He wants to buy us a place for our kid free time.
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Anonymous
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Hello, DCUM.
I've been with my boyfriend for a year and a half and he's wonderful. We each have two kids between the ages of 5-10 and we both coparent 50/50 with our exes. Right now we only have every other weekend aligned where we are kid free together, but in the new year we will be aligning our weekdays as well. Week A we'll have 2 days without kids then week B we'll have 5 days without kids, repeat. We haven't met each others kids yet because we've been focused on laying a strong foundation and both of our exes are flailing around to different extents. So, our thought process has been there's a reasonable chance one or both of our exes will impose some more transitions on the kids and we don't want to add to that for any of them. We currently live in different suburbs about 45 mins apart. Long term, we have a mutual understanding that neither of us will force a blend, have our kids change school districts, or move them further from their other parents. We suspect our exes will both eventually blend with someone and each want to remain a non-complicated steady force for our kids. He approached me last week and told me that he'd like to buy us a city place as a home base for us for when we don't have the kids. His thought process is that if we are going to live half our lives without our kids (our exes both caused the divorces) then we should at least make our no kid time the best we can. He wants to get a place we can make our own and walk to coffee shops, restaurants, museums, theaters, cook together, walk the dogs, work from home or have very fast commutes (currently we each commute in a few days per week), be closer to my family (my siblings and mom are all in the city). We currently go to the city for pretty much all our date nights now. What do you all think about this? Can this be sustainable long term? I am struggling with "allowing" myself to feel happy or build something intentionally during my kid free time since all I ever wanted in life was to be a mom. I never in a million years imagined I'd get divorced or be dating again. FWIW I'm 36 and he's 38. |
Anonymous
| Who’s paying? |
Anonymous
Him. He makes almost 40x what I do. |
Anonymous
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If you can afford it, it sounds nice. Why not?
The one thing I'd watch out for is buying property together when unmarried. I'd see a lawyer, and pretend for the sake of the documents that you're strangers. Make sure all the money stuff is in writing now - what if one of you wants to sell and the other doesn't? What if one of you loses their job and can't afford the mortgage? What if one of you dies? That all needs to be worked out and written into a legal document before you own property together. |
Anonymous
Oh gosh, I just saw this, I'm the PP. Then you need to remember that "we" aren't buying anything. HE is buying a place. And you can hang out there a lot. Maybe he'll even give you a key. But it's HIS house, not "our" house. Be CRYSTAL clear about that. Do not put forward one penny of money and do not make decisions about it. |
Anonymous
| If he’s buying a place in the city that you can share when you don’t have your kids, what is there to think about? What is the question? |
Anonymous
PP to add - there can be a month to month rental agreement between the two of you if he wants you to chip in, but that also needs to be in writing and clear it's a rental. You have no stake in this place. |
Anonymous
| Don't buy property with someone you're not married or engaged to. If he wants to buy an apartment that you also spend time at, he can do that. But you shouldn't really be involved in the decision making or the paperwork. |
Anonymous
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Only if he has a lot of money. He probably has wanted to invest in real estate for some time. Nobody is buying right now and definitely not for those reasons. He can buy whatever he wants, wherever he wants.
Not sure why you think it's for you too somehow. Don't think you will be the only woman there. Both of you sound like you are on cloud nine right now. |
Anonymous
Go for it with all of this in mind. Sure you can weigh in on what you like or don't like but I think that he needs to be 100% the decider. I'm sure it feels totally decadent to be thinking of yourself but please enjoy your life! |
Anonymous
| Is he adding you to the title? |
Anonymous
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He’s buying the place not you. No we there ma’am .. Plus you two aren’t married nor engaged.
He can do what he wants w his money. Enjoy those visits at his place. |
Anonymous
| Wasn't the same posted last week from the woman's POV? |
Anonymous
This. Do not contribute one cent towards it. He is more or less buying a vacation home for himself. I would also have a long discussion and very strong boundaries around how often you will stay there. He is probably expecting you will spend every day without your kids there. From my experience, packing up your stuff and going to another house 2-3 times a week is exhausting and eventually you will want space and evenings alone at your own home. Plus, I’m guessing your usually weekly cleaning is done when your kids are gone - you need to factor in that you still need time at your house for regular maintenance. I went through something similar when my BF purchased “us” a $100k vehicle. He refers to it as “ours” and we use it for weekend travel, but I do not contribute anything to it and view it as 100% his. |
Anonymous
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I think longterm this relationship won't work, but if short term he wants to buy/rent a condo downtown for you guys to live in during kid free days so you can have more fun and enjoy life more, sure, cool, that sounds nice. Enjoy it while it lasts.
There is no way the level of compartmentalization you are currently doing is going to work long term, especially given the age of your children (10+ more years of parenting for both of you, your kids will only get more opinionated and challenging from here on out), and the apparent dysfunction with each of your respective exes. |