Apologies in advance for the long post!

I have been married for 5 years.
I was wondering if there is anyone out there who has a husband or wife that obsesses about finances even when they actually have worked hard to secure their financial future.
I am having a lot of trouble dealing with my husband’s anxiety when it comes to money. We moved countries recently for me to be close to my family as I spent 4 years in his country, alone since he does not have any ties there and was desperate to get back.
We both worked very hard to save for our future in my country because we knew the cost of living is high however, it is higher than we both thought, which is still very much within our means, however, he is unwilling to dip into our savings in order to settle down here permanently. He is looking purely at the number, mortgage rates, vs exchange rates and based on that alone says the mortgage repayments are too high..I agree however we have the money(more than a home would cost), he is just chosing not to want to spend it.
His goal before he was married was to retire early and I have to say this goal is still his goal. He makes the necessary financial decisions in order to achieve this goal. While I would like to retire early too, we may or may not live that long, so I would prefer to have a good balance where we can enjoy our life and also be able to save for our future.
We have a pretty simple situation that most, we don’t have kids, probably wont and we have one family car and no other commitments or debts.
I have asked repeated times what goals he would like to achieve as a married couple in our new country and he says he doesn’t have any goals. He just wants a stress free life. I want to settle down, I want to buy a home with the money we have saved and have the comfort and pride in what we have worked hard for. But he does not want to do it here, he would prefer to live back in his country because the numbers make sense there not here. I feel like I am competing with money and I cannot win and to be honest I don’t think however much money he has will ever be enough or ease that stress for him and he does not see it. He doesn’t tap into the emotional side of our marriage, just looks at the numbers and that drives me crazy.
Unfortunately I tried my heart out living away from my country for 4 years, however I recently lost my father and I need to be with my small family in order to try and heal from this tragic loss. I am not getting any emotional support from my husband during this time either because he is so obsessed with money which makes me sad. I really need him. I am not ruling out moving back to his country, but would prefer we make a medium term commitment here.
If anyone has any ideas, would love to hear them.
Thanks so much

He suffers from terrible insecurity. No matter how hard he tries to be stress free from money and life,it can not be done. We are all stressed in one way or another. Get a good counselor and see if he will go with you.

Sounds to me like the problem is him not wanting to live in your country.

Had you discussed where you would live before you two married?

Maybe you could ask him what his desires would be if money wasn't an issue - then you will be able to tell if it is money fears controlling him. Also ask if something happened in his past that made him think money is security or gave him the irrational fear. Or what are his real fears behind the fear.

I think it is the fear draining the life out of the marriage, because it controls like an addiction. To let go of the fear would be to let go of what he needs to concentrate on to feel safe and in control. That's why you can't negotiate yet until he is free from it. But getting him to see it is the first step.

Im sorry to hear about your problem.

My marriage has suffered IMMENSELY because of my wifes FOO obsession with money. Not to have it in order to live high on the hog, just to have it. They say its so they can feel secure, but I think its more than that. ANd since I've been reading, to my SURPRISE, money issues are numerous AND many people see NO problems with it, as long as it is SAVED and NOT SPENT.

IMO, whether your spouse is SPENDING it or obsessively SAVING it, the stress of MAKING it is still there. If my wife needs $1000 for something, she'll freak about it UNLESS she has an extra $3000. We can never save enough, we can never be SECURE enough, it really sucks. She says we have nothing and no savings and are in trouble, but we managed to pay for my sons prep school with our INCOME,no loans and STILL SAVE A BIT.(and that was $50K for 8 months) And now are paying for college, with no lone, soon to be two. And still, see complains on how I screwed up so badly. It kills me, literally.

I know your frustration. To me, and I realize I am in the HUGE minority, MONEY should be the LAST stupid thing couples fight about. It's just not worth it. I hate those stupid saving radio programs, those no debt hideous things, the Dave something or other. I think THESE things have created this save, save, save, worry, worry, worry junk. And they ALL say the same thing. "When I retire THEN I'll start living it up" Yeah, Ok. Thats NEVER happened as far as my family is concerned. They were obsessed with money all their lives, they saved and scrimped all they lives and were tight as a drum all their lives and you know what? All those habits CONTINUED when they retired. These people LOVE TO SEE THE NUMBERS IN THE STATEMENTS, THATS IT!!!! They simply LOVE MONEY, not WHAT money can do for them, and don't even listen to any excuses either.


I hope you can change your husband. But, let me tell you, its tough. Cheapness, obsessiona and worry about cash runs deep. And the love of cash ALWAYS WINS OUT. OVer the spouse, over happiness over EVERYTHING.
Good luck, I just wanted to tell you how badly I feel that you play second fiddle to the almighty buck, like many others. Maybe there are those that can help you here. There are some pretty smart posters on this site. Good luck!

I am hestitant to post advice or observations about a problem that gets into some deep psycological hang-ups, because those really do need professional help.

Alice T is right about trying to get those with money anxiety to explicitly describe what it is they fear, and what it would take to make them not worry, but that only works when the anxiety has some rational basis, and they accept that solutions are possible.

One of the things which started me posting here was me and my friend both have wives with some sort of money anxiety, or at least an irrational desire to have things both ways. I cannot my wife to sit down and fill out the HNHN financial survey. She scoffs at my budget ( I do one every year, and track expenses and income against my goals). I have always made 2 and 3 times the income of others my age in my profession, but she has always talked about how "we don't have anything", etc. We can't even go shopping for furniture or remodeling without her proclaiming that we can't afford it. She wants me to "give her an amount", and put it in her hand, regardless of the money we have in the bank.

What I have been doing:

What I have been doing is the POJA. I make her agree to every purchase, even if it is something we need, like a new sink. I have created a project spreadsheet for the house, since we need to and want to do a lot of fixing up with the children being grown. I have a worksheet for every room, front yard, back yard, garden shed, roof, HVAC, etc. I filled it all in with my cut at it. She scoffed. I put it on our computer, on the desktop. Slowly, she started looking at it and criticizing my allocations and estimates. I showed her how to edit it for different scenarios. Now she is shopping and pricing online and filling it in.

Also, I realized a long time ago that I saved lots of money when I was a boy because I enjoyed investing and multiplying it. People who are spenders have to change their mindset and learn the joy of making money. Spenders usually are trying to compensate for some other insecurity or hurt. Hoarders are, too.

Give more money. Even when you don't have much, giving it where you can see it helps someone with even less will make you realize the real power of money, that you have with it, instead of it having power over you. When my children were little, I used to get whatever bonus or overtime money I had, and take them Christmas shopping for the orphanage. They loved it.