finances help: My boyfriend has money problems and I don’t know how to help. - Help.com

My boyfriend has money problems and I don’t know how to help.

Quick recap:
We are in a long distance relationship. We are very happy, and there are no real problems in our relationship apart from the distance. We love each other and care for each other deeply, and are compatible in almost every sense.
I’m a college student, and am doing pretty well for myself. I have a scholarship and a part time job, and supportive parents I can count on if I’m ever in trouble. Even though finances are tight, I can treat myself to something nice on occasion.
He’s a struggling entrepreneur with a great attitude, a large network of friends and contacts, and a start up with seemingly good potential.

That being said, there is problem of his finances.
Although his startup looks very promising (for a number of reasons I won’t list for the sake of brevity), he has no cash to inject into it b/c he’s spent too much time on building it for no return, and has barely scraped by on temporary part time jobs for the past year.
I’ve discovered a pattern in his use of money that I believe exacerbates his problems. He tends to spend more than he has. Which is to say, he doesn’t worry, even when money is tight, and likes to splurge on unnecessary things even when I warn him our budget is limited.
He also doesn’t seem to look into the future of his finances. He’s had trouble paying for his rent, and when I spoke to him today he said he couldn’t even pay for groceries. This is really bad. He’s been borrowing money to pay for his rent and survive for the better part of the year and has massive debt, and is quickly running out of places from where to borrow.
I tried suggesting that he take a break, do some soul searching, and consider changing his priorities (as in, getting a more stable job and saving up). He refused my advice, and yet couldn’t come up with a better idea. He’s intent on working on his company, but it won’t give him any returns until he’s able to invest in it, and he won’t be able to invest in it until he saves up money. But as it stands, he can’t even pay his rent and constantly borrows money. Even though he is clearly under-employed he refuses to apply for welfare. I’m worried that if something doesn’t happen to turn things around dramatically, something bad will happen when he finally runs out of places/people to borrow money from. And I won’t be there to help him out b/c of my own constrained finances and the fact that I live so far away.
I’m really concerned, to say the least.

His financial problems are also putting a strain on our relationship in that he says he may not be able to visit me in Christmas like we had planned (which is expected when he can’t even buy groceries or pay rent). I visited him during the summer, paid for my airplane tickets out of my own pocket and paid for our groceries the whole time (and some other expenses). This time, all I’m asking him to do is pay for his plane tickets to my house, and I will provide everything, meals and everything. But he can’t even give me that much. If he doesn’t come, I don’t know when we will see each other next. Being in a relationship with someone I can’t be with in the foreseeable future is really straining my ability to put up with it, but I’d like to make it work.

Any (constructive) suggestions on how to handle this? Is there anything I can do? I’m not sure what to do to help him. I have no money to spare, but even if I did, I wouldn’t feel comfortable putting money into the black hole of his growing debt.
If there’s anyone with experience with finances or on healthy relationships who could give me some advice, I would really appreciate it.

This open post was written 4 weeks ago | V/U/S: 209, 3, 3 | Edit Post | Leave a reply | Report Post

finances, long distance relationships, debt (How Tags Affect Reciprocity)

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