AIBU - expecting son to pay for his own 'luxury' groceries on top of rent

Around 30% of your income on housing costs is good. He pays less than that for bills, food and rent. Which is a good deal. And it’s teaching him that things cost money.

I think it might be good for him to do a budget for his costs IF he moved out. To compare. Do a weekly shop (with coffee pods). Do a rent check in the area. Let him see what costs what.

I think £500 is excessive. Especially if youre expecting him to pay for his meals at the weekend, his car electric and any extra luxuries eg fizzy drinks and coffee.

Life is expensive, better to get used to it tbh.

Using coffee pods is an expensive hobby so I can understand you not wanting to provide an unlimited supply for the whole house.

If I was you, I would tell your son that he has to buy his own coffee pods for himself and girlfriend. Probably you will have to keep your own coffee pods in a secret place only you can access.

He will soon realise how he was taking it for granted when he has to put his hand in his pocket to buy them,

He thinks £500 a month is excessive

If he couldn't live with you, where else would be get room, utilities, and partial board for £500 a month? To answer the actual question, though - if it's something only he uses then it's reasonable to ask him to pay for it himself. Assuming it's you and/or DH doing the regular household shopping and he's just adding his items to the list and expecting you to pick them up and pay for them, I'd have another discussion and explain to him that the meal planning - grocery list - shopping process already includes a lot of budgeting and that may mean buying non-premium brands of some things, forgoing certain luxuries, making certain things from scratch rather than buying convenience versions. If his requested items are consistently pushing the cost go up by more than his share, some mitigation is needed - could be he shops separately, or he is responsible for buying/paying for certain items himself.

I’d charged mine 30 quid a week.

Any luxuries he bought on top of that himself.

I think you are charging quite a lot. Especially as you don’t need it. I would be be buying coffee pods though.

If he thinks £500 a month is excessive, he can always move out and get a private rental. Where he’ll have to pay for his own food, own utilities inclusive bf car charging and not have luxuries of nespresso.

If he is living with you to save for a house (and he is actually saving with some fun bits in), then it’s a balance of making him realise the cost of things but also helping him get along. If he’s living with you because it’s too expensive to live alone or he is just pissing away his disposable income, then I’d put costs up because you don’t need to fund his lifestyle.

For the nespresso, I would probably agree to buy however many pods a month, make sure you allocate yourself how many you and DH want and just let DD and DS fight amongst themselves over the leftovers. Or they can both buy their own if that isn’t enough.

Absolutely not being unreasonable.
Time to give him the prices of shared rooms in houses locally and calmly suggest that maybe this is a good time to look at moving out.

It is an extremely beneficial wake up call for them when they move out.