When you are living with a significant other, it is normal to split up the bills in a way that seems fair to everyone.

What would you do if you were paying the vast majority of the bills even after your boyfriend got a raise and could afford to pay more?

That is what happened to the woman in this story, and when she brought up splitting the bills more equally, he got upset.

Who is in the right here? Let’s read the whole story to decide.

AITA for expecting my (28F) boyfriend (26M) to pay half in rent?

For context, I live in Southern California and my boyfriend moved down here 2 years ago from Washington State.

When he moved, he was worried about his finances since he paid $500 in rent there so we made an agreement that he would only have to pay $500 in rent here, until he was more well established in his career.

At the time, he made about $22/hr working 40hr a week and I made a salary of about $70k. Our rent back then was $2300 but I was more than happy with paying the rest of the bills if it meant he could move down here to be with me.

To this day, he still pays $500 in rent and I take care of the rest, including utilities and groceries (most of the time).

It is time for him to start paying his fair share.

The problem is, I recently got promoted to a salary of $113k and he is about to be promoted to a wage similar to my previous wage (expecting the ballpark of $60-$65k).

Honestly, I am tired of paying over 4x the amount in bills than him and I just want a small financial break.

Our current rent for the last year is $2800 so I asked him if we could finally split the bills in half (only rent, I have no problems covering everything else).

My reasoning is that I was ok paying $1800 in the first year for rent and $2300 in the second year, so he should have no problem paying $1400 with his new wage.

He said no because I make a lot more money now so we should continue splitting bills based off income, but the highest he’ll help is up to $1000.

He is just taking advantage of her at this point.

I have never brought up finances with him because I already felt bad he moved his whole life to be with me, and I didn’t want to hold money over his head because it feels manipulative.

But I want to start actually being able to enjoy my money and save or go on vacation or do something fun with it, instead of all my money going to bills and feeling guilty for going out for food instead of saving money by cooking at home.

I agree that splitting bills in half means I will be saving a lot more money than him, but I’ve been draining my resources just keeping us afloat this whole time.

He doesn’t sound very financially responsible.

He has more debts than I do (I prefer to pay for everything up front instead of taking loans) but if the tables were flipped I wouldn’t expect him to take a financial burden for loan decisions I decided to make before we started living together.

Plus I’ve already taken on the financial burden for the last 2 years and he’s only been able to pay off one of his loans (for his car).

Am I wrong for wanting to charge him half in rent? Or is $1000 month more reasonable.

AITA?

He really needs to be paying his fair share. Whether that is 50/50 or some other arrangement is up to the couple, but the way it is now just isn’t right.

Let’s see what the people in the comments on Reddit have to say about it.

Yup, split everything fairly.

The low rent at first was kind, but never permanent.

Splitting bills proportional to income is usually fair.

This commenter did the math for her.

This seems pretty fair.

Money fights are a leading cause of divorce.

If you liked this post, check out this story about an employee who got revenge on a co-worker who kept grading their work suspiciously low.