When you don’t agree on where to spend money

[Anonymous]

DH is notoriously tight with money, except he’s happy to spend on things that are important to him. For instance, I’d really like to spruce up our house and one of the things I think would help is if we switched out the builder grade light fixtures. That’s not important to him, so he says that he doesn’t want to spend the money on it.

Meanwhile, he has no issue with buying new golf clubs for himself or buying lunch and coffee everyday.

I’ve explained to him that I don’t think the double standard of spending is equitable. FWIW we both work full time but he WAH most days so he would be the one to be home for the electrician which he doesn’t want to do.

Yes, I could save “my” money and fund the whole project myself but he spends “our” money on what he wants so why should I have to do that?

[Anonymous]

What an idiot he is.

Just book the electrician, and when he throws his little toddler fit, tell him that's what he gets for spending uncontrollably on golf.

[Anonymous]

DH and I have different priorities. Mine is home, his is cars. We agree on a budget for each of those things, and within that budget - there are no questions about spending it. We might ask for input on style or comfort, etc, but the money is earmarked to be spent.

It doesn't necessarily mean the budgets are the same amount, but it's an amount both people feel is fair. For us, home improvements are budgeted about $4,000/year, and DH has a "rolling" $10K car fun-money budget, but it doesn't get spent down every year, so over the course of a decade, it's probably about the same being spent on home improvements vs car improvements.

Don't just do it and then have him throw a fit. Use this as a way to improve your relationship, not damage it further. I recommend some of John Gottman's work on how to get through disagreements in a healthy manner.

[Anonymous]

Why are you asking his permission? I find a great deal on light fixtures, buy them and put them up myself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why are you asking his permission? I find a great deal on light fixtures, buy them and put them up myself.

This, but I make my husband put them in.

[Anonymous]

It would be helpful if you explained your financial arrangement. It sounds like you have separate buckets?

[Anonymous]

If you've got the money and it's important to you just go out and do it. If he goes crazy you have a much bigger problem that you need to deal with.

[Anonymous]

Just create a budget that has lines for dining out/coffee and golf, and home improvements.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just create a budget that has lines for dining out/coffee and golf, and home improvements.

This. Create and budget, come to an agreement on it, and then no later resentments or disagreements.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It would be helpful if you explained your financial arrangement. It sounds like you have separate buckets?

OP here. When we got married neither of us wanted to switch banks so my paycheck is still direct deposited into my own account and I write DH a check for household expenses with a few hundred left over each pay period for personal expenses such as clothes and haircuts. We have joint savings at DH’s bank and all off our investments and retirement accounts are joint. We have a joint credit card. I have a debit card which is linked to my account and I use it for personal expenses.

It sounds convoluted but it generally works because he has opinions about what I spend money on ($$ haircuts for example—although he gets haircuts much more frequently than I do so it probably ends up almost even by the end of the year) and I don’t have to hear about it if I pay for it myself. But, for instance, he puts things like his haircuts, new golf clubs and greens fees on our joint credit card which gets paid out of the account we both put money into.

He used to insist that I pay for things like dinners out with my friends, my gas expenses and other stuff like that out of my account. For instance, lunch out for him would be counted under the food budget but if I went out to dinner with a friend it would be considered out of my personal budget. I put my foot down on those kinds of things and now he doesn’t say anything about it.

But the issue is that if it’s not something he wants or would choose for himself then he doesn’t want to contribute money to it. Our mattress was 10 years old and was killing my back but he said it was fine for his so didn’t want a new one. I finally got him to make it my birthday present and he agreed. I needed a new computer and that ended up being a combo Mother’s day/anniversary gift. When he needed one he just went out and bought one.

So now I want to change out the light fixtures on the main level and he doesn’t care about it so he says he doesn’t want to spend the money on that. Yes, I could pay for them and installation out of my personal account but the principle of doing that annoys me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It would be helpful if you explained your financial arrangement. It sounds like you have separate buckets?

OP here. When we got married neither of us wanted to switch banks so my paycheck is still direct deposited into my own account and I write DH a check for household expenses with a few hundred left over each pay period for personal expenses such as clothes and haircuts. We have joint savings at DH’s bank and all off our investments and retirement accounts are joint. We have a joint credit card. I have a debit card which is linked to my account and I use it for personal expenses.

It sounds convoluted but it generally works because he has opinions about what I spend money on ($$ haircuts for example—although he gets haircuts much more frequently than I do so it probably ends up almost even by the end of the year) and I don’t have to hear about it if I pay for it myself. But, for instance, he puts things like his haircuts, new golf clubs and greens fees on our joint credit card which gets paid out of the account we both put money into.

He used to insist that I pay for things like dinners out with my friends, my gas expenses and other stuff like that out of my account. For instance, lunch out for him would be counted under the food budget but if I went out to dinner with a friend it would be considered out of my personal budget. I put my foot down on those kinds of things and now he doesn’t say anything about it.

But the issue is that if it’s not something he wants or would choose for himself then he doesn’t want to contribute money to it. Our mattress was 10 years old and was killing my back but he said it was fine for his so didn’t want a new one. I finally got him to make it my birthday present and he agreed. I needed a new computer and that ended up being a combo Mother’s day/anniversary gift. When he needed one he just went out and bought one.

So now I want to change out the light fixtures on the main level and he doesn’t care about it so he says he doesn’t want to spend the money on that. Yes, I could pay for them and installation out of my personal account but the principle of doing that annoys me.

Put it on the joint credit card! The double standard is ridiculous!

[Anonymous]

Buy the light fixtures on the joint card. When he complains, compare the total of the light fixtures to the sum of the golf/greens fees. Probably a wash

[Anonymous]

Time to combine bank accounts.

[Anonymous]

I think the bigger issue here is that your husband is a selfish jerk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It would be helpful if you explained your financial arrangement. It sounds like you have separate buckets?

OP here. When we got married neither of us wanted to switch banks so my paycheck is still direct deposited into my own account and I write DH a check for household expenses with a few hundred left over each pay period for personal expenses such as clothes and haircuts. We have joint savings at DH’s bank and all off our investments and retirement accounts are joint. We have a joint credit card. I have a debit card which is linked to my account and I use it for personal expenses.

It sounds convoluted but it generally works because he has opinions about what I spend money on ($$ haircuts for example—although he gets haircuts much more frequently than I do so it probably ends up almost even by the end of the year) and I don’t have to hear about it if I pay for it myself. But, for instance, he puts things like his haircuts, new golf clubs and greens fees on our joint credit card which gets paid out of the account we both put money into.

He used to insist that I pay for things like dinners out with my friends, my gas expenses and other stuff like that out of my account. For instance, lunch out for him would be counted under the food budget but if I went out to dinner with a friend it would be considered out of my personal budget. I put my foot down on those kinds of things and now he doesn’t say anything about it.

But the issue is that if it’s not something he wants or would choose for himself then he doesn’t want to contribute money to it. Our mattress was 10 years old and was killing my back but he said it was fine for his so didn’t want a new one. I finally got him to make it my birthday present and he agreed. I needed a new computer and that ended up being a combo Mother’s day/anniversary gift. When he needed one he just went out and bought one.

So now I want to change out the light fixtures on the main level and he doesn’t care about it so he says he doesn’t want to spend the money on that. Yes, I could pay for them and installation out of my personal account but the principle of doing that annoys me.

PP here and maybe I'm misreading but does your DH not have a separate account? Alternatively, does he have a separate account at his bank along with the joint account that he contributes to similar to the way you do? It sounds like that might be the case but wanted to confirm.

The thing is the hybrid approach to finances only works if both parties are in agreement regarding what counts as joint expenses. You guys are so far apart on how to classify expenses that it doesn't seem like you are good candidates for a hybrid system for finances.