Behind with mortgage but he keeps spending

Dear Coleen

My husband and I have been married for 15 years and we generally get on well.

I’m a stay-at-home mum and he works full time, so he takes care of the money side of things.

However, there’s a big problem – he lies about money. I recently became suspicious and opened a few household bills to find that we’re late on our mortgage payments and our credit card bill is almost three times as high as he told me it was.

This has happened two or times before in the past and when I confronted him about it he became very defensive and cross with me.

However, he still goes for drinks with his friends, he recently bought himself a new bike, and he will often buy himself new clothes.

Him lying about our money situation is almost more worrying than anything else as I then start to wonder what else he’s lying about.

Coleen says

To be honest I think he’s getting himself into a massive financial hole.

He feels as if he should be in control of the household accounts, but instead he’s allowing it to get out of control and his only means of defence against you finding out is getting angry when you start to ask questions. That’s just not good enough.

You need to sit him down and say: “Look, I’m not having a go at you but I know our money situation is a bit out of control, so we need to sort it out together.” Don’t do it in an accusatory way, but rather in a practical way. You could suggest that you take some of the stress off of him by keeping an eye on the bills for a while.

After all, just because he works there’s no reason why you can’t handle the finances. Looking after them could be your contribution to the household. Reassure him that you’re not going to worry or moan about the current financial situation you’re in, but rather try to make things better going forwards.

If he carries on getting defensive or burying his head in sand, then you do have to put foot your down, get tough and make him realise that if things carry on you could lose everything. And don’t forget, it’s your money too. Even though you don’t technically earn it, you being at home is allowing him to be the breadwinner.

Marriages are a joint partnership and this is a joint problem that he needs to involve you in. Good luck.

If I confront him about his lies he gets defensive