Money Moral Dilemma: Should we split bills equally if my husband has higher outgoings?

MSE_Kelvin

This week's MoneySaver who wants advice asks...

My husband and I have similar salaries, but he has higher outgoings than me due to child maintenance payments for a child from a previous marriage. Is it reasonable to still expect household bills to be split equally between us?

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JGB1955

Absolutely - why should you subsidise his commitments from a previous relationship?

Sky_

My husband and I have always pooled our money and taken similar amounts of personal spending money, regardless of who is earning more or less.  At times I've earned more and at other times he has, but that system has always worked for us. It's a bit cliché, but we consider ourselves a team and we both hate the thought of the other one going without or having less than us.

So in your scenario, I'd say that you should contribute more, so that you're each left with similar amounts of disposable income after essential bills.  Your husband presumably did not anticipate becoming an absent parent when planning his child and living apart from his child is surely hard enough, without also being (in my opinion) further penalised because of that situation.

If his child lived with you/him, would you refuse to contribute in any way to their costs (expense of extra bedroom, heating, food, holiday costs, etc).

p00

I may be old fashioned but to me the total income would be taken into account, minus outgoings, split the rest.
You either have an equal relationship or you don't.

Meganandrea999

I think this really depends on your relationship. I have a similar salary to my partner but I have a lot more debt I’m trying to pay off. I wouldn’t expect him to pay more l, but he’d have to understand that currently I can’t afford for example to move somewhere else and pay more, so unless he insisted that he wanted to pay more he would have to wait until my debts were paid off. If he did pay more I would want to contribute extra once my debts were paid off for a period to repay him as I don’t think it’s fair for him to subside me without being repaid, or I might make an agreement that if we split he would get a slightly larger enough of the equity based on the extra he paid. 

I don’t think there’s a right of wrong. I don’t think it’s fair so expect you to pay more to subsidence someone else’s last relationship, but if you can afford to and want to it’s completely your choice 

CapricornLass

Like Meganandrea, I think it depends on your relationship, what your approach to money is, where the child is living, and also what sort of income you have between you. 

I wouldn't consider child maintenance a  household expense myself if the child is not living with you, and strictly speaking, your husband should pay for this himself.  If the child is living with you, then yes, they are  part of the household, and the costs of rearing them would be included in the household bills.

It may be though that from a practical point of view, he wouldn't be able to meet these costs without help from you, or you are quite happy to help pay a part of them.  Whatever you decide to do you have to be happy with the solution.  If you aren't, then you might become resentful, and then you run the risk damaging your relationship.

camaj

Why should he pay less than half of, say, the electricity bill because he has to pay child maintenance? That's not how it works. If he was living alone he'd have to pay all of it.

maddogwoman

Surely his maintenance is a household bill as I assume you live in the same household as your husband and knew he had a child from a previous relationship before you got married! 
I was in the same situation and we decided to have just had one joint bank account to make life easier. Both our salaries were paid into it and then all our bills and expenditure went out of it.  In practice this meant that after his maintenance payments went out there was very little left of his salary to contribute to any bills, but I was aware of what he was paying before we got married and thought he had suffered enough not being able to live with his daughter. 

Pixel_Runner

Share the maintenance payments burden.

Surely when you got married you declared "what's mine is yours, and yours is mine"? That covers everything, possessions as well as debts.

If you are at all thinking about letting your husband have less spending money than yourself - then that is a very selfish attitude.

Erica51

Surely you realised when you married this man that his commitment both financially and emotionally to his child didn’t end? Take off what he pays to support his child before you share what’s left and help him to do the right thing.

Thrugelmir

camaj said:

Why should he pay less than half of, say, the electricity bill because he has to pay child maintenance? That's not how it works. If he was living alone he'd have to pay all of it.

Perhaps his electricity bill would be far lower if he lived alone..........