More money?

Question

I have a question that has been bothering me of late. If a man and a woman are living together, how much money should each of them put into the common expenses? I work and bring home approximately $3200 a month. My boyfriend is retired and has an income of approximately the same amount. I have no outstanding bills (car payment, credit cards, etc..). He has a car payment, boat payment and credit card payment every month.

He pays the rent of $1400 and I pay the phone, cable, water, electricity, my cell phone, his cell phone, groceries, gasoline to go to work (45 miles per day) and other incidental expenses. I also make payments on his credit card totaling about $700 a month.


He feels stressed because he feels that he is shouldering the bigger amount of the bills. I feel stressed because I feel that I have no savings and that all of the little bills add up to my whole take home pay.

What do other couples do? What is reasonable for a couple living together to do?

Answer 1

He's the one with the problem...not you! He needs to change HIS way of thinking. You pay MORE than your share now. $700 a month on HIS credit card bill??????? You need to move on from there, and from HIM! He's draining you dry!!

Answer 2

If you both have equal incomes and you're adamant about dividing the bills fairly you should each be paying equal amounts of the household bills.

Now how you define household bills is a big issue. Are his car, boat and CC bills from before the relationship or during it? If they're from before then he should still be responsible for them on his own...unless you're enjoying 1/2 the use of them. If you brought your own car and no other debt you're pretty much even there.

The bills I'd count as household bills for sure would be the rent, phone, cable, water electricity cells, groceries, gas...etc. Those should be divided between you. Now, does that $700 you're paying on his card bring your total of the bills up to the $1400 he's paying for rent? Or do you two need to go back and re-figure exactly what 1/2 is?

Answer 3

We split our joint costs in half...rent, cable, electric, etc. We have a joint checking and we just each put half in to cover the bill. We each pay our individual expenses ourselves..credit card, insurance, car payments, etc.

I used to feel that when we went out, or had unexpected expenses that I always seemed to be handing out the dough. So I started my own savings and he has his own savings. I now give myself a certain amount of money each week to cover random expenses, pay bills, and put the rest in savings. This way I still feel like I have control over my own money. We pretty much split everything right down the middle, It is generous that you are contributing so much, especially HIS credit card...you should stop making his payments on that for him, he racked up the bill not you!!

Good luck!

Answer 4

If it really has to come to this there may be other relationship issues. But its easy to quantify what each of you is paying and bringing into the situation. Write it all down and check the bottom line. Inevitably someone either makes more or spends more. I make way more then my wife who basically only works part time. But who cares I love her and she is well worth it. If thats not the case maybe you ought to start to think about whether you think the relationship is working for you.

Answer 5

we have a house account and contribute the same amount to the account every month...all house bills get paid from that account...I pay my personal bills and he pays his personal bills....we take turns with special things like nites out etc.....

Answer 6

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Answer 7

let him pay his cell phone and half for groceries and let him pay cable he watches tv doesn't he thats only fair