How Do I Tell My Fiancé to Stop Paying His Parents' Mortgage?

[Music] Brought to you by the Every Dollar app. Start budgeting for free today. I'm wondering how how can I nicely tell my fiance that his parents' financial shortcomings aren't his job to solve. Oo, I'm looking at John. Yeah. I I mean my first answer would be just to read back what I mean to say back what you just said to sit down and say hey honey your your parents' financial challenges aren't yours to solve. I'm assuming that you've tried that in 1700 other iterations of that. And so I think the deeper question is less about you asking him. It's you asking yourself, do I want to here at the doorstep? Do I want to be married to somebody who will put his parents' financial shortcomings ahead of the family that we are about to start co-creating together? That's the real question here. All right. I I just I mean I understand some of it some of it but like it's at some point we were paying their mortgage and you know tell us how the conversation goes when you say what John said which is honey dear I I I can't live like this your parents their struggles they're not your fault we can't solve them we've got to solve our own for our own financial peace what does that conversation look like and what does you do. It's usually I mean it never really ends in a fight or anything like that, but it's it's usually like they're still my parents. I don't want to see them fail. And I mean, I get that. I do, but like at what point is it at what point do you let them learn for them theirelves? Yeah, listen, you're right. You are correct. So, you don't have to convince us that there's a point. He's beyond the point. Um, my question is, is he an only child? Is there some sort of um hardship that's caused them to have financial struggles? Or is it truly just misbehavior with money? And he's the responsible sibling and feels like he's the hero. He's the oldest of four. And no, there isn't really anything that's causing them to lose money. It's like they have a bunch of pets and they can't pay their light bills, so they go out and get a dog, you know? Yeah. Like Yeah. But but you got to you have you have to metabolize that the bigger issue here is not your parent, not your future in-laws financial situation. It's that you sat down with your fiance and say said, "Hey, this is a big deal to me and your choices are impacting our life together." And he said, "Nah, I don't care. I'm going to keep doing what I'm doing." That to me is the bigger issue here. It's a big deal. And by the way, this will show up again when you'll get married. This will show up again when you'll buy a house. This will show up again when you'll start having kids. Mhm. This kind of indifference to you saying, "Hey, this is really important to me." And him going, "Yeah, I don't care." That's going to keep showing up and you have to ask yourself, am I going to sign up for this for the rest of my life? That listen, what John is saying is so true, Amy. I'll tell you, um, a piece of advice that my mom gave me when I got married, she said, "The behavior you allow now is the behavior you'll allow for the rest of your marriage." And so it was basically saying if I let this slide now to John's point, I'm going to keep seeing this type of behavior play out play out because I've allowed it and I said this is okay and people treat you the way you allow them to treat you. So if you say it's okay, then it is okay. So I would not, this is hot take. I would not marry this person until we have figured out how to solve this and I have seen how he enters into and solves conflict. Absolutely. And by the way, neither Jade nor I are against supporting parents at all, but I want to do it in the right order. I want to put our oxygen mask on first and make sure, as for me and my house, we've got our four walls taken care of. We are able to financially support somebody else. And my guess is that y'all are struggling too financially. Do y'all live together? We do. We actually we got engaged and then recently after found out that we were pregnant. Okay. So, um, y'all are have your own financial challenges ahead of you and you're concerned that he's putting money in their account and they're being irresponsible. It's not even a matter of them like struggling with poverty or health issues. They're just making bad choices, right? Jade is so right. You have to have the deeper, harder conversation because right now your fiance's parents financial situation, that's just the proxy war. That's not the real issue. The real issue is you said, "Hey, this matters to me." And he said, "Yeah, I don't care." Or they're more important than you. And in many ways, he's now also continuing that same chain of bad financial behavior and making bad financial choices, right? Because choosing to pay for something that's neither your responsibility or priority instead of what actually is. Yeah. That that's how you get in the situation that the in-laws are in. So, he's starting to repeat that behavior, which is a red flag. All right. All right. So, let me say this. You're not crazy. Okay. You're not crazy. And by the way, this isn't the only thing. He disregards what you want or feel, is it? No. No. These kind of things don't happen in a vacuum. People don't work together and they're not aligned on vision and goals and values and priorities. And then there's one weird thing over here. That's just not how people operate. And so you have to be honest with yourself. And by the way, you're in his life forever because y'all created a human together, right? So there's going to be some peacemaking here. But it's not too late to not bind this thing together legally and get into a big a bigger mess, if you will. Y'all are already connected forever. But I want you to be honest about the state of your relationship and how he dedicates his life to service to you and vice versa or how he is just dragging you along through whatever he gets good and ready to do in the world. All right. So, so I guess um do I stop asking nicely at this point? Do I just say, "Hey, dude, get your head out of your butt." in my it it I think it's it's when you enter into those conversations with you with the word you when you start those conversations with the word you first you're you're starting a fight you're declaring war and he's going to defend himself what's more important here is for you to come up with your or what statement I am going to fill in the blank I will not be married to somebody who puts other people's priorities ahead of ours will not marry somebody who doesn't care what I want or what I feel or what I want to co-create. I will not engage in. And so it's not about you need to get your head out of your butt. It is gently and firmly and in full control. I will not fill in the blank or I'm going to fill in the blank. That's the declaration. And then he gets to decide does he want to be a part of this thing or not. Create your free every dollar budget today. The simplest way to budget for your