Arguing because of money

[yessisan]

DH and I have been arguing lately about not having enough money to even pay the utilities. In fact, the groceries he bought for this week made us have an extra over charge. And it’s all because he decided to work with a JW elder who has bounced his paychecks more than 4 times. This time, because this man’s check bounced, we are overdrafted over $1000 and now I can’t even pay the water and electricity. We can’t pay for gas, and we have to pay our property taxes in November and in December, plus, we just got the hospital bill from his accident that happened in March. We are negative in our account. I don’t know what to do. I don’t get paid until Tuesday, but all of that is going to go onto covering the overdrafts.

I tried telling DH to please work for someone else. This person he works for is so inconsiderate. He owed us a check from 8 months ago, because according to him he had no money. Dh then decided to get a different job, and now that this man, supposedly had money, contacts him 2 wks ago, and DH quit his other job to go back to this JW man. So, now we’re overdrafted and the overdraft took the little money we had on my savings account, which is for me to pay my quaterly taxes.

I’m desperate. I put an ad on cragslist to rent one of our spare bedrooms, and I’ve gotten 1 response. A 20 yr old and a 25 yr couple who isn’t married but are willing to pay on time and be neat and help keep the house clean. I don’t want to have unmarried people living at my house. I have 2 spare bedrooms, that could be another option… Ahhhh! I’m just speaking nonsense. I don’t know what to do. This couple could help moneywise, but I couldn’t live w/myself if I allowed this type of immoral behavior in my own home.

I’m going crazy, I’m really stressed. I cannot ask my parents for money because my dad will say “I told you your DH cannot support you”. What can I do? I cannot publish an ad asking for a Christian person with good moral values. How can I rent a room in my house if I can’t ask for specifics?

Sorry I’m venting, I just need to get things off my chest, especially when DH won’t listen to me about not working for this man. I reminded him of how the checks bounced before, and he just ignored it. Now we have no money, he quit his other job, and we cannot even rent a room of our house.

 

[Eileen_T]

Hand over ALL responsibility for the finances to your husband at once. As the head of the household it is his problem. I was in a similar situation once and was given that advice.

God Provides, you know that, sometimes He allows bad situations to happen to bring good out of it. Maybe if your husband has to press the JW for his just wages and doesn’t get the help he desperately needs, it may help turn him away from the whole thing.

Remind him that the labourer is worthy of his hire. (Luke 10:7)

If necessary, from your wages take out enough for your petrol money (and maybe also for food for you). If the electricity is cut off, eat sandwiches. Just show your DH that it is all up to him now.

You may need to open a separate bank account or ask to be paid in cash for a while.

 

[jmcrae]

Hand over ALL responsibility for the finances to your husband at once. As the head of the household it is his problem. I was in a similar situation once and was given that advice.

If necessary, from your wages take out enough for your petrol money (and maybe also for food for you). If the electricity is cut off, eat sandwiches. Just show your DH that it is all up to him now.

I completely agree. There is no time for sissy-pantsing around with a dialogue - just hand him your pay cheque minus your “allowance money,” together with the overdue bills, and say, “Honey, you’re in charge of our bills and expenses, now.”

I am willing to bet that this situation will turn around in six weeks or less.

 

[ChristineML]

I once wrote a $2,000 check accidentally in the wrong check book from the wrong checking account and (surprise!) it bounced. The lady I wrote it to (no surprise) asked for the amount in cash this time, which I delivered personally to her house the VERY NEXT DAY. AND TO BE FAIR, BECAUSE IT WAS MY MISTAKE, I reimbursed her for any bank charges / fees she had to pay because of my bad check.

It is completely appropriate for your husband to not only ask to be paid in cash, but to ask that all bounced check fees be paid to him as well, because it was his employer’s mistake that caused those bank fees. Then at least you’ll know if the employer has the money to pay him or not. You won’t be strung along for weeks not knowing.

Feeling for you…

 

[ack]

Well, one of my friends put an ad on Craigslist saying that she preferred a Catholic, and that seemed to keep the riffraff away (she’s actually had non-Catholic tenants, and has no problem with it, but she always says “Catholic preferred” to scare away irresponsible people.)

Is this illegal, probably so…but take a look at Craigslist…there are many advertisements for illegal goods and services on there already, and nobody does anything about it.

(More specifically, housing ads on Craigslist often have ads seeking a roommate with a specific political orientation, usually houses of liberal hippies looking for another liberal.)

Also, you could advertise at your parish, maybe in the bulletin.

I cannot publish an ad asking for a Christian person with good moral values. How can I rent a room in my house if I can’t ask for specifics?

 

[kage_ar]

For short term, one of you could take an extra job - bring in some $$ to get past this crisis. If you have to ask for help from family, then swallow your pride and do it.

Then comes time for a real PLAN. Cut bills, have you checked out angel food angelfoodministries.com/ for groceries?

The plan includes a serious budget and takes two adults to make work. You are married, you are partners, the financial survival of your family is the shared responsibliity by both of you.

If the house is more than you can afford, perhaps you can sell it and buy something smaller?

 

[mommamia]

Unfortunantly I am in this boat. I tried telling him he should try to pay all the bills and balance the checkbook, but he just refuses. Dh is hard worker, but tends to make bad choices sometimes, mostly trusting people who aren’t that trustworthy. I wish I had some advice, but right now I can’t pay my mortgage or my kids tuition, dh keeps telling me the money is coming, but it has been almost a month. Combine that with the fact that he works in another state and isn’t feeling or living our pain and it is tough. My 14yo son has been collecting copper to help pay the bills.

However I have found arguing with him counter productive. It just makes us both feel bad. I usually turn to God with these feelings, and pray for something to come along, and He has never disappointed me. Even in times when it looked like there would be no answer, something always came along. God would not give us more than we could handle. I will pray for you.

 

[KCT]

Hand over ALL responsibility for the finances to your husband at once. As the head of the household it is his problem. I was in a similar situation once and was given that advice.

What if the wife is better at these things? A couple has to suffer because someone’s opinion is that men should be the ones balancing the checkbook?? It is an opinion; no where does the Church teach that men have to handle the finances.

If the husband agrees to delegate that to the wife and she agrees as well, then he better go along with what she decides.
—KCT

 

[crenfro]

Hello.

Here are some things that have helped me and my husband to get our financial house in order:

How to Get Out of Debt, and Stay Out of Debt
by Jerry Mundis

Debtor’s Anonymous, which has helped us more than any counseling service. Here is its website:

debtorsanonymous.org/

I’m also interested in these new Catholic financial books

7 Steps To Becoming Financially Free
and its companion workbook by Phil Lenahan but I have yet to
look into them.

I’m so sorry this is happening in your life and you have my prayers.

 

[SeekerJen]

What if the wife is better at these things? A couple has to suffer because someone’s opinion is that men should be the ones balancing the checkbook?? It is an opinion; no where does the Church teach that men have to handle the finances.

If the husband agrees to delegate that to the wife and she agrees as well, then he better go along with what she decides.
—KCT

I don’t think that was the point. Without being able to read minds, I think the point was that the husband refuses to address reality, namely that the couple is unable to make ends meet because the husband insists on working with an unscrupulous boss. By handing over the household expenses, the husband is forced to see that his choices are leading them into financial ruin, and hopefully that realization will prompt change.

 

[jmcrae]

What if the wife is better at these things? A couple has to suffer because someone’s opinion is that men should be the ones balancing the checkbook?? It is an opinion; no where does the Church teach that men have to handle the finances.

He will start to get quite good at it when he’s the one reading the threatening letters and looking at those yellow stickers.

If the husband agrees to delegate that to the wife and she agrees as well, then he better go along with what she decides.
—KCT

Including getting a better job, in this case.

This is not a problem of poor money management; it’s a problem of the money not actually making it into the bank, because the husband’s employer is a dead-beat.

The reason she needs to put all of the responsibility on him right now is that he is removed from the consequences of his choice to work for a dead-beat employer. If he were the one reading the mail, he’d “get it” that the money has to come home, right bloody now - and he’s the only one with the power to make that happen.

It’s not that she, or either of them, is a bad money manager. It’s that he needs to get knocked on the head with the yellow stickers and the cut-off warning notices, because she doesn’t have the power to get his employer to pay him. Only he can do that - and if she makes him responsible for the finances, he’ll be the one reading the messages, without the nice, kind filter of “Honey, would you please …”

 

[yessisan]

Thanks to all who’ve been answering. Just to answer a few things, if I gave him the checkbook to handle all the finances, NOTHING would get paid, we’d be kicked out of our own house, and be left in this same situation over and over again.

Another thing is that it is the employer’s fault that we ran into this money issue now that the health insurance is trying to collect debt, which for some dumb mistake on their part, they’re sending in to collections when the first bill I received was yesterday!! And also when we have to pay 3 tax bills which sum up to over $3K!!! So, $6K in debt, overdrafted accounts and no money!!!

At least, earlier this evening DH got a call from the place he had just quit and asked him if he wants to come back to work, so he’s back as of tomorrow. But this JW dude is out of town on vacation w/his wife and kids in Vegas while we are struggling with the money thing.

As for selling the house, the housing market has crashed, especially here in CA, so there is no way in the world we could seel it. My neighbor’s house has been for sale ever since we moved in 7 months ago, they’ve dropped $100K or more from the price and it’s already on foreclosure. The market is scary, so there isn’t a way to sell. That is why we decided to go ahead and rent a room. We finally got a decent woman interested in it. I’m just waiting to hear back from her.

About getting a 2nd job, I already did, plus I go to school 2 nights a week at one school and once a month at another school, I teach CCD and am an EMHC. DH works in construction, so he’s setting up a few side jobs. If things go well, tomorrow someone will sign a contract for a $2000+ job, it’s small but it will help immensely.

God is definitely on our side, it’s just so stressful to see that when we thought we had over $1K in one account and savings on another and all of it disappears, it got us really scared, plus it all happened on the weekend after banks close, so we couldn’t even go get money out of our CD account.

By the way, thanks for letting me know about the food ministry, I’ll check it out if we need to by next week when we’re all out of food… and speaking about food, we ran out of dog food yesterday and my poor bear has no dry food! I hate to feed him people food, but it’s gotta be done while we get money in the bank.

I hope this employer pays us all the overdraft charges, otherwise, we’re gonna have to go to court. I cannot believe this guy had the guts to call DH and tell him to quit and then get us in this situation!

 

[Patrick7]

Hand over ALL responsibility for the finances to your husband at once. As the head of the household it is his problem. I was in a similar situation once and was given that advice.

God Provides, you know that, sometimes He allows bad situations to happen to bring good out of it. Maybe if your husband has to press the JW for his just wages and doesn’t get the help he desperately needs, it may help turn him away from the whole thing.

Depends on the woman. and wheather she is comfortable letting him lead.

Talk to the elders and let them help you if things get further out of hand.

I say let the guy give the woman the control and let her handle it. Never assume the man is the head of family.

 

[vester444]

Ok - is there anything extra that he does that he would "miss’ if it were taken away? I mean ANYTHING.

Cell phone. Cable TV. Long distance. Heck, even the phone line. Does he have a Nintendo/GameBoy etc. Sell everything that isnt tied down, sister. And shut off everything that you dont have to have.

When he comes home to a home with almost nothing in it and nothing to do (CDs gone, stereo gone, TV gone, etc.) It will make him see that this is serious.

To clarify I wouldnt sell anything behind his back. I would say - this is the situation you put us in, and this is waht I need to do to get us out of it.

Vester

 

[KCtheMommy]

Hand over ALL responsibility for the finances to your husband at once. As the head of the household it is his problem. I was in a similar situation once and was given that advice.

OK, I have to say take the whole handing-over financial responsibility advice carefully. I did that once, we ran out of money so fast, because my DH has a math issue. Actually he has a spending issue. When he ran us into the ground twice in one month between paychecks, he not only handed back the responsibility, but his Visa Check Card, his Credit Cards, and the check book – and ASKED ME to put him on a cash allowance.

In our family whoever is more responsible with something get’s the job. Period. It’s no man thing or woman thing, it’s just a thing. For instance my DH does the ironing. LOL

Your DH needs to ask to be paid in CASH, and he also needs to suggest reporting the guy. This is illegal. We are talking lawsuit, and court fees plus bounced check fees.

Sorry this is happening.

 

[twk001]

Okay- I agree with those who recommend the cutbacks. DH and I are about 50k in debt and have already paid off just as much (school debt, credit cards while in school debt, and just plain overspending). if can be done. Cut back EVERYTHING. cut off your internet, your cell phones, your expanded cable or dish, your grocery bill should be slashed by at least 40% by shopping at Aldi, Sams, and any other discount chain you can find. sell a second car. sell any unused CD’s, have a HUGE garage sale and sell everything you can. sell furniture if you have to and buy secondary from a garage sale or salvation army. believe me, there are ways. if you have extra appliances in your basement or garage sell them for cash or to a scrap metal place. lastly, I do recommend a good debt counselor. crowncatholic.com has good budget coaches or you may need to locate and contact a debt settling agency to consolidate all your bills and settle them for less. it does hurt your credit a bit, but certainly less than having unpaid bills. also, sit down with DH ALONE (no kids) and have all the bills, the checkbook, etc ready to discuss rationally and calmly and if he isn’t willing to change something, then yes, hand it all over. twk

 

[yessisan]

I welcome all opinions, but know this isn’t about poor money management. It’s about DH’s boss bouncing checks.

ABout selling our things and buying used stuff, we bought all our things used. More than half the houes is empty, and we are cancelling the services we don’t need. I need the internet for school and work, so I cannot get rid of it. I did though, cancel the phone line. We need 2 cars because we have 2 very different schedules and he works in different cities all the time, and I work far from where he works - opposite directions. We tried commuting together, him dropping me off at BART (the metro of the Bay Area) but it didn’t work, I had to get to work 1 hr early and I’b be sitting outside since the office isn’t open that early, and DH would always be late to work when we were able to commute together.

We don’t have that much debt, except for my school and my taxes, now we have the hospital bill and property taxes, but that’s all.

About the renting a room in our house, well, we have 2 women interested now. One seems to be a young adult/teen who would live in the US for a while to get to know her grandmother, and another one seems to be a very hard working woman who spoke about God, so I’m leaning more towards the 2nd one.

God is helping us fast. He always helps us when we’re most in need. I just hope either of the 2 women do accept to rent. One would move in 2 wks, another one asap.

 

[yessisan]

I am SOOOOOOOOOO mad!! The man finally contacted us and he’s telling us that he’ll only pay us the amount that the bounced check was for, and that any other charges weren’t his responsibility!!! I’m short $1490 because of this person not having enough funds and now he’s telling us tough luck!!!

How dare he? I spoke to my bank and they are telling me I cannot use my debit card any more. I deposited my paycheck yesterday, and ran to get dog food, but I had to charge it in DH’s credit card since the bank is not allowing us to use my card! Then they said that they will no longer accept any form of payment with this person’s name on it for our account, and said he had to pay us in cash and that there is nothing the bank can do to help even though we’re the victims here! Now I don’t have enough money for the mortgage payment! I don’t have money to pay my 2nd installment for school. We couldn’t even buy bread last night for our dinner!!:crying: I can’t take this!!!

I want my money back!!! It’s not my fault that this man’s check bounced! :crying:

 

[KCT]

Any chance you can take him to court? Or at least find a lawyer who will write a nasty letter? —KCT

 

[yessisan]

Any chance you can take him to court? Or at least find a lawyer who will write a nasty letter? —KCT

DH doesn’t want me to go to that extreme yet.

I was about ready to go to his house last night and demand payment and to tell him that this morning I was going to sue him. But DH asked I wait and see if the man’s bank will take care of the charges since he swears to God he had over $7K in the account.

I don’t believe him though, he’s done this 4 times to us already.