Posted 06 February 2005 - 07:22 PM
If you have a rental property that's generating income, You're already on your way to establishing some serious wealth and assets for the future.
Not buying something because you don't feel old enough never made a lot of sense to me, but if it works for you, that's fine. There's nothing wrong with not making financial commitments because you feel you don't have enough money. Exercising restraint is a much greater example of maturity then doing something "because you're 30, and this is what 30 year olds do." It's why you have a lot more at your age than most who are ten years older have. Overall, you seem to only have one flaw in your system.
No offense, if your husband is like you say he is, then he is the problem. Not knowing his personal history, I'm only going to say at his age he should probably have something established credit-wise that is not a direct result of you. Aside from that, I will say that I had a girlfriend who had a similar attitude in regards to financial dilemmas. When the going got tough, she threw up her hands and walked away. We lived together and made agreements as to how things would work.
This is going to upset the femi-nazis in the group. They're going to accuse me of being a controlling, dominating and evil person. The first thing you have to do is accept that unless he wants to learn to be responsible, you will never teach him. The burden of handling the finances is yours alone. When my ex and I shacked up that was the situation. I was a waiter and a part time college student. I had my own apartment, a car, a motorccle, and many other nice "domestic" type things. My ex was a bartender. She had a roommate. She was not in school. She owned a crappy old car, and her clothes. She had several CCs that had gone into default/charge off. And yet she made more money than me, but I had more to show.
Here's where people start to get tense. If your DH has any source of income you need to take it away from him. I would consider taking the CC away unless he only uses it for emergencies. You give him an allowance each week that you do not question what he spends it on, but also do not give extra unless you know exactley what he's buying. If he has income you can take away, then you also have to take his bills and pay them as if they were yours, afterall you are spending his money like it is yours. I never once had to "take" money from my ex. I was lucky that she hated financial stuff so much that she willingly handed it over each day. Just by taking control of the money and knowing where every penny was being spent, I cut her debts in half in less than six months. Every bill was paid in advance. We made the mistake of never saving anything. But we were in a position, that we coverered all of our monthly expenses with three weeks of work, and each month we had a fourth week where we splurged and spent, and lived higher than anyone in our position should have. And we financed our lifestyle with cash. The two of us were very good at our jobs and every Monday morning I routinely put over 1000$ cash in the bank. If your DH has no source of income other than what you make, his bills can wait, right here and now, he is not a financial contributor because he "works" outside the home and has no income. And he has less financial say than you. That's all there is to it.
Accept the fact that you will argue about money. More often than you'd like. A financial dilemma is almost always a bill or bills that aren't paid for any number of reasons. The people who suffer from these have a tendency to want to spend often. They don't understand the concept of "buy now, pay later." They don't realize that most of our expenses are paying for things we got yesterday. They view the finances in very simplistic terms that are often inaccurate. This is how these arguments work. He sees something he wants. It costs 1000$. He looks in the check book and sees 3000$. Since you control the money he has to ask you for it (this may be damaging to his/her ego.) You say "no" because you have 2500$ in bills for the month, and only 500$ in reserve. He gets pissed because he doesn't understand how there can be 2500$ in bills and if it is that much it's your fault because you control the money. You will be accused of selfish spending, and that you are trying to deprive him of something. He's had a tantrum and yet he has never sat down and looked at all the bills. He has no clue where he has ever spent money because he doesn't think about it when he spends it. You can't hand him the checkbook and tell him to handle it because he won't. And you'll suffer. It's a no-win situation that doesn't change until he's ready to look at himself and change his way of thinking. Unfortunately it can become exhausting to you. And it never seems to end. Sometimes you can let them have their way just to shut them up, but be very careful. By now you've realized you're dealing with a large child who is learning how to get his way. This is the same for women as well.
Overall you have to stand your ground. Invite them in on financial matters, ask for their opinion as it is their money too. Once the argument is over and they start to act civil again, you can go back to thinking he/she is an alright person.
That's how to deal with a SO who doesn't handle finances in a responsible manner. At least that's the best plan I have come up with. Every situation is different and should be handled accordingly. As for retirement and investments, American Express has financial consultants for regular people with regular incomes.
DH is still of the belief that if you ignore something financially, it will go away. Definitely trying to help him with that one!
