Am I Responsible for My Fiancée's Debt?

Brought to you by the EveryDollar app. Start budgeting for free today. Me and my girlfriend, we had a daughter. She's not my fiance, so she moved in with me and she has a lot of credit card debt, $75,000 in credit card debt. So, and that was kind of, you know, she worked full-time at night, I worked full-time during the day. We get a lot of babysitting help, so we don't have to pay for babysitters, so that's nice. Yeah. Where'd this debt come from? That's a lot. Yeah, it sure is. Some of it was, like, before I met her, she was working like 70 hours a week, so she was working during the day and then at night. And then, so she just kind of got, I think, used to a lifestyle that, you know, and then started working half those hours and, you know. Oh, and continued it, and so that caused the credit card debt. That makes sense, okay. Yeah, and then, obviously, she got pregnant and her job kind of closed down for a while, you know, doing renovations, and then I just think it snowballed. I didn't realize she was putting, like, formula, diapers, and stuff on her credit card, like, because we were moving in together, but we weren't, like, we're not, like, integrated together, you know what I mean? Like, I wasn't sure exactly how she was doing it. I just, I knew she was working, but I didn't know. How bad it was. Yeah, okay. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So you got $75,000 in credit card debt, or she does. What other debt do you guys have? I have, well, I have no credit card debt. We both have $13,000 left on our cars. Individually or together? Individually. She has $13,000 on hers, I have $13,000 on mine. Okay, okay. Yep, yep. So, yeah, so basically, that's kind of been, like, in the background, like, and, well, you know, she had a baby, she was a full-time student. You all had a baby, though, right? Well, we, of course, we have a baby. I mean, you know. I mean, you're not saying it. Yeah, you're not really taking care of it. That's what it feels like. She's taking care of everything, right? No, no, no, no, absolutely not. No, no, no, no. I pay for, so let me get to the rest of it, and then it'll make more sense. Please, help us out. So, I'm getting there, I promise. Okay, okay. Yeah, so, well, point is, she was in the middle of, like, finishing her degree when we met. So, she was, you know, full-time student, full-time, well, you know, mom. I mean, we split duties, but still, it's a lot, you know? And then, full-time employee, so, you know, it was just a lot all at once, so. How old's the baby now? So, she's 18 months. Okay, 18 months. So, you guys have started to get a little bit of a rhythm, a little bit of a flow going on, and you're looking up saying, hey, this debt, this is the problem, we need to start solutioning that. Can I ask one question? I just wanna make a, is this your fiancee or your girlfriend? She's my fiancee now, yeah. She is your fiancee. And we just got engaged, yeah, we got engaged June 30th, yeah. When do y'all get married? When's the wedding? What date? Well, we're still kinda unsure about that. Next year sometime, we're just gonna have a small. Matthew, you know, you're basically married. You guys live together, you have a baby together? Yes, and trust me, I know, this is, yeah. What's the purpose of waiting, is the question. Well, we wanna do a church wedding. You know, we're Catholic, we wanna do a church wedding. So, well, I'm Catholic, she's not. Wait a minute. But it takes 18 months to get a church wedding? No, I guess not, but just. Matthew, we need a little urgency. We need a little urgency in life. We want this debt paid off, we need to get together, we need to make this official, we need to like. But you can't roll the Catholic thing back in when it matters on getting married, but it didn't matter before. This is unfair, because this is sounding bad, and this is not, this is not fair. Listen, hey, we're on your side, we're on your side. We truly, truly are. No, she's totally on board with the timeline. I know, I try to get, like, people yell at me all. What if you did this? People yell at me all the time, because I say, like, I'm like, I'm watching my daughter, and they're like, you're not watching your daughter, it's your, I'm like. I know, semantics. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we got you. But it is not semantics when we're gonna talk about your money, because the way Jade and I are gonna answer it is that it is gonna be separate. There is no combining right now, because you don't have any legal protection. She doesn't have legal protection financially, neither do you. You don't, until you guys are legally married. So our advice is gonna be different, though, Matthew. I know, but can we say what we're about to walk through is going to look different, because you don't have a wedding date set. And I'm not trying to box you, put you in a box, Matthew, because I like you, you're fun. But this whole semantics thing is real, and you may call in two years and be like, I don't know, you know, this happened and this happened. So until you guys are married, we would give you one set, a plan, one way, and then there's gonna be another plan until you're married. So here's what we would say, because. Well, that's another piece, I guess, I haven't really thought about yet. Like, I trust her fully, and I know, and that's the thing, we're not quite married yet, but I understand, with her being my fiance, that's why we're kind of really trying to deal with it, just the emotional stress that she's carrying from it, like, well, so. Let us give you a solution. Because all that you're saying, the emotional stress, the dollars, all of this stuff, I think Rachel and I, there's two routes here. I wanna simplify it for you, because it feels like a lot floating around your head. There's two routes. The one route is you can say, we're not married yet, therefore everything is separate. This is my baby, I am devoted to my child, but financially, our lives are separate. That means her debt is her debt, and my debt, that means your only debt is a $13,000 car, and you're paying it off, and we can give you the seven steps to make that happen and give you financial peace. The other choice, which I actually feel is a better choice for you, if you do say this is the woman you wanna marry, is you can go to the courthouse, you can fill out the piece of paper and be married on paper, so that you can legally combine and work together, and then later on, when you can afford to have a party and do the church wedding and things like that, you're doing that just as a show and a party for your friends. Yeah, I guess I just don't know, I guess I just don't quite know the, I don't know the difference as far as what the benefits, as far as financially being married versus not. So that you, I'll paint you as the, would be the quote-unquote victim, right? If this happens, is that you take your income, you throw $80,000 over the next 18 months at this credit card debt, and then she looks up and she's like, listen, I don't wanna do this, I'm taking the baby and we'll figure out custody later, but we're done. You have no legal protection. But you don't know what- Matthew, listen to our show, the craziest stuff happens on the show that people comment, I know you're the exception to the rule, Matthew, you are special, I know, I know. Well, maybe a little, but no, not really, but yeah, no, but we'll think about it this way, I think about it from a perspective of like faith, you know, I just have faith that like, I'm kind of- So what do you wanna do? Maybe you're right, maybe- Talk to the woman whose husband has a gambling addiction and talk about faith, yep. I mean, we all do, I love Jesus, we got some faith, but we're also- We gotta be smart. We gotta be smart, and there's no legal protection, Matthew, and so keeping it separate, but I think what Jade is saying, combining everything is the best thing for you guys, and you're basically married, Matthew, you're basically married, just go do it, go do it. Create your free every dollar budget today, the simplest way to budget for your life.