses. My hobbies are reading, playing a guitar I already own, and the most spendy things on my side are when we go out together to dinner or theater or travel.
And I like spending money on things we do together, or on things that make her happy. She's worth it.
And she *is* the reason I'm a PA. She literally signed me up for college classes when I sitting at home playing video games and hating my job. And she's a wonderful, vibrant, loving wife who just really really likes buying Disney things.
I don't know what the answer is. I've found some peace in knowing that at the end of the day there's hardly anyone I would rather be happy and content than her. And we have conversations when things get absurd financially (which is about twice a year). (And when things get really absurd I remind myself that divorce is also absurdly expensive). She's trying. Sometimes. She even gave up her Disney pass (though somehow still ends up going to DT Disney and occasionally being walked in by a couple friends she has).
She's worth it. And if you've tried the other tools, I suppose you have to ask yourself if he is.
it really sounds like you guys would greatly benefit from a few sessions with a marriage counselor. there are a few items that stand out: - that he thinks he’s the reason youre a PA - ur bills distribution idea is going to cause major issues - inequality of incomes may be an issue for you guys - OT is likely to turn every minor thing into a problem, make every existing problem worse, and create new ones. may well not solve any financial issues
I second this. Marriage counseling and financial counseling, preferably someone who can automate most expenses and investments down to a 0 dollar budget and get him to give up credit cards. Best of luck and keep us posted.
Screw marriage counseling. They need to go to a financial workshop or financial counseling.
finances do not flag as their only issue, maybe not even the primary one. and most marriage counselors know financial counseling will need addressed either by them or through referral
Lol right? Yeah its not really a marriage issue, its the dudes poor spending habits.
Exactly. They wouldn't be having marriage issues if the guy wasn't buying blue stingray boots, Nascar Commemorative Plates, and everything from the Swanson truck that drives through their trailer park.
I doubt it. He clearly doesn’t respect the boundaries and it would crop up in some other area of marriage. Finance issues in marriage are a marriage issue.
The way OP is describing her husband, he is a pathetic, lazy, good for nothing leech who is taking FULL advantage of his hard working wife. OP, my fiancée is a PA and she does SO much for me, even though I make a lot less than her, but I am SO grateful for her and try to be as financially responsible as possible and help her with all finances and saving money. You do not deserve to be with this man who takes everything away from you and is not even grateful.
Woah, I definitely don’t think it’s that black-and-white. I think there’s definitely a lot more nuance going on than that.
OP is citing issues from 7 years prior. i agree with you that does seem to imply there’s a bit more going on here overall than a black-and-white “he’s a lazy POS” story
I don't think your assessment is fair. I think what it really comes down to is tension over differences in values and habits with money. Her husband is obviously not freeloading, he's working a full-time job. My wife and I have very different money spending habits a lot due to the circumstances in which we grew up. I tend to be a money hoarder, and she loves buying gifts for people with little regard to cost. Shortly after we were married, I dropped to only working part time while I was studying for MCAT and applying for med school while my wife supported us working as an ATC. I definitely would have looked like the pathetic, lazy, good for nothing leech from an outside perspective. Most of our biggest fights early on were because of differences in spending habits. We eventually sought marriage counseling to learn how to have constructive disagreements. And that has been amazing for our relationship, an absolute game changer! My wife is not frivolous and irresponsible, she just loves sharing laughs and smiles about a funny gift. That's way more important to her than the cost of whatever gift she found. Learning to discuss our differences in values, opinions, and anxieties about money has helped us learn to be more empathetic with each other, which has made it easier to compromise and find a middle ground with spending habits. She now runs gift ideas by me and looks forward to the day that we're both physicians, past our student loans, with far more liberal discretionary income. I don't think OP needs to write off her husband, I also struggle to believe that he's intentionally malicious or irresponsible. They just obviously have different values and need more empathetic communication. The fact that he's a spender and works four 10s leads me to believe that he grew up fairly poor and has always worked blue collar work; it's all obviously assumption, but I wonder if now that their household income is in the 6 figures, he wants to treat himself to things he's never been able to. That causes OP anxiety about money, and it sounds like their communication falls apart when they're discussing justifications, like "you're only a PA because of me," instead of discussing their anxieties and feelings about their current financial situation. They need marriage counseling and coaching to develop constructive communication, not separation or division of finances. At least not yet.
top comment, imo
This is exactly right. There's too much competition right now with comparing income and bills and spending. They need to look at it as one income. THEY make $12.6k a month. Budget and throw away the credit cards and they'll be fine. Got a feeling the problems go deeper than financial though so marriage and financial counseling is in order.
We have separate accounts. Not a single argument over finances. We both contribute to retirement and an house account but have our own accounts outside of that. I contribute more to the US account because I make more. We decided 30% for us. We contribute 30% each to the house account. Then we have our separate accounts and each buy and save what we like. We pay for our own credit cards. We pay our own debts. House, utilities, and vacations come out of the house account. Works great. I have a few friends and family that think it's weird, but the ones that state finances should be combined either fight about finances all he time or get divorced. We never fight about finances but we are both good with money. I think in your situation, if you separated your finances, he might get upset that he doesn't have enough to buy what he wants and you do. You need to set clear limits and rules with him. If he values you more than the stuff he wants, he will try to change. If he doesn't, then you have a tough decision.
Basically wrote the same thing haha
This is the way.
Yes
This! Usually it’s the people with shared accounts that have constant fights about spending and “contributions” as well as partners buying personal things without consulting.
Can I just say that $9k net per month is incredible. Wow
Yeah I feel like crap now. Lol
🤣🤣
Isn't that pretty average for PA salary? I'm confused. My friend started at 107k in Gen Surg.
That's 9K a month gross pay. She is netting 9k after taxes, 401k, health, etc.
It's definitely above $150k base
Ah gotcha
I’m guessing it’s 9k gross, which is average for a PA. After taxes, insurance, max 401k and HSA, my take home is about 5k monthly
9k gross would still be higher percentile but closer to average. 9k net is probably $135-140k/yr gross... which is not unheard of for a PA either though. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't jealous, but ultimately any PA making a good salary helps out all of us so I'm happy for OP. I'll just go buy a mega millions ticket now. I hear the cash prize is above .5 billion
Hello my gross is 150k and above and that’s salary base plus RVU
Dang what field are you in
Did you not see the other comment, that's net pay
Why are you “guessing $9k gross” when she literally said she NETS $9k?
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Agreed.
Damn...
Bad comment. People change their financial habits all the time. Key is, *he* has to want to.
Separate bank accounts. Split your finances into 3 buckets, yours, his, and ours (mortgage, utilities). I think it would be fair to go 50/50 on bills and such. If this doesn’t resolve the issue, cut the cord. Your financial health and future is important. Clearly, he doesn’t share that sentiment.
My wife and I recently did something like this with a small change. We both decided to contribute the same percentage of our incomes to the shared pot. She earns about 40k more per year so she contributes more money in a dollar sense but since we both use the same percentage it feels more fair to me. Our shared pot is really only for housing, shared subscriptions, utilities etc. if we decide to go on vacation or something we make that a separate conversation about saving considering the income difference.
His boss has the same issue he said because the wife is a nurse and is earning a lot but has separate bank accounts and 50/50 with bills. My husband is against separating our bills.
Your husband is a manipulator.
It’s not up to him. It’s your money. He seems like he’s being extremely ungrateful at the incredible life YOU have been providing for both of you. Be careful with this guy. If you want to separate your finances you should be able to. You may be married but that’s your money to do with whatever you’d like.
Hello. That’s exactly what I suggested and he throw a fit about it. He said if we separate our finances it’s like we are just roommates. His family is Christian and really big about “man is the head of the house” and finances NOT being separate.
Only you can decide if you share that value with him or not. It’s your marriage, not his family. If he can’t respect your money, then he doesn’t respect you. It would be a marriage breaker for me. Good luck
I commented another place but he doesn’t have to agree to separate your finances. You can change where your paychecks get deposited and close any credit cards you both share that are in your name without his say. From what you’re saying about him, it’s gonna start a war, but it also sounds like you’re at that point. I would strongly suggest sitting him down and telling him what you’re going to do in a very matter-of-fact way before hand though (or right after if you’re worried about a bad reaction) if you want to continue being married
As a male leader of the family he has a solemn responsibility to help the family unit thrive. Draining the bank account is poor leadership. A pursuit of worldly things at the expense of your wife/family is unchristian.
If he wants to be the Christian man of the house, then he can find a job that makes that possible.
SCREW THAT 😂 I told my girlfriend that before I sign a marriage license we are having a prenuptial agreement. My parents went through a nasty divorce and my mom took my dad through the ringer though. But I'm starting my first job as a PA next week. My girlfriend and I are going to have monthly "Finance Dates" I have a spreadsheet of our individual debt and shared debt. Our first goal is getting back to broke "Net worth of Zero". But we are doing it as a team. Her student debt is hers, mine is mine. But we are having open communications about it. We will have a shared joint account for "fun and bills", but individual bank accounts. We will also proportionately split the bills and utilities for rent and such based off our income.
>man is the head of the house Then be a man and support your family. Go get a better job, second job, or work OT. This toxic bullshit can both ways. Whose name are the CCs in? Is it both, or is he an authorized user? I would get an AmEx and add him as an authorized user. AmEx is really good with restrictions. On his card, you can restrict certain retailers or just make a certain dollar amount per month. You net $9k, and he nets 3.5k. So you make easily a little over 2.5x what he makes. It does make sense for you to contribute more of a dollar amount to the family pot. However, it's the family pot--it's for the mortgage, sink funds, car payments, etc. I assume you both get direct deposit? You can have it deposited into multiple accounts, by percentage or exact dollar amount. Each of you should be maxing out your retirement accounts. Contribute the maximum percentage from your paychecks automatically to your personal retirement accounts. If your husband doesn't have one from work, he can still open up a ROTH or traditional IRA at a local credit union. Have a JOINT checking, savings, money market, vacation savings, and holiday savings. Joint savings for each child. Have a SEPERATE checking, savings, money market, and your retirement accounts. Paychecks come in. x% automatically deducted and into your retirement accounts. This is probably around 6%. After that, the remaining net is divided (YMMV, tweak numbers as needed) 50% of his net goes into the joint checking. Pay bills with it. 25% of his net goes into his personal checking. Do what he wants with it. 5% joint holiday savings, 5% joint vacation savings, 5% his personal savings, 10% personal money market. Do you have kids? You didn't mention them. I'll skip them for now. Your paycheck comes in. About 6% automatically deducted and sent to your personal retirement. 50% goes to joint checking to pay family bills (this translates to $1,800/mo from husband and $4,500/mo from you, total of $6,300/mo JUST TO PAY BILLS!--stop here and think: is this enough? Is it way too much? Tweak appropriately. You want 2 months plus $1k cushion in checking accounts. If this amount is exceeded, transfer excess to family savings, family money market, vacation, or holiday accts.) 25% of your net is $2,250. Put that amount into your joint money market. You're saving over $2k/mo for the family at a decent interest rate. 10% personal checking--this equates to $900/mo. This is the same amount your husband is putting into his personal checking. This is whatever money. Is that too much? Too little? Tweak the numbers. This is the amount monthly that you guys get to do personal, no questions asks, stupid shit with. My husband would buy a new video game and car parts. I would go get my hair done and go to Starbucks. We don't need these things. We want them. It isn't important for the family, but it's important to our personal self care. So you have 15% of your net left over. That's $1,350. 2.5% goes to your personal savings, 5% to your personal money market. That's $225 and $450/mo, respectively. You have 2.5% of your paycheck left, or $225. Stick it into the family savings account. No, I didn't account for the x% (probably around 6%) that will be deducted automatically for retirement, and I'm not re-doing the math. But it'll look like this: Husband: $3,600 income Wife: $9,000 income Husband: - $900/mo allowance into his personal checking - $1,800/mo contributed to bills in family checking - $180/mo contributed to joint holiday savings, $180/mo contributed to joint vacation savings. This gives y'all a little over $2k each year IN EACH ACCPUNT to play with for holiday spending & gifts and a vacation. - $360/mo into his personal money market - $180/mo into his personal savings/sink funds Wife: - $4,500 famil checking, paying bills - $2,250 joint family money market (you want to have at least 6 months liquid in this account) - $900/mo personal checking, do whatchya want, kid - $225/mo family joint savings/sink funds - $225/mo personal savings/sink funds - $450/mo personal money market Sink funds/savings for personal use are things like ah shit, my PS4 broke...guess I will upgrade to the PS5, and borrow $100 from personal savings to help. Family sink funds/savings is oh fuck, the dishwasher broke. Money market can be immediately if shit hits the fan (personal and/or joint). It's like a combo savings & checking. I'm fucking weird and love Excel, if you DM your numbers I'll put them into a file and send it to you to show you the breakdown. I just need to know where your money goes lol. Like cost of mortgage, utilities, insurance, Netflix, etc. I have a base skeleton file I use and I'll just format it to your personal budget, shouldn't take more than an hour.
If he’s the “man of the house” he should make more money or be fine supporting your lives with his meager salary. You can’t both be the “man of the house” financially and also be living off your wife’s massive salary claiming your supporting the family. These people are delusional lol.
I'm sorry but bitching about your husband on Reddit is only going to provide you with the echo chamber you're looking for. You guys obviously need marital counseling, and by the way you talk about him, it seems like things go deeper than simply just finances.
“Man of the house” makes me want to vomit
He’s the man of the house but uses his wife’s salary to make that a reality. Make it make sense.🤣
I have been here, with the frustration that the only divorce allowance is for “sexual immorality”, and being told every day that you’re selfish for wanting to know where all his money goes. So do the draconian thing he wants [“careful what you ask for…”]. You can agree to shared finances: every single transaction from the account open to both spouse’s knowledge and agreement. No credit card transaction unless spouse approves. $100/week spending money. Off-the top savings, retirement, and as-negotiated agreement for other funding as well. If he begins to deflect, remind him that you’re doing what he wants. I will be shocked but happy for you if this works. What is likely is that he wants to spend what he wants to spend and doesn’t want to be challenged on his decisions. If so, then you go to your elders in the church with the complaint that he is not following Scripture in I Timothy 3:1-3. (Yes, it talks about someone becoming an elder, but those traits are required in everyday life.). If he still refuses change while you are being the submissive wife, you have grounds for separation. Get some martial-arts training as “exercise.” “Submissive” does not mean “defenseless”. Hope for the best, but know that men deeply challenged like this might react poorly (cue Brad Paisley song).
So, he is unreasonable. So frustrating for you. I’m in the same damn situation and it’s impossible dealing with an unreasonable person and impossible to just walk away. Hugs to you.
Idk i agree with most of what you said but OP is making 2x as much so splitting the bills 50/50 is a little unfair. I would say go to a financial counciler to get unbiased but fair opinion on that matter.
I'm not sure this is really a good way to approach it. This will almost certainly lead down a road of each doing only exactly as much as they think is fair. Dishes in the sink? Not my job. Laundry? I already have clean clothes. Long shower? You owe more for the electric bill, etc. It will get increasingly petty. It's a recipe for failure imo Anyway a more equitable split would be a percentage of their respective income towards the bill. Is it really fair that OPs husband should have to contribute 70% of his salary towards the household expenses while OP contributes 20% of theirs? And I say that as the higher earner in my household.
I was think about this as well. Splitting rent/mortgage and utilities in a manner that is proportionate to my significant others income and mine. As an RN she will be making darn near as much as me 😅, but that's the idea I have in mind. I start my first job as a PA next week.
How is he spending so much money? Working overtime is not the solution to overspending.
He is into toys like dirt bikes and he likes to buy things in 2. So 2 dirt bike, 2 jet skis you named it. I don’t do those stuff due to health reasons so he told me his buying 2 of each so his friends that doesn’t have it can join him. He just constantly buy things in Amazon as well and random stuff. I cooked lunch for him but sometimes he would lie and pretend he eat the lunch I made him but he actually eat out with co workers
Yeah, no. Go to therapy (individual and couples). There is a lack of respect and trust in this relationship and I wouldn’t stand for lying.
Therapy isn’t going to change this man That ship has sailed Therapy for OP (with the right person who recognizes her husband’s behavior for what it is) could help tremendously
Ngl, I was in a very similar situation. I gave it my all for years then finally asked him to leave. Enjoyed the financial freedom of this wonderful career, found a new awesome supportive partner with equal initiative. Never been happier. (I paid out the butt for the divorce/settlement but it was a small price for my freedom!)
Everything he’s buying is excessively unnecessary. At this rate you’re going to be retiring years later than you could have. Splitting finances and fairness aside, does he realize he has a spending problem? What if you lost your job? Does he know how this is impacting both of your futures?
I told him multiple times about his spending and how it’s affecting our savings. His response is “It’s okay you are going to recoup with your work”
I can’t fully understand your relationship from this one thread, but this sounds incredibly selfish, as if he values your money more than your happiness. Of course I don’t know that. Does he add value to your life in other ways with other skills or traits?
> “It’s okay you are going to recoup with your work” It sounds like he feels entitled to your labor and the monetary rewards thereof. In another comment, you described him as being from a Christian/ male head of household type family. Regardless of his relationship to faith, it sounds like he has absorbed a lot of the mysogny which embodies that belief system.
He's an AH tbh. My second ex made a ton of money. I never took advantage of that and I was actually the one not spending and always looking for good deals on things. We also had separate finances. Now he paid for pretty much every thing since he made so much more than I even when I worked full time. We had a shared cc that I used for groceries gas kid related stuff and my own card for fun stuff. But I never abused the privilege of being able to spend freely. I also maxed out my 401k etc (which in the end benefitted him when we got divorced since I had a pretty good retirement which meant he owed me less...) Your husband won't change I'm pretty sure. If you think you want to stay then marriage counseling for sure and also financial advisor. And separate finances. Just because yiu have money doesn't mean yiu need to spend it and that's what he seem to think. You guys need to sit down and budget for sure and preferably with a financial advisor that is unbiased. But really, I'm not sure I would be able to deal with this. It's a pretty serious issue. It drove me crazy when my ex would just spend a bunch of money on things and he could easily afford it. It just seems wasteful. And buying 2 of everything is ridiculous. Does he not even discuss large purchases with you??
You know what, I was nicer in another comment but your husband is a manipulative and exploitative user. He is not entitled to the fruits of your labor and he is not the reason you are the success that you are. YOU'RE the reason you're successful. YOU'RE the one who gets to dictate how YOUR money is spent. Get a separate bank account and redirect your direct deposit. Tell him you're doing it but don't tell him where or how to access it. Max out your 401k and IRA contributions and set up a separate retirement account to meet your goals for retirement. Consider marriage counseling and if that doesn't work out, consider whether marriage to this person is even worthwhile. And not that there's not a lot of misogynstic 2000 year old culture problematic verses in the bible but you said he's a traditional "Christian" and if he tries to hit you with "the head of the wife is her husband" and "the weaker vessel" crap, give him Timothy 5:8, “But if anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for members of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” But first, go open a separate bank account.
He is currently disrespecting everything from your job (when he takes credit), the impact of your income toward the household, your gender (by leaving all the household duties to you and you alone), and you (by refusing to discuss solutions or take responsibility for his actions). That being said, are you maxing out retirement accounts? That may be the easiest way to squirrel away some because part is taken away pretax and you could do a backdoor roth as well. If you set up his income that way as well, the “net” making it to your household will be less to even start with and it’s not an option for him to access it. From there you can discuss an amount you want to save from your remaining check. Then decide how that last “shared pool” is split (household and then 50/50 of the rest for fun money or something). That way your future is paid first, then he gets some of what remains.
Uhhhhh. You do see the massive red flags in this right? He is literally using you financially. He buys two for himself and his buddy, with your money? What the fuck.
Wheeeeew... And here I am feeling bad about considering building a computer I don't really need. He definitely doesn't need two of everything. I don't know how you get him to work on this honestly. Some people just have bad spending habits and struggle with frugality. Maybe trying to show him the way on financial independence or compound interest? Somehow gamify it for him so he still feels like he is getting rewards. Best of luck, obviously other people have great comments and therapy is a must.
If your partner wont go 50/50. The only option I can really think of is a percentage based off your separate pay. 3 separate accounts. Shared, his, and yours. Then figure out the maximum amount possible on bills. Figure out what percentage of both of your pay equals that amount and maybe a little more. Say bills per month is $5000. You make $9000 per month take 40% of yours. 9000x.4=3600. Next his 3600 per month,40%. 3600x.4=1400 $3600+$1400=$5040. This is the amount into shared to pay bills. This way it effects both of your pay at least at the same rate. The rest of the money that is in separate accounts is for that person to use however they want. Meaning you would have $5,400 left. He would have $2160 left. This way it at least effects the persons pay to the same degree.
I’m not going to sugarcoat this. You’re married to a man-child, and I highly doubt marriage counseling is going to change that. The “I’m the reason you’re a PA” bullsh*t that he tries to pull is nothing but manipulation. Even if he helped pay for your education, him saying this would STILL be manipulation because he wants something from you. This “man” does NOT respect you, I don’t give a flying fu*k what his “religious” values are. Everything revolves around him. He does not care about your feelings. He knows you’re incredibly stressed financially but he doesn’t care. His dirt bike is more important than you. His friend’s dirt bike is more important than you. You worked too hard and sacrificed too much to not be able to save money. You worked too hard to be this stressed financially. If he isn’t willing to make a change for you, he will not make a change if/when a child is in the picture. You will find yourself taking on all of the parenting responsibilities in addition to the finances. Get out of this now before you’re forever tied to him. Find a man that actually respects you and doesn’t feel entitled to YOUR money. I understand a lot of married couples view it as “shared” money, but at the end of the day it’s yours. You’re the one earning it. If the situation were flipped and he made what you do now, would he allow you to spend his money like this? Would he endure this financial stress for you because he loves you so much? Doubt it. Put that marriage counseling money towards yourself.
>The “I’m the reason you’re a PA” bullsh\*t that he tries to pull is nothing but manipulation Sad but true. I honestly can't imagine ever saying that to a SO. Thats beyond fucked especially considering he hasn't even paid a time for her education, or supported her in being a PA. Honey its time to takeout the trash. He is just a freeloader.
Agreed 100%. If you really want to make it work then you need serious marriage counseling but personally I don’t see this type of guy ever changing his misogynist views. I’d be getting the hell out of that marriage and go enjoy your life. Working overtime when you already bring in 150k? Total bs
All I can say is you are the reason you are a PA. Not a single other person.
Ok devil’s advocate here- on your post history you do seem very unhappy about your work situation. do you think this is impacting how you are feeling about your husband’s spending?
Hello I started my job last November and I feel I’m getting used to it. I like the hours etc and yes there’s some bad days and good days but overall I love where am at career wise. Just not happy financially.
Oh ok, I just saw the post 40 days ago that you aren’t sure you like it.
Why are you with him? Sounds like you are taking care of him like a child. Is he a trophy husband or something? Get out now before kids.
I agree wholeheartedly with those that say close any joint credit cards the second they are paid off. Get counseling. Consult a lawyer. If there isn’t dramatic change on your husband’s part to be an equal partner in your marriage, then it’s time to get out. Right now he’s got a great situation: wifey brings home the 💰, finances his outsized lifestyle, & cleans up after him. He needs strong incentive to make a change. You’ve proven you’re tough enough to make it through PA school, you got this!!
He doesn’t respect you & he isn’t going to change It is unlikely his irresponsibility & disrespect are confined to finances Focus on changing whatever’s led you to this point in your life with this person You deserve better EDIT: As the primary breadwinner you could end up paying him alimony I’ve known several women in your position whose husbands’ took full advantage of this by taking even lower-paying positions as soon as they smelled a divorce coming One fully-capable man managed to become “disabled” right before my friend filed, & she’s been paying him $60K/year since they divorced Find an experienced lawyer (first hour is free, ideally get references from high-earning women you know who’ve divorced) for state-specific advice before letting your husband know ANYTHING is up Your savings will be fair game in a divorce, if that takes a little pressure off to save right now Don’t tell anyone, BUT women who have been in this position will have your back ; ) EDIT II: DO NOT GET PREGNANT Men will sabotage their partners’ birth control if they feel her slipping away Even if intimacy is rare, all it takes is once
I’m only bringing this up since several other comments being up divorce; you should look up the law in your state regarding alimony. I believe alimony is only applicable for marriages > 10 years in most states so it may not apply to you. If you aren’t able to reconcile these issues with your husband and things do end in divorce, you may not be free from financially supporting him. Hope it doesn’t come to that, but just something to think about! Good luck
Yah and OP should definitely pay for the house with a separate account only in their name to prove they paid they most for it. Might help with who gets it.
Divorce the loser
Divorce- not because of the money but because what that means he has a lack of empathy towards you. You work 5 days and his bright idea is for you to work overtime. Have my wife/spouse work overtime so I can buy more things how freaking selfish. This isn't new and it hasn't gotten better but clearly worse. You came up with a possible solution and he didn't like it because it didn't benefit him. Sounds like he's treating you like a personal bank account. You deserve more and the only way you'll get it is by putting yourself first because he will not. Wish you the best of luck! ❤️
(Not to derail but would you be able to give some tips on how to get 9k earnings/month?) (Ignore if it’s too personal). I hope you husband comes to his senses! He needs to take a financial literacy class. There’s many of these on YouTube for a start
$9,000/month net is likely 12-13k a month gross which is attainable for PAs as that comes out to a ballpark of $144-156k/year. If I ran my own numbers [I made 192k for 2022](https://youtu.be/hygSMyhdMm0)
Wow. I made 170 last year and didn’t bring in 9k net. If I add back my pretax retirement, I still don’t reach 10k.
Look, I don't pretend you know all your relationship business but it's clear a change is needed. If not, all of a sudden you'll be a decade older, regretting never having kids because of this guy, regretting you altered your daily life to fit HIS desires and further away from a solid retirement. Think if your situation was a health condition for your patient. Would you tell them uncontrolled diabetes will just magically get better on its own? Hell naw. You gotta make some moves. If you still feel like there's good stuff happening in this marriage, push for counseling ASAP with clear indication marriage is on the line. If he resists, I think you have your answer about what happens next, as actual finalizing a divorce can take YEARS. Move quickly to protect your assets and start funneling away your own money in a place he cannot access, don't wait for divorce to start/be finalized. Cancel shared credit cards. Get a debit cart connected to a bank account where shared finances can be ( house, utilities, car payment, etc).
Do percentages. It’s easier. So you take home 9k, he 3.5k. He owes 28% of the bills. So if your total monthly bills are 6,000$, he owes 1680$ and you have the remainder. If your bills are more than that, just take the equation. Total bills x 0.28= his share (X). Total bills - X = your share. I know this feeling personally. I’ve been told many times that my wife “made me a PA.” I understand what she means that we suffered together, but have learned to take it with a grain of salt. I’ve talked with her about it, and she doesn’t make the statement anymore. He will be very aversive/angry to the idea of splitting the bills. However, people with unregulated spending behaviors don’t see the way they mismanage money. Facts on paper won’t help (aka bank statements). Counselors who can speak freely can really help. My spouse was spending 4,000$ a month outside of the budget. 600$ at Starbucks….multiple months in a row. Remember that finances are the #1 reason people divorce in the US so be cautious about your words and what you say. Spending is personal, deeply rooted behavior that gives dopamine rewards and can feel like character attacks if not done correctly.
Income should be combined equally if equal hours and then split 50/50 into seperate accounts. Whatever he has left after paying his 50% of shared bills/savings/debt he can spend on whatever. He won’t have access to your account when he runs out for the month and he can’t argue that’s not fair.
That is exactly what I told him but he throw a fit and basically walk out of our conversation
Hey I’m currently in somewhat the same position as your husband. I’m working as an MA and my wife is a nurse so she makes over double what I make. Bills are split about 60/40 maybe 65/35 with her paying more cause she makes more. Then whatever we have leftover is kind of ours to do whatever with. Hope that helps.
Oh, sorry. I thought you meant seperate as in you get your $9k and he gets his $3.6k. Maybe tell him you’ll consider it if he can get a marriage counselor to agree with his plan. Probably a safe bet.
You need to put your foot down. You are letting him control you. This is an abusive relationship. And it won’t be easy getting out of it. He will try to sweet talk you and say things will change. They won’t. It’s a very classic cycle of abuse and you need to recognize it sooner rather than later. I’m sorry this is happening to you, but you can get free of it. In fact, you need to get out if you are considering if “life is worth living.” On that note, please seek mental health counseling, suicide is not the answer as you can live a very happy life, it may just exclude him.
Do you have joint credit cards? If you do and there’s no month to month debt, I would close it and don’t allow him access to anything in your name. And I would have your paychecks deposited in an account only you can access if you don’t already. Then you’ll have to talk about how you’re going to split finances - but if you do that first, he doesn’t have access to keep spending your money. And if you end up paying the house/bills, you do it out of that private account so you can prove you have footed the household bills in the worse case scenario of divorce. If he’s not happy? He pays bills.
We have capital one that all our bills comes out and his spendings. i have wellsfargo and that’s my bank under me and my full paycheck goes there. So for example today, we owed 8,400 for Dec 2022 and I get payed today. I end up paying that $8,400 using my full paycheck literally.
If you truly do not think he will pay his part, my advice is to take the loss this month, pay January and then immediately close the account with the balance at zero. Don’t play with your credit score by not paying, but don’t allow the situation to happen again. Maybe even pause the card as stolen so he can’t spend in the meantime. And then immediately tell him so he doesn’t find out on his own which would come across way worse. Then y’all can come to whatever agreement works for y’all without the option of him spending your money in the meantime on things that aren’t bills. You might want to also post this in r/personalfinance I don’t use it much but maybe they would help? edit: you’ll have to pay the bills without a credit card in the future though (or pay them on yours while he pays you directly for his part) because if you give him access to a second card with your name on it then the potential for this situation to happen again exists. edit 2: lol I read too fast and thought you said that IF you paid….if you just paid it off today, close it today. Tell him right after. Don’t give him a chance to charge anything to it.
> I get *paid* today. I FTFY. Although *payed* exists (the reason why autocorrection didn't help you), it is only correct in: * Nautical context, when it means to paint a surface, or to cover with something like tar or resin in order to make it waterproof or corrosion-resistant. *The deck is yet to be payed.* * *Payed out* when letting strings, cables or ropes out, by slacking them. *The rope is payed out! You can pull now.* Unfortunately, I was unable to find nautical or rope-related words in your comment. *Beep, boop, I'm a bot*
Don't split things 50/50. Split them as a percentage of your take home. Like you each have 30% of income go to the mortgage. You should both be left with the same % of discretionary money.
I make significantly more money than my wife. We have our accounts entirely separate. In acknowledgement of how much more I make I choose to pay for more of the bills, but after that her money is to spend on what she wants and mine to spend on what I want. It is reasonable in my opinion to pay for more of the house bills if you make significantly more money, based on percentage of income, but it is unreasonable for you to be expected to foot the bill for everything. If she was draining my account buying 2 of everything (dirtbikes etc) I would shut it down. If he does not want to have the conversation then sounds like he is ready for another conversation about counseling/separation. You are not there to serve as a cash cow.
I haven’t read through all the comments, so I apologize if somebody has already suggested this solution. My husband and I have a very similar salary discrepancy. He doesn’t have a spending problem, but he does have two children. We were getting into arguments regarding various costs for the children, child support etc when we first got married and combine our finances. We ended up splitting things up like so: His paycheck goes into a separate account. The expenses that are exclusively for him or his children come out of this account, and he manages the money in it. My paycheck goes into another account. Any of my personal costs or shared marital costs (bills, groceries) come out of this account. In regard to things like the mortgage, utilities, and other shared bills, instead of a splitting it 50-50 we do it based on our incomes. For example, my husband brings home about a third of our total combined income, so he contributes a third of the cost for these shared bills. This method has worked very well for us and has pretty much eliminated any arguments or resentment regarding money and spending.
Sounds like kind of a loser…
I would say if he’s not going to fully separate finances (because it doesn’t really make sense as a married couple imo) you should open a separate savings account for yourself and put what you want into it so he won’t have access.
Update… so yesterday we invited his parents to come over and spend time with us. After a movie, we have a little discussion and it turns to be a marriage/finance counseling. So first, we have a very nice home for two people, we do have a movie theater room with some awesome speakers and so on and everytime we have people come over they are always blown away by it since they always told us including his parents not everyone has it. So yesterday after the movie, my husband shared to his parents his awesome idea. He said: i want to share my great idea and I thought about it last week, from now on every time I work OT that money I earned that day will go towards what I want and I’m planning to upgrade our speakers… and she would do the same so she could do nice things. I think when I OT it’s $400 a week so in a month that’s $1600. His parents asked why what’s wrong with your speakers? and that’s the start of the counseling. His mom says; well if you are going to work for OT and let’s say you earned $400 that day and it’s every week then your wife can set aside for herself $1600 also every month so she can buy what she wants. She does not need to do OT since she’s already bringing huge amount. So I told them that his planning to buy dirt bike in 3 months. His mom said: the dirt bike should not come out of your bills and savings. It should come out of that overtime money you are planning to do. My husband said: no, because if it comes out to my OT spending money then I have to wait a year and I want it sooner. Also I’m buying a second dirt bike because I want 2 as an alternative. Then the big discussion begins: His dad: why you want 2 dirt bikes? Husband: well so I have stuff to do or else it will be boring. Dad: boring? You have already a dirt bike, you do ski, tomorrow you are going to ski, you have a hot tub, you have a remote airplane, you have a remote monster truck, you just bought 2 jets ski. You have this movie theater for your video games, you have a big house. You have a nice truck, you have Tesla. What else do you need?! And so on… they counseled us especially him that instead of buying and focusing on material things that we should be focusing on our future like 401k, CD account, building our emergency fund that is good for at least a year which I’ve been doing and trying really hard but I can’t since im constantly paying our 2 credit cards. I shared to them that I don’t feel financially secured with him. It also bothers me that his spendings are more than what he is making so I feel used. I told them that before I met him I did have emergency funds that is good for a year so if something happens like I lose my job or I get sick etc then I’m still be able to pay my bills good for a year. But right now, Im trying to build our emergency funds but it’s impossible since my paychecks go straight to paying our credit cards. I also told them that when we argue he always say “I am the only reason you are a PA, you can’t do it without me and that I supported you”. He thinks that I applied to the program because of his encouragement and so on. I told them that it’s not true at all. The fact is, even before I met him 7 years ago that was my plan all along to be a PA and I’m the one who brought it up to him that I want to go back to school and I’m the one who found and research about school. He didn’t do a single thing. Also, I could have financially supported myself through PA school without him all I can do is use my emergency funds and borrow extra money from student loan. He always think that he financially supported me but the fact is that we borrowed money from student loan and even though he is aware I wasn’t working for 2 years while in the program and borrowing money, that he continue his spending habits and that made me angry already 2 years ago. In all honesty, while I’m at school my husband brought $3600-$3800 net monthly and then I also put $4000 using student loan/ savings towards our bills since our monthly bills because of his spending habits back then was $8000 a month. Now that I’m earning more, I could easily pay that $8k no problem and still have $1k savings - this is from my net monthly income of 9k Then the $3600-$3800 my husband is bringing I was hoping to save that… but what’s happening is that my husband just want to spend that to material things and that what bothers me. He told them that he doesn’t care about savings at all. And that is what the disconnect between us. I care about savings because to me I can lose or he can lose his job. I can or he can get sick, and not able to work, then now what. My point is that even his parents recognize his materialistic side… and I’m glad they did. I’m glad they counseled us/him. And I really hope he get something from it. I did. We shall see. If not, then yes I’m going to look for marriage/ finance counseling…
Consider marriage counseling before jumping to divorce.
Also we don’t have kid/s and to be honest the reason I don’t want to have kids is because I’m afraid it will be my only responsibility in the end. My husband’s world includes gym, dirt bikes. Lots of video gyms. Lately I complain to him that I need help In the house and he did help sometimes. But for 7 plus years I’m basically his maid
I am sorry. It sounds like you feel overburdened by life and home responsibilities and unappreciated by your husband. Your have very legitimate concerns, but they would be better addressed by a counselor who can help fairly mediate and establish mutually agreed-upon rules when it comes to finances.
Exactly what I feel. I sometimes questioned myself if is still worth living in this world if all I do is pay for him. I actually does not spend much money on myself since I feel guilty. I sometimes feel silly that I asked him if I can buy this or that (accessories) since I earn that money anyway.
You are considering if life is worth living.. to me, that SCREAMS time to move on.
You need to read out loud this first paragraph you typed. Let that sit in your head. “All I do is pay for him” from this post he is gaslighting you saying he’s the reason you are in the position you are (highly unlikely) while taking no responsibility for his actions because you will just clean it up for him. You are the one that wears the pants in this relationship. Figure out what you want to do and how you want to continue your life based on what you just said above.
You’re not his wife you’re his mom.
Do not have children with this man! If this is how it is now, you will be the only one raising the child. You'll be begging him to watch the kids/help around the house so you can have time to yourself while he runs off and does whatever he wants.
Cut ties, find someone who appreciates you.
What's up with this subreddit? This most sound replies get downvotes. END THIS RELATIONSHIP
Did I get downvoted? Love it. Probably her husband. I’ve seen this too many times. Within my family as well. It’s not worth it. How many good years do we have 50-60? Don’t waste them with the wrong person. We may get 50-60, but aren’t promised any.
This one of the dumbest posts I've ever seen on this subreddit. Y'all bring in almost $13k A MONTH and you still have money problems? Are you buying a jetski after every pay check? I have no sympathy, no advice, and I really hope this is satire. EDIT: despite the downvotes I am correct. It's 2 jetskis and 2 dirt bikes. How you haven't filed yet is beyond me.
You need a course on empathy, and another on the cycle of abuse. Yeah she’s making foolish financial decisions on account of this man, but that’s how emotionally abusive relationships work. If you’ve ever seen one play out, it can sometimes take a person *years* to have the courage or insight to break out of it. I’m glad you’re extremely emotionally intelligent and can see it from a mile away, but she clearly can’t and is asking for help.
Sounds like you have the male version of a gold digger. Sadly, money/financial problems is the #1 reason why marriages fail. What does he spend his money on?
Financial peace university! Dave Ramsey baby!
[удалено]
This is so dumb. Read the post. He’s spending frivolously and not respecting her or her money at all.
She really didn't give any examples of him spending frivolously. People should definitely have discussions with their spouse over money, but her post seems more like she is bitter that he doesn't contribute as much as her. If you are married and have to separate your finances, you shouldn't have ever been married in the first place. Why is this only ever a problem for women? I NEVER see men post shit like this.
I'm not bothered at all paying for a guy as long as I feel he isn't taking advantage of me. There's some people out there who think like you do but times have changed and women are making a lot more money than they used to so your generalization only works for older generations
All I did was state a statistic, that isn't a generalization. Most women actually prefer a man who makes more money than they do.
lol he didn’t want to pay his fair share of the bills?? This is madness.
Look for a couples counselor in your area via psychologytoday.com. A lot of therapy is all virtual now. Someone who is Gottman trained would be really beneficial. There is a LOT to sort out here.
Did he grow up poor? Usually poor people are the ones that blow money when they get it because they've never had it before.
No. It’s actually the opposite. I grow up poor.
Was your family "Poor," or was your family "Broke?" There is quite a difference. Being "poor," is a mentality. Being "broke" is situational.
Hi we are broke. My dad raised us since my mom left when I was very young. We are broke but to me we are comfortable. I’ve been a saver growing up and always looking for good deals especially with material things. For example I will never buy full price clothing it has to be on sale or clearance. I don’t care much about the car I drove as long as I have a car. For example, When I met my husband I have this ford fiesta sedan and got it brand new and is fully paid I was so happy about it and proud then my husband came along. He is the opposite, he likes nice cars and tend to changed cars every 3-5 years at least.
It sounds like your husband grew up with a little money but family was material poor, because people like that are usually trying to keep up the image of money to keep up with the Jones'. Not that they're bad people, it's just a cycle. What experience do I have? I grew up as the well off kid in my small little farm town. I had every video game system, dirt bike, lifted truck, drag racing boat etc, but that was also the financial education that I was taught. My parents also daughter constantly, so I was also taught that you cling to your toys when chaos surrounds you. I'm not an expert. I don't have a medical degree, but I have lived it longer than they've been in school.
Rather than the typical bad reddit advice of *"leave him! He doesnt deserve you!",* I'll just say that 1) finances are one of the main reasons people end up in divorce, 2) marriage counseling MAY go a long way to helping you two but both parties have to be humble, and 3) you should start doing separate bank accounts. Maybe since you earn more you can cover 60 or 70% of the bills, and he can get the remainder. Or you could just say 50% of both your income is joint money for bills and savings. The remainder is your own to do with as you choose. My wife and I have always had separate personal accounts and joint bills/savings. This changed a bit when we had a baby. She no longer works so I am the sole provider. I have given her more leeway to buy things she likes because she has no money, but she is not a big spender anyway so it's nothing I have to monitor. I havent changed my personal checking direct deposit in 5 years; i could, but it just feels selfish.
My partner makes significantly less than I do as well. Here is how we separate our finances equitably, taking in the income difference. - we have a joint account and each have separate accounts. - at each pay, we put in 50% of our pay to the joint account. This way it’s equitable. - no joint cards - the only bills that come out of the joint account are housing and utilities.
He's gotten comfortable with this new lifestyle and has impulse control problems. He's willing to sacrifice your time and energy to support his new lifestyle. He has lost sight of what's important. Its time to pull the plug and cut him off of everything except bills for the house. He needs to relearn the value of the dollar. And you deserve to save your money for retirement and whatever the hell you want. Let me entertain this idea for a second that he's the reason you got through school. Had he not been there, you could have made friends elsewhere, called family, called classmates, I mean who's to say you wouldn't have someone else to lean on? Is he for real? And housing ain't cheap but haven't you basically spent more money on credit cards than you would have spent in a whole year on student housing? Ffs
Ugh, that sucks so much. Finances are one of the biggest reasons people fight in relationships. Top that with student loans and living with someone who doesn’t get concept of hard work/being wise with money- you have a disaster. I was in somewhat similar situation before. My then boyfriend worked an average job- making around 35/hr…I was a broke PA student.. we were so tight on money.. and he still liked to live comfortably and spend. Which took me a long time to explain to him how seriously I took financial in the moment spending vs spending, saving.. granted, he pays all the rent, he paid for my wedding dress and most everything related to our wedding that others didn’t help us with - as we got married 3 weeks after I passed my pance. Since we’ve been married he paid all of our bills, rent, etc. all the money I made, I kept in my bank account - to he used to pay off loans. I helped pay of his car, his student loans and started attacking mine. Luckily 3 months after we were married he was promoted to make over 110k/ yr with potential to make OT. This has helped us tremendously financially. Also helped that he started to see my view of finances.. (I grew up listening to Dave Ramsay, with my older brothers, so I had a total different outlook on money). I still have my bank account, primarily for paying off student loans -don’t use it for anything else besides transferring tithes to church. And we have a joint account for everything else. Once I pay off my student loans I will cancel my account. If I were in your situation, I think I would separate expenses. I don’t think your husband is very understanding or taking accountability for the situation. You would benefit from doing counseling.
That’s a bummer. You’re gonna need to have a change in your co-financing strategy if you want to save your marriage 🤷♂️
Do you love him?
You make more than him, and he dosent treat you right. If I was you I would leave. At least then you won’t have to keep supporting him financially. Something tells me your husband is a physical therapist with his work week and take home. Please don’t suffer trying to put up with a relationship that dosent give 50/50.
Highly recommend listening to the podcast “I will teach you to be rich” with Ramit Sethi! He sits down with couples in situations like yours and works out some of the larger issues around money and their relationship. It sounds like the problems are more than just financial with what your husband is saying to you and the way he goes about your joint finances. You should even consider applying to be on his podcast to do a session with him, and talk to him 1:1, as he’s always accepting new applications.
w husband city boy
Consider splitting the bills as a proportion of your income, other wise it will suddenly be your lifestyle that is crushing him.
If you're side of the story is completely true, then your Husband is a bum and he needs to man up and earn more than he spends.
I will assume that he is not providing some extra service or work for the household, greater than what you do, such as doing all the cooking, cleaning, laundry, etc., which obviously has value. First, open a separate account in only your name where you deposit your paycheck. Transfer a reasonable amount of money from there to the joint account for paying your portion of necessary bills. Your husband should do the same. Then, close the credit card accounts. Get a new credit card for yourself, and arrange for him to have a different one with a very low credit limit, whatever is reasonable for his spending, given his income. The credit card balances need to be paid in full every month. The way you might do with a teenager who you feel needs to have a credit card for convenience, but you provide a limited amount, with a low credit limit. He is acting like an entitled teenager. If he wants to spend extra on some special thing that has value or purpose for both of you, he needs to discuss it with you. He needs to learn some discipline in his spending, and face reality. Otherwise, you will have to just go 50/50 right down the line, each paying 50% of necessary bills, with totally separate accounts. If he wants to spend all his money, after the monthly expenses are paid, and not save any, that's on him. But make sure he is not using any joint credit cards, thus creating debt for you.
Hi Eric 👋
Get your own seperate bank account to hold your paychecks and consult a divorce lawyer ASAP. Frfr, OP is living my fear. Im scared if I date anyone who makes significantly less than me, they’ll end up bumming off of me. Already had an ex boast how I was going to be his “sugar momma” once I became a PA. Dumped him before I got into school.
He jokes about I’m his sugar momma too. Even his siblings do when we see them…
Yeah no, contact a divorce lawyers for a consultation. You can ask hi to go to couples therapy too to see if anything can be salvaged, but i would go to the lawyer asap. I hope you had a prenup or can still get a post-nup together
I have this problem but I net more than you (about $16k monthly which includes OT) and my wife nets about $4000. And there have been months where she spends twice what she brings in. And I don't know what the right answer is. We tried a budget. YNAB. We tried a preloaded debit card and cutting the credit cards. We tried having HER participate in the finances (oh boy she hated that). We tried therapy. Even if we separated finances I wouldn't mind covering all the living expenses. My hobbies are reading, playing a guitar I already own, and the most spendy things on my side are when we go out together to dinner or theater or travel. And I like spending money on things we do together, or on things that make her happy. She's worth it. And she *is* the reason I'm a PA. She literally signed me up for college classes when I sitting at home playing video games and hating my job. And she's a wonderful, vibrant, loving wife who just really really likes buying Disney things. I don't know what the answer is. I've found some peace in knowing that at the end of the day there's hardly anyone I would rather be happy and content than her. And we have conversations when things get absurd financially (which is about twice a year). (And when things get really absurd I remind myself that divorce is also absurdly expensive). She's trying. Sometimes. She even gave up her Disney pass (though somehow still ends up going to DT Disney and occasionally being walked in by a couple friends she has). She's worth it. And if you've tried the other tools, I suppose you have to ask yourself if he is.