Wife is upset that my sister bought a house

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:2 of you working for 10+ years and you couldn't save up for down payment? Paying mortgage on a condo would have been forced savings. Stock market has gone up almost 4x since 2012. Apple went up 10X since 2013, Tesla 50x and FB 10X.
Not too late for you two. Both of you need to get a 2nd job at night and weekends, and you should be able to buy something in two years. Working 2nd jobs will keep you from spending.
How low is your income? Can't be lower than my $35k. I think you have spending problem and you don't invest. You got to invest if you have low income. Saving is not enough.

Sounds like you follow stocks. What should we buy right now that will go up a lot?

Please do not take financial advice from internet strangers! Go to a fiduciary and discuss your options.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My wife is crying and throwing a tantrum because my younger sister and her husband bought a house. We have been unable to buy a house for years due to low incomes. She has wanted to nest since we turned 30, we are now 35 and it’s been a long road of renting. She says it’s my fault as I can’t provide for her enough to buy us a house. She has been crying and is hysterical and being mean. I told my mom that she was being a baby and my mom thinks my wife bullies me. What to do?

I was with you until you said you went to your mom and cried and complained about it. You need to grow up, it's clear your wife is upset because she has married a child.

[Anonymous]

OP, if you are content to maybe someday barely afford a home, and never have kids, and be clueless about personal finance and probably not have much of a retirement, then you do you. If that's what you really, truly want. But if you're thinking you can go on as you have been, and a home and family and adequate retirement will somehow appear without you having to make any changes, you're wrong. And your wife knows it.

Do your wife a favor-- tell her the truth. If you don't want a home and children, tell her. Tell her now so that she knows and can get out. Because it's clearly not what she wants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:2 of you working for 10+ years and you couldn't save up for down payment? Paying mortgage on a condo would have been forced savings. Stock market has gone up almost 4x since 2012. Apple went up 10X since 2013, Tesla 50x and FB 10X.
Not too late for you two. Both of you need to get a 2nd job at night and weekends, and you should be able to buy something in two years. Working 2nd jobs will keep you from spending.
How low is your income? Can't be lower than my $35k. I think you have spending problem and you don't invest. You got to invest if you have low income. Saving is not enough.

Not necessarily working in the same place and not saving. My husband and I both have PhD, so we spent our 20s making barely anything (I was so proud of myself for saving 5-6k of my 24k income In a Roth IRA). There really wasn't enough left over for a substantial down payment, and we also expected to move around for jobs and postdocs. When we graduated, we decided starting a family was a top priority due to family history of infertility, so paying for day care while trying to launch careers delayed buying for a while. We definitely did not want to put our down payment savings into the stock market since we hoped to buy in the near term, but it took us 4 years from when we got our first jobs in the DC area.

Eventually we bought a fixer upper in MD and I have to commute to DC because our incomes don't get you far here, so it's doable with compromise. My larger point is just that people can have trouble saving or not being able to settle down long enough to buy without it being the result of financial illiteracy or a spending problem.

[Anonymous]

I don't understand what the problem is with this dude talking to his mom. It depends on how he uses that information with his wife but I don't see any real issue in being able to have serious conversations with your parents and your life, so long as you're not demeaning your wife or sharing intimate details of her she wouldn't want to be shared.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand what the problem is with this dude talking to his mom. It depends on how he uses that information with his wife but I don't see any real issue in being able to have serious conversations with your parents and your life, so long as you're not demeaning your wife or sharing intimate details of her she wouldn't want to be shared.

Would “demeaning your wife” include telling your mom that she (the wife) “was being a baby”?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My wife is crying and throwing a tantrum because my younger sister and her husband bought a house. We have been unable to buy a house for years due to low incomes. She has wanted to nest since we turned 30, we are now 35 and it’s been a long road of renting. She says it’s my fault as I can’t provide for her enough to buy us a house. She has been crying and is hysterical and being mean. I told my mom that she was being a baby and my mom thinks my wife bullies me. What to do?

Well, unless you two starts behaving like adults instead of behaving like immature children, there is little hope. If you two want a house, increase work hours, change jobs, find part time jobs and start saving.

If you two want to act like a couple, stop crying because someone else has a better toy and stop running to mommy because someone is bullying you. You solve your individual and mutual problems by discussion and finding solutions.

Be a team and try again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, if you are content to maybe someday barely afford a home, and never have kids, and be clueless about personal finance and probably not have much of a retirement, then you do you. If that's what you really, truly want. But if you're thinking you can go on as you have been, and a home and family and adequate retirement will somehow appear without you having to make any changes, you're wrong. And your wife knows it.

Do your wife a favor-- tell her the truth. If you don't want a home and children, tell her. Tell her now so that she knows and can get out. Because it's clearly not what she wants.

+1 something tells me that OP has said they can’t have kids until they buy a home, and his 35 year old wife is starting to realize she might never become a mother or have a family. If that is true, you are the bully OP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, if you are content to maybe someday barely afford a home, and never have kids, and be clueless about personal finance and probably not have much of a retirement, then you do you. If that's what you really, truly want. But if you're thinking you can go on as you have been, and a home and family and adequate retirement will somehow appear without you having to make any changes, you're wrong. And your wife knows it.

Do your wife a favor-- tell her the truth. If you don't want a home and children, tell her. Tell her now so that she knows and can get out. Because it's clearly not what she wants.

+1 something tells me that OP has said they can’t have kids until they buy a home, and his 35 year old wife is starting to realize she might never become a mother or have a family. If that is true, you are the bully OP

+1

And the people posting that she’s in the wrong are the same ones who post here and say women shouldn’t have income requirements for dating. Would have saved this OPs wife a world of disappointment if she had.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't understand what the problem is with this dude talking to his mom. It depends on how he uses that information with his wife but I don't see any real issue in being able to have serious conversations with your parents and your life, so long as you're not demeaning your wife or sharing intimate details of her she wouldn't want to be shared.

It's definitely NOT a good idea to talk about your spouse with your mom, especially if you're a man. My brothers both confided to my mom about their relationships (she's very good at prying), and it has the effect of poisoning their relationships. When I talk about my relationship with her (before I learned not to) she did not do the same with me. Instead, she'd talk about how much better she was at being a wife than I am, and how lucky I am my husband puts up with me... The mom attitude towards daughters-in-law is a real thing with some women.

[Anonymous]

Tell her to get a higher paying job. You’re not her paycheck.

[Anonymous]

OP if you are not a troll:

Why is a house a value you and your wife do not share? What do you see your role in supporting a family to be? What did you tell your wife about your plans for the future before you married and have you followed through with these? Why are you “low earning”?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, if you are content to maybe someday barely afford a home, and never have kids, and be clueless about personal finance and probably not have much of a retirement, then you do you. If that's what you really, truly want. But if you're thinking you can go on as you have been, and a home and family and adequate retirement will somehow appear without you having to make any changes, you're wrong. And your wife knows it.

Do your wife a favor-- tell her the truth. If you don't want a home and children, tell her. Tell her now so that she knows and can get out. Because it's clearly not what she wants.

+1 something tells me that OP has said they can’t have kids until they buy a home, and his 35 year old wife is starting to realize she might never become a mother or have a family. If that is true, you are the bully OP

+1

And the people posting that she’s in the wrong are the same ones who post here and say women shouldn’t have income requirements for dating. Would have saved this OPs wife a world of disappointment if she had.

Well, maybe he had an age-appropriate income when she dated and married him. He just hasn't figured out how to grow it.

[Anonymous]

Sorry, no man uses the word nest.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, if you are content to maybe someday barely afford a home, and never have kids, and be clueless about personal finance and probably not have much of a retirement, then you do you. If that's what you really, truly want. But if you're thinking you can go on as you have been, and a home and family and adequate retirement will somehow appear without you having to make any changes, you're wrong. And your wife knows it.

Do your wife a favor-- tell her the truth. If you don't want a home and children, tell her. Tell her now so that she knows and can get out. Because it's clearly not what she wants.

+1 something tells me that OP has said they can’t have kids until they buy a home, and his 35 year old wife is starting to realize she might never become a mother or have a family. If that is true, you are the bully OP

+1

And the people posting that she’s in the wrong are the same ones who post here and say women shouldn’t have income requirements for dating. Would have saved this OPs wife a world of disappointment if she had.

Well, maybe he had an age-appropriate income when she dated and married him. He just hasn't figured out how to grow it.

Maybe, but if she came on here and said “how do I choose a partner who will be able to support my goals of having the basic financial stability to have children before I reach advanced maternal age” the men would call her a gold digger.