'My partner kept secret how much money she has in savings and let me pay for most things.'

"My (M30) partner (F28) kept secret how much money she has in savings and let me pay for most things."

We’ve been dating for nearly 5y and in that time I’ve always had a full time job earning average money and she has been studying with part time jobs earning far less. I had almost no savings and we never really gave details about how much we had in savings until maybe a year or so ago.

Over this period she has always said she couldn’t afford things and I’ve paid a larger portion of rent (probably 70%) since we moved out together 3 years ago. I’ve never wanted to let money get in the way of living/our lives and could probably do a bit better job of saving. And I was always happy to pay more until she also started working full time when we would start splitting things evenly.

My dad passed away unexpectedly and he left me $500,000 which I got about 6 months ago - which is obviously life changing, I’ve probably never had more than $10,000 in my savings. We’ve started the process of buying a house and I was happy to put most of the money into a deposit and pay a larger portion of the mortgage until she started full time work (2y away).

Right before we went to submit the application she said she actually had $50,000 in savings and should we mention that in the application. She was a bit embarrassed to bring it up. I get that she wouldn’t mention this when we first started dating, and I don’t even care about the amount, but she has actively said “I can’t afford this” and let me pay for things countless times.

I asked why she left it so late to bring it up, that we should use some of it to pay for the house, and asked her how long she had had it. Basically she had it the whole time and that it was savings she accumulated since she started work as a teenager.

I’m annoyed for a few reasons - she was going to let me put most of “my” money into the house without helping, and that all these years I’ve been paying a greater portion of things including rent, food, bills, overseas holidays, entertainment etc while she had waaaay more money than I ever had.

I was earning more but that meant I wasn’t saving much, if anything. She also wasn’t saving much, her money was mostly from before we met. I never wanted money to get between me and anybody else, especially my partner but I feel really hurt, lied to, and taken advantage of.

She’s normally great and I love her, but she isn’t the best decision maker sometimes, and I have caught her in little lies before. These lies didn’t bother me much before as they were insignificant - most of the time a laughed it off like “why would you lie about that," but now we’ve hit something big in life and this proper lie has me worried.

I’m really struggling to get past it and the relationship feels tainted now. I’m not sure I can get past it, but everything else in the relationship is great. And it’s really not a good atmosphere to be trying to buy a house. Anyone else have similar experience? Did you split or how did you regain trust?

TLDR; girlfriend kept secret a large savings balance and let me pay for most things for years even though I had little savings. Only brought it up once we nearly applied for the mortgage and was about to let me pay for the whole deposit with money I got from my dad when he passed.

EDIT: Thanks to everyone who gave some insight, this has helped me understand how I'm feeling and get some fresh perspective that's been super helpful.

Just to clear some things up, we live in Australia and are therefore classified as a de facto relationship so legally/financially similar to married anyway. We both aren't interested in marriage, but before this we were 100% committed to each other for life and happy and stable.

We also come from very different family situations. I too have been working since I was 15 too but have less in savings as I needed to move out and started paying rent when was going to uni, and have worked full time since I finished my degree.

I've had to scrap a bit to get by and haven't received money from my parents or anyone until my dad passed. Saving a significant amount of money was definitely a luxury that I haven't been able to do until recently. My plan was to do enough to get myself through uni, get a good job, and then start saving, which I am lucky enough to be able to do now.

She lived with her parents until we moved in together so was able to save a lot more money before she moved out. Someone mentioned her saving this money is a massive green flag and I completely agree, she's certainly more conscious of keeping a safety net and that's a good thing.

To clarify, I never expected her to "drain" her savings, but she wanted to move out just as much as I did and I think she could have contributed _some_ of this money so that I could save some money myself, knowing that when she finished her degree she would be able to save more.

She also changed the degree she was studying after 2y of her first degree which has prolonged her studies, which she was partly able to do because I've been in position to support her. I think she should have been more upfront that she had some money at least after we moved out when I didn't have much - and in hindsight I could have communicated better here to.

I think our different financial history in this regard has played into this issue now. She's going to be more cautious about spending savings where I used what I would of saved to get by. A lot of questions about if she asked me to pay more vs if I offered. As I said in another comment: It depends of course, it was a mix.

We have always rented small 1 bedroom apartments, the cheapest we could get, but property is wildly expensive here. She said she can’t afford to pay 50% so she asked if I could pay more. But other non essentials, there were definitely times I offered to pay and am ok with that, although still feel a little misled.

We should have communicated to each other better, and I assumed things when I shouldn't have. But I don't think I was ever hiding anything, and she hasn't said that I was. And after we've talked about this its become clear that if I asked her directly what her situation was she wouldn't of told me about the money.

I'm glad that she has the emergency savings, anyone of course should be able to be financially independent from their partner, but 50k a few years ago to me was a crazy amount of money. Anyway, this has been a big lesson. House hunting is on pause for now and we need to work on ourselves and communication.

The biggest issue for me was always the trust that I feel has been broken, and that maybe I've ignored smaller issues in the past. If we stay together we'll need to formalise our financial situation (clear rules, potentially cohab agreement etc), and if not I'll probably buy a smaller place by myself. Jeez that's a lot of words, if you've read this far and offered advice I appreciate you :)

Here's what people had to say to OP:

active-arachnid2124 wrote:

Until ya'll talk about your financial goals and values don't make any joint purchases together. I strongly suggest going to a couples therapist or finding a list of questions to ask yourselves related to your long term goals.

Address that your trust is broken and that this is something you have to seriously consider moving forward. Talk about what the funds are. Is the 50k in like retirement account? Was it something easily liquidated? An emergency savings?

OP responded:

Emergency savings and eventually a house - which came quicker than we thought it would obviously. Frustrating that she waited so long to bring it up, but like I said sometimes she just has poor decision making skills. We talked it all out, everything (hopefully) is out on the table now. I told her how it made me feel, now I’m just stuck.

Formal_Start5497 wrote:

Well I would probably hold off on buying a house for a while after learning about this, and I think it's time you both sat down and had a serious talk about your finances going forward. I do have one question though, has she ever offered to help chip in on anything in the past?

OP responded:

I think we will hold off. It’s hard though, I was so ready and excited, but yeah I need to pull back now.

No not really, it’s always been her saying I can’t do this I can’t afford it, and me saying it’s ok I’ll pay for all/majority.

synthetic_anonymous wrote:

I was definitely expecting the amount to be closer to your inheritance than to zero. Just to put things in perspective, $50k is not that much money when you start using it to split rent, bills, groceries, vacations, etc. That money would have been gone inside of a year or two. I understand that it’s more than you had, and I understand how easy it would be to feel taken advantage of.

With you working full-time and her in school, you bore the financial burden of providing the lifestyle you both wanted. I get it. If I were you, I would have a serious conversation with her to ask why she kept this from you and what her plans are for the money. It wouldn’t surprise me if one thing answered the other.

Like, this could have been her safety net if your relationship went sideways, which would be smart to keep hold of. It could also be something as simple as her having more “traditional” values, learned from her parents, in which the man pays for things. I dunno. Definitely worth having a conversation before blowing up your relationship.

OP responded:

Thank you, articulated the other side well with this and I can definitely appreciate she needs a safety net, a bit more conservative, and 50k not being much these days etc I do think she could have been more upfront with how much she had and open to going into savings when she knew i wasn’t saving much though.

We’ve had the serious conversation, I just am afraid she’ll do something similar in the future, knowingly or unknowingly.

thin_entrepreneur98 wrote:

50k over 10 years since she’s been a teen isn’t a whole lot. I actually think this could be a big green flag for a long term partner. She might not think that what you’ve wanted to spend money on was a good idea, but doesn’t know how to say no - so it’s turned into a if you want this you pay.

Long term, this women will not do you wrong. If everything is joint, she will never let a bill go unpaid. Your mortgage will get paid off sooner. She won’t rack up a line of credit. If you have kids, I bet she’ll shop second hand and look for free stuff. A huge red flag would be hiding debt. A green flag is hiding saving - but needs a conversation for sure. This woman will never be actually broke, or make you broke.

starry_nite99 wrote:

Never ever EVER buy a house with someone you’re not married to. NEVER. Neither of you have legal protection if you split up or one of you passes away unexpectedly. Unless you’d be ok to own half your house with her parents if she unexpectedly passes.

The money thing is more about how each of you handle money. Affording something doesn’t mean using your last dollar. It means being comfortable spending x amount on something. Ex: right now I have the money to go on vacation, but I would rather not because I want to put that in savings.

To someone else, they would say I could afford it, but I say I can’t. She is a saver, and has been building that nest egg for about 15 years. If bills were always split based on income (which it should be), then this is also on you for not having savings- it was clearly never a priority to you.

You made the decision to go on holiday, do certain things knowing you would be paying a certain amount for it, and was ok with it. To you, you could afford it. She told you what she could afford. The only thing I would not be ok with is if she didn’t split things income proportional. That would be a deal breaker because it’s not only lying but taking advantage of you.