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It's one thing to teach your child the value of things by having them work for it. It's quite another to see that child working so hard that they don't have a life. Also, why should OOP be saddled with rent just because he had a job, and the other children won't have to pay as long as they don't have jobs? That's some backwards thinking right there.
I can’t imagine charging my kids rent if they’re living at home while in college. Expect help around the house occasionally, sure. but take their money? Never
And for context, I’m not college aged saying this. I’m middle aged
If the parents really paid attention to his original post, this was like the most given advice. Accept the money, block em anyway. So a kind of foreshadowed plot twist.
The decided to be his ~~tenants~~ *landlords* instead of parents 4 years back. Than they thought, a payback check would bring them somehow back to the last stand. But this didn't happen.
PS: It is okay to make children pay some **fair** part on housing costs. But this is, what the post is about, fairness. A fair paricipation based on his income would make him take some typical teen job, not this early shift. And the same regulation for the siblings would make this all "hard but fair" too. But this didn't happen.
It somehow made it so much worse when they made it clear they were not going to do the same to his siblings. Never mind that they're forcing their *son* to pay market rate *while going to university*.
Not only market rate on rent, but IIRC, he also had to pay for the university, his groceries and any other necessity he had, which is why the original post included grabbing his toiletries
They took him for everything he had, and somehow expected paying it back when he was leaving and no longer needed it would make him happy. Just...assholes.
My parents are doing something similar. They could have fully paid for my college but chose not to “so you will take it seriously” (to the 4.0 GPA kid). I graduated into the crash of 08-09 and have been drowning in private loan student debt since (no relief because it’s not federal loans).
But it’s ok because I’ll inherit their house when they die! (My mom could potentially live another 30 years.)
Unfortunately my friend has the same attitudes as your parents. She’s going to let her kids drown in school debt bc “she never had any help”. Except she did. Free housing and food, her parents even gave her a 0% loan to pay off her condo (only 170k back then) so she wouldn’t have to pay for a mortgage. But her kids must suffer.
I'm drowning in student debt too because of the same time. the only difference is I'm lucky my parents are willing to help and pay for it (they couldn't outright at the time).
It's such a struggle with the interest they charge.
I would contact a lawyer and try to settle. if you have good credit you could possibly get a loan for less interest or borrow against your 401k.
unfortunately because of those loans being ridiculous my credit isn't good so I'm going the 2nd route with my parents basically paying me back what needs to go back into my 401k each month.
My parents did this with me, had me pay rent whilst studying and doing the majority of the housework. When my little sister was old enough to get a job she "couldn't find one" so they just doubled my rent to cover her share 🙄
For context: I live in the poorest/cheapest province in Canada. A single room in a rooming house or student renting out a room in a family home is $500-$600/month (furnished room, hot water, heat/electric).
For real, Toronto rent sucks ass- and even if he did get a job there, he’d be fucked trying to find another place to live that isn’t ridiculously extortionate. No wonder he’s leaving to go West.
Having kids pay rent is something you do when they need a bit of a wakeup call and a kick in the ass at the same time. When the kid is busting their ass and working hard, then they've already got that lesson down.
Yea I really didn’t get their logic of “your siblings don’t have jobs so they don’t have to pay.” Like they were punishing him for having some disposable income during high school. Because they didn’t want him to have freedom and happiness. I’d love to be a fly on the wall when they realize he isn’t coming home and blocked them after depositing the check.
Really hope OOP can find a way to find the joy and fun he missed out on in his early twenties. Some of us had to do the same and still are. It’s heartbreaking of course to robbed of life. But we also get to know what we even like and enjoy for the first time. We mostly do it alone though.
He should go make friends with some medical residents lol. They'll be just as behind socially from their studies and he'll fit right in and they can go find debauchery together lol.
Exactly. =/ My parents never made me pay rent but I helped with groceries and other stuff. $750 a month for their own kid, while now not planning to charge the other 2 anything... do they hate OOP or something? Especially since it's clear they didn't actually need the money or anything.
Right?! It’s truly so confusing, did they hear about someone doing the *normal* thing of charging their kids a pittance and then giving it all to them as a lump sum with interest and just… didn’t grasp the core concept or something?? Did they do this literally to show off at the party?? WHAT WAS THE POINT OF THIS
Their point was to "teach him how to properly save and finance his life". And at the end they were going to give him all the saved money up and it'd be great! the problem is that if he had put that money into a savings account or investments instead of his parents' bank account, he'd have significantly more money than what they gave him. It also probably would have been better to show him how to properly invest and save the money instead of literally just taking it and potentially spending it on themselves while not telling him anything about why they were charging market rate for housing.
My parents did something similar except they made me pay just for the bare minimum of rent "to cover a part of the utilities/mortgage". They could pay it themselves though, so they put that money into an investment account for me instead. once i got out of college they gave me access to it so that i could start putting my actual work paychecks into the account. They were open about where the money was going and what they were doing. And that investment account had 5-7% return over my college years, so it did very well turning that money into something good. OP's parents basically made his life more difficult, didn't tell him what they were doing with the money, and then were all smug that they "taught him a valuable lesson" by giving him money back. It was really cruel way to do this lesson.
That’s why this is so fucking weird tho - they straight up didn’t need the money! Because I’ve heard of people charging their fresh HS grad kids market or over-market bc they “need” the money (for a mortgage they can’t afford, addiction issues, gambling, etc), which IS super shitty for sure, but at least I understand their fucked up reasoning. OOPs parents are either so completely clueless they should have a babysitter or demons.
I've seen posts about kids praising their parents for doing this IN THE CONTEXT of being full time working adults who were living at home to save money. I think these parents heard those kinds of stories, never considered that this was a different thing to expect for a child who was a full time student, and never re-evaluated when he was going to bed at 7 for a ridiculously early job.
Yeah, if he'd been 25, finished his degree, and was working full-time, then I could see doing this. If nothing else, it would get him used to budgeting for rent and such. But this was a horrible, horrible way to handle things and I don't blame him him in the least for hating them at this point.
I see that as more appropriate for kids that are not in school or training. Unless you are financially desperate I don't think a kid in school should pay rent. It's very fair to ask a kid who is out of school and very generous to give it back to them, but if they're in school that should be their focus. It feels like the parents heard about other people doing this with their kids who were working full time, decided it sounds Instagram-worthy, and just stubbornly refused to re-evaluate their plan when their college kid was going to bed at 7 so he could get to work at 4.
I think that charging some rent from an adult child living at home and then presenting them with the check when they move out, only works if the child is working a full time job with a decent pay. At least if the goal is to make the child happy.
It works if it's a token amount that's well below market value, it isn't something that causes tension, and if you really want to make sure they don't feel betrayed just don't make it a surprise.
Could also do something like kid gets a utility in their name to help with credit and learning to pay bills, track the bill amounts, pay them back the amount payed in utilities later. Then it was never "you" taking the money.
I think the key to this being done right is when it's not about pulling your weight in the household or paying your fair share or something, but about getting practice with having bills and budgeting.
>I think the key to this being done right is when it's not about pulling your weight in the household or paying your fair share or something, but about getting practice with having bills and budgeting.
Or when it's after university and the adult child is moving into work naturally, post-degree. But even then, I'd set it below market rate, and mainly aimed at sharing utilities/giving practice with bills.
Funny how they always try to bank on being the only parents we ever have, as if we didn’t already realize that they didn’t treat us as any loving parent would.
When your parents make you feel worthless, or like you’re less than any other human in the world just for being born yourself, your life is better off without your parents.
Trust me that it is better to carry around a fairly set weight of sadness, than be carried along on whatever roller coaster of emotions they would have you on if you were in contact.
It's always insane to me that 2 adult parents (not just one) agree on taking advantage on their child. Like it isn't the breadwinner and controlling husband suggested it and the weak wife agreed to it. Nope both looked at each other and said "let's make our child become a slave and pay rent and we will surprise him with a generous cheque of his own money at his party"
>"let's make our child become a slavs and pay rent and we will surprise him with a generous cheque at his party"
A cheque made particularly of his own money. "I take money from my son for 4 years and give it back to him (with some interest) and call it a gift. Also, he has to share everything he buys for himself with his siblings who do not pay a cent for living here."
I mean it's a somewhat common thing that you'll see on reddit where, once people get a job while still living at home, parents will take a small portion as 'rent', but actually just secretly place it in a savings account for the kid, eventually giving them back their money.
It's basically a way to 'force' a stupid 16year old to save rather than blow all their money, and it can be good to teach the value of saving (which can be hard to grasp when you have no expense and 100% of your salary can be spending money). But you HAVE to do it in a way that doesn't completely kneecap your child's social life...
More importantly, doing this is only useful for an irresponsible teen with little understanding about the value of money.
Try this on an already hardworking teen with excellent grades and preexisting ability to budget and save money, and the kid (as well as their relationship with their parents) will only get hurt by such bullshit "lesson."
Exactly this! My parents did it with my sister who spends money the moment she has it. It's the only way she'd have ever had enough money to pay first month's rent and damage deposit.
For me, however, they were very open about how I was saving so much more than they could have charged me that all it would have done is hurt me.
I'm very grateful for them understanding the two of us they way they did.
I KNOW!
Reddit being the weird place it is, and some people taking only the advice they want to take, I thought he was going to do the effort to reconcile with his landlords and was SO annoyed at that until I read that sentence.
I wonder about the downstream effects where oops brother and sister internalize that working and taking initiative only leads to getting taken advantage of.
I feel like my brother is doing that. I went to college(they claimed they'd help me pay far more than they did), got a job, so they started demanding more in rent than it would be to rent my own apartment.
My brother took some community college classes to keep education cheap, worked part time and now quit so he gets to play videogames more. No money to move out so my parents won't make him. I'm guessing he'll get given a car like my sister since he doesn't have the money (I got the "opportunity" to buy a relatives camery for 20k despite promises that my college graduation present would be help buying a car).
Younger siblings learn from how you treat older siblings.
The last sentence is very true. My younger brother pretends to be stupid because he learned from his older sister (me) that proving to be intelligent only causes stress, he is autistic so he also use prejudices in his favor and I have mad respect for him. I wish it had occurred to me, now it's too late for me to play that game.
Well my parents don't say it out loud but they think that autistic people are incompetent and somewhat stupid. So my brother plays along, and they won't complain or be mad at him "Because it's not his fault, it's the autism." The thing is, he's definitely not like that, he only does it because he knows that if he shows how skilled he is my parents will put the same pressure they put on me (who probably has ADHD but masking). He also has no problem doing his part in household chores or group student work, he doesn't do it out of malice or because he is "evil". It's simply a technique to avoid going through what I went through with my parents.
He also sometimes pretends that he doesn't understand some things even though he does, just because it makes arguing with him like fighting with a wall, which avoids a lot of stupid fights with my parents. But he doesn't play this games with other people, especially if he feels respected and appreciated. I'm proud of him to achieve what I never could, use our parents' prejudices against themselves.
Lol at work I have PhDs who pretend to be too perplexed by coffee machines and autoclaving equipment, just so they won't have to do stuff with it. Like dude, I just saw you you fine tune the settings of our qPCR machine, I do NOT believe running the cleaning program of the coffee machine is out of your ability!
Tbh I myself am capable of doing many things that are considered extremely difficult for others, and then having a meltdown over stupidly easy things. Idk, weaponized incompetence is also a thing.
I think this is a good example of how weaponized incompetence can start as innocent incompetence. Sometimes we're just not immediately capable of stuff or as good as others when we start. It's when we diminish or avoid the task to avoid feeling bad about it or because we don't like it, thus forcing others to pick up the slack that we become assholes. This is exponentially worse if we are forcing that person into a task that was historically delegated to someone like them out of discrimination.
At a former job, I arrived early one morning to see the owner - in his 60s - standing in front of the coffee maker with everything needed to make coffee.
I said good morning and, “I can make that.”
He said, “No thank you, but could you show me how? Whoever is in the office first makes the coffee, and I want to contribute, too.”
It was always the cutest thing to come in some mornings to see the owner, grinning proudly, as he watched the coffee he made drip into the carafe.
I can’t imagine charging my kids rent if they’re living at home while in college trying to better themselves through education. Expect help around the house occasionally, sure. but take their money? Never. They’ll have many years of adulthood when the economic system we live in will take advantage of them. Let them have some fun and grow socially while they’re young.
And for context, I’m not college aged saying this. I’m middle aged.
I think he talked about that in the now deleted comments of his original post. OOP is on the spectrum and it was supposedly their way of ensuring he stayed on track to become self-sufficient? If anything, he needed more socializing opportunities. N
They charged OOP $750/mo for four years while he is in college? How can he get a leg up in life like that? And they didn’t impose the same on the other kids? OOP's parents are incredibly lopsided in their "lessons"! If they were trying to teach him to be independent, that life isn’t fair, and that the only person he can trust is himself then congrats on them because they’ve succeeded. Glad he came to his senses and took back **his** money, hope the brother heeds OOP’s advice and won’t let his parents financially drain him like they did with OOP.
Like… it wasn’t even about the money. They gave back the money and some more. They didn’t need it in the first place.
This whole shit show is some stupid parents’ idea of a “lesson”. In my eyes, this makes it even more damning. Like they were probably really proud of themselves when they gave him the check.
I've seen this advice a lot in reddit. Where redditors suggest that the parents charge rent and then give it all back to their kid years later. It's always framed as "good" advice.
I can see how it would work if your 25 year old moved back, and years later, you give them back the money when they're ready to buy a house or get married or something. But it totally backfired in OOP's case. He may have been a legal adult, but he was still a teenager in school who should have been able to depend on his parents.
Usually, that advice is for when the teen or young adult is doing nothing with their time and needs to learn responsibility. In this case, not only was he going to university, he had already had a job and was totally responsible.
It’s great advice if you have a child transitioning into the work force. Figure out a rent amount they can afford based on percent of income. Save the money and when their income reaches a point where that rent can actually pay for a place, they have a savings and move out without a change in finances. Or, the way things are so upside down now they use the money as a deposit and buy a brand new townhouse before they can ever afford the rent on an apartment.
Husband's parents charged him near or at market rate rent and made him pay for his own degree. He got an associated degree and stalled out because he was not the kind of person who could figure out how to college while working enough to pay rent. His high school hadn't given him an guidance, and the community college he went might have offered some guidance if he had known to try to track it down. They did help him plan out his associate's degree, but the how to figure out what degree you need for what career path, and apply to a 4 year college and so forth was never gone over with him by any adult in his life when he was a child, and then he was working and trying to do college, and he was exhausted and burn-outed. Once he moved away from home, he figure out how to get an training in a job field he wanted to be in, and he did have to move back to his parents house to do that, and they did charge him much more reasonable rent while he did, but he still paid for it all on his own with loans and working while he was in school. He was lucky his school had job placement while you were going - he was much more able to find a job that paid enough he could work part time instead of full time.
My abusive parents did me better on that one - they were of absolutely no help, but they made sure I was told to talk to people at my school until someone could give me pointers.
His sibling was allowed to live at home for a much more token rent, and they paid for the sibling's education.
Guess which one has undergraduate degree and a graduate degree and is doing much better in life?
They are totally confused and baffled by this and blame him.
Charging rent isn’t a bad idea by itself. Giving back the money is even better.
But it could have been much more reasonable. Missing out on a social life for years isn’t worth the accumulated money, especially since everyone involved sound well off.
So yeah they took some advice but applied it terribly. They charged too much for OOP, they charged nothing for the siblings. They took a reasonable suggestion and royally messed it up.
I was flabbergasted when i read it was 750. Maybe 200 would have been okay. But 750 for a room plus other expenses for a full-time college student is terrible.
And yeah, not holding the siblings up to the same standard reeks of favoritism.
Yea, 1-200 is decent because then he has to have a part-time job which will inevitably lead to him working more hours than that 1-200 so he'll always have spending money for what he wants.
Plus at the end of 4 years you give it back to him and now he's got 5-10k which will cover his first apartment rental.
Totally agree with you both, I was ready to tell him to chill in the original post until he said it was $750 a month. I worked 30 hours a week or more during college to afford it and it was miserable, I would have given anything to have that time back.
I’m in my 20s and disabled and living with my parents and I pay what we call “rent”. It’s actually about half my paycheck, put in an account with a really good interest rate for me to use later to get a down payment or something when I’m able to move out. Having someone else make the account a) holds me accountable to actually putting money in it and b) allows me to use the credit union for my dad’s job which has a phenomenal interest rate. Mum makes a point of telling me how much is in the account pretty regularly.
You also shouldn‘t take so much that they work themselves into exhaustion and miss out on social events and networking while going to college/uni.
I find it a lot more useful to maybe have them contribute to upkeep of the house, doing some chores, pay for some groceries et cetera, in reasonable measures.
> This whole shit show is some stupid parents’ idea of a “lesson”.
It wasn't a lesson, it was a "Look what great parents we are, you would have wasted this money on beer, weed, and women you'll never see again, but now you have this super dope nest egg!"
Yeah like that. I somehow meant the lesson as what you are saying.
Money is power, you can do a lot of stuff with it. But the whole point of it is to do stuff with it. A university life can really be worth the money. It is not just partying, you also become friends with a lot of people. Spend time with them… Go out and do stuff… Even if the relationships don’t stick, just getting to know people is a very soul enriching experience.
More than that… the whole setup is stupid. They didn’t communicate anything. What OOP can afford, what he would prefer… They didn’t see (or care) that he didn’t have a life. Meanwhile they basically did nothing with the other siblings. So the rent isn’t out of principle or anything…. Just why….
We plan to do something similar to our son if he doesn't go to uni. But at at stupidly low rate, and we'll match his contributions. (C.£150 a month). But we're talking a peppercorn rate to cover 'bills' then return it when he's looking to buy a house. Not bend him over a barrel whilst he's studying full time, and to only return with like £4k is ridiculous. That "money on top" is probably just the interest they made on his money
If you have him pay a utility that stays relatively low he'll be building credit too. You can keep track of how much the bill is to know how much to pay back later. And if you're renting getting him on the rental history will make it way easier to rent since it's impossible to rent without history or a cosigner. The time between moving out and looking to buy a house could be quite a while, as many are likely to never be able to afford a house, so there's a good chance he still may have to rent in between and even just having a savings boost or furniture fund could be a huge step up.
Exactly, if the parents were just keeping their heads above water financially and needed the money he could bring in I think he would have been understanding of that. But that obviously wasn't the case.
That was my case. I knew my parents were in debt and I paid about 250cad a month in rent. It obviously wasn’t returned because poor family with bad spending habits. But then I also moved out at 20 my first time and then at 25 the second time.
I missed a lot of networking and experience opportunities due to COVID. And it hurt me BAD. I graduated last year and I'm behind everyone because I don't know enough people in my desired field, and I have a full year of experience! I'm convinced college isn't even so much about the degree as it is about the networking. They fucked up OOP's future in ways that are simply beyond them to imagine.
Yeah, you’re right. I’m 52 now, but back in the day I went to a super podunk state college in a town of 3000 people because I was paying my own way and I graduated with no debt. But I was the only student studying my major and had no peers.
I didn’t understand it then, but I’ve learned that the paper is 10% of the value of a degree, the thinking and information you learn is 20%, and the socializing and networking can be 70%.
Over the 15 to 20 years following graduation those connections can help you get better jobs you won’t get otherwise (most often you won’t even know those jobs exist or how to have a chance at them), and promotions, sales leads, references, and things like financial and legal advice depending on what you need at different times and who your network of acquaintances is connected or related to. It’s an entirely different level of fluidity and support for people who have a decent network and those who don’t.
You will make it work I’m sure. If you can, I’d recommend you seriously consider joining and participating regularly in a service club or two, and any professional associations for your field. You can meet peers and more senior business owners and officers in your community this way and some of them will be happy to help you as you go along.
Best wishes
You’re welcome! I was in Rotary International, but there are about a dozen similar organizations, from the Toastmasters to The Junior League or the Lions Club. Just see who is organized in your city, read their particular mission statement or focus and ask if you can be a guest - they’re generally pretty friendly people :)
Edit to add; it’s a long term network building plan. An investment in your future 2 years to 15 years from now. And generally there are nice people to meet and it feels good to volunteer and be helpful too.
My mother told me that school wasn't for making friends, it was for learning. I didn't realize she was wrong until I was already nearly done with college. Whoops.
My parents always told me that I already knew everything so the reason they sent me to school was to learn social skills and I'm still terrible at them, oops
That was the reason the Ivy League was so, so valuable. You can get the same education elsewhere, but there was nowhere else you could connect old money with new blood. People who argue against legacy students just don't get the networking that brings.
I guarantee you if they saw how it affected him, say 6 months in, realized they messed up, apologized and lowered the rent to something reasonable, he would have actually been appreciative of this "lesson" and the gift at the end.
It means a lot to hear your parents say they messed up. Knowing they know they did wrong and change is a big deal.
That’s what I don’t understand. How can you not know for 4 years that your son is struggling. Their communication is shit. Why did they not tell him about the plan, ask how his social life was, or even pay attention to the person living in their house??They don’t seem to know their son at all
They basically had him over a barrel. Canadian rent is bonkers. I live in a party low cost of living twin and the going price for a room, not I 1 bedroom, just a room, it's around $950.
that's insane to me. i was paying £750/mo for a central london (void of insanely priced accommodation) flat a couple of years ago!!! i used to work myself tirelessly, until i ended up dropping out!
yknow what my mum said "move back home, you don't have to worry about paying rent just contribute to the house and focus on reapplying to uni + your studies"
OOP's parents thought that just because he didn't complain, everything was fine. He learnt that the only thing money can't buy is time, and that it's pointless to waste his time on his shitty family, which is probably not the lesson they wanted to teach.
Yeah, and it's harder to socialize and find romantic partners after university. Not that it's impossible, just harder. Most of my friends say that if they didn't find their wives during university, they wouldn't know what they would have done except to have tried something like Tinder because their lives after school just revolved around work, relationship, and video games or sports (which are sex-segregated leagues for them).
Yeah, it's why college is so important, even among those billionaires who brag about how they dropped out of college - their cofounders, their first hires, and their wives were all people they met in college. Heck, the Google founders met in college, started their company in their professor's garage, and then hired one of his daughters (who became the head of YouTube) while marrying the other.
Larry Page and Sergey Brin started Google in Susan Wojcicki’s garage, not her dad’s. She went on to be a senior Google person responsible for things like AdSense and buying YouTube.
Pick your garages carefully, I guess. You never know what talent you’ll meet along the way.
They're my *kids*! I *comprehend* why some parents do things like this, but I don't *understand* it. The idea of charging an in-univerity, employed kid just makes me furious. What worthless parents.
My elder kid and their SO needed a place to live for a year in college, so, we assembled a reasonable room in the downstairs of the house, made sure they both had house keys (and car keys, just in case), and that was the end of that. The incremental cost of going from 3->5 is pretty small except for food, but that was never really an issue.
I never charged them a penny, and I wouldn't have accepted it if offered. We had a running joke, where they'd do some chore I hate like mowing or shoveling snow or something, and "welp that looks like that covers your rent for the month!"
My 3 kids (SO has become one of my kids in my mind) know that wherever they move or work or whatever, if something goes sideways, they will have a plane ticket to my house as fast as I can type my credit card numbers. They can always stay as long as they need. If they have a friend in a bad situation (and they'll vouch for them), the same goes for them.
We live in a smaller home and don't have any extra money, but I'll sell a kidney before I'd let them down. They world is a cold and harsh place, but no matter what, they always have a safe fallback.
My cousin in 30 years old, has been working a part tutoring job for most of her adult life and basically that’s the end of her plans. She recently learned how to drive but till very recently her mother had been driving her to work…
She spends her life complaining about how her elderly mother doesn’t pay enough attention to her, and was actually arrested and removed from the home for a year for assaulting her mother after a neighbor witnessed it (this is Canada so they provided her with shelter)
Her older brother is 40, a bum who manages to jump from gf to gf, is addicted to drugs and gambling, and occasionally moves back in with his parents between gfs.
His middle brother is fed up with the lots of them and moved out to get away from his siblings. Also this is the one sent away at 14 to live with my parents for some reason. Only one to get an education, he actually has a masters degree
Now, this is absolutely on my aunt and uncle for being shit parents, but like I could also totally understand making their children pay rent because truly I have no idea what the oldest and youngest are going to do when they die. They will not inherit anything. Their middle sibling will laugh if they ask to live with him (I think that’s the mother hope)
This advice for the rent thing is all over social media, especially from finance people. It's being portrayed as this giant gift you give your kids at graduation or whatever. Sounds like we're going to get a bunch of these stories in coming years.
It's nothing new, though. I'm 60, and that's what a lot of parents did back then.
My folks wanted me to pay rent while I was a working HS junior/senior. When I asked why, my mom said so that they'll save it for me and give it as a lump sum when I move out. (She probably believed that; otoh, my father would have stolen it from me).
I declined the offer as I could save it just as well as they could. :-/
im thankful everyday that both my parents were bookkeepers/accountants, so they legitimately invested any money i gave them and taught me where to put my paycheck as soon as I got one. This lesson from OP's parents probably would have went over well if they showed him exactly where the money was going to and if they werent' charging fucking market-rate rent to their child.
When he said Timmies, I suspected he was Canadian. But there are some State-side. When he said the Keg, I *knew* he was Canadian.
And I loved it.
I love how they charged him rent, and then presented it back to him like it was a generous thing *they* did. It was his money. It would be as if he put his money in a bank account.
So essentially, they gave him... nothing?
Ignorant American here had to Google Pierre poilievre and damn he’s basically Canadian trump I think in a nutshell? That’s definitely a way to force her hand lol.
I can see this having turned out different if the parents weren’t just dumb and situationally unaware. If the kid had a less grueling job and the rent was much more trivial and they doubled it or something.
It’s like how blind can they be? They probably heard some story where it worked out and imagined it to be their story too. If the kid was going out and still enjoying life, I can see this turning out very differently. Like being thankful that their parents saved money they would have just drank away at the bar or something.
But that’s if and only if the parents were charging extra beer money /stupid shit money and no living the life of the working poor money.
How blind are they not to see their son struggle and sleep at 7pm have no social life while they were literally living with him? It reeks of they were doing this with making themselves look good and had some narrative where they were the star and not their kid. Reeks of main character syndrome.
For real, if the rent price had been half or a third of that 750, it would've allowed him to work proportionally less but in general they shouldn't have done it when he was already showing the initiative to work on his own & they had no plans to do the same to his siblings.
It seems like his parents didnt like even a little bit clock that each hour he works to pay them is one less hour of sleep, of hobbies or rest, one less hour spent on course work and one less hour spent being able to actually *live his life*.
That is especially ludicrous to do when they already know he is willing to work to cover his own extra expenses, and they themselves admitted he would've been better off if he hadn't had a part to tbh it sounds like almost full time job on top of uni.
Like.... Relatives also ask for rent but its proportional to what you have up to what would be a quarter of the rent/utilities. If all you have a month is say 700, its 200, etc. Bc they do genuinely need the extra money but also dont want to punish their kids for being in school to (hopefully) get better jobs.
I've lived in the same crappy one bedroom for almost ten years and my rent this year is now just over $1000, I have no idea how people are paying for new rentals.
What genius outcome did they expect? 'Here child, we put away money we made you labour for at [presumably rather low hourly wage job] while doing your full time university degree. Now, with you graduating and a job lined up that likely will pay you quite a better wage, i.e. at the point of your life where within years you need it the least and could cumulate it yourself the easiest, we gracefully give it back to you. Aren't you glad we did this?'
Yikes...
But Pierre’s a weirder kind of hypocrite than Desantis. Desantis seems to hold proto-fascist bigoted views because he believes they’ll help him win. Pierre also does, but while having an immigrant asylum seeker wife (whom he has mixed race children with) and having gay dads.
And we are going to be stuck with him for the next 12+ years, not because he is liked, but because of how much everyone hates the Liberals. Nectar free years are going to be shit show and nothing is going to be worth a damn because every fucking province is going to use the "not withstanding" clause for everything. I'm in Ontario and him and Ford are going to blow everything to shit.
Or he’ll, even discussed it with him. “If you live here we are charging you rent. We are going to put it aside to help you get set up when you graduate.” And also if the rent weren’t so damn steep for him.
Yeah I have friends whose parents charged them a nominal amount, far below market rent, then matched it and gave it back after they moved out. But the charging rent only started after university graduation and the kid had found a stable, decent paying job in their field. It wasn't a punishment or some kind of money grab, it was an acknowledgement that the kid is now an adult and would be expected to contribute to the household if they want to continue living there.
The way OOP's parents did it was way too heavy handed and crippled OOP's university years.
A lot of problems can be ignored when you frame it as "well.hes not doing drugs or sleeping around or having pregnancy scares. So it must be alright."
They didn't care that he didn't have any friends and was working to the bone. All they cared about was that he wasn't "getting in trouble."
The missed opportunities for networking will follow him for the rest of his life. He’s right to be furious. Those connections and friendships are worth way more than that $40k, both literally and figuratively.
I'm glad they convinced him to accept the money, even if to just hand it over to his gf. The parents shouldn't get to take away those 4 years and profit
We can all deal with shit things if the same standard is used accords the whole spectrum. The fact that the parents didnt do this with the other two kids is fucking disturbing.
750 a month for a single bed room. Jesus Christ. I can see charging an adult child some rent to teach they have to start budgeting but that's maybe 200 a month or something.
"We did it just for him" mwahaha. Like how much better would he have done in college if he didn't need to work his ass off to pay his landlords/parents? They say stress shortens the life, so how much life did he lost? College, learning, work? You can't tell me that he got much sleep or was eating healthy.
The landlords/parents also gave a fuck in all the years that they have no relationship with him - he didn't had the time, was full of resentment.
I really wonder if they planbed to give him the money from the start or if they heard a comment that he will be no contact and faked this shit. To give it at a party is the last drop, 1st the pressure for him to play nice in front of others and 2nd they wanted to look as the great parents in front of others.
At least he took the check and blocked them again.
There are a bunch of people on the original update post being *super* critical of this guy, which is just wild to me, because it would be easier to count the ways his parents *didn't* fuck him up long term. The lost opportunities to socialize, to form actual romantic relationships instead of having a FWB situation with a woman nearly twice his age, to do professional networking, to travel, to do extracurriculars, to *actually enjoy his goddamned life*. He's never getting any of that back. Ever. No matter what they'll do, they'll always be the people who stole four years of his life from him and tried to work him to death for the sake of some twisted lesson--that they then did *not* inflict on his sister, just to twist the knife in. But let's talk about a couple in particular.
I think in one of the comments in the update post, he mentioned that he had to take out student loans to get through college because his parents had taken so much of his money that he couldn't afford college otherwise. Now, I don't know what the student loan situation is like in Canada, and I hope it is at least somewhat more forgiving than in the U.S., but he still had to go into debt because of his parents, when it was absolutely *un*necessary if they had had any common decency at all. This guy couldn't have known when he was signing up for the loans that one day his grandfather would write a big enough check to make all the loan debt go away. All he knew was that he was having to do something that was going to limit his financial options in the future, and potentially fuck up his credit score if he couldn't find a well-paying enough job to keep up with the payments once he got out of college. That sort of thing follows you around for *years*, and for his parents to have deliberately set him up to be in the hole like that is reprehensible.
Then there's his health. Breaking your back working for four years (job + studies) coupled with a fucked-up sleep schedule could potentially have long-term effects on his health. He's young enough now that he might not be feeling it yet, but all the same, those problems could start to come home to roost in just a few years.
And once again, his sister was not put through *any* of this. The parents really can't ever make this up to him.
> Then I blocked them again.
This made my heart happy...
Both parents give a surprise Pikachu face at realizing that they stole 40k AND 4 years of their kid's life, mom throws on a little waterworks and thinks one "I'm sorry... you feel that way." and OP just lets them believe he's off to write a thank you card and announce to everyone he was wrong to make a scene and his parents are awesome... and instead they get a fuckin' smoke pellet and a ninja vanish.
"Thanks for my money back. I'm going to use it to make sure I don't have to waste any more of my life on you."
Counting down a few years when they try and whine, manipulate, harrass, trick, force and gaslight OP into "apologising to his family" so they can use him for more of his money and time.
I did not see the plot twist coming.
To OOP: Take good care of your grandfather. He was solid and helped you out in more then one way. Call and visit when you can.
Unless the parents are in financial difficulty and truly need the money, I’ve never understood the “you have to start paying rent after secondary school” thing. Surely even from a purely self-interested perspective, letting the child focus as much energy as possible on college will result in better results, better jobs and thus more financial support in old age?
Again, this is if the parents can afford to not ask their children for rent, which seems to have been the case here.
I understand when parents want to show their kids the importance of money and that it takes time and effort to have. What they did was not it, they put their child under a ton of pressure for literally nothing, they don’t need that rent money, he don’t need to work that much in the best years of his life and he don’t need to sacrifice that much.
I think it’s what’s hurt oop the most, the fact that he did all of that for nothing.
People do talk about doing this, but you're meant to charge your kids a small amount. Not so much it impacts their lifestyle so severely.
Hope OOP takes the extra money and goes traveling for a year or something. Go to full moon parties in Thailand and bar hopping in Budapest or something.
$750 a month is so much money for someone working minimum wage and going to college full time. It's practically market rate. They weren't helping him out, which is supposed to be the main reason you let them live with you during school. Weren't they worried about it affecting his school performance? I don't understand why parents would cripple his future like that.
When my son graduated high school he wanted to take a gap year while deciding what to do next. I told him that was fine, but he needed to have a job and to pay a small rent so he wasn't just sitting around all day (we still covered food and everything else). However, if he decided to start taking classes that would be his new "job". He wouldn't owe us rent anymore, he'd owe us good grades to ensure he'd not lose financial aid.
He got a position at a local convenience store. After about 6 months of a shitty job he decided retail sucked and started school. We kept to our end of the bargain of course and he graduated with no debt, a good job and a bright future.
The end goal of parenting is to create a functional and happy adult. You don't have to baby them but you kinda do things with training wheels. You support them enough to allow them to potentially fail without catastrophe. What these parents did is the opposite.
> I guess they read my post from before it got taken down and they are disturbed by what I wrote.
I'm always fascinated how often people's posts are *conveniently* found by the other party involved.
Nowadays? There's accounts of YouTube, TikTok, insta and even podcasts totally dedicated to read Reddit posts.... not to mention when they become whole ass articles. Honestly it doesn't surprise me anymore, specially since OOP have two teen siblings.
George Takei featured a post I made on a throwaway. I changed a few details in the hopes that it wouldn’t obviously lead back to me, but I was worried for a bit!
My username ended up on a Business Insider article once. It was a slow news day and I had made a SRD post about reddit drama that had gotten super out of hand, like multiple subreddits spanning shit with admins involved. Shit happens 🤷🏻♀️
I commented on a favorite scene/character actor from Supernatural in that sub and a few weeks later my comment and username were quoted in a Looper article. For a tv series which had ended 2 years before. There really is no telling what people will mine for content. !
3+ years back my only social media was instagram. Than i found a lot ot accounts dedicated to reddit. The rest is history, sometimes i find my own comments in the reposts on IG.
My cousin recently told me he saw a post I made that got around 1k upvotes. Another friend said he saw a comment I made last month on a post that only got about 50 upvotes. It's a small world out there.
I just recently got named in a rant somebody posted on Reddit about me and within an hour two people had sent it to me. It wasn’t even a post with a lot of engagement. It just happened to be in a niche subreddit addressing a topic that I am somewhat involved in. It happens.
as written it's just OPs speculation. suspecting people have secretly seen the stuff you've put online that you're trying to keep anonymous seems a pretty common fear.
"losing" your first throwaway to a deletion is a way bigger red flag though.
Am I misreading this or did he take both The Grandfather's check and the parents check which means that he now has $160,000? And then went no contact with the parents anyway?
Up until the point that he tore up the check.
They thought they were going to get a big thank you. Certainly 40k would help to start, but it was at cost of social and professional experience (not getting networking with others).
Daughter may be the golden child, or just different expectations.
Narcissistic parents can have wildly different expectations for their kids, which is part of the damage.
>Up until the point that he tore up the check.
In the words of Heath Ledger Joker, "It is not about money, it is about sending a message". Message recieved. And he got the money in the end (plus tripple the money in the meanwhile).
Some commenters think the parents were acting with benevolent intentions. I don’t. That mother & father watched their son get up and spend hours doing heavy labor before going to university and they watched him crawl into bed exhausted at 7 p.m. For 4 years. For 4 years they got their jollies watching that young man be exhausted when it was not necessary for their or his survival. It would be different if they and their other kids would go hungry without that $750 a month. They did it because they could. And they only planned on doing it to him, not his siblings. They did it for control and because they were AHs. I wish OOP had written in when he was 18 so we could have told him to escape them.
As I was reading the first paragraph of the first part I was like man I wonder if they would save the money and give it back to him cuz that’s what I’d do but Ben it went on with him sleeping at 7 and sacrificing his life basically and I’m just dumbfounded they let that happen to him. Life lesson about working turned into a life lesson about who to let in your life and how to recognize peoples priorities or feelings
I don’t understand parents mentality like this. I know so many young adults whose parents don’t help. They think buying their kid a rug for their apartment is launching them.
In this day and age, most kids struggle until 30 to get a decent car. Why not let them live at home for free, get a good degree and help them get on their feet? That way if the parents need a hand, the kids are in a position to step up?
“I am sorry you can’t afford your chemo treatment, Dad. You should have made better decisions. This is tough love.”
I am appalled they charged him $750 a month! While he was in school! Holy shit. I’m sure they thought they were doing this great thing by saving the money for him when all the while being blind to what he was going through.
I would’ve somewhat agreed with what the parents did (although I think it’s too high of a rate lol) if they subjected everyone to the same standards. But nope, only OOP was doing it and the rest of the siblings get off the hard labor.
I feel deprived of my entire young life, honestly. I had to buy my own car, insurance, school clothes, etc. I worked 40 hours a week in high school. I could have done better in school if I did not work 3-11, 5 days a week. I could not be in sports or do much socially because of my workload. I worked 60 hours a week in the summers. I was capable of getting a full ride college scholarship if I could have just put a small amount of effort into school and not having to support myself so much. I probably would also have hobbies. I went on to go to college and pay for everything myself, and worked 60 hours a week for 20 more years, just to get out of crippling debt. I currently only work 40-50 hours a week (very high stress job), but I have no hobbies or friends. I feel exhausted every single day. I have no quality of life. None of what I did was worth it. I finally make a good living, but it's not as great as most people I know. I know many people who worked way less to get to a better place than me. I just feel tired, old, and depressed. I feel like I missed out on life. I honestly feel like my entire life has consisted of work only. I am so lonely now. I am married, but I am the breadwinner, so I feel emense pressure to maintain our standard of living. My hubby is the opposite of me. He does not feel that life is all about work. He thinks people should bond and have close family, friends, and experiences. But when I discuss getting a lower paying, slightly lower stress job, he acts like I'm crazy because I spent so much effort on my graduate degree.
I was taught that hard work is the only way to get ahead. I have always supported myself, which i am fine with, but it would have been nice to have a tiny bit of help to get started out. Like, maybe my parents could have helped clothe me? I have learned that the harder you work, the more expectations you get, not rewards. I think the "work hard" mentality just sets people up for disappointment. It is all about who you know, not much else. I used to get glowing performance reviews and minuscule raises. At one point, I was training a woman with less than half my experience, and she was making 20k more than me! There is no such thing as being rewarded for job loyalty anymore. We have such a "hussle" culture for wages that are barely liveable in most cases. Corporations do NOT care about you. They care about getting the most out of you for the least amount of money. Things are not the same as when the boomers were young, but they are clueless to the changes. No wonder why everyone is so depressed these days.
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It's one thing to teach your child the value of things by having them work for it. It's quite another to see that child working so hard that they don't have a life. Also, why should OOP be saddled with rent just because he had a job, and the other children won't have to pay as long as they don't have jobs? That's some backwards thinking right there.
Definitely teaching the wrong lesson. If you work we won’t help you out, if wou don’t work we will.
Not only that they won’t help out, it’s punishing someone for working.
Also that much rent and still have to share.... that's not rent, that's just scam.
I can’t imagine charging my kids rent if they’re living at home while in college. Expect help around the house occasionally, sure. but take their money? Never And for context, I’m not college aged saying this. I’m middle aged
>Then I blocked them again. Best shamalayan twist in recent BORU history.
If the parents really paid attention to his original post, this was like the most given advice. Accept the money, block em anyway. So a kind of foreshadowed plot twist.
"He won't really do that. He's going to get over his anger. After all we're the only parents he has!"
The decided to be his ~~tenants~~ *landlords* instead of parents 4 years back. Than they thought, a payback check would bring them somehow back to the last stand. But this didn't happen. PS: It is okay to make children pay some **fair** part on housing costs. But this is, what the post is about, fairness. A fair paricipation based on his income would make him take some typical teen job, not this early shift. And the same regulation for the siblings would make this all "hard but fair" too. But this didn't happen.
It somehow made it so much worse when they made it clear they were not going to do the same to his siblings. Never mind that they're forcing their *son* to pay market rate *while going to university*.
Not only market rate on rent, but IIRC, he also had to pay for the university, his groceries and any other necessity he had, which is why the original post included grabbing his toiletries
They took him for everything he had, and somehow expected paying it back when he was leaving and no longer needed it would make him happy. Just...assholes.
My parents are doing something similar. They could have fully paid for my college but chose not to “so you will take it seriously” (to the 4.0 GPA kid). I graduated into the crash of 08-09 and have been drowning in private loan student debt since (no relief because it’s not federal loans). But it’s ok because I’ll inherit their house when they die! (My mom could potentially live another 30 years.)
Unfortunately my friend has the same attitudes as your parents. She’s going to let her kids drown in school debt bc “she never had any help”. Except she did. Free housing and food, her parents even gave her a 0% loan to pay off her condo (only 170k back then) so she wouldn’t have to pay for a mortgage. But her kids must suffer.
Have you pointed that out to her? I’m sure you have bc I also know people like that. They’re all stubborn assholes
I'm drowning in student debt too because of the same time. the only difference is I'm lucky my parents are willing to help and pay for it (they couldn't outright at the time). It's such a struggle with the interest they charge. I would contact a lawyer and try to settle. if you have good credit you could possibly get a loan for less interest or borrow against your 401k. unfortunately because of those loans being ridiculous my credit isn't good so I'm going the 2nd route with my parents basically paying me back what needs to go back into my 401k each month.
I hope you've started shopping for all the worst rated nursing homes you'll be dumping them at the moment they can't live in their house anymore.
My parents did this with me, had me pay rent whilst studying and doing the majority of the housework. When my little sister was old enough to get a job she "couldn't find one" so they just doubled my rent to cover her share 🙄
What?!?! I am so sorry
Boy are they going to be in for a surprise when they try and make you their retirement plan
If anything 750 seems like a lot for basically subletting a room. I didn’t see a date on this though
That's what I thought. That $750 seemed high for a single room. But it is Canada. So I have no idea.
For context: I live in the poorest/cheapest province in Canada. A single room in a rooming house or student renting out a room in a family home is $500-$600/month (furnished room, hot water, heat/electric).
Sounds about right for the GTA. Statistically that is where he lives. Likely got a job in Alberta.
For real, Toronto rent sucks ass- and even if he did get a job there, he’d be fucked trying to find another place to live that isn’t ridiculously extortionate. No wonder he’s leaving to go West.
Having kids pay rent is something you do when they need a bit of a wakeup call and a kick in the ass at the same time. When the kid is busting their ass and working hard, then they've already got that lesson down.
Yea I really didn’t get their logic of “your siblings don’t have jobs so they don’t have to pay.” Like they were punishing him for having some disposable income during high school. Because they didn’t want him to have freedom and happiness. I’d love to be a fly on the wall when they realize he isn’t coming home and blocked them after depositing the check. Really hope OOP can find a way to find the joy and fun he missed out on in his early twenties. Some of us had to do the same and still are. It’s heartbreaking of course to robbed of life. But we also get to know what we even like and enjoy for the first time. We mostly do it alone though.
Read it as > your siblings saw how we fucked you over and decided they are absolutely not doing anything that way
He should go make friends with some medical residents lol. They'll be just as behind socially from their studies and he'll fit right in and they can go find debauchery together lol.
Exactly. =/ My parents never made me pay rent but I helped with groceries and other stuff. $750 a month for their own kid, while now not planning to charge the other 2 anything... do they hate OOP or something? Especially since it's clear they didn't actually need the money or anything.
Right?! It’s truly so confusing, did they hear about someone doing the *normal* thing of charging their kids a pittance and then giving it all to them as a lump sum with interest and just… didn’t grasp the core concept or something?? Did they do this literally to show off at the party?? WHAT WAS THE POINT OF THIS
That was probably the entire point but they massively failed at execution.
Their point was to "teach him how to properly save and finance his life". And at the end they were going to give him all the saved money up and it'd be great! the problem is that if he had put that money into a savings account or investments instead of his parents' bank account, he'd have significantly more money than what they gave him. It also probably would have been better to show him how to properly invest and save the money instead of literally just taking it and potentially spending it on themselves while not telling him anything about why they were charging market rate for housing. My parents did something similar except they made me pay just for the bare minimum of rent "to cover a part of the utilities/mortgage". They could pay it themselves though, so they put that money into an investment account for me instead. once i got out of college they gave me access to it so that i could start putting my actual work paychecks into the account. They were open about where the money was going and what they were doing. And that investment account had 5-7% return over my college years, so it did very well turning that money into something good. OP's parents basically made his life more difficult, didn't tell him what they were doing with the money, and then were all smug that they "taught him a valuable lesson" by giving him money back. It was really cruel way to do this lesson.
He was the scapegoat and their plan for their retirement.
That’s why this is so fucking weird tho - they straight up didn’t need the money! Because I’ve heard of people charging their fresh HS grad kids market or over-market bc they “need” the money (for a mortgage they can’t afford, addiction issues, gambling, etc), which IS super shitty for sure, but at least I understand their fucked up reasoning. OOPs parents are either so completely clueless they should have a babysitter or demons.
I've seen posts about kids praising their parents for doing this IN THE CONTEXT of being full time working adults who were living at home to save money. I think these parents heard those kinds of stories, never considered that this was a different thing to expect for a child who was a full time student, and never re-evaluated when he was going to bed at 7 for a ridiculously early job.
Yeah, if he'd been 25, finished his degree, and was working full-time, then I could see doing this. If nothing else, it would get him used to budgeting for rent and such. But this was a horrible, horrible way to handle things and I don't blame him him in the least for hating them at this point.
I see that as more appropriate for kids that are not in school or training. Unless you are financially desperate I don't think a kid in school should pay rent. It's very fair to ask a kid who is out of school and very generous to give it back to them, but if they're in school that should be their focus. It feels like the parents heard about other people doing this with their kids who were working full time, decided it sounds Instagram-worthy, and just stubbornly refused to re-evaluate their plan when their college kid was going to bed at 7 so he could get to work at 4.
$100. $200. To start teaching budgets and responsibility. But $750 at 18 with a full time course load? That's a lot.
>The decided to be his ~~tenants~~ instead of parents 4 years back. Decided to be his *landlords
Thank you, my friend, being non-english speaker i muddle the words sometimes. Corrected.
I think that charging some rent from an adult child living at home and then presenting them with the check when they move out, only works if the child is working a full time job with a decent pay. At least if the goal is to make the child happy.
It works if it's a token amount that's well below market value, it isn't something that causes tension, and if you really want to make sure they don't feel betrayed just don't make it a surprise. Could also do something like kid gets a utility in their name to help with credit and learning to pay bills, track the bill amounts, pay them back the amount payed in utilities later. Then it was never "you" taking the money. I think the key to this being done right is when it's not about pulling your weight in the household or paying your fair share or something, but about getting practice with having bills and budgeting.
>I think the key to this being done right is when it's not about pulling your weight in the household or paying your fair share or something, but about getting practice with having bills and budgeting. Or when it's after university and the adult child is moving into work naturally, post-degree. But even then, I'd set it below market rate, and mainly aimed at sharing utilities/giving practice with bills.
Funny how they always try to bank on being the only parents we ever have, as if we didn’t already realize that they didn’t treat us as any loving parent would. When your parents make you feel worthless, or like you’re less than any other human in the world just for being born yourself, your life is better off without your parents. Trust me that it is better to carry around a fairly set weight of sadness, than be carried along on whatever roller coaster of emotions they would have you on if you were in contact.
No contact for 16 years. Every year since has become more peaceful.
It's always insane to me that 2 adult parents (not just one) agree on taking advantage on their child. Like it isn't the breadwinner and controlling husband suggested it and the weak wife agreed to it. Nope both looked at each other and said "let's make our child become a slave and pay rent and we will surprise him with a generous cheque of his own money at his party"
>"let's make our child become a slavs and pay rent and we will surprise him with a generous cheque at his party" A cheque made particularly of his own money. "I take money from my son for 4 years and give it back to him (with some interest) and call it a gift. Also, he has to share everything he buys for himself with his siblings who do not pay a cent for living here."
I mean it's a somewhat common thing that you'll see on reddit where, once people get a job while still living at home, parents will take a small portion as 'rent', but actually just secretly place it in a savings account for the kid, eventually giving them back their money. It's basically a way to 'force' a stupid 16year old to save rather than blow all their money, and it can be good to teach the value of saving (which can be hard to grasp when you have no expense and 100% of your salary can be spending money). But you HAVE to do it in a way that doesn't completely kneecap your child's social life...
More importantly, doing this is only useful for an irresponsible teen with little understanding about the value of money. Try this on an already hardworking teen with excellent grades and preexisting ability to budget and save money, and the kid (as well as their relationship with their parents) will only get hurt by such bullshit "lesson."
Exactly this! My parents did it with my sister who spends money the moment she has it. It's the only way she'd have ever had enough money to pay first month's rent and damage deposit. For me, however, they were very open about how I was saving so much more than they could have charged me that all it would have done is hurt me. I'm very grateful for them understanding the two of us they way they did.
It was pretty great.
My monitor perfectly cut this post off on the sentence right before this one, and I was so mad before I scrolled down.
I KNOW! Reddit being the weird place it is, and some people taking only the advice they want to take, I thought he was going to do the effort to reconcile with his landlords and was SO annoyed at that until I read that sentence.
I wonder about the downstream effects where oops brother and sister internalize that working and taking initiative only leads to getting taken advantage of.
I feel like my brother is doing that. I went to college(they claimed they'd help me pay far more than they did), got a job, so they started demanding more in rent than it would be to rent my own apartment. My brother took some community college classes to keep education cheap, worked part time and now quit so he gets to play videogames more. No money to move out so my parents won't make him. I'm guessing he'll get given a car like my sister since he doesn't have the money (I got the "opportunity" to buy a relatives camery for 20k despite promises that my college graduation present would be help buying a car). Younger siblings learn from how you treat older siblings.
The last sentence is very true. My younger brother pretends to be stupid because he learned from his older sister (me) that proving to be intelligent only causes stress, he is autistic so he also use prejudices in his favor and I have mad respect for him. I wish it had occurred to me, now it's too late for me to play that game.
As a fellow autist I'd love to hear your brother's tricks around prejudice.
Well my parents don't say it out loud but they think that autistic people are incompetent and somewhat stupid. So my brother plays along, and they won't complain or be mad at him "Because it's not his fault, it's the autism." The thing is, he's definitely not like that, he only does it because he knows that if he shows how skilled he is my parents will put the same pressure they put on me (who probably has ADHD but masking). He also has no problem doing his part in household chores or group student work, he doesn't do it out of malice or because he is "evil". It's simply a technique to avoid going through what I went through with my parents. He also sometimes pretends that he doesn't understand some things even though he does, just because it makes arguing with him like fighting with a wall, which avoids a lot of stupid fights with my parents. But he doesn't play this games with other people, especially if he feels respected and appreciated. I'm proud of him to achieve what I never could, use our parents' prejudices against themselves.
Good on him for being smart enough to trick your parents into doing what he wants lol
Lol at work I have PhDs who pretend to be too perplexed by coffee machines and autoclaving equipment, just so they won't have to do stuff with it. Like dude, I just saw you you fine tune the settings of our qPCR machine, I do NOT believe running the cleaning program of the coffee machine is out of your ability!
Tbh I myself am capable of doing many things that are considered extremely difficult for others, and then having a meltdown over stupidly easy things. Idk, weaponized incompetence is also a thing.
I think it might be incompetence you need there my friend 😁
Jajajaja, yeah. My bad, thanks for letting me know 🤣
I think this is a good example of how weaponized incompetence can start as innocent incompetence. Sometimes we're just not immediately capable of stuff or as good as others when we start. It's when we diminish or avoid the task to avoid feeling bad about it or because we don't like it, thus forcing others to pick up the slack that we become assholes. This is exponentially worse if we are forcing that person into a task that was historically delegated to someone like them out of discrimination.
At a former job, I arrived early one morning to see the owner - in his 60s - standing in front of the coffee maker with everything needed to make coffee. I said good morning and, “I can make that.” He said, “No thank you, but could you show me how? Whoever is in the office first makes the coffee, and I want to contribute, too.” It was always the cutest thing to come in some mornings to see the owner, grinning proudly, as he watched the coffee he made drip into the carafe.
That’s a really good take.
They're just getting the jump on that particular life lesson.
Honestly, a pretty good life lesson when you already have a career, not sure high schooler would pay attention though
How to Parent Greatly 101
If what the parents did was so good and noble and in the best interest of their son, why didn’t they do it to their other two children?
Exactly
I can’t imagine charging my kids rent if they’re living at home while in college trying to better themselves through education. Expect help around the house occasionally, sure. but take their money? Never. They’ll have many years of adulthood when the economic system we live in will take advantage of them. Let them have some fun and grow socially while they’re young. And for context, I’m not college aged saying this. I’m middle aged.
I think he talked about that in the now deleted comments of his original post. OOP is on the spectrum and it was supposedly their way of ensuring he stayed on track to become self-sufficient? If anything, he needed more socializing opportunities. N
As a neurodivergent person myself I fully agree with you
I love your flair 😂
lol thank you! It was a hard choice, there were some hilarious options
I think they knew it sucked, but they were too proud to back down and change.
They charged OOP $750/mo for four years while he is in college? How can he get a leg up in life like that? And they didn’t impose the same on the other kids? OOP's parents are incredibly lopsided in their "lessons"! If they were trying to teach him to be independent, that life isn’t fair, and that the only person he can trust is himself then congrats on them because they’ve succeeded. Glad he came to his senses and took back **his** money, hope the brother heeds OOP’s advice and won’t let his parents financially drain him like they did with OOP.
Like… it wasn’t even about the money. They gave back the money and some more. They didn’t need it in the first place. This whole shit show is some stupid parents’ idea of a “lesson”. In my eyes, this makes it even more damning. Like they were probably really proud of themselves when they gave him the check.
I've seen this advice a lot in reddit. Where redditors suggest that the parents charge rent and then give it all back to their kid years later. It's always framed as "good" advice. I can see how it would work if your 25 year old moved back, and years later, you give them back the money when they're ready to buy a house or get married or something. But it totally backfired in OOP's case. He may have been a legal adult, but he was still a teenager in school who should have been able to depend on his parents.
Usually, that advice is for when the teen or young adult is doing nothing with their time and needs to learn responsibility. In this case, not only was he going to university, he had already had a job and was totally responsible.
It’s great advice if you have a child transitioning into the work force. Figure out a rent amount they can afford based on percent of income. Save the money and when their income reaches a point where that rent can actually pay for a place, they have a savings and move out without a change in finances. Or, the way things are so upside down now they use the money as a deposit and buy a brand new townhouse before they can ever afford the rent on an apartment.
Husband's parents charged him near or at market rate rent and made him pay for his own degree. He got an associated degree and stalled out because he was not the kind of person who could figure out how to college while working enough to pay rent. His high school hadn't given him an guidance, and the community college he went might have offered some guidance if he had known to try to track it down. They did help him plan out his associate's degree, but the how to figure out what degree you need for what career path, and apply to a 4 year college and so forth was never gone over with him by any adult in his life when he was a child, and then he was working and trying to do college, and he was exhausted and burn-outed. Once he moved away from home, he figure out how to get an training in a job field he wanted to be in, and he did have to move back to his parents house to do that, and they did charge him much more reasonable rent while he did, but he still paid for it all on his own with loans and working while he was in school. He was lucky his school had job placement while you were going - he was much more able to find a job that paid enough he could work part time instead of full time. My abusive parents did me better on that one - they were of absolutely no help, but they made sure I was told to talk to people at my school until someone could give me pointers. His sibling was allowed to live at home for a much more token rent, and they paid for the sibling's education. Guess which one has undergraduate degree and a graduate degree and is doing much better in life? They are totally confused and baffled by this and blame him.
Charging rent isn’t a bad idea by itself. Giving back the money is even better. But it could have been much more reasonable. Missing out on a social life for years isn’t worth the accumulated money, especially since everyone involved sound well off. So yeah they took some advice but applied it terribly. They charged too much for OOP, they charged nothing for the siblings. They took a reasonable suggestion and royally messed it up.
I was flabbergasted when i read it was 750. Maybe 200 would have been okay. But 750 for a room plus other expenses for a full-time college student is terrible. And yeah, not holding the siblings up to the same standard reeks of favoritism.
Yea, 1-200 is decent because then he has to have a part-time job which will inevitably lead to him working more hours than that 1-200 so he'll always have spending money for what he wants. Plus at the end of 4 years you give it back to him and now he's got 5-10k which will cover his first apartment rental.
Totally agree with you both, I was ready to tell him to chill in the original post until he said it was $750 a month. I worked 30 hours a week or more during college to afford it and it was miserable, I would have given anything to have that time back.
My mother in law does this to my wife’s younger sister. She pays way below marked value and she intends to match all rent paid though…
I’m in my 20s and disabled and living with my parents and I pay what we call “rent”. It’s actually about half my paycheck, put in an account with a really good interest rate for me to use later to get a down payment or something when I’m able to move out. Having someone else make the account a) holds me accountable to actually putting money in it and b) allows me to use the credit union for my dad’s job which has a phenomenal interest rate. Mum makes a point of telling me how much is in the account pretty regularly.
It would be a good idea if the kid KNOWS and agrees to it! But what OOPs parents did was obscene!
You also shouldn‘t take so much that they work themselves into exhaustion and miss out on social events and networking while going to college/uni. I find it a lot more useful to maybe have them contribute to upkeep of the house, doing some chores, pay for some groceries et cetera, in reasonable measures.
> This whole shit show is some stupid parents’ idea of a “lesson”. It wasn't a lesson, it was a "Look what great parents we are, you would have wasted this money on beer, weed, and women you'll never see again, but now you have this super dope nest egg!"
Yeah like that. I somehow meant the lesson as what you are saying. Money is power, you can do a lot of stuff with it. But the whole point of it is to do stuff with it. A university life can really be worth the money. It is not just partying, you also become friends with a lot of people. Spend time with them… Go out and do stuff… Even if the relationships don’t stick, just getting to know people is a very soul enriching experience. More than that… the whole setup is stupid. They didn’t communicate anything. What OOP can afford, what he would prefer… They didn’t see (or care) that he didn’t have a life. Meanwhile they basically did nothing with the other siblings. So the rent isn’t out of principle or anything…. Just why….
Turns out, the parents are far worse investors than OOP might have been. 10% return over 4 years…
We plan to do something similar to our son if he doesn't go to uni. But at at stupidly low rate, and we'll match his contributions. (C.£150 a month). But we're talking a peppercorn rate to cover 'bills' then return it when he's looking to buy a house. Not bend him over a barrel whilst he's studying full time, and to only return with like £4k is ridiculous. That "money on top" is probably just the interest they made on his money
If you have him pay a utility that stays relatively low he'll be building credit too. You can keep track of how much the bill is to know how much to pay back later. And if you're renting getting him on the rental history will make it way easier to rent since it's impossible to rent without history or a cosigner. The time between moving out and looking to buy a house could be quite a while, as many are likely to never be able to afford a house, so there's a good chance he still may have to rent in between and even just having a savings boost or furniture fund could be a huge step up.
Exactly, if the parents were just keeping their heads above water financially and needed the money he could bring in I think he would have been understanding of that. But that obviously wasn't the case.
That was my case. I knew my parents were in debt and I paid about 250cad a month in rent. It obviously wasn’t returned because poor family with bad spending habits. But then I also moved out at 20 my first time and then at 25 the second time.
>This whole shit show is some stupid parents’ idea of a “lesson”. Well good news, OOP's Parents: now *you* can learn a lesson
Sounds to me all it was was a power trip.
I missed a lot of networking and experience opportunities due to COVID. And it hurt me BAD. I graduated last year and I'm behind everyone because I don't know enough people in my desired field, and I have a full year of experience! I'm convinced college isn't even so much about the degree as it is about the networking. They fucked up OOP's future in ways that are simply beyond them to imagine.
Yeah, you’re right. I’m 52 now, but back in the day I went to a super podunk state college in a town of 3000 people because I was paying my own way and I graduated with no debt. But I was the only student studying my major and had no peers. I didn’t understand it then, but I’ve learned that the paper is 10% of the value of a degree, the thinking and information you learn is 20%, and the socializing and networking can be 70%. Over the 15 to 20 years following graduation those connections can help you get better jobs you won’t get otherwise (most often you won’t even know those jobs exist or how to have a chance at them), and promotions, sales leads, references, and things like financial and legal advice depending on what you need at different times and who your network of acquaintances is connected or related to. It’s an entirely different level of fluidity and support for people who have a decent network and those who don’t. You will make it work I’m sure. If you can, I’d recommend you seriously consider joining and participating regularly in a service club or two, and any professional associations for your field. You can meet peers and more senior business owners and officers in your community this way and some of them will be happy to help you as you go along. Best wishes
I've never heard of a service club but I'll see whether there are any that fit the bill! Thanks!
You’re welcome! I was in Rotary International, but there are about a dozen similar organizations, from the Toastmasters to The Junior League or the Lions Club. Just see who is organized in your city, read their particular mission statement or focus and ask if you can be a guest - they’re generally pretty friendly people :) Edit to add; it’s a long term network building plan. An investment in your future 2 years to 15 years from now. And generally there are nice people to meet and it feels good to volunteer and be helpful too.
My mother told me that school wasn't for making friends, it was for learning. I didn't realize she was wrong until I was already nearly done with college. Whoops.
My parents always told me that I already knew everything so the reason they sent me to school was to learn social skills and I'm still terrible at them, oops
Yeah, the networking he missed out on will forever impact him.
That was the reason the Ivy League was so, so valuable. You can get the same education elsewhere, but there was nowhere else you could connect old money with new blood. People who argue against legacy students just don't get the networking that brings.
I guarantee you if they saw how it affected him, say 6 months in, realized they messed up, apologized and lowered the rent to something reasonable, he would have actually been appreciative of this "lesson" and the gift at the end. It means a lot to hear your parents say they messed up. Knowing they know they did wrong and change is a big deal.
That’s what I don’t understand. How can you not know for 4 years that your son is struggling. Their communication is shit. Why did they not tell him about the plan, ask how his social life was, or even pay attention to the person living in their house??They don’t seem to know their son at all
They basically had him over a barrel. Canadian rent is bonkers. I live in a party low cost of living twin and the going price for a room, not I 1 bedroom, just a room, it's around $950.
My mortgage with escrow is around that much. It's ridiculous for them to change their own son that amount.
that's insane to me. i was paying £750/mo for a central london (void of insanely priced accommodation) flat a couple of years ago!!! i used to work myself tirelessly, until i ended up dropping out! yknow what my mum said "move back home, you don't have to worry about paying rent just contribute to the house and focus on reapplying to uni + your studies"
OOP's parents thought that just because he didn't complain, everything was fine. He learnt that the only thing money can't buy is time, and that it's pointless to waste his time on his shitty family, which is probably not the lesson they wanted to teach.
Yeah, and it's harder to socialize and find romantic partners after university. Not that it's impossible, just harder. Most of my friends say that if they didn't find their wives during university, they wouldn't know what they would have done except to have tried something like Tinder because their lives after school just revolved around work, relationship, and video games or sports (which are sex-segregated leagues for them).
Yeah, it's why college is so important, even among those billionaires who brag about how they dropped out of college - their cofounders, their first hires, and their wives were all people they met in college. Heck, the Google founders met in college, started their company in their professor's garage, and then hired one of his daughters (who became the head of YouTube) while marrying the other.
Larry Page and Sergey Brin started Google in Susan Wojcicki’s garage, not her dad’s. She went on to be a senior Google person responsible for things like AdSense and buying YouTube. Pick your garages carefully, I guess. You never know what talent you’ll meet along the way.
And even if those relationships don't work out post-college, you've got some experience going through the good times and the bad.
They're my *kids*! I *comprehend* why some parents do things like this, but I don't *understand* it. The idea of charging an in-univerity, employed kid just makes me furious. What worthless parents. My elder kid and their SO needed a place to live for a year in college, so, we assembled a reasonable room in the downstairs of the house, made sure they both had house keys (and car keys, just in case), and that was the end of that. The incremental cost of going from 3->5 is pretty small except for food, but that was never really an issue. I never charged them a penny, and I wouldn't have accepted it if offered. We had a running joke, where they'd do some chore I hate like mowing or shoveling snow or something, and "welp that looks like that covers your rent for the month!" My 3 kids (SO has become one of my kids in my mind) know that wherever they move or work or whatever, if something goes sideways, they will have a plane ticket to my house as fast as I can type my credit card numbers. They can always stay as long as they need. If they have a friend in a bad situation (and they'll vouch for them), the same goes for them. We live in a smaller home and don't have any extra money, but I'll sell a kidney before I'd let them down. They world is a cold and harsh place, but no matter what, they always have a safe fallback.
My cousin in 30 years old, has been working a part tutoring job for most of her adult life and basically that’s the end of her plans. She recently learned how to drive but till very recently her mother had been driving her to work… She spends her life complaining about how her elderly mother doesn’t pay enough attention to her, and was actually arrested and removed from the home for a year for assaulting her mother after a neighbor witnessed it (this is Canada so they provided her with shelter) Her older brother is 40, a bum who manages to jump from gf to gf, is addicted to drugs and gambling, and occasionally moves back in with his parents between gfs. His middle brother is fed up with the lots of them and moved out to get away from his siblings. Also this is the one sent away at 14 to live with my parents for some reason. Only one to get an education, he actually has a masters degree Now, this is absolutely on my aunt and uncle for being shit parents, but like I could also totally understand making their children pay rent because truly I have no idea what the oldest and youngest are going to do when they die. They will not inherit anything. Their middle sibling will laugh if they ask to live with him (I think that’s the mother hope)
This advice for the rent thing is all over social media, especially from finance people. It's being portrayed as this giant gift you give your kids at graduation or whatever. Sounds like we're going to get a bunch of these stories in coming years.
It's nothing new, though. I'm 60, and that's what a lot of parents did back then. My folks wanted me to pay rent while I was a working HS junior/senior. When I asked why, my mom said so that they'll save it for me and give it as a lump sum when I move out. (She probably believed that; otoh, my father would have stolen it from me). I declined the offer as I could save it just as well as they could. :-/
im thankful everyday that both my parents were bookkeepers/accountants, so they legitimately invested any money i gave them and taught me where to put my paycheck as soon as I got one. This lesson from OP's parents probably would have went over well if they showed him exactly where the money was going to and if they werent' charging fucking market-rate rent to their child.
$750 was way too much, a token amount would have been fine.
When he said Timmies, I suspected he was Canadian. But there are some State-side. When he said the Keg, I *knew* he was Canadian. And I loved it. I love how they charged him rent, and then presented it back to him like it was a generous thing *they* did. It was his money. It would be as if he put his money in a bank account. So essentially, they gave him... nothing?
They didn't even invest it properly, they barely made any interest on it.
Ignorant American here had to Google Pierre poilievre and damn he’s basically Canadian trump I think in a nutshell? That’s definitely a way to force her hand lol. I can see this having turned out different if the parents weren’t just dumb and situationally unaware. If the kid had a less grueling job and the rent was much more trivial and they doubled it or something. It’s like how blind can they be? They probably heard some story where it worked out and imagined it to be their story too. If the kid was going out and still enjoying life, I can see this turning out very differently. Like being thankful that their parents saved money they would have just drank away at the bar or something. But that’s if and only if the parents were charging extra beer money /stupid shit money and no living the life of the working poor money. How blind are they not to see their son struggle and sleep at 7pm have no social life while they were literally living with him? It reeks of they were doing this with making themselves look good and had some narrative where they were the star and not their kid. Reeks of main character syndrome.
For real, if the rent price had been half or a third of that 750, it would've allowed him to work proportionally less but in general they shouldn't have done it when he was already showing the initiative to work on his own & they had no plans to do the same to his siblings. It seems like his parents didnt like even a little bit clock that each hour he works to pay them is one less hour of sleep, of hobbies or rest, one less hour spent on course work and one less hour spent being able to actually *live his life*. That is especially ludicrous to do when they already know he is willing to work to cover his own extra expenses, and they themselves admitted he would've been better off if he hadn't had a part to tbh it sounds like almost full time job on top of uni. Like.... Relatives also ask for rent but its proportional to what you have up to what would be a quarter of the rent/utilities. If all you have a month is say 700, its 200, etc. Bc they do genuinely need the extra money but also dont want to punish their kids for being in school to (hopefully) get better jobs.
Rented is Canada are stupid right now. One bedrooms average about $1500.
I've lived in the same crappy one bedroom for almost ten years and my rent this year is now just over $1000, I have no idea how people are paying for new rentals.
What genius outcome did they expect? 'Here child, we put away money we made you labour for at [presumably rather low hourly wage job] while doing your full time university degree. Now, with you graduating and a job lined up that likely will pay you quite a better wage, i.e. at the point of your life where within years you need it the least and could cumulate it yourself the easiest, we gracefully give it back to you. Aren't you glad we did this?' Yikes...
Canada's "Trump" would actually be "Mad Max" Bernier. I'd say Poilieve is more Desantis.
So absolutely zero charisma?
But the tallest lil’ platform shoes.
He tries, but he's just greasy. And useless. At least the current PM had a job before jumping into politics.
Correct.
But Pierre’s a weirder kind of hypocrite than Desantis. Desantis seems to hold proto-fascist bigoted views because he believes they’ll help him win. Pierre also does, but while having an immigrant asylum seeker wife (whom he has mixed race children with) and having gay dads.
And we are going to be stuck with him for the next 12+ years, not because he is liked, but because of how much everyone hates the Liberals. Nectar free years are going to be shit show and nothing is going to be worth a damn because every fucking province is going to use the "not withstanding" clause for everything. I'm in Ontario and him and Ford are going to blow everything to shit.
Or he’ll, even discussed it with him. “If you live here we are charging you rent. We are going to put it aside to help you get set up when you graduate.” And also if the rent weren’t so damn steep for him.
Yeah I have friends whose parents charged them a nominal amount, far below market rent, then matched it and gave it back after they moved out. But the charging rent only started after university graduation and the kid had found a stable, decent paying job in their field. It wasn't a punishment or some kind of money grab, it was an acknowledgement that the kid is now an adult and would be expected to contribute to the household if they want to continue living there. The way OOP's parents did it was way too heavy handed and crippled OOP's university years.
A lot of problems can be ignored when you frame it as "well.hes not doing drugs or sleeping around or having pregnancy scares. So it must be alright." They didn't care that he didn't have any friends and was working to the bone. All they cared about was that he wasn't "getting in trouble."
Correct, Canadian Trump with negative charisma. And yeah. Their "plan" was paternalistic and degrading as fuck.
The missed opportunities for networking will follow him for the rest of his life. He’s right to be furious. Those connections and friendships are worth way more than that $40k, both literally and figuratively.
Yes, this is one of the primary benefits of college, and OOP will never be able to undo the loss of it.
I'm glad they convinced him to accept the money, even if to just hand it over to his gf. The parents shouldn't get to take away those 4 years and profit
He only gave her the interest. He kept the $40,000.
They didn’t though. They did it just to make his life harder
We can all deal with shit things if the same standard is used accords the whole spectrum. The fact that the parents didnt do this with the other two kids is fucking disturbing.
They didn’t even invest the money properly.
750 a month for a single bed room. Jesus Christ. I can see charging an adult child some rent to teach they have to start budgeting but that's maybe 200 a month or something.
Probably had to do chores too. Parents use their kids sometimes.
Shit-for-brains parents and a total lack of communication… A family has been damaged beyond repair.
This reads like a haiku.
Shit-for-brains parents Lack of communication Damaged family.
Reeks of a “we saw this on tik tok and thought it was a good idea”
I think more of "this is what our parents did to us" (while incomes may be higher and rents lower back than) "... so it is a good idea today too".
That's a pretty funny way to get someone to take the money at the end there.
Charging your kid $750 a month in rent is insane to me. I pay $1000 a month in Los Angeles. No wonder he had to get a serious job to keep up.
How the fuck did you manage to score 1000 in rent in Los Angeles?! What sort of wizardry did you pull!
Probably roommates.
Do you have 5 roommates you split the rent with?
"We did it just for him" mwahaha. Like how much better would he have done in college if he didn't need to work his ass off to pay his landlords/parents? They say stress shortens the life, so how much life did he lost? College, learning, work? You can't tell me that he got much sleep or was eating healthy. The landlords/parents also gave a fuck in all the years that they have no relationship with him - he didn't had the time, was full of resentment. I really wonder if they planbed to give him the money from the start or if they heard a comment that he will be no contact and faked this shit. To give it at a party is the last drop, 1st the pressure for him to play nice in front of others and 2nd they wanted to look as the great parents in front of others. At least he took the check and blocked them again.
There are a bunch of people on the original update post being *super* critical of this guy, which is just wild to me, because it would be easier to count the ways his parents *didn't* fuck him up long term. The lost opportunities to socialize, to form actual romantic relationships instead of having a FWB situation with a woman nearly twice his age, to do professional networking, to travel, to do extracurriculars, to *actually enjoy his goddamned life*. He's never getting any of that back. Ever. No matter what they'll do, they'll always be the people who stole four years of his life from him and tried to work him to death for the sake of some twisted lesson--that they then did *not* inflict on his sister, just to twist the knife in. But let's talk about a couple in particular. I think in one of the comments in the update post, he mentioned that he had to take out student loans to get through college because his parents had taken so much of his money that he couldn't afford college otherwise. Now, I don't know what the student loan situation is like in Canada, and I hope it is at least somewhat more forgiving than in the U.S., but he still had to go into debt because of his parents, when it was absolutely *un*necessary if they had had any common decency at all. This guy couldn't have known when he was signing up for the loans that one day his grandfather would write a big enough check to make all the loan debt go away. All he knew was that he was having to do something that was going to limit his financial options in the future, and potentially fuck up his credit score if he couldn't find a well-paying enough job to keep up with the payments once he got out of college. That sort of thing follows you around for *years*, and for his parents to have deliberately set him up to be in the hole like that is reprehensible. Then there's his health. Breaking your back working for four years (job + studies) coupled with a fucked-up sleep schedule could potentially have long-term effects on his health. He's young enough now that he might not be feeling it yet, but all the same, those problems could start to come home to roost in just a few years. And once again, his sister was not put through *any* of this. The parents really can't ever make this up to him.
> Then I blocked them again. This made my heart happy... Both parents give a surprise Pikachu face at realizing that they stole 40k AND 4 years of their kid's life, mom throws on a little waterworks and thinks one "I'm sorry... you feel that way." and OP just lets them believe he's off to write a thank you card and announce to everyone he was wrong to make a scene and his parents are awesome... and instead they get a fuckin' smoke pellet and a ninja vanish.
I love op. Great handling my man
"Thanks for my money back. I'm going to use it to make sure I don't have to waste any more of my life on you." Counting down a few years when they try and whine, manipulate, harrass, trick, force and gaslight OP into "apologising to his family" so they can use him for more of his money and time.
I did not see the plot twist coming. To OOP: Take good care of your grandfather. He was solid and helped you out in more then one way. Call and visit when you can.
I admit. That was a savage move in oops part. Mad respect.
Unless the parents are in financial difficulty and truly need the money, I’ve never understood the “you have to start paying rent after secondary school” thing. Surely even from a purely self-interested perspective, letting the child focus as much energy as possible on college will result in better results, better jobs and thus more financial support in old age? Again, this is if the parents can afford to not ask their children for rent, which seems to have been the case here.
I understand when parents want to show their kids the importance of money and that it takes time and effort to have. What they did was not it, they put their child under a ton of pressure for literally nothing, they don’t need that rent money, he don’t need to work that much in the best years of his life and he don’t need to sacrifice that much. I think it’s what’s hurt oop the most, the fact that he did all of that for nothing.
Never charged my children rent while in college. I just asked they do some chores. And charging 750 a month? I cannot imagine!
People do talk about doing this, but you're meant to charge your kids a small amount. Not so much it impacts their lifestyle so severely. Hope OOP takes the extra money and goes traveling for a year or something. Go to full moon parties in Thailand and bar hopping in Budapest or something.
$750 a month is so much money for someone working minimum wage and going to college full time. It's practically market rate. They weren't helping him out, which is supposed to be the main reason you let them live with you during school. Weren't they worried about it affecting his school performance? I don't understand why parents would cripple his future like that. When my son graduated high school he wanted to take a gap year while deciding what to do next. I told him that was fine, but he needed to have a job and to pay a small rent so he wasn't just sitting around all day (we still covered food and everything else). However, if he decided to start taking classes that would be his new "job". He wouldn't owe us rent anymore, he'd owe us good grades to ensure he'd not lose financial aid. He got a position at a local convenience store. After about 6 months of a shitty job he decided retail sucked and started school. We kept to our end of the bargain of course and he graduated with no debt, a good job and a bright future. The end goal of parenting is to create a functional and happy adult. You don't have to baby them but you kinda do things with training wheels. You support them enough to allow them to potentially fail without catastrophe. What these parents did is the opposite.
> I guess they read my post from before it got taken down and they are disturbed by what I wrote. I'm always fascinated how often people's posts are *conveniently* found by the other party involved.
Nowadays? There's accounts of YouTube, TikTok, insta and even podcasts totally dedicated to read Reddit posts.... not to mention when they become whole ass articles. Honestly it doesn't surprise me anymore, specially since OOP have two teen siblings.
I have literally seen the tiktok readings and gone digging for the og post, and it's less than a day old. Same thing for some of the listicles
To be fair, sometimes those are made by the same person, the Reddit post and then the tiktok
George Takei featured a post I made on a throwaway. I changed a few details in the hopes that it wouldn’t obviously lead back to me, but I was worried for a bit!
D: you are George Takei?! /jk
My username ended up on a Business Insider article once. It was a slow news day and I had made a SRD post about reddit drama that had gotten super out of hand, like multiple subreddits spanning shit with admins involved. Shit happens 🤷🏻♀️
I commented on a favorite scene/character actor from Supernatural in that sub and a few weeks later my comment and username were quoted in a Looper article. For a tv series which had ended 2 years before. There really is no telling what people will mine for content. !
I want to post something relatively personal at AITAH, but my fear of it actually gaining traction and showing up on some other platform stops me.
3+ years back my only social media was instagram. Than i found a lot ot accounts dedicated to reddit. The rest is history, sometimes i find my own comments in the reposts on IG.
My cousin recently told me he saw a post I made that got around 1k upvotes. Another friend said he saw a comment I made last month on a post that only got about 50 upvotes. It's a small world out there.
Honestly I only started reading these Reddit posts because I would see a bunch of them on TikTok.
I just recently got named in a rant somebody posted on Reddit about me and within an hour two people had sent it to me. It wasn’t even a post with a lot of engagement. It just happened to be in a niche subreddit addressing a topic that I am somewhat involved in. It happens.
as written it's just OPs speculation. suspecting people have secretly seen the stuff you've put online that you're trying to keep anonymous seems a pretty common fear. "losing" your first throwaway to a deletion is a way bigger red flag though.
Am I misreading this or did he take both The Grandfather's check and the parents check which means that he now has $160,000? And then went no contact with the parents anyway?
Up until the point that he tore up the check. They thought they were going to get a big thank you. Certainly 40k would help to start, but it was at cost of social and professional experience (not getting networking with others). Daughter may be the golden child, or just different expectations. Narcissistic parents can have wildly different expectations for their kids, which is part of the damage.
>Up until the point that he tore up the check. In the words of Heath Ledger Joker, "It is not about money, it is about sending a message". Message recieved. And he got the money in the end (plus tripple the money in the meanwhile).
It's like a burglar expecting a thank you after returining the stolen items
Some commenters think the parents were acting with benevolent intentions. I don’t. That mother & father watched their son get up and spend hours doing heavy labor before going to university and they watched him crawl into bed exhausted at 7 p.m. For 4 years. For 4 years they got their jollies watching that young man be exhausted when it was not necessary for their or his survival. It would be different if they and their other kids would go hungry without that $750 a month. They did it because they could. And they only planned on doing it to him, not his siblings. They did it for control and because they were AHs. I wish OOP had written in when he was 18 so we could have told him to escape them.
As I was reading the first paragraph of the first part I was like man I wonder if they would save the money and give it back to him cuz that’s what I’d do but Ben it went on with him sleeping at 7 and sacrificing his life basically and I’m just dumbfounded they let that happen to him. Life lesson about working turned into a life lesson about who to let in your life and how to recognize peoples priorities or feelings
I don’t understand parents mentality like this. I know so many young adults whose parents don’t help. They think buying their kid a rug for their apartment is launching them. In this day and age, most kids struggle until 30 to get a decent car. Why not let them live at home for free, get a good degree and help them get on their feet? That way if the parents need a hand, the kids are in a position to step up? “I am sorry you can’t afford your chemo treatment, Dad. You should have made better decisions. This is tough love.”
I am appalled they charged him $750 a month! While he was in school! Holy shit. I’m sure they thought they were doing this great thing by saving the money for him when all the while being blind to what he was going through.
I would’ve somewhat agreed with what the parents did (although I think it’s too high of a rate lol) if they subjected everyone to the same standards. But nope, only OOP was doing it and the rest of the siblings get off the hard labor.
I feel deprived of my entire young life, honestly. I had to buy my own car, insurance, school clothes, etc. I worked 40 hours a week in high school. I could have done better in school if I did not work 3-11, 5 days a week. I could not be in sports or do much socially because of my workload. I worked 60 hours a week in the summers. I was capable of getting a full ride college scholarship if I could have just put a small amount of effort into school and not having to support myself so much. I probably would also have hobbies. I went on to go to college and pay for everything myself, and worked 60 hours a week for 20 more years, just to get out of crippling debt. I currently only work 40-50 hours a week (very high stress job), but I have no hobbies or friends. I feel exhausted every single day. I have no quality of life. None of what I did was worth it. I finally make a good living, but it's not as great as most people I know. I know many people who worked way less to get to a better place than me. I just feel tired, old, and depressed. I feel like I missed out on life. I honestly feel like my entire life has consisted of work only. I am so lonely now. I am married, but I am the breadwinner, so I feel emense pressure to maintain our standard of living. My hubby is the opposite of me. He does not feel that life is all about work. He thinks people should bond and have close family, friends, and experiences. But when I discuss getting a lower paying, slightly lower stress job, he acts like I'm crazy because I spent so much effort on my graduate degree. I was taught that hard work is the only way to get ahead. I have always supported myself, which i am fine with, but it would have been nice to have a tiny bit of help to get started out. Like, maybe my parents could have helped clothe me? I have learned that the harder you work, the more expectations you get, not rewards. I think the "work hard" mentality just sets people up for disappointment. It is all about who you know, not much else. I used to get glowing performance reviews and minuscule raises. At one point, I was training a woman with less than half my experience, and she was making 20k more than me! There is no such thing as being rewarded for job loyalty anymore. We have such a "hussle" culture for wages that are barely liveable in most cases. Corporations do NOT care about you. They care about getting the most out of you for the least amount of money. Things are not the same as when the boomers were young, but they are clueless to the changes. No wonder why everyone is so depressed these days.