Couples splitting rent

anon808

As above, I'm just wondering how couples split rent when they are living together?
Do you do it 50/50? Based on income? Based on what you can afford? Savings?
Basically my partner and I moved in together about 2 months ago. We currently do everything 50/50 (rent and bills). 
It's actually working out more expensive for me now compared to when I was housesharing as everything was split between 4 of us then. I'm not on the breadline or anything but my savings ability has taken a huge hit and I'm now only saving 100-200 per month, compared to about 400-500 in the past, which is significant as I want to save a deposit for a house. He, on the other hand, is now saving more as he used to pay a lot more for rent and bills. Also, he earns about 2.5 times what I do and is saving circa 1000 a month.
Some friends said they used to pro-rata with their partner based on Net Income and others said they did it 50/50 as why should it cost someone more to live with their partner than if they didn't?
I'm just looking for opinions on how others do it. If enough people think I should raise it with him, I might. If not, I'll just leave it and keep going on as we are!

Nervous Wreck

That's silly. If you want to raise it with him, do. You'll get mixed opinion here but it sounds like you want to raise it so do what you feel is best. There's no right answer. Couples agree different ways. Assuming you're planning on getting a mortgage with him, its probably safe enough to say that his savings will go towards that so maybe it'll all balance out. Either way, if it's bothering you, bring it up. But remember that the fact that it bothers you doesn't oblige him to agree to a change and he may not.

Rackstar

I wouldn't have agreed to move in together under those terms.

If he is earning more, he should pay a larger chunk.

I pay the majority of our mortgage as my partner doesn't earn as much.

listermint

Based on income,

Why because if you are going to marry or have children you can't continue a 50 50 charade.

Samuel T. Cogley

Until you're married 50/50

bertsmom

As a lady I cannot understand why it should be less than 50/50. I have always been the partner on the lower income but I have always paid my half. Why should my partner pay more than I just because they have made better life decisions as regards education and job prospects etc.
I don't value promotions in work as it would have an effect on my work/ life balance but if my partner works hard and excels his pay becomes better why should I be rewarded by paying less? I use 50% I pay 50% end of.

deathtocaptcha

50/50. Unless you're married or he volunteers to pay more, it's ridiculous to expect him to effectively subsidise your cost of living simply for being his partner.

It's like going out for a meal together as a couple and him paying only for his own share because he had less to eat... how would you feel about that?

Or if he uses less hot water than you for showers etc... he'd work out an average cost per shower / bath etc and bill you accordingly because you'd use it more...

You're opening up a big can of worms and if he retaliated with the same level of nitpicking you probably wouldn't like it...

LincolnHawk

I paid based on income in the past with the missus. We're married and now I pay 100%

myshirt

You should pay half of the rent, but a cap should kick in at 35% of your take home pay.

You can't be paying all your money on rent. Surely your partner will be reasonable here.

_Kaiser_

To be honest, this seems like more a PI issue than anything else. You've moved in with this man but resent the impact it's having on your ability to save for your house, and resent him not being as affected because of his higher income.

If ye were "just friends" then yes, 50/50, but if you are supposed to be a couple I think ye need to have a chat about a more equitable split, and you might need to equally let go of saving for "your" house (are you not BOTH saving for that?) If you have moved in together then it must be serious enough and so surely you should be pulling together and supporting each other towards whatever future you're working towards?

Victor

Whose idea was it to move in together? Will studying that inform your decision?

CIARAN_BOYLE

Victor wrote: »

Whose idea was it to move in together? Will studying that inform your decision?

More importantly imo who picked the property.

If you wanted to rent a 1 bed apartment for 1k and he wants a 3 bed house for 2k then he should have to pay the extra.

syndrome777

Victor wrote: »

Whose idea was it to move in together? Will studying that inform your decision?

this.

If I knew I would be paying more moving in with my bf....and especially if he earn multiple of my salary.....I wouldn't move in period.

If on the other hand I could pay more or less the same amount as I was paying house sharing I would move in with him.(and by what you are saying, he is now paying less....so he should be ok with paying more now, as he was paying more when you weren't living together)


it's not really fair that he can save 10x more than you , and you break up and then what, unles moving in was your idea, and you were prepared to pay more now, than 50/50 is fair.

evolving_doors

Depends how serious the relationship is.
Your question of fairness seems to be predicated on the assumption that ye might split up... he's quids in and you've foregone massive savings.

If yer seriously heading towards marriage then great, yer both saving about 1.2k a month.

At the moment yer in a transition phase.
Can you ever see a future time of going back to house share land? I think not. So forget about that saving situation from now on. Those days are over.

No easy answer.

Nervous Wreck

syndrome777 wrote: »

it's not really fair that he can save 10x more than you , and you break up and then what, unles moving in was your idea, and you were prepared to pay more now, than 50/50 is fair.

But from his side, he should save less and then they break up and he's down loads in his savings? 50/50 is what they decided so it is 100% fair in terms of the agreement. Renegotiationg that isn't a matter of fairness imo.

theniamh

my opinion is if you both picked the house to move into, you knew the rent before moving in. Surely that was the time to say, I cant afford to live here as my house saving will take a hit. Then at least ye could have looked for a cheaper house or he could have decided to pay more.

In my situation we are both paying 50/50 and our house savings go into a joint account. I earn more so i can save more, but once that money goes into the joint savings account its ours. but we sat down and talked it all out before the savings started.

If you dont say anything it will eat away at you. perhaps you should look for a cheaper place to rent as you cant keep up with the high rent costs and try to save.

syndrome777

theniamh wrote: »

my opinion is if you both picked the house to move into, you knew the rent before moving in. Surely that was the time to say, I cant afford to live here as my house saving will take a hit. Then at least ye could have looked for a cheaper house or he could have decided to pay more.

In my situation we are both paying 50/50 and our house savings go into a joint account. I earn more so i can save more, but once that money goes into the joint savings account its ours. but we sat down and talked it all out before the savings started.

If you dont say anything it will eat away at you. perhaps you should look for a cheaper place to rent as you cant keep up with the high rent costs and try to save.

we are doing the exactly same thing. Split the rent 50/50 but I save more cuz I earn more. But all our saving go for house deposit.

Nervous Wreck wrote: »

But from his side, he should save less and then they break up and he's down loads in his savings? 50/50 is what they decided so it is 100% fair in terms of the agreement. Renegotiationg that isn't a matter of fairness imo.

true, if they haven't discussed this before they moved in

they still should. there will be a time to go for hollidays and stuff and you can do 50/50 is one is earning a lot less....well you can not do anything

Lau2976

I pay 65% of the rent and he pays 35% because I work from home and have set up in the spare bedroom. He moved in with me and we were both renting alone so it worked out cheaper for both of us, but our system has been fairly simple, we have a household budget that we both contribute to at the start of each month, from this we deduct any bills, weekly grocery, rent and date money. Anything left in it rolls over to the next month for emergencies.

Anything else comes out of our personal accounts, like petrol or gym memberships, etc

It sounds like the issue is with your expectations of each other and the communication of those expectations. I would talk to him if I were you

Are you saving for a house together or is it you alone? How will you split it then? I think it's important to consider it now if its something you plan on doing with him in the future.

April 73

For me it's totally dependant on what conversation you've had on future plans & what you discussed before you moved in together.
When myself & my now husband first lived together we split costs 50/50. Our incomes were fairly similar then though.

When things got more serious & we were engaged and saving for a house we pooled resources. At various times over the years whoever has been the higher earner has paid more.

Nowadays - married with kids - we put most of our earnings into the joint account and leave ourselves with the same amount of pure spending money each. So the mortgage, bills, food, expenses all come from the joint account & we each have our own money to spend (the same amount each regardless of who earns more) Obviously the higher earner contributes more to the joint account in this scenario. That seems reasonable to me but we're married & supporting kids together.

I think you might need to sit down & discuss this with your partner. Otherwise it'll fester & cause problems. Two separate people coming together like this always warrants discussion on the ground rules. Good luck.

BrokenWingz

We always split 50/50 and my income was just over half of his. I was set on knowing I was paying my own way and there could be no comeback of "but I pay more" in case of disagreement.

As the first reply said this obviously bothers you, so perhaps you should raise the subject for discussion and see what comes of it.

Dr_Kolossus

anon808 wrote: »

As above, I'm just wondering how couples split rent when they are living together?
Do you do it 50/50? Based on income? Based on what you can afford? Savings?
Basically my partner and I moved in together about 2 months ago. We currently do everything 50/50 (rent and bills). 
It's actually working out more expensive for me now compared to when I was housesharing as everything was split between 4 of us then. I'm not on the breadline or anything but my savings ability has taken a huge hit and I'm now only saving 100-200 per month, compared to about 400-500 in the past, which is significant as I want to save a deposit for a house. He, on the other hand, is now saving more as he used to pay a lot more for rent and bills. Also, he earns about 2.5 times what I do and is saving circa 1000 a month.
Some friends said they used to pro-rata with their partner based on Net Income and others said they did it 50/50 as why should it cost someone more to live with their partner than if they didn't?
I'm just looking for opinions on how others do it. If enough people think I should raise it with him, I might. If not, I'll just leave it and keep going on as w

Was in the same situation with my now wife. She didn't earn quite as much as me, but insistence on paying half the rent. I just paid more of the bills, bought the takeaways, most of the drinks, treated her. If he's not doing this, he's either a fool or a tight arse. Bring it up with him, if he doesn't change then he's the latter.

Do u want to be with someone like this?

Wardling

We split our rent fifty fifty but our salaries would be very similar to begin with

One_Of_Shanks

April 73 wrote: »

For me it's totally dependant on what conversation you've had on future plans & what you discussed before you moved in together.
When myself & my now husband first lived together we split costs 50/50. Our incomes were fairly similar then though.

When things got more serious & we were engaged and saving for a house we pooled resources.

Yeah this is my thinking on it too.

You really need to sit down and have a chat about if yee are staying together and intending getting married or remaining together long term and stuff.
And if you feel awkward having that chat then that in itself would say to me that splitting rent 50/50 regardless of income is the way to go for now.

If the relationship isn't sort of concrete long term type thing then why should he pay more than 50/50?
If roles were reversed you wouldn't be asking the question.

However, if yee are very serious about each other and plan on staying together for the rest of your days then you are getting a raw deal here and yee need to have a chat.
I suppose the bottom line here is that you're asking people for advice without us knowing the full situation in the relationship.

Just my opinion but if I was that chap and I was really confident that the relationship was gonna last for the duration then I would be the one to broach the subject with you coz its the right thing to do and then you set up a joint account and that's your savings together for the future and then you should both have the same disposable income left after rent, bills, diesel, bla bla bla are all paid.

On the other hand, if I'm that chap and I have some doubt about whether you're ultra-serious for the long-term yet then I'd do what he's already doing.

So really it's all about what page you two are on as a couple.

Parchment

I would only split costs 50/50 even if one person earns more. I dont expect anyone else to carry me nor do i wish to carry anyone else.

OP why did you move in with him on those terms? If the shoe was on the other foot would you feel the same?

All costs split 50/50 imo. I don't see fairness in one paying more than the other regardless of income. The higher earner should be left with more disposable income and should be able to save more as they earn more and are entitled to benefit from this.

RoisinClare6

I've been living with my boyfriend for 2 years now. Our current situation is he works full time When I work part time x2 days a week. He pays for our day to day living (food shop/general bills) basically anything we need for the week. Then when I get paid at the start of the month my €600 pays our rent for the month.

Not ideal but that's where we are at until I can get fulltime work!

Murrisk

Alexia Repulsive Munitions wrote: »

All costs split 50/50 imo. I don't see fairness in one paying more than the other regardless of income. The higher earner should be left with more disposable income and should be able to save more as they earn more and are entitled to benefit from this.

They don't necessarily work harder though. If the relationship proceeds to marriage this is a recipe for disaster.

catrionanic

We always split 50/50, regardless of who earned what, until we opened a joint account a few months before we got married. If it's not the sort of relationship where you're certain you're going to make commitments to one another, either through marriage or a house purchase, then I think it's fair enough to go 50/50 and you should have thought about this when you were deciding to live together, as that would have been the right time to address it.

If you're in it for the long haul, then you're a partnership and should pool your finances. I'm currently on maternity leave and earning a whopping €235 per week, so my husband is paying for almost everything. And I'll be going back part-time, so he will continue to earn more than 3x my salary. But I am raising his children and keeping his house running, and I don't think you can put a price on that!

theteal

It's been mentioned a few times already but I'm curious as to what difference marriage makes in this scenario?

If you're moving in together, it's a "serious" relationship. A piece of paper to say you're joined at the hip makes no difference as far as I'm concerned.

Anyway, to answer the OP's query, we did 50/50 but then again our salaries were much the same (I think the NHS London weighting add-on may have put mrsTeal slightly on top of that scale). She's on sprog leave at the moment so I'm now covering 100%

One_Of_Shanks

theteal wrote: »

It's been mentioned a few times already but I'm curious as to what difference marriage makes in this scenario?

If you're moving in together, it's a "serious" relationship. A piece of paper to say you're joined at the hip makes no difference as far as I'm concerned.

Ah well most people just mean staying together forever etc. Marriage is just a quick way of summing it up, for the purpose of this topic.

I'm not even married myself, despite being with herself for 14 years. But when people call her my wife I know what they mean. It saves time.

MayoSalmon

50/50 equality feminism all that no?!!

paulieeye

I agree with who ever said that it should be 50/50 unless he volunteers. Ur paying more than u were before yes but thats because ur getting a better product in that u now longer have to house share with others. Like he's in the same situation, he would of been able to save even more if he was house sharing with 4 people in total too.

ur both using half the place so should pay half. Course he could always offer to pay more but thats up to him. I offered to pay more when I was sharing with GF but she never asked and actually insisted on me paying less than I offered.

Murrisk

MayoSalmon wrote: »

50/50 equality feminism all that no?!!

The female is often the higher earner these days so paying proportionately doesn't mean the male is worse off.

MayoSalmon

Murrisk wrote:

The female is often the higher earner these days so paying proportionately doesn't mean the male is worse off.

You mean the Gender Pay Gap is actually for male pay equality?! Fantastic

Lia_lia

When we first moved in together we did it based on income as I earned a lot more than he did. Also the rent in our house was expensive for the time.

His pay has since increased so we now split it 50/50. Our rent has never changed so we are paying below market rate. We have always paid 50/50 with regards bills.

theteal

One_Of_Shanks wrote: »

Ah well most people just mean staying together forever etc. Marriage is just a quick way of summing it up, for the purpose of this topic.

I'm not even married myself, despite being with herself for 14 years. But when people call her my wife I know what they mean. It saves time.

Is moving in together just for the craic? I'd assume the whole moving in would be the start of the rest of ye're lives. Marriage makes little to no difference on top of that. It just surprised me that a few people have made mention of the split being different depending marital status as opposed to accommodation status.

One_Of_Shanks

theteal wrote: »

Is moving in together just for the craic? I'd assume the whole moving in would be the start of the rest of ye're lives. Marriage makes little to no difference on top of that. It just surprised me that a few people have made mention of the split being different depending marital status as opposed to accommodation status.

Well I wrote 2 paragraphs of a reply already painstakingly mentioning "long-term" over and over again.
And then I replied back to you explaining that in this context the marriage thing was just people's way of saying a long term commitment.

And now you're back about it again. So I don't really know what else to say.
I was just trying to help out the OP with advice.
I never claimed to be an expert on marriage, I already said I'm not married myself.
You're getting hung up on a tangent here.
You could always start a thread about this question and besta luck if you do.

_Brian

anon808 wrote: »

As above, I'm just wondering how couples split rent when they are living together?
Do you do it 50/50? Based on income? Based on what you can afford? Savings?
Basically my partner and I moved in together about 2 months ago. We currently do everything 50/50 (rent and bills).?
It's actually working out more expensive for me now compared to when I was housesharing as everything was split between 4 of us then. I'm not on the breadline or anything but my savings ability has taken a huge hit and I'm now only saving 100-200 per month, compared to about 400-500 in the past, which is significant as I want to save a deposit for a house. He, on the other hand, is now saving more as he used to pay a lot more for rent and bills. Also, he earns about 2.5 times what I do and is saving circa 1000 a month.
Some friends said they used to pro-rata with their partner based on Net Income and others said they did it 50/50 as why should it cost someone more to live with their partner than if they didn't?
I'm just looking for opinions on how others do it. If enough people think I should raise it with him, I might. If not, I'll just leave it and keep going on as we are!

It's a long time ago now but the week we moved in together we opened a joint account and all money was pooled, all bills expenses paid from that. That was 1992, we were married in 1995, moneys been pooled ever since.
We've gone through periods where one or the other has been earning more, but it never mattered.

One_Of_Shanks

_Brian wrote: »

we were married in 1995

careful there. Yer not meant to mention the M word.

athtrasna

Moved from Accommodation and Property. Personal issues charter applies, please take time to read it if you're not familiar with it before posting

Mod

Big Bag of Chips

It's largely irrelevant what others do. As a couple you have to come to an agreement on what works for you. If something is bothering you in a relationship then of course you should talk to your partner. Then you can decide between you whether or not things should change.

Murrisk

Murrisk wrote: »

They don't necessarily work harder though. If the relationship proceeds to marriage this is a recipe for disaster.

Proceeding to marriage very soon actually and 50/50 is not changing!

Victor

catrionanic wrote: »

If you're in it for the long haul, then you're a partnership and should pool your finances.

_Brian wrote: »

It's a long time ago now but the week we moved in together we opened a joint account and all money was pooled, all bills expenses paid from that.

Be very careful with something like this. Each partner should always have some of their own money.

Alexia Repulsive Munitions wrote: »

All costs split 50/50 imo. I don't see fairness in one paying more than the other regardless of income. The higher earner should be left with more disposable income and should be able to save more as they earn more and are entitled to benefit from this.

What if the situation arose (injury, illness, redundancy) where one side wasn't able to cover their 50% of shared expenses at all, never mind discretionary spend?

MayoSalmon wrote: »

50/50 equality feminism all that no?!!

Balance.

Lyra Fangs

bertsmom wrote: »

As a lady I cannot understand why it should be less than 50/50. I have always been the partner on the lower income but I have always paid my half. Why should my partner pay more than I just because they have made better life decisions as regards education and job prospects etc.
I don't value promotions in work as it would have an effect on my work/ life balance but if my partner works hard and excels his pay becomes better why should I be rewarded by paying less? I use 50% I pay 50% end of.

Bit of a sweeping statement there? Maybe it's because they're further along in their career because they are, for example, a few years older. In the industry myself and my partner work in those few years can double your salary.

We used to split 50/50 when our salaries were relatively on par but now that there's a significant gap he pays more. It allows us access to apartments that are outside my budget (were we to split it evenly) but that are more convenient in terms of size and location.

Once both partners are happy with the arrangement that's all that really matters. In our case it's temporary as well so that helps.

Rachiee

Ask yourself why this arrangement seemed fair to you when you agreed to rent the place and now all of a sudden doesn't. Was it something a friend said or are you getting stressed about money and it's causing resentment to build.
Either way if it's bothering you you should talk about it but I wouldn't go in making demands (if 50/50 was fair then, it probably is still fair now)
But you might as well tell him that you are loving living together but it's tough that you are so much financially worse off at the moment. He might offer to pay more or might make more of an effort to treat you or he might just acknowledge your feelings.
P.S. for all you know his extra savings are going towards both of your futures.

anon808

Thanks to everyone for their responses so far.

It's really great to get all perspectives. I actually can see both sides and opinions and really appreciate all and any feedback. Some people had a few questions so I'll try to fill in the blanks. 

Who's idea it was? It was a mutual decision as both our leases were up around the same time and it just seemed like the next logical step in our relationship.

Why didn't I realise it would be more expensive? This is kind of a tough one as when we started looking, we had a smaller budget that was more in line with the rent I was paying. But with the market the way that it is, we felt under pressure to push out our budget to get something suitable. So I knew I would be taking an extra 100 hit a month to my savings -- fair enough, that one is on me and I am fine with that bit.

Where I am really hurting is that I really miscalculated how much more expensive it would be bills wise. eg having to split bills by 2 instead of 4. Even though its a smaller place, they aren't half what we use to pay. Also, we have a few more utilities compared to my last place (Sky, phone line, high speed broadband etc) as he is used to having these. Again, this is an oversight on my part and I fully hold my hands up. Doesn't really help my savings situation but is my fault I know. I also thought that day-to-day grocery bills would be less as my friends all seemed to spend less when they moved in with their partners but doesn't seem to be the case in our house! Again, stupid assumption on my part!

When I mentioned this to some friends recently, that's when the topic of splitting rent by income came up. To be honest, I hadn't even considered this until then. I actually fully think it should be 50/50 for rent and bills and have no problem with this. But it got me wondering what others do and wondering if the fact that we aren't doing this, does it mean that he isn't as serious about me as I am about him. Which some of the comments seem to indicate.

I'm still saving (albeit a lot less than I used to) for a mortgage (not necessarily MY mortgage, just a mortgage, obviously with him if it goes that way) so a lot of you are right, it will all work out in the end. But if that doesn't happen, (god I hate being so pessimistic) then I've taken a hit on my mortgage savings by moving in with him, where as he has padded his out that bit more by moving in with me.

As was advised, I will try to talk to him about this but I know its going to be awkward and difficult and I really don't know how I can do this without looking tight. I mean I am still saving so it's not like I'm on the breadline. And it sounds really bad saying "I don't want to be worse off if we break up" because that looks like I'm not committed.
Anyone got any more advice on how I can do this without coming across as either of those things??? :)

Addle

You can discuss it with your friends, and online...
Your first discussion should be with your OH.
Just set it out as you have above.

Victor

anon808 wrote: »

both our leases were up around the same time and it just seemed like the next logical step in our relationship.

Just to let people know that if they have been renting, as tenants (not licencees) for 6 months, they are entitled to a 'Part 4' lease for a total of 4 years and there is no obligation to move out after the (typical) 12 months. In rent pressure zones, this largely means that the landlord can't increase rent by more than 4% per year.

laserlad2010

anon808 wrote: »

When I mentioned this to some friends recently, that's when the topic of splitting rent by income came up. To be honest, I hadn't even considered this until then. I actually fully think it should be 50/50 for rent and bills and have no problem with this. But it got me wondering what others do and wondering if the fact that we aren't doing this, does it mean that he isn't as serious about me as I am about him. Which some of the comments seem to indicate.

What do you mean you think he isnt as serious about you as you are about him?

You earn X. You had Y disposable income when you lived in a houseshare. That's now changed because you're living in a two person household, obviously it's going to be more expensive?? It's a natural step in a relationship and brings its own drawbacks and advantages.

You're still saving and you have said yourself there are areas you could cut back on so that you can still save loads.

For what it's worth, you're basically asking him to pay more so that you can save more?? I'd be fine if you were struggling to have some personal spending and it was affecting your quality of life but it isn't, you're just waking up to the realities of life outside a houseshare!!

I'll warn you, if you approach this by accusing him of not loving you enough to pay more for your household costs, well, let us know how you get on:rolleyes::rolleyes:

You're far better off just being honest and asking him to contribute more so you can save more but to be frank even typing this out makes me a little annoyed so hopefully he's not like me!

MayoSalmon

Victor wrote:

Balance.

Nothing balanced about it, just taking more from the top (tall person) to give to bottom (short person). It's quite a good graphic in how the left views many issues in life, in so far as they genuinely think that unless they take more of the resources from elsewhere they will never been able to see over the metaphorical fence.

Tigger99

I'm female and when I lived with my first boyfriend I earned a good deal more and I insisted on paying more of the rent. I think anything else stingy and thoughtless.

There seems to be an assumption on here that this would just work one way, in terms of the guy automatically paying more.