Preg wife - take out loan for addition but we are debt free?

I think she sounds really stressed. I'd make a getaway happen, and maybe if she's amenable/it's even possible, see about sending a kid or two to a relative's home for a weekend here and there before the baby is born.

Good work. Sex unknown. I'm pretty sure it was involved.

Rice and beans. I think this is one of the best foods ever. I will have rice and beans tonight and everyweek...granted, with a Margaritta.

Validate your crying pregnant wife's needs today. Listen to her talking about what the addition will do and what it will improve. Ask her open ended questions about what she sees. Make a plan. Hold the plan until the newborn is safely arrived. She may see differently then.

Your cars will let you down soon enough. Murphy is making the rounds with everyone at HT.

Your wife needs something. Learn and make a list of things that she wants and needs and look for ways to provide some of these things that she thinks that the additon alone will provide.

Take her out for supper tonight and talk about the great things you have already achieved together. Call it a school board meeting provided by the PTO.

We have a 1200 sq foot home. My boys came back to live here (one returned from Washington for a job with a girl friend. One came home after his divorce and asked is a friend who was down on his luck could move in after that).

We had 6 adults living here for about 3 years. it was tight but we did it just fine. 4 children and 2 adults should make it too. Take your time and build as you can afford it, in the end you will be happier.

You might mention the cost of putting in a new septic to her as well. That is the one thing here the county MUST inspect (otherwise we are on our own and can do what ever we wish with our property)
I would like an extra bathroom here and we do plan to build one eventually.

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2Ti 1:7 for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.
Luceo non uro

Been there, done that. 2 kids, third on the way, no debt. Put big addition on the house, year and a half later wife left, she got the kids, I got the mortgage.

So, ummm, yeah, no stinking way.

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Flaming Xtian
I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
Mahatma Gandhi


Libertarindependent

My Grandmother raised 11 kids (19 years between the oldest and the youngest) in an 1100 square foot house with one teeny bathroom and a kitchen so small that you had to push the table up against the wall to pass thru it - and she did it in Minnesota so limited ability to let the little ones go outside to play in the winter time.

How old are the children / how far apart in age are they? I'm pregnant with #4 (plus I have 3 stepkids) and let me tell you, hormones are the Devil LOL! I agree that you need to sit her down and have a good heart-to-heart with her. Tell her gently that going into debt isn't the way to do things, but if the two of you can get to the root of her concerns (i.e. she feels overwhelmed, she feels boxed in, the kids are bouncing off the walls and each other, etc) that you CAN and WILL work together as a team to figure out other ways to address her needs.

We have a larger home but the rooms are configured very oddly, and the bedrooms are tiny. I already have my two older girls shoved into one room, and now my 13-month old is going to have to share with his brother come July. I dream about being able to move into a house with larger bedrooms and more bathrooms, but reality is that where we are is already at the top of our price range, and it's going to be 10+ years before we're able to move anywhere different.

I don't like it, my DH doesn't like it, the kids don't like it But reality is reality, and me crying to my DH that I want an addition to the house or I want to move into a bigger house isn't going to accomplish anything except frustrate him and make my eyes red.....so basically there's no point to it.

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Miniature Bull Terriers
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I doubt a bunch of strangers will change your wife's mind. You are using your man brain, logic. She's using her woman brain, comfort. Look at the home and car of the typical single man and single woman. Most guys don't give two hoots about their home and vehicle. Women tend to place a lot more value on comfort and their homes and vehicles shows that. Truth be known, most single guys that drive nice vehicles are either gay or understand that women are attracted to a comfortable vehicle.
She is home with the kids and expects to do it comfortably. You just need to give her the comfort she wants and if that means you have to bust your hump to pay for it, that's not her end. Perhaps if the burden of paying for this addition fell equally, where she had to stick the kids in public school and get a 40 hour a week job, the interest in a mortgage might wane.
All of this was written in jest with bits of truth thrown in.
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I was raised with Parents, one set of grandparents, 2 brothers and a sister in a 1200 sq ft house with 3 bedrooms and (thankfully) 2 bathrooms.

Enclose the porch for her yourself - start it now, but get her to wait a year on the rest.

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Apocalyptic and Survival Fiction - Readers and writers welcome

I agree with the hormones being a little out of whack. If shes wanting a 75k addition then you can probably do it yourself for 25k. Tell her you'll start it next spring after the baby arrives and in the meantime you can save money to get it rolling.
Debt=slavery
no debt= freedom.

This one.

The whole mega house idea is OVER. Done. She has pregnancy hormones.

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Alice
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"No great thing is created suddenly." ~Epictitus

There is no way in the world I would go into that kind of debt over extravagances. No way, especially since you are now out of debt. I would just close in the porch as you imagined, and leave her dreams in fantasy land at this time.

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Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

Well, let me see.

She is in a smallish space 24/7 with active, healthy kids. I think she sounds crowded and claustrophobic, and she feels like she needs help with that RIGHT NOW!

Also, do you only have one bathroom? If so, that is very tight for a family of 5, let alone 6. Especially if somebody comes down with the flu.

My suggestion? The kids need a playroom ASAP. Because it is new they will spend time in it, and right now she NEEDS that!

The porch can be enclosed quickly and temporarily with plastic sheets. Or a shed could be brought in for a playhouse: give the kids paintbrushes and be prepared to supply shelves for their books, toys, whatever. Or, an Uncle of mine moved the cars to the driveway and sectioned off part of the garage. Or, send her off for a weekend in a hotel and give her some cash for shopping so she gets a break.

WHATEVER, she is emotional right now and healthy kids are turbulent. She feels claustrophobic and like she is being nibbled to death by ducks.

I felt that way with my own 2 kids who were less than a year apart in age, and I was not pregnant! I love them to death, but sometimes I simply had to be in a room that did NOT have kids in it!

Basically, THIS!

If this is not like her, I’m sure it is just the long winter cooped up with kids, being pregnant, and just being tired of always being frugal and making do. Here’s what would work for me if I were in her shoes. Get a contractor out to give you a bid to do all she wants done (that should be free). She will be impressed that you are taking her serious. Once you get a real cost then call your banker and ask what the current rate is and what you need to pay down. Then you can calculate what your monthly payment will be plus your down payment. You will also need to talk to your insurance agent to see how much the insurance will increase and compute the increase in the taxes so you know the real cost of this addition. Like someone said here, you should never start a major project like that while she’s pregnant. That’s just too much going on. You can clean out and organize enough to get you through these next few months. But for now, the two of you go open a bank account as a building fund and move X amount over to cover the down payment. Next, start making that mortgage/tax/insurance payment into that account every month no matter what. If it is hard to do, especially with the new baby so be it. Cut back somewhere so you can make that payment. After all, if it were real your mortgage company would not want to hear excuses. In a year’s time you should have a much larger balance and you will know exactly what it is going to feel like to have to come up with that money every month not to mention the increase in utilities. At that point you both should be better able to gauge if this is something you really want to do or if it is just too heavy a price to pay for your family. My guess is after the baby is born and summer is here, life will look very different.

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Living Large Down on the Farm.

We managed in a tiny house for a few years, and I have to dmit that every aspect of our lives became easier with a bigger living space. It's possible tht I was just making everyone miserable in a small space...
As a mom, pregnancy DOES make you a little crazy sometimes. 3 kids already, she may just need some space in her life right now- and physical spce is all she can think of. Find out a way to give her time nd quiet and room to breathe, it should help. Hng in there.

I'm sure that every little effort you mke now will help you all get through this prt, nd when the baby is born (and your wife isn't sharing her body s well as everything else in life) the two of you cn come up with a plan that works. But be prepared! This sounds like it's a real issue- you may end up building a little more addition than you are currently planning- this is probably not JUST pregnant brain!

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They shall all sit under their own vines and their own fig trees, and they shall live in peace and unafraid. Mica 4:4

I am disgusted with the number of people here who are encouraging you to blow her off, tell her how things are going to be, and dismiss her problems as pregnancy and hormones, as if that makes her less of a person.
Disgusted.
Is this woman your partner in life, or isn't she?
I'm going to assume that you want a partner, and not a broodmare or slave as some would suggest you dismiss her as.

There are times in life when we really, really think we can do something. And then we try - and find we can't. We're miserable and unhappy and already upset with ourselves for failing at what we thought we could do, and having the one person that we love and trust more then any other shove "well, so-and-so did it just fine" in our faces sure as heck doesn't help any.

It does not matter who's grandmother, brother, cousin, aunt raised however many kids in a space just as small or smaller.

Your wife is telling you that she can't and you need to listen.
Just reading other things you've posted here before, clearly space is an ongoing irritation for her. You fail to see it as a problem and now she is ready to explode.

Why - are you all going to start peeing and showering 4 times as much?
I think you're BOTH over-reacting here.
Maybe insisting on 4 bathrooms is the only way she can get across to you that living with just one is driving her insane, and to heck that Great-Aunt Brenda raised 11 kids with nothing but an outhouse. In Alaska.

Listen - it happens. It happens to all of us. It happened to me. I was living and working on a farm when DH and I became a couple. He knew that all I wanted was my own farm. We had a 5 year business plan for crying out loud!
But when we got here, it was too much. He was overwhelmed. Everything became a fight, because all of this was a constant irritation to him.

But he's my partner.
So I talked to him. And more important, I listened. I told him that it wasn't fair the way he was destroying my dream - and then I told him that if he was this unhappy with it, we'd move. Off the land I'd wanted and saved for my whole life (and, if anyone's wondering, I was making the money, folks assume that a woman compromises to keep his paycheck coming, not so), and to the edge of town. I told him that I needed at least room for a garden and my favorite goat, and that I wanted to work towards this again, but if that's what it took to make him happy, so be it. Because I was not going to have us spending our lives making each other miserable.

And once he knew that I understood, really and truly, how unhappy and overwhelmed he was, and that his happiness was important to me, more important then anything else, then, he could listen. We could talk, and we could compromise. We didn't sell out and move townward. We did take on some debt for things that would make him more at ease.
We worked together, because that's what partners do.

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A ship in the harbor may be safe, but that's not what ships are built for

I can say without a doubt, if I was living in that small of a space with two kids, one man and another kid on the way..homeschooling and winter just leaving, I would be wanting more space too.

WOW! I didn't see anyone telling him to blow her off. Pregnancy does effect your thinking too. I don't feel it is fair of her to think she should get her way, just because. If he is the wage earner while she is home with the kids, I can see his concern with taking on that much debt. That's a lot for a guy to do. Maybe she needs to think about that part of it. I didn't see where he said he is unwilling to compromise with her. If it is a partenership as you say it should be, then she needs to take his feelings & thoughts into consideration also. Not just expect him to take a loan, build her what she wants, & then work his butt off to pay for it. Not saying she doesn't work also, but what she does is not bringing in the income to pay that loan.

Another thought. Years down the road, the kids will grow & leave & there you will sit with a house that is way too big for what you need.

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I can't believe I deleted it!

Who was it that said enclose that porch for a playroom ... BINGO!

Long winter in most parts of the country, coupled with pregnancy hormones ... I can see asking for more space NOW!!! As in Yesterday!!!

This too shall pass.

If she was in agreement with you to rid debt by eating rice & beans for a year, then I feel her words are a result of severe cabin fever and hormones. NOT THAT THEY AREN'T REAL FEELINGS!

Spring will come and you have 20 acres for the children to roam on ... that isn't a tight space by any means!

Listen to her, validate her feelings, discuss it, validate her feelings, list the pros and cons, validate her feelings.

But spending $75K??? No way!!!

Just make sure you validate her feelings!!! <=== men ... this is big, HUGE! for women.

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The purpose of these open discussions is to learn.
A 24 by 32 house is small. If this house would have been built on a basement, there would be a big gain in space. In many areas of the country, foundation walls need to be 4 feet into the ground. With two feet above ground, you only need to add three rows of block and a concrete floor. Hardly a budget breaker.
Instead of buying standard 4/12 roof trusses, buy 8/12 or 12/12 attic trusses. That style truss has a living space within the truss. Again, not much extra initial cost.
Then, if you need more space, you can do it within your original existing structure at much less cost than an addition.

"My Grandmother raised 11 kids (19 years between the oldest and the youngest) in an 1100 square foot house with one teeny bathroom and a kitchen so small that you had to push the table up against the wall to pass thru it - and she did it in Minnesota so limited ability to let the little ones go outside to play in the winter time."

Bluemoontick - are you one of my neices?

We had five bedrooms, one for Mom and Dad, and at one point had 2 oldest girls in one, 2 oldest boys in second, 2 younger boys in third and the five younger girls in the last one. And yes, one very small bathroom with a toilet that didn't flush right. Kitchen table was always kept against the wall and used as a work area -

Mom and Dad eventually put on an addition, but never finished the second bath . . .

Anyway - this sounds more like nesting than anything else, and with today's economy, it's not the time to take on debt. I supervise a few younger women, and it's funny how the staff talks about how being pregnant will affect a woman's brain. Yes it's affectionate, but it's also true and it's something as a boss I've had to deal with and understand when dealing with subordinates.

Like others have said, talk and plan and WAIT until after the baby is here for a while to decide what to do. It would be different if you had planned to add on in the future, and were just moving up the date, but this sounds like a new idea that did not appear until after the pregnancy hormones kicked in.