Living together - financial arguments

jellyhead

meanycath wrote:

I'm going to print off all the messages on this thread to remind me when I'm feeling like backing down, that I am not wrong or unreasonable.
I know that it's different with my BF as my son is not his (and his kids are not mine) but I still think this "business" attitude is not right. I wouldn't mind if it worked both ways and I was getting X % of his business and his property but he says that as I'm not earning enough to put money into either of those things then why should I have a share?

I think he would always use money to have "control" over me and that is something I don't want.

Catherine x

hi cath, good luck with all of this whatever you decide. i've felt quite sad reading all of the comments, especially yours. maybe it's different in my situation because my son doesn't know his biological father but when i married my hubby my son 'became his' - he married the both of us. i'm having a baby now and will give up work to look after the baby full time so hubby will be supporting us all financially (i don't get money off sons biological father). never has it crossed hubby's mind that i should be helping out or that he shouldn't have to support 'my son' - we're a family, what's his is mine (literally, his wages go into my bank account lol!).

i don't mean to sound like i'm crowing about my wonderful husband - i honestly don't understand why your bf doesn't see things the same way as my hubby. hubby and i were married a year after we got together and initially it felt a bit strange for me to spend hubby's wages but when he moved in after the wedding i had no choice, by having him in our lives i lost out on financial support from the government so he had to support us all, i only worked part time. okay i'm not working as much as he does and it's his wages paying the mortgage but if we did split up we'd share the equity because although i'm not contributing much financially i'm doing my bit for the family, i'm doing the childcare (makes no difference that my son isn't hubby's biological child). he gets the benefit of having me as a wife :-) any extra financial burden he has to shoulder through choosing me instead of somebody who has no children and can work full time to contribute equally to the mortgage etc. is worth it to him, it's all part of me and it's me he chose to marry. although initially i kind of felt like i should be 'grateful' to him for 'taking us on' he doesn't feel that way at all. even before we married he was paying for my son to have swimming lessons etc. that i couldn't afford and paying for days out at theme parks etc. that's just the way things are when you start a relationship with somebody who already has children to provide for, you're starting a relationship with the whole package, not just the female. sorry to be harsh but your bf doesn't sound right, he's got some really odd ideas about money and relationships and i don't think he'll make you happy unless he changes a lot.

on a trivial note, he's not actually allowed to live at your house, even a few days a week. try telling him you've been grassed up to the tax credits people by a neighbour and they want repayments of ten grand (two years at a hundred a week, is that right?) plus repayment of housing benefit, council tax benefit etc. etc. - see how he handles that - if he wants to move in then those debts would be his, it would be his fault. aren't i evil, cackle cackle! sorry ...

i hope you have a nice evening out anyhow :-)

margaretclare

meanycath wrote:

I think he would always use money to have "control" over me and that is something I don't want.
Catherine x

Yes, I agree with you there.

Every couple organises their finances differently and really it doesn't matter at all PROVIDED THAT there is complete openness and trust, both can sit down and discuss, make decisions jointly. And all this talk of inheritance I find in pretty poor taste, and that's putting it mildly.

Good luck, Cath! Stick to your guns, don't be manipulated. There is a type of man out there who uses money for control, but also uses love (or what he think of as love) for control too - talk to any Women's Refuge, they are full of women who've been controlled by 'love'!

Best wishes

Aunty Margaret

Spendless

jellyhead wrote:

on a trivial note, he's not actually allowed to live at your house, even a few days a week. try telling him you've been grassed up to the tax credits people by a neighbour and they want repayments of ten grand (two years at a hundred a week, is that right?) plus repayment of housing benefit, council tax benefit etc. etc. - see how he handles that - if he wants to move in then those debts would be his, it would be his fault. aren't i evil, cackle cackle! sorry ...

LOL- that is very naughty of you to think jellyhead!!

PS Jellyhead you also need to clear your PMs cos i can't send you any more as your up to your limit

Scarlett1

meanycath wrote:

He says that I am not "giving up" anything but eventually he will have built up some money which he can put in his will and leave to his children.

ok, so does that means that he has no intention of leaving anything to you or any children you have together in the future, even though he is demanding a chunk in YOUR house

and as for not divorcing his wife yet, and sleeping in a portakabin at night, hmmmmmm a bit suss there

Scarlett1

elona wrote:

I want to say "Good luck" as well.

Just a nasty thought but- these other women with children that he has been with and never shared childcare etc. - do you think he is targeting people who he thinks will be vulnerable?

Can you be sure he really is getting a divorce?

If he is so keen to own your house and to "employ" you in his business - then you would be completely under his thumb!

Are you also sure that he is spending nights in the portacabin - or does he have someone else on a string?

Sorry I didnt see this post, but yes elona, I think the same

Catherine, tell him to not slam the door on the way out

jellyhead

yes that was horrid of me spendless lol! i've cleared my pm's a bit now, only 44 in my inbox lol! i just thought of the grassing up thing because a girl a few doors down from me has been caught out this year and is in serious trouble. she's been claiming income support etc. and other stuff she shouldn't be entitled to if she's deemed to be living with her boyfriend. she's entitled to her severe disablement allowance or whatever it's called i think but everything else is put in jeopardy by her boyfriend having a job. she's disagreeing, saying that he doesn't live there, and it's true that he's never given her any money towards the house, herself or the children but his stuff is there and he spends the night more often than not. he says he lives on a friends sofa, but without a permanent place of residence how can he prove he's not living there with her as her partner? besides which who would believe he's been in a relationship with her for years but isn't paying her bills, buying things for the children, buying food, etc. etc. he's been keeping his wages for himself and paying some food money, buying his own cigarettes and beer but now she's been caught out i'm not sure sure who has to repay all of the years of benefits - her or him? it's all down to whether or not they're classed as living together - they would both say they're not. but i wonder if cath would be classed as living with her bf if his stuff is at her house and he stays over most nights? using her house as a base for his kids and himself is putting her tax credits at risk, very selfish of him in my humble opinion.

ho hum, we're being very mean about the bf but he really doesn't sound that good for cath, sorry to be negative cath but reading your posts makes me feel angry towards him. you deserve better and if you're going to stay with him he needs to be shown how to treat you better, if you really want to spend the rest of your life with him then hopefully you can teach him to think of the pair of you as a partnership before you allow him to move in. i think your £150 a week estimate sounds a bit low actually, does he expect you to feed his children from that? will he expect it to cover take-aways, nights out, alcohol, new clothes, all the petrol, etc? is a relationship where you can't afford to have a child what you really want? do you agree deep down on what's important if there is a child? (hubby and i both agree that one of us being at home most of the time is what's best - it would be a nightmare if one of us thought staying at home was a priority but the other thought we should earn 2 full time incomes and pay childcare out of that). if he lived at your house full time would he want cable TV and would he pay for it if so? what about the phone bill - if he lived there would he spend hours on the phone then expect you to pay for it? if your fuel bills were higher due to him having more hot baths there would he increase what he pays you? sorry for being picky lol!

loopy_lass

Spendless wrote:

LOL- that is very naughty of you to think jellyhead!!

PS Jellyhead you also need to clear your PMs cos i can't send you any more as your up to your limit

i am under the impression he CAN stay at her house whilst she is still claiming but obviously not for weeks at a time... the only stipulation is that he isnt contributing to the family income of food rent etc... (which he isnt lol) and you arent living as husband and wife, which if he only stays a few nights a week your not!

apparently its a new EU law that says the gov have no right to delve into your private life...

dunno if its true, but its what some person at the job centre was telling me....

obviously its a in a nutshell job but worth looking into


hth loops

jellyhead

i was under the impression that in order to claim you're not living as a couple the other person needs to have a registered address they pay rent and bills on - does the bf pay for his portakabin? well, i hope it goes okay for the girl in my street then - technically she was living with him but he didn't give her any money. they said she can't prove he wasn't giving her cash though. she lives by cash, goes to the post office to claim her benefits and pays for everything in cash, no bank statements to back up that she was paying her own bills in full. the investigation has only been in the last month or two so if anything recent has changed maybe it might go in her favour. anyway, sorry for going off topic lol!

cath, i know this sounds mercenary but why isn't he earning enough to pay you more than the £600/750 per month? his business doesn't sound that good to me, would he better off working for someone else rather than himself? or could he live with his parents if he's helping with their mortgage? i'd make him wait for a while, at least until you've finished using legal aid - it would be free if you weren't sharing your house with him so why pay for it? it's another cost you incur by having him move in therefore it should be paid by him. you should not be made financially worse off by sharing your house with him - not if he has the money to 'lend' to you - how much of his own cash is he keeping hold of? why isn't he letting you have free access to his bank account? ask him if you can have a joint account! i think you should factor health costs in too - in the first 12 months of hubby moving in with me i needed £168 in dentist fees, more than £200 in new glasses (i had to buy new frames, they said mine were the wrong width on the bridge of my nose, said that was the cause of my headaches lol!) and prescription costs were around a hundred for the year. i don't cost hubby that much every year but they were extra costs we hadn't factored into the budget apart from the prescriptions. you would be getting that kind of thing for free, i used to just pay a £5 glazing charge every year to get new lenses put into my old glasses frames but all of a sudden there were these unexpected costs. so he'd have to agree to pay any health costs you might have in full, otherwise you'd be short of money. sorry to be mercenary but you need to make sure that you're not WORSE off by having him live with you.

Curry_Queen

Well, I've just spent the last hour or so reading through this thread and alarm bells are ringing left, right and centre. Most people have already commented on and said the same things that I would, but there is one thing that sticks out amongst all else and for this reason alone you need to think seriously about your future with this guy Cath, and that's his comment regarding not paying a penny towards your son :mad:

You and your son come as a pair, not separate entities, and I'm sorry but any guy that wasn't prepared to equally commit to my children as to me would be down the road like a shot ... "Love me, love my child" ... nuff said.

I wish you all the luck in the world hun as this can't be easy for you, although I've detected a change in your attitude and thinking as the posts have gone on, which is a good thing and I think you already know what to do, it's just having the courage to do it, and you will

You take care ok *hugs*

rchddap1

Curry_Queen I was about to say the same thing. Cath also said in a previous post that he would want the equity in the house and other assets to go towards HIS children....what about YOUR son. If he doesn't class your son as his son then chances are this side is only going to get a lot worse further down the line. What if your sone wants to go to University, will he help towards the costs? My partner's daughters are also a part of my family now. They are a part of me and always will be. The fact that I was only 12 when the first was born is neither here nor there. Doesn't matter. I will help them if they ask with no questions.

Perhaps he's now talking of marriage and divorce to his wife as he thinks that this is one way to get what he wants? I've been with my partner for over 5 years now. We're engaged and do plan to marry, but at the end of the day its just a bit of paper and a bit of gold round my finger. What's most important to me is that we're together and get through life together as a team / partnership. I'm not sure that your bf would do this.

Please be careful and think about things carefully. You've obviously gone back through all the posts and I would encourage you to keep reading your own again and again. If it was only one thing it could be handled / managed, but when you put everything together you have to ask what this guy really wants. Will this relationship last, and will is benefit not only yourself, but also your son. If he wants to be a part of your life then your son becomes his. However, he doesn't see that...and this is a major problem in my book.

Have courage to do what you know is right.