....to think that when you invite people to visit, you should give them dinner?

[Financeprincess]

DH and I have just returned from a visit to his aunt's house, 300 miles away. She asked us to visit. She's in her sixties, widowed, but young and active. She lives in a house with no mortgage that she's just accepted an offer of £650k on, and has a generous pension to live on.

That sets the financial scene. My problem with her is that she always expects me and DH to pay for everything and it drives me mad.

When she visits us, and she tends to invite herself, she always wants to go out for dinner and drinks, and expects us to pay. This summer, she came for a week and we gave her dinner - cooked or paid for by us - every night, plus nice lunches and plenty of wine etc. and she never even offered to pay for coffees in a cafe.

However, when we visit her, she never reciprocates. She expects us to take her out to a restaurant, presumably to thank her for her hospitality (although she invites us and we go to please her...she's a nice woman, but it's quite an undertaking visiting her, plus she keeps her house bl**dy freezing, so it's not very comfortable).

We've just returned from one such visit. We were only staying one night, but she'd booked a restaurant and had decided that we'd be going for cocktails first. At the bar, we ordered (the aunt is the 'hang back at the bar' type), then when the bartender told us how much the round was she started fumbling around for pound coins and saying, "How much will mine be?", so to save embarrassment we just paid (£25 for three cocktails). I thought, surely she'll pay for dinner? However, after we'd eaten, she said, "how much is mine?". Not only that, we had a discount voucher for the restaurant - Loch Fyne, to give you an idea of price - and she insisted on seeing the calculations, even though my husband said that it would be about £40. I'd told him before that on no account were we paying for his aunt again, and that we should let her pay, which he accepted reluctantly. Her share was more than £40, but she said that she'd just put £40 on her card, AND she let us leave the tip!!

I was really annoyed, although I couldn't show it. I've started thinking of her as Aunt Sponge (James and the Giant Peach, if you don't get the reference!) because I think she's a shameless sponger. She clearly expected us to pay for her, and didn't seem able to contemplate actually paying for our dinner for once.

It's putting me off visiting her again. Just to reiterate, she is not at all short of money. She's about to downsize, releasing £250k, and was boasting about the £30k kitchens she's been looking at for the new house. She also goes on lots of lavish holidays.

Am I being unreasonable to think that this woman is simply tight?? I wouldn't dream of asking somebody to travel hundreds of miles to visit me then expecting them to pay for their own dinner, let alone mine too!

The idea of calling her on her behaviour is very tempting. The only reason I haven't done it is because my husband tends to avoid confrontation and she's his aunt! I will have to do something before the next visit though, since I think I'd lose my temper.

I'd be too embarrassed to dodge paying for things, even if I were the type to do it. I laughed about the older relatives thinking that the single tin of Asda value curry and the six pack of cheap sausages represented adequate catering. Aunt Sponge, at lunchtime on our visit, gave us some bread rolls made by a neighbour that had gone stale and carefully took out only half of a small pack of turkey slices and half a small pack of ham. I thought, "why not go wild and put all of it out?".

I think it's clear that she's a tight-arse. The issue now is how you deal with her. Lots of good suggestions here about just not going out for meals, etc. Explain in advance that this time you'll be staying in.

Perhaps she wants to hang onto every penny as she's not sure whether she'll need it for care, etc when she's older. I bet it's scary for her being on her own. Lots of people cling onto their money for later on in their lives, the difference is that many are also happy with a home-cooked meal when they visit relatives.

My mum's like this. Always hangs back in restaurants, to the point now where we don't take her. Fil's like it too.

Mum goes on many holidays a year, so she's not short of a bob or two. She's 80 odd and so's fil.

Fil's even complained that he's got so much money that he doesn't know what to do with it!

I totally appreciate the fear that many ageing people must feel knowing they have little or no earning capacity left, and must rely instead on finite savings and/or a pension. Taking it to the extreme, you read every so often in the paper rather sad stories about older people who've left fortunes despite living a very frugal and hard life because they were too scared to spend "just in case". However, when applied to people like the aunt in the OP, or to some of the others mentioned, I have no patience at all - and any suggestion they're holding back for care home fees or whatever is simply an excuse - how can it be anything else when these people are quite happy to spend lots of money, arguably unnecessarily (who needs a £30k kitchen, or "lavish" holidays after all - they're "nice to haves", not necessities) on themselves left right and centre but become a reincarnation of Scrooge at the prospect of spending on anyone else ?

I'm afraid my (thankfully) ex MIL was like this - forever describing herself as a "poor widow" but living in a house worth £900k (15 years ago!), very high 6 figure savings and investments and a monthly income of more than £2000 (15 years ago when that bought you a lot more). She'd never so much as pay for a cup of coffee and consequently I used to dread any family get together because she'd always hang back or disappear at bill time, and neither of her children were well off enough to pay for her too without feeling the hit. Meanwhile she spent 8 weeks of the year in South Africa, always took an annual cruise, replaced her car with a brand new model (thus losing £££s immediately she drove away) every 3 years regardless of the fact her car never had more than 20k miles on it - I could go on (and on). I honestly feel in her case that she had delusions of grandeur - had had a very comfortable lifestyle while her husband had been alive - and that her status as "widow" entitled her to a certain level of "respect" - which translated as her never paying for anything if someone else was around. Attempts by her children to even things out, or to avoid particular restaurants etc were met with lots of crocodile tears and accusations about not caring. I think had I remained with my ex, sooner or later there'd have been an almighty showdown .... oh, and meals at hers, on very rare occasions were always very plain, Spartan and simply not enough for everyone - though she always ate heartily when we went out.

I agree, that unless someone isn't in full control of their faculties, that this sort of behaviour is appallingly rude and extremely arrogant. I'm not sure age necessarily has anything to do with it though I think my ex MIL's attitude was fashioned by a lifetime of being utterly indulged by her late husband (she never worked in paid employment again after marrying in her early 20s), and she didn't want to curtail that at all once he died. If this aunt takes it upon herself to book restaurants without any prior discussion, then she should also be prepared to pay the whole bill - though most people would probably feel uncomfortable not paying for themselves. However, to reluctantly pay just for herself - and even then not the full amount, nor a tip, is plain mean. Who the hell does she think she is - why is it so much more important for her money to be preserved over anyone else's ? Chances are that a stereotypical babyboomer like her (i.e. one who's done very well out of property and pensions) has far far more disposable income than the younger generation she expects to sub her. Perhaps it's true that she watched her own parents, or grandparents, struggle financially in their old age - and it may well have been the case that they needed help from children to make ends meet, thus planting in her head this notion that when you get to a "certain" age it's your "right" to be "treated" all the time, but times have changed since then and the (typically) babyboomers who retain that sense of entitlement even though they're very fortunate make me want to spit. I do of course accept people can be mean at any age ..... I wonder if this aunt has always been like this ? If it's a relatively recent development it could maybe have something to due with a sense of entitlement due to age alone, and regardless of her actual circumstances. She needs to either be put straight - or you need to avoid any situation where she pulls a fast one. Decline invites to eat out - unless you're happy to pay for yourself of course - and are confident she'll stump up her fair share. Also, don't be pressured into fancy meals or days out if she comes to you - just do what you feel happy to provide and no more.

My MIL is like this. Unbelievably tight,which enables her to go on cruises and Caribbean holidays. She has never ever got her wallet out in any restaurant or establishment we've ever been to. I find the constant expectation that we will pay for everything rude and very uncomfortable, as my parents are the snatching the bill out of your hands type. It's not even the money, I'd feel much happier spending 20 quid on a meal for her if she'd ever bought me a 2 pound ice cream, for example.

She comes for Christmas every year, and for the last 3 years we've taken her to the pantomime, which of course we have paid for. Every year I have sat there in the interval hoping that she might offer to buy her grandchildren an ice cream, which she never has, but always wants one when I crack and get up. Last year we had my parents here too and she overheard me talking to them on Skype when they were insisting on transferring the money for the pantomime tickets to my account. This obviously triggered an iota of guilt as that year she bought two bottle of sparkling wine on a BOGOF offer, and went on and on about them all the time she was here. "That's my contribution to Christmas," she trilled with every sip. I was so tempted to tell her they didn't cover the cost of the fucking pantomime tickets. And she then let my dad buy her two glasses of highly overpriced wine at the theatre by standing there with her wallet nailed shut until he was embarrassed enough to offer.

Phew, what a rant. Sorry OP. But you're not alone!

Anyone still needing to feel better: have a listen to grande dame Dame Ann Leslie, talking about "pocket patters".

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0183rb5

She is so very grand that it recasts mean people as petty, not grand themselves.

She is tight. Yanbu.

i once stayed with a "friend" - we never saw each other again after i stayed .... takeaway for saturday night - she asked me to pay my share. then we went out for breakfast at a cafe the next morning. wtf?!?!?!?! i had to pay for my breakfast too. it was a 200 mile trip to see the miserable tight woman - so 400 miles. pfffffttttt. hope she's reading this.

tightarses the lot of them. perhaps there is a website somewhere called frugal tightwads and they are all swapping tips on how to get out of paying for stuff.

I disagree that it is a generational thing - I just think some people are mean and some are generous.

My own parents are very generous (they are in their 80s) to the point where it is almost embarassing, my Dad & DH nearly came to blows once when neither would let the other pay for a meal - why they couldn't split it 50/50 I don't know. I only have to say 'that's nice' about something in a shop and my DM rushes to buy it, I have learned to say 'that's nice BUT I DON'T WANT IT' .

My siblings are tightwads, I know for a fact that their household incomes are higher than our's but they never, ever offer to pay for even a coffee out.

Thanks ladies, who knew that so many of us had tightarses for relatives and friends???

The MIL stories gave me a good laugh. Do they really think that nobody notices their stinginess? I come from a generous "fight over who pays the bill" family too, so this sort of thing always surprises me.

Bit of insight into the Aunt Sponge situation. DH was talking to another family member today and mentioned what had happened. The other family member said that Aunt Sponge had told him that because she and her husband had always bought Christmas and birthday presents for their nephews and nieces when they were small, then she felt that it was time that the younger generation paid her back. Yes, really. I did not make that up. So the presents for children had strings attached; perhaps she has a list of what they cost, inflation adjusted, and means to recoup every penny!!

I will be following the sage advice from this thread.

just say sorry aunt sponge (the poster who said that made me laugh) but before you come to visit can you pop to the supermarket and get what you fancy for dinner , and i wouldnt pay just say oh shall we split the bill aunty look it costs this much why dont you pay yours, people who stingy like that get right on my wick

...and thanks for the link to 'Dilemma' and the pocket patters. Hilarious.

good god stingy arse indeed she is totting up presents , what a lovely aunty sponge she is, MY B and sil is like this we dont see them anymore tbh we cant afford it, they owe us a lot of money and earn 3 times as much as we do, its true the more you have the more you want to keep for yourself

This has reminded me of a couple we used to hang out with. Always hung back at the bar, would sit with empty glasses until others had finished and accepted expensive drinks on anyone else's round, but never once paid for any of ours.

The final straw was when they deliberately walked out of a restaurant without settling their tab and implied I was some sort of goody two shoes for actually calling over a waitress to pay for what dp and I had eaten.

Never again. Shame as they were nice in other ways but tightness and dishonesty are not characteristics I seek in friends.

I had friends like that carly she moved from here to live with her partner and we would visit for a weekend or whatever, we would go to the supermarket and she would throw things like pack lunch stuff or packs of mince etc in the trolley and never pay EVER , so one visit i didnt offer to go to the supermarket to get food and she fed us grudgingly, we were not invited back

What is it with stingy arses and food? It's really strange because I might aswell admit the relative I've spoken about above is my brother. We grew up in the same house and were fed equally. My mum was a great cook and I don't ever remember being hungry. We weren't rich at all, but we were all fed. Yet he is the most gluttonous person I know. It must be a psychological thing.

Liege. How do you not murder her?!