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The original was posted on /r/AmItheAsshole by /u/iCraveAttention on 2023-09-19 22:12:50.

I’m going to skip most of the backstory and just jump in.

My wife has wanted to have kids for a while and I’ve been putting it off, but now that I’m 30 (the age my parents had me) the idea has grown on me a bit. So earlier this year I told her we could probably start trying in 2024.

That said, I’ve been asking my wife for access to her student loan accounts for a while now. She just keeps putting it off and I’ve kind of let her since she’s generally responsible with money. Last week I finally forced her to give it to me since I said we wouldn’t be able to start trying for a baby until I’ve looked at her accounts to get a full picture of our finances.

Anyway, what I saw pretty much sunk my battleship. Not only is there a lot more debt than I thought, there were multiple private loans, including one for 20k on a variable rate interest (currently about 9%).

I did some math and the total principal across all her loans is a little over 90k. This includes credit cards and car. I estimated the total payments to about $150k over 10Y if we were to continue to make the minimum payment like she does.

I’ve basically put together a plan (that I haven’t told her yet) which is along the lines of:

  1. I’m going to sell some stock and pay off her credit card ASAP.

  2. She’s going to have to start working in the summer (she’s a teacher)

  3. Once my car loan is paid off next year, I’ll start putting those payments towards the principal balance of the variable rate loan.

Over 5 years we should be able to pay off all the loans that are above 6% interest and lower the monthly payments by about 75%. Basically get rid of all the high interest private loans and just continue to slowly pay down the federal loans.

I just know she’s going to get very upset and it’s going to start a big fight about how I said we could start trying, but it seems insane to me to have a kid with that much debt especially when we already have practically no savings.

So WIBTA to delay having a baby for 5 years because of money?

I don’t think I would, but I know she’s going to think I am. I feel like I’m just being pragmatic about it.

Extra info I’m sure people will ask about:

Our finances are basically entirely separate. This is because I pay for rent, utilities, groceries, date nights, etc. We have a joint account, but rarely use it for anything since there’s no joint expenses.

We’ve been married about a year. Together for 8.

My wife wanted to get married and have kids like 5 years ago and I had pushed it off for a while.

I guess it’s EDIT time:

Here’s some answers to questions / info, since this is getting more attention than expected…

Wife is 28. She’s a teacher. She makes a little over 60k. I make about 100k.

The 5 years thing is just a general idea. Realistically what I want is to pay down the non-federal loans. But at the end of the day all I want is to have some level of financial security where we won’t be completely fucked if I lose my job, so as long as we can get there then it’s all good.

My sister recently had a kid, two of my friends are pregnant, and I’m down to join the dad squad. I’m not putting this off because I’m not ready, I’m putting it off because not being completely financially fucked is more important to me than having a kid.

Additionally, thanks for the advice so far. I’m reading everything and will respond when I can.

I like the idea of getting a fertility test and will definitely be incorporating that into the plan.