Wife Spending Issues

Batgurl

OP the thing that struck me most is that you keep pointing out you earn much more than her. That “your” money is propping up the family. Do you feel that it’s “your” money she is spending and begrudge her that?

You and your wife have 3 kids. At some point along the way, she would have taken 3 bouts of maternity leave. You do realise how a women’s career suffers at these points? It shouldn’t but it does. So while you’ve had years and years to buildup your fine-paying career, she’s taken hit after hit to bare and raise your children.

You need to understand it’s not “your” money any more, it’s “yers”. And she is entitled to spend it as she would her own income, because ye are married now and it’s a joint income; morally and legally.

I also think, because you don’t seem to do any of the child management, that you don’t realise just how bloody expensive kids are. All that cash that can’t be accounted for? I’d bet heavy that it’s going on the kids for things you don’t even know they need like non uniform days or meeting friends or needing new hockey sticks/balls/gum shields cause the old ones broke.

You are of course, as a married couple, expected to have open and frank discussions about finances but I feel you are veering down a “my money” path and someone in this thread needs to remind you of the bigger picture.

sbsquarepants

I personally think OP the best advice is the just make everything automatic. That's what myself and the missus do - money comes in, direct debits and standing orders take care of everything automatically and what's left over is just up for grabs by whoever wants it for whatever reason.

Money is for spending!

Addle

As long as one of those dd is for saving.

lawred2

Try go through the 50/30/20 household budgeting approach with her.

Google it.

Failing that get her a revolut card that you top up but that sounds ridiculous. Like you're dealing with a teenager and not an equal partner.

woodchuck

I think automation is a good idea for savings - just treat it like another bill. If money comes out of the current account and goes directly into a savings account, then it's not (directly) available to spend. I think you need to spell out to your wife that this is what needs to be done if you want your kids to be able to go to college and that you'll both have less money to spend on luxuries as a result. I wouldn't bother getting into a discussion about the amount she spends on dinners, coffees etc as there'll be less money available for this anyway if you funnel the money into a savings account. But I do think you need make it clear that ye can't afford a trip to Paris or a new car atm.

LegacyUser

Batgurl wrote: »

OP the thing that struck me most is that you keep pointing out you earn much more than her. That “your” money is propping up the family. Do you feel that it’s “your” money she is spending and begrudge her that?

You and your wife have 3 kids. At some point along the way, she would have taken 3 bouts of maternity leave. You do realise how a women’s career suffers at these points? It shouldn’t but it does. So while you’ve had years and years to buildup your fine-paying career, she’s taken hit after hit to bare and raise your children.

You need to understand it’s not “your” money any more, it’s “yers”. And she is entitled to spend it as she would her own income, because ye are married now and it’s a joint income; morally and legally.

I also think, because you don’t seem to do any of the child management, that you don’t realise just how bloody expensive kids are. All that cash that can’t be accounted for? I’d bet heavy that it’s going on the kids for things you don’t even know they need like non uniform days or meeting friends or needing new hockey sticks/balls/gum shields cause the old ones broke.

You are of course, as a married couple, expected to have open and frank discussions about finances but I feel you are veering down a “my money” path and someone in this thread needs to remind you of the bigger picture.

I don’t know where you picked up that I’m not involved in child management. My wife does the school run but she often works weekends so it’s me doing all the ferrying to activities and birthday parties etc. and it’s almost always me bringing them to swimming and gymnastics etc., and on the side of the pitch at matches and training. If they need a new hurl or boots or whatever one of us will look after it, usually me. I have a good understanding of what these things cost I can assure you.

After we got married I insisted everything be pooled financially as I wanted an equal partnership. I dont resent her spending our money but I do resent the general indifference to financial planning and the lack of follow through on things we previously agreed like saving at least some of the CB and stick to a generous (IMO) monthly budget.

In terms of her career that is a fair point although I honestly think it had limited impact as she is in a service type role with almost no opportunities for advancement. She has mentioned recently that she wouldn’t mind a change of direction but that’s another days work and I will do my best to facilitate whatever she wants to do.

I wasn’t expecting six pages of replies so sorry that I can’t respond to everyone but I have read each and every contribution. A lot of the advice is along the same lines, automated saving, multiple accounts and segregation of spending etc. We are at least 3/4 of the way there as the accounts are already there. It’s the follow through and joint oversight that has been lacking to date. The ideal thing would be to sit down and review monthly but my wife tends to try to avoid these things. I don’t think we’ll ever be fully on the one page but I can live with a certain amount of give and take.

LegacyUser

Batgurl wrote: »

You need to understand it’s not “your” money any more, it’s “yers”. And she is entitled to spend it as she would her own income, because ye are married now and it’s a joint income; morally and legally.

I strongly disagree that OPs wife should be allowed spend their money however she likes. It's a joint income therefore it should be a joint decision for big ticket items like holidays/cars etc and he should be able to talk to her about their joint expenses and long term goals like saving the child benefit for their kids 3rd level education. This was agreed and she hasn't followed through and spends money from the state thats not hers or theirs but for their children's up keep as 'pocket money' for herself.

The CB is the one thing that I would really be firm about OP, it was agreed and hasn't happened that all or at least some would be saved each month. Everything else is debatable as can be seen from this thread that some see her as reckless with money while others are reading it as you being tight so you are going to have to just try and discuss it without either of you feeling attacked or bullied. Maybe talk to her about you both using something like a phone app to track money for a month and you can see where you are both spending too much or too little. I know you say you keep track on spreadsheets etc but that can be very dry and come across as being tight to her.

jlm29

jlm29 wrote: »

I’m not great with money myself, so I can sympathise a little with your wife! and my OH is wonderful with it (I’m pretty sure he could live on a tenner a week!!). That said, I do remind myself often that the reason he could live on a tenner is that I cover some of the bigger weekly expenses like food and childcare.
Anyhow, your wife needs to cop on. My child benefit goes into my kids bank accounts. Lately I’ve had to dip into it a good bit (unpaid maternity leave, lots and lots of home improvements etc), but my kids are still in full time childcare, my intention is that I’ll be more diligent about saving it once they’re in school. My understanding is that once they’re 7, they would have to co-sign it. I’m sure it can be set up that both of you would have to sign to withdraw it. The other spending needs to be addressed, but this is the first thing I would tackle

I appreciate the bind you are in now, so this isn't really a personal comment but just using the above to highlight flawed thinking, imo. The only time to save is now. Do not put these things off until some ideal future date as you will always postpone the saving. Your future self will have to deal with different bills that will be just as urgent. We imbue our future selves with self control we know we don't currently possess (across a range of things such as "I'll get fit next year, I'll write that book, make up with that friend" etc). The only time is now.

OP, tbh, you know the solution to this already, it's just a question of having that hard conversation. Every unnecessary thing either of ye buy is robbing yourselves of something else ye actually want (whether that is a better college experience for your kids, earlier retirement, better holiday, etc). Every hour ye both work is being wasted if the earnings from that hour is wasted, imo. There is a cumulative consequence to bad spending, sure one coffee is nothing, but 100 coffees is a fair bit. Unfortunately, we aren't designed to see the cumulative effect of our actions as we want immediate returns.

A great book on how we think about (and misthink about) money is Dollars and Cents by Dan Ariely. We are not logical when it comes to how we spend (and I'm as bad as anyone).

fed_u

OP - I see similarities between your wife and myself and if somebody sat me down I'd probably agree with what they say but it's not as easy to change your habits..
Tough love is needed and her acc needs to have a certain amount that will cover the expenses - anything extra she can spend on what she likes - if it runs out so be it, zero access to an account to dip into. You only learn the value of money by not having it in the first place! It'll take a while but the spending will eventually slow and become more reasonable! I was terrible at blowing large amounts on clothes, beauty etc and now im only buying what I actually need..
I definitely think the child benefit should not be there for her to spend - that's the first thing you should sort and set up a DD to kids college fund.

woodchuck

Off topic posts deleted.

Please always bear in mind to offer advice to the OP when posting.

Batgurl

When I made my initial post, the OP had written a number of posts about what he DOES do and never once mentioned that he does child management.

He mentioned bills, car maintenance, grocery shopping, and that his wife looked after the kids while he was building his career. So my assumptions were based on the information provided which is all we can do.

I still think the OP underestimates a huge portion of the child management which his wife doesn’t even tell him she does. It’s the age old story of a new Mum “sitting at home all day with a new born doing nothing instead of cleaning and washing and cooking a meal for her partner to come home to”. Any person who has been a new mother will tell you how frustrating this assumption is.

In a later post the OP reiterated that he earns the majority of the family income (hence the “my money” question) and regardless of what naive and inexperienced posters say, a women’s career can definitely be detrimentally impacted by maternity leave. Even if you think she has “no where to go” it’s completely unfair to think her taking on this task didn’t add value to your life (at the expense of hers).

I’m not saying you don’t have to sit down with her and discuss spending. If you need to put money aside for children’s future, that’s obviously necessary. But don’t go in thinking this is all on her. Challenge your own bias. Open your eyes and see it from her point of view too.

mirrorwall14

Just an approach that works for us as we were both very poor with money in the past. We now still spend a decent chunk but also save well and are over paying the mortgage.

Start a daily discussion of the transactions on the account. Literally daily. What was this transaction? What was this withdrawal for? Print out the results, physically write down on the page the category (maybe you do the digital and have your wife write down?). Total it and categorise it. See where the money is going weekly/monthly. It seems like overkill but it’s the one sure fire way for both of ye to see exactly what money is going on. Personally I would do this after a discussion of how we start saving the required money for the kids college.

Three years on we can tell you every single transaction going through our account, we both know exactly what the bills are. We’ve designated discretionary money for both of us that we manage in our own way. My husband thinks of his as a daily allowance. I organise mine weekly and we both have our own ways of spending it e.g. coffee, lunch out etc. Before we took this approach we were hemoraging money. Now we’ll still way overspend on coffee and lunches the odd time but we agree to do it and do it conciously, knowing that we will neeed to pick up the slack financially somewhere else.

We now have an extremely detailed spreadsheet developed over two years and tailored exactly for our household. All annual and obvious big bills/costs are saved for monthly within this so that even if our savings account looks lovely and healthy and we get tempted to spend we can see exactly where we are going to need that money (e.g. Christmas savings, house insurance etc). After all of those got sorted then we narrowed it down further into a miscellaneous list of GP visits, hairdresser etc.

Essentially our approach is every single thing that can be categorised into even an irregular spend has been taken out of the category ‘miscellaneous’. This means we almost entirely avoid one off expenses throwing a wobbler on the finances while simultaneously making us very aware of the cost of everything and how our balances are running.

LegacyUser

@Batgurl I didn’t list off a division of chores because it’s not really all that relevant. It’s not causing an issue. If you are implying that a lot of her spending is probably actually necessary spending on kids books, uniforms etc etc that I am not aware of then I assure you it isn’t. We have a very equal part in raising the kids and she has actually said to me in the past that I do an awful lot more than some of her friends partners, but again, it’s not an issue whatsoever.

I did state that I earn more, and if I hadn’t someone would have almost certainly asked. As above, we do adopt a joint approach to what is coming in but where it goes after that is where the issues start to arise. The different views on this throughout the thread make for interesting reading.

@fed_u you are spot on. When we have discussed these things in the past she will agree that she does overdo it at times, and will also agree to saving more etc. but then carries on as if the conversation never happened. It’s hugely frustrating and I am left with the choice of putting up with it for a quiet life or getting firmer and insisting things are followed through which I know is going to be very uncomfortable for both of us and if handled badly could be disastrous for the marriage. There are worse things that could be wrong but it’s still not a pleasant situation.

.......

Most couples dont earn the same amount and most couples dont live on the same amount.

One person is usually the higher earner, and one person is usually the higher spender - not always the same person!!

Peoples lives are not the same, some people have more expensive hobbies, more expensive tastes (my husband spends an eye watering amount on designer shoes while I wander about in cheap shoes - however, I have about 30 pairs of shoes and he has 4 or 5).

The key thing here is that you need agreement on the division of the household income. That division includes a portion for "discretionary spending" and you both get the same amount for it. If she spends her entire discretionary spend on costa coffees then thats her business, but that does not entitle her to then make her way into the savings for other spending. Any necessary spending should already have been catered for in the original division (and yes, the division gets changed with changing needs).

I would institute a monthly "budget" meeting where the divisions are agreed and the discretionary spend discussed. We call it "doing the money" and usually its just a simple matter of paying whats owed, and dividing whats left. But it can include discussions of upcoming expenses or decisions on "big spends".

If she is out of discretionary spending money by the 2nd week of the month then she doesnt get anything else without a full sit down and rejig of the finances for the rest of the month, at which point you will be asking her choice between feeding the kids for the rest of the month or spending in costas (you may word it more diplomatically, but she gets nothing extra without something else suffering). She has to SEE that suffering. Using up savings isnt seeing it. You need to, say, delay a bill and let her be the one to take the daily calls from the utility company asking for payment.

Unless she is more involved financially then she wont take any responsibility.

jlm29

Deleted User wrote: »

I appreciate the bind you are in now, so this isn't really a personal comment but just using the above to highlight flawed thinking, imo. The only time to save is now. Do not put these things off until some ideal future date as you will always postpone the saving. Your future self will have to deal with different bills that will be just as urgent. We imbue our future selves with self control we know we don't currently possess (across a range of things such as "I'll get fit next year, I'll write that book, make up with that friend" etc). The only time is now. ).

Thanks, appreciate the input. I suppose every case is different. Saving is really important, I get that. But there’s also little point in having money lying in a bank account earning little or no interest, while paying interest on loans, IMO. Once there’s a rainy day fund, and plenty provision made for emergencies etc, obviously. We haven’t been putting off saving so we can go out for lunch, coffees, on holidays etc, but we have kept our borrowings low, and put ourselves in a position where our mortgage will be cleared before our oldest child gets to second level education.
Anyhow, sorry OP, that’s off topic. Good luck having the chats with your wife

Daisy78

Batgurl wrote: »

When I made my initial post, the OP had written a number of posts about what he DOES do and never once mentioned that he does child management.

He mentioned bills, car maintenance, grocery shopping, and that his wife looked after the kids while he was building his career. So my assumptions were based on the information provided which is all we can do.

I still think the OP underestimates a huge portion of the child management which his wife doesn’t even tell him she does. It’s the age old story of a new Mum “sitting at home all day with a new born doing nothing instead of cleaning and washing and cooking a meal for her partner to come home to”. Any person who has been a new mother will tell you how frustrating this assumption is.

In a later post the OP reiterated that he earns the majority of the family income (hence the “my money” question) and regardless of what naive and inexperienced posters say, a women’s career can definitely be detrimentally impacted by maternity leave. Even if you think she has “no where to go” it’s completely unfair to think her taking on this task didn’t add value to your life (at the expense of hers).

To be honest I'd be a little bit pissed off too if I was earning the bulk of the family income only to have to watch my partner recklessly spend it without having regard to bills, savings, etc Money is always hard earned and if the poster is on a good wage then I'm sure he worked bloody hard to get to a position which comes with such a salary. Also there is nothing in his post that suggests she is currently on maternity leave so what gives with all the spending.

Anyway leaving that aside I find it astonishing that your wife does not know what your monthly mortgage payment is. It smacks of a woman who decided that the financial stuff was for the man to worry about, what if you decided to separate or if you died? She would be forced to deal with it then. There is no excuse.

Someone made a suggestion that you get into the habit of saving for the both the small (ish) things as well as the bigger life events which is a good idea. It sounds like your wife has a "because I'm worth it attitude" to spending and saving for the big ticket items might not seem to offer the immediate payback she is looking for. Saving 120,000 for the kids college education might just seem like too big of an ask. Saving for the smaller things like weekends away, Christmas, etc as a first step might be a bit more acheivable for her and get her into the right mindset. Maybe you could encourage her to open a credit union account with a view to putting a bit aside every week? She needs to take some responsibility for herself and not rely on you to subsidise her.

Daisy78

Batgurl wrote: »

When I made my initial post, the OP had written a number of posts about what he DOES do and never once mentioned that he does child management.

He mentioned bills, car maintenance, grocery shopping, and that his wife looked after the kids while he was building his career. So my assumptions were based on the information provided which is all we can do.

I still think the OP underestimates a huge portion of the child management which his wife doesn’t even tell him she does. It’s the age old story of a new Mum “sitting at home all day with a new born doing nothing instead of cleaning and washing and cooking a meal for her partner to come home to”. Any person who has been a new mother will tell you how frustrating this assumption is.

In a later post the OP reiterated that he earns the majority of the family income (hence the “my money” question) and regardless of what naive and inexperienced posters say, a women’s career can definitely be detrimentally impacted by maternity leave. Even if you think she has “no where to go” it’s completely unfair to think her taking on this task didn’t add value to your life (at the expense of hers).

To be honest I'd be a little bit pissed off too if I was earning the bulk of the family income only to have to watch my partner recklessly spend it without having regard to bills, savings, etc Money is always hard earned and if the poster is on a good wage then I'm sure he worked bloody hard to get to a position which comes with such a salary. Also there is nothing in his post that suggests she is currently on maternity leave so what gives with all the spending.

Anyway leaving that aside I find it astonishing that your wife does not know what your monthly mortgage payment is. It smacks of a woman who decided that the financial stuff was for the man to worry about, what if you decided to separate or if you died? She would be forced to deal with it then. There is no excuse.

Someone made a suggestion that you get into the habit of saving for the both the small (ish) things as well as the bigger life events which is a good idea. It sounds like your wife has a "because I'm worth it attitude" to spending and saving for the big ticket items might not seem to offer the immediate payback she is looking for. Saving 120,000 for the kids college education might just seem like too big of an ask. Saving for the smaller things like weekends away, Christmas, etc as a first step might be a bit more acheivable for her and get her into the right mindset. Maybe you could encourage her to open a credit union account with a view to putting a bit aside every week? She needs to take some responsibility for herself and not rely on you to subsidise her.

fed_u

The 1p savings challenge might also be an idea - different versions available daily / weekly / monthly etc. Kinda nice for a rainy day fund or as a treat at the end of the year.. might help get in the habit of saving!!

Graniteville

I haven't read the 7 pages, but I'd be in a similar but less serious situation.

I'm good at budgeting, she's rubbish and admits that.


As I'm in business, I had a chat to our accountant and he came up with the perfect solution.

We're jointly assessed for tax and it's set that I get the max credits.

This reduced her take home pay and increased mine. Credit cards were canceled and she has the independence to spend her money on anything she wishes along with her car outgoings and just one household bill - TV license and sky.

It was a less confrontational way of doing it as I avoided the "you can't spend on that" argument.

It's meant decent savings and has allowed a couple of extra weekend breaks - so she sees the benefits too.

meeeeh

Or you could ask your employer to pay any bonuses or pay raises to another bank account your wife doesn't know about. If money doesn't come into the joint account she won't know it's there. It's a bit dishonest approach but it might work.

JustAThought

Sounds like she is refusing to admit she does not have the income or lifestyle she wants. Paris - the most expensive city in Europe?New cars?Aimless unnecessary shopping - boredom shopping for unneeded and never used clothes?

I find having a banklink facilitates casual spending. If the incidental spend for her is e150 a week then cut up the visa and in particular the debit card and let her use cash only - when she sees it vanishing from her purse and knows there is none til the following week she will know soon enough what she is frittering it away on. Set up direct debits to savings accounts with a 30 day request for funds restriction in both names - you can access it in a crisis but otherwise it is unavailable . You mention college but what about medical emergencies or the future - or are you going to be impovrished when you are old? Time to factor that in too.

Unanimous

Hi OP,
I hope this advise is not too late.
Please understand that your wife is not good with money so there is no need to be frustrated with her.
It will never change no matter who talks to her (financial expert or not). The marketing strategy used by businesses these days are not helping either as they try to encourage people to buy what they dont need or what they already have but in a different package.

Plan the finances on a spreadsheet.
Income per month, then deduct the bills per month eg mortgage, electricity, cars, phone bills etc (put every single thing there).
Then deduct the savings per month.
Then agree on monthly allowance for everyone, yourself, for her and for each of the kid. (ie share whats left among everybody).

When she is involved in this process she would agree to a lesser amount than she spends already because spend thrifts really dont know how much they spend. After this has already been agreed (ensure that she agrees), then oversee that all the salary comes to one place and all the bills are transferred and everyone gets their allowance.

That way she will realise that what she spends per month is way higher than what she thought was reasonable and if she comes to ask you to increase it, ask her which allowance does she want to reduce to increase her's? definitely not yours or the kids. that would probably teach her to manage money.
*note-if possible try to get both of you to send your salaries to a joint account where ye cant solely access it. and create standing direct debit fore the bills to that account. then monthly allowance should be standing order into your person accounts.
So neither you nor her can go there to withdraw money unless its an emergency and the other person is involved.
This is not to control her but ye are 1 and should be responsible to each other and not use your salary for what you like while the other person uses their salary for the house.

My family had a similar model when growing up and my dad had to suggest it to his friend who had this issue you have with his wife.
The wife had already influenced the kids to spend recklessly. what he did was to implement a similar model and then give everyone their allowance(kids had control of their allowance).
Wife was always begging kids and her husband for money etc. kids ended up getting part time jobs to get additional income to spend as they like.
Wife pushed to reduce kids allowance since they now earn their own money. etc (was a learning experience for all as the loving mother who was always buying and influencing kids to spend ended up teaching kids how to manage their income.

you can use similar model, doesn't have to be exact but see how you can restructure it to fit your home and it should help

Addle

Even Bernadette as gave Howard an allowance on the Big Bang theory.

My OH pointed out to me that a take away coffee for me everyday, sometimes twice a day, added up to the guts of €1k a year, while i was complaining about not being able afford the holiday i wanted.
My take away coffee spend quickly became part of the holiday fund.
And I don't miss it at all.

sbsquarepants

fed_u wrote: »

The 1p savings challenge might also be an idea -

What's the 1p savings challenge?

fed_u

sbsquarepants wrote: »

What's the 1p savings challenge?

While you won't get rich quick I found this helped give me a goal as I was terrible with money and it was nice to have something at the end of the year for my efforts.. you can do different versions be it daily, weekly or the backwards one!!
https://skintdad.co.uk/skint-52-week-saving-challenge/amp/

BrookieD

try this as a saving challenge... found it great last year and this.

http://diaryofaworkingdad.eu/index.php/2018/01/07/money-saving-tips-for-xmas-2018/

julyjane

none of those savings plans would work in this house inevitably after a week or 2 we'd be taking €2 for milk here and there or not have change. and when there's school going children they're always needing to bring in a few euro for this and that. and there are days when life is s**t and I just want a takeaway coffee.

The savings that have worked for me are a standing order to the credit union on the first of every month, treat it like a bill. it's not too easy to take back out but I can if I need to.

a few years ago I was saving for a holiday and got one of those tins that you need a tin opener to open, they're €1 or €2. I had already paid for the holiday itself so this was to save up my holiday spending money, a great incentive to put €20 or €50 away, "will I spend €20 going out for lunch or would I prefer another €20 in the holiday pot?"

shesty

Would also suggest child benefit going straight i to a savings account, maybe in one of the kids names (don't tell the kid!)., with no card access to it and no ability to transfer from it online between accounts.A credit union or building society account should work best for this.