Aibu about Teens new year party disaster

You were insanely optimistic not to have expected some problems!

So the younger flatmates had adults to support them?

Completely different to the OP's son's situation. No 20 somethings plus boyfriend backing him up with rowdy behaviour.

I am sorry but I chortled at the dog. Just because it had gone ok before doesn’t mean it will every time. Seems a reasonable compromise has been reached.

You’re crazy to have gone out and left a load of 16 yo’s alone. Obviously they are brats who dont have any respect for other peoples property and maybe you were just naive thinking they were good kids but ultimately this is on you.

I voted YABU because whilst your son may be mature and it might have been fine previously, while he and his friends were younger, no way on earth can he be expected to control his peers at 16, some of whom were clearly not as mature as him, and starting to experiment with more autonomous behaviour Etc.
You should certainly ground him for a while and remove devices for no more than a week, but claim for the damage on your insurance, and not force him to pay for it all: it’s partly your fault for expecting teens, parties and alcohol (inevitably slipped in by others even if not provided by your son) to result in no damage to your property…

Your DS might be mature but I doubt he was mature enough to handle gate crashers (I am presuming that some people were made aware of the party probably on SM who weren’t invited) and that is why you should have been there to turf them out.

I doubt your DS enjoyed the party

Its reasonable if he had the party despite your instructions not to. However if you agreed to him having a party, or even failed to explicitly tell him not to and set boundaries for who and how many people could come round, I'm sorry, but its on you, as you failed in your duty. Unless your DS goes to a lot of empty house parties and knows how they end up, then it's up to you to have used your life experience to warn him of the way they spiral out of control. How people tell others, strangers turn up, and drunk teens are not careful with other people's property.

Yup.

When I was a student, my younger flatmates held a party. Some randoms turned up at the door with cans of beer, expecting to be allowed in.

I was the oldest resident - in my 20s. I told them to go. When they tried to persuade me to step aside, my boyfriend loomed behind me. That did the trick.

Absolutely this, what an insane move on the OP part. A 16 year old is not mature enough to deal with this himself and should never have been left. Massive over reaction on OP part and no, I wouldnt even make him pay it back, whilst it is unfortunate, it should never have been allowed in the first place!

I don't think this is reasonable no. He probably didn't do any of the damage himself and if he had known about it he would probably have tried to stop it. So essentially the two of you are both equally culpable; you both agreed to a party and therefore both accepted the risk. He was obviously at fault for who he invited and crowd control. However, you were at fault for placing this level of responsibility on a 16 year old.

I think a more reasonable outcome would involve a division of culpability taking into account your respective abilities to pay. Him getting a job to pay some of it (ideally during the school holidays rather than upsetting his studies) absolutely makes sense but I think that a target of £500 to settle the debt would seem more reasonable for a 16 year old. You might recoup some more of the money more subtly, for example by saying you are still paying for the damage if he asks for something like new clothes etc for the next 6 months or so.

Have your neighbours said anything about these parties?

My late husband told me that his son had said that he'd never hold a house party - he knew of too many where the house had been wrecked. That was 30 yrs ago.

@CombatBarbie

Just me that wants to see the pink/yellow dog?

Why would you want to see that?
Poor dog.

He's had parties before..at 15/14..and now going away at new year, leaving him at home to have a party. So, all underage (I know many kids drink before 18 but you don't arrange things so it can happen unsupervised with lots of mates and probably people who aren't his mates). He cleans up - move on and you stay home.
Yes, you surely must have a picture of the dog!

I'm more worried about poor Ddog, there might have been harmful ingredients in the dye and he/she could easily have licked it.

i remember talking to a parent of older children - she said that she wanted to be the person the kids called if an adult was needed - promised to stay sober when her kids were out, always offered to pick kids up and drive them home, promised that she might be mad, she might want to know all of the details and she might say they were stupid, but in the moment, she would always help, whether it was drink, drugs, violence, anything.. I have the same conversation with my kids... I am here - call me!! I can't fix everything, but I will show up.

Yes. And it sounds like you've given him this responsibility before, when he was even younger. That was stunningly naive of you and I'm surprised that you and her got away with it on those occasions.

Again, he might be sensible, other 16 year old are not.
It's clear on this board that even grown women can't police their friends behaviour on occasions. Expecting a 16 year old boy to do so is madness.

It's worth noting that some human hair dyes are toxic for dogs, especially as they tend to lick their own fur. This is actually the occurrence that would worry me the most as that treatment of a dog might have been very frightening for it.

This is totally on you. How is a 16 year old supposed to police a party, make sure others aren't drunk, stop others causing damage, expel gatecrashers etc? It needs adult supervision. If you had said you can have three or four mates round, and he invited his whole year group, then you perhaps have a point. But if you told him he could have a party and left him to it, then of course it could get out of hand, and there's very little he could have done about it. Do you not remember teenage parties?! There's always a chance of it getting out of hand, even if he's had parties before that have been ok

Or thanking her lucky stats that nothing serious occurred. The OP wasn't just absent during the party she was staying away. Irresponsible madness.

I think it's very unreasonable to make him pay £800 unless he deliberately caused the damage. These parties get out of hand. You should have been there ir paid an older young person ( ie early twenties) to supervise/be a bouncer.
Your poor son.

personally I think this is all on you - expecting a 16 year old to manage a house of unsupervised excited 16 year olds on NYE was setting him up to fail.

Have you never watched TV or films? I'd go as far as saying this is the inevitable outcome of leaving a 16 year old in charge of a party. I don't think you should blame him to much - next time supervise the party.

You were the irresponsible one OP. I'm not sure what you were expecting. Fine dining and in bed by 9pm??? 16 year olds are not mature enough to be left alone in an empty house having a party. Just tell him that's the last one...punishment enough.

Just me that wants to see the pink/yellow dog?

This will be a lesson learnt for both you and him. Parties can and do escalate very quickly. You will laugh about it in years to come.