fremantle

Hi. Any advice would be appreciated.
I emigrated to Australia nearly two years ago and married an Australian.He has a fairly well paid job netting say around $84k a year. I am currently part time not earning much at all (say $20k). Hubby is in a hard manual job and is not far off 60 so his ability to earn this amount will only be for the next year or so before he looks for something less damaging to his body and consequently less money (probably around half). I am 10 years younger and will return to full time work then or before that.

Our situation is, husband has a house fully paid for worth around $750k.An investment property purchased around 4 years is now worth around $40k less than it was purchased for. We have no savings and my husband has neglected his superannuation over the years so there are only employer contributions which amount to between $20-30k so nothing of note. We have a small outstanding loan of around $15k which I have tried to divert money to paying off since it was taken out around 18 months ago and it is gradually going down.

I am very cautious with money and not a risk taker. My husband doesn't seem to worry about money and likes to enjoy life eating out, holidays etc especially as he hates his job and works such long hours he needs to have fun times. I am not adverse to fun times but I come from a background where I had little money and had to make the best of what I got so I am used to having to go without and when I was on my own it was easy to budget but now I struggle when we have such different view points and with him being the main wage earner not sure how much influence I have/should have over the family finances and it is starting to cause arguments.

My husband sees our future with travel etc but I can't see how this will happen when there is limited income coming in to pay for it and no plans having been made for superannuation to help fund it. He is also keen to sink more money into another investment property which may or may not at this stage be an investment property with a tenant in, or potentially used by us as a holiday home or maybe even our eventual home when we are older. We have so far not been able to pay off the small outstanding loan so I can't see how could we commit to paying back an interest only loan of around $240k especially with our financial circumstances due to change in a year or so. I am trying to work out a budget just to deal with our current circumstances let alone taking on another property.

Am I being unrealistic in not wanting to become involved in another property or should I be more supportive.

I know money is one of the main causes of arguments and we really are poles apart on this subject.

Points of view would be appreciated. Thanks for your time.

Cheetah7

If it were me I would not be taking any more financial risks without professional advice from a financial consultant/advisor.

Perhaps if you were to make the appointment for both of you to discuss things and everything weighed up, he might see things more realistically. Not having a pension is madness to be honest and I can see why you are worried.

There is nothing wrong in enjoying life but you should always be prepared for other things - life insurance/pension, make sure the bills are paid and there is food on the table, anything left over can go towards whatever you want.

Deffo make an appointment to discuss it.

ABCDiamond

You are not being unrealistic in the slightest.

As has been said, you need to discuss all this, thoroughly, with a third party.