Do your ILs have keys to your house?

[snowballsandsunshine]

Long standing disagreement with the ILs which keeps getting brought up every so often.

I will not give keys to our house to my ILs (or my parents for that matter, but they don't care I don't have keys to their houses either!). I actually wouldn't give anyone a key out of choice at all, but I have given one to my cousin (who lives round the corner and is like my sister) just in case we ever get locked out or have an emergency. I gave it to her because I know she'd never, ever use it unless I asked her to. The ILs don't know my cousin has a key, they'd get really offended and cause a huge fuss.

My ILs always had a key to DHs house before I lived with him, which he took off them to give to me when I moved in (years ago now). I think he meant to get another cut for them but I said I didn't want people having keys to my home and he never did. We then bought a house together and they asked for one, and I (nicely) said no and explained we weren't giving keys to anyone.

My ILs are not bad people, they wouldn't be in my house stealing or anything like that. I'm just extremely private and I absolutely hate the thought that they could let themselves in. They wouldn't to do anything bad, but I wouldn't put it past them to do it if for example FIL wanted to borrow something out of DHs shed/toolbox and I wasn't here. Or - MIL being nice would let herself in when she knows I'm not here and do my housework because I'm pregnant and can't manage it with a toddler (not true, I am pregnant but I'm absolutely fine,
I'm in good health!). I can't bear the thought of someone folding my huge pregnancy pants or actually seeing my messy kitchen when I'm having a lazy day ha ha ha!

Anyway, it keeps getting mentioned. I stand firm and say no, DH does say 'Snow says no' but does try to get round me in private because he doesn't see an issue.

AIBU?

Both sets of parents have keys for our house. My Mum has used hers once in 10 years when we were away and she called in to stay overnight with the dog.

MIL is trickier. Last year I bought a Ring doorbell and didn't tell anyone, just popped it up and away we went. MIL wasn't due around, nobody had asked her to call in for anything but I was in the staff room (teaching) one afternoon and got a notification that there'd been movement at the front door. Checked the live feed and there she was, using her key to get into the house. You can speak through it, so I asked "Hi MIL, are you alright, I wasn't expecting a visit today?" and she almost soiled herself in the rush to find an excuse for going into our house when she shouldn't have.

Since the doorbell arrived there've been 100% fewer unannounced visits whilst I'm at work. There may well be a link between the two.

My ILs ended up with a key after months of nagging.They thought it was 'sensible', despite living 200 miles away.

Finally took it back after they continuously let themselves in each time they came down to visit. Was particularly embarrassing early one morning when I'd just had DS1. They rocked up at the crack of dawn when I was naked having just got out of the bath. That + hormones = LAST STRAW!

My SIL still lets them have one. About a year ago they wandered into her & BIL's bedroom at 8am, FIL in full flow at how lazy they were to still be in bed. BIL totally needs to grow a pair.

Guard your house keys with your life!

phoning our cleaner to get her to check what was in the fridge.

I hope you told your cleaner that you would be seriously pissed if she gave out ANY information to your mil. Why did she have your cleaner’s number?

Neither my ILs or DPs have a key. My ILs would probably be fine, but my folks already like to drop in - giving them keys would mean coming back from a dog walk to my mum washing the dishes while my dad makes tea. Ugh, I'm in a cold sweat just picturing it.

Yes. My mum does too.

They each pick ds up from school one day a week. In laws live 40 minutes away so it's easier for everyone if they take ds to ours, give him his tea and have a play etc.

Mum lives close but sometimes ds wants to come home instead of Nanas house.

I've got nowt to hide. Sometimes they do my ironing!

My PIL have a key but would never ever use it unless they have to or phone for permission first. We live close by and MIL once asked if she could sit at ours until the workmen finished in her house (total bedlam), which of course we were fine with.
My DM has a key too but only uses it when she's asked to feed our cat.

My DSis however is a flat out no to anyone having a key. She's at the other side of the country and when I was staying at hers for a week she wouldn't give me a key or the alarm code so I was stuck in when she was out at work and stuck out if she left before I got back. Very annoying and it made for a difficult visit.

YANBU if you're not comfortable with it.

DM has a key, she lives alone but very close and is always welcome to pop in if she needs anything. She would never let herself in if we were home though, this is more like needing sugar / milk when we're at work.

Oh I'm not worried that they'll overstep when the baby arrives. They know my due date but baby will be coming by ELCS a week or so before that - and they don't know that. My mum would 100% say sorry no visitors if I asked to her as well, no worries about that.

When we had DD I made it clear (to everyone) that unplanned visits were not ok and actually they didn't try it once. MIL did have a tantrum when DD was two weeks old and we cancelled a visit - because I'd only been out of hospital for a few days following a 3 day horrendous birth and was resting. They only live five miles away and we genuinely didn't think they'd mind. I was sleeping (and by some miracle DD was too) so DH rang her and said we're going to have to leave it for today, can you come tomorrow and she went on and on about how disappointed she was and said she couldn't come till the following week (she could, they're retired she was just having a strop). DH told her off then, said she was being silly and selfish and she did apologise after. She's not done anything like that since.

The following people have a key to my house
Mil - even though she lives a continent away
2 friends who live in Florida and visit once a year
BIL and SIL 1 - one each
BIL 2
The cleaner
The dogwalker
My next door neighbour
My friend from when the kids were little
The old babysitter
My friend who is undergoing chemo and stays in our house the night before a treatment
Probably a few random people I've forgotten.

Given what you've posted OP I would never give a key to your in laws. Your FIL opening the parcels would be the first and last straw for me. I'd also be hopping if someone came in and started cleaning (cleaner excepted :))

there are plenty of Threads on here about people kicking off about MIL's and FIL's having no qualms about just entering homes.... and invading privacy.. crossing boundaries etc...

FUCK that...so No OP... you are NOT being unreasonable...

Just a note of caution to you OP.

If PIL don't care about boundaries and are as determined as you say to get your house keys it may be that they have already got some copies made (by whatever means) and are in effect going through the motions of seeking your approval to them having keys. They will use the excuse of a new baby expected to offer all kinds of 'help' in the hope that you will feel bad at refusing. Harden your heart, it's your home, not theirs, no matter what they think.

PositivelyPERF

Because (classic MIL) she found our cleaner for DH before I had moved in. Obviously the cleaner switched loyalties fairly swiftly and stopped participating (not least because her friend worked as a cleaner for MIL, and MIL ended up charging her friend 100s of £ to retrieve some items she had sent back home after MIL had told her she could have them as she was throwing them out. Because she is a bitch) but it was a horrifying thing to learn that she had been calling to check.

Fil is a locksmith and changed our locks for us when moved into our new house (unasked) and kept a key. He changed our door number,
Knocker etc because he didn’t like the ones that were there and replaced them with awful ones- again unasked. He kept letting himself in but didn’t realize we have a monitored alarm system so I told him the alarm company were concerned about activity at the house while we were at work and we had instructed them to call the police next time the alarm system was turned off. He soon stopped after that.

@iffyjiffybag They definitely don't have keys already. There's only three copies, mine (which they've never had access to) DHs (he would never go against what I've said and let them have it, even if he doesn't really get why it's a problem for me) and the one I had cut that went straight to my cousin. We had new doors installed when we moved in so I know there aren't any more kicking around.

I'm 99% sure they wouldn't do that anyway. They are blurry on boundaries but they aren't nasty, I honestly don't think they'd go that far. Plus they know me well enough to know what a huge falling out it would cause if they did something like that.

They are blurry on boundaries but they aren't nasty, I honestly don't think they'd go that far.

I once said that

They are blurry on boundaries but they aren't nasty, I honestly don't think they'd go that far.

That’s exactly what DH says. I haven’t told him his mother was gloating to mine about getting a key cut without our knowledge 🤦🏻‍♀️

My parents (just my dad now) always had keys to our house, whereas dh's parents (just his mum now) never had keys - despite the fact that she lives 5+minutes away, whereas my dad lives 25 minutes away. Difference was that we trust my dad (and my mum when she was alive) whereas we didn't/don't trust MIL (that's dh's opinion of his own mother ). Meant that they could accept deliveries, help with picking ds up from school when he was younger and we had work commitments, feed the cats etc.

SIL (the one dh likes) does have keys as she comes to feed our cats when we're away on holiday. He'd never give keys to his other sister (he'd pay for a cattery if nice SIL wasn't available).

It really does depend on your relationship with your in-laws.

Yes our in laws live literally round the corner so it's really incase we get locked out or if they pop in to let the dog out if we are out for the day!

They would never come into our house and clean or anything like that and if they wanted to borrow a tool etc would ask and only get it themselves if we said to but someone is generally home more than they are work wise.

I'm always surprised at the number of treads on MN about this topic! Unless my family are rare I don't think it's the normal custom to hand over extra keys to your parents/inlaws.

I suggest embracing technology to solve this issue! My colleague recently bought a new house and she had electronic locks installed for keyless entry (you can use a physical key in an emergency). She loves it because she has incorporated it with her home security system, she can set it to allow visitors entry and can monitor activity. She and her DH got this system in part -you guessed it!... because her recently retired inlaws had taken to invading their privacy and entering their home when they were out to entertain themselves and have a good rummage around. Now they don't have a key but can get access when granted remotely by my colleague/her DH and their access activity is monitored. My colleague was very happy to explain all these wonderful bells and whistles to them and as she had hoped, they seem to have been so intimidated by all the technology and monitoring capability that they haven't tried gaining access to her new home once!

This high tech entry system is quite expensive I believe, but far cheaper are home security systems like Nest. You can set up motion sensor cameras in your rooms to monitor when you are not home to deter burglars. If you casually mention this to your snoopy parents/inlaws, it might make them think twice before snooping around your home when you are out if they think they'll be caught on camera. You can set it up so that you get alerts on your phone if the cameras detect motion and start filming so you'll know exactly what they are doing in your home. I'd mention that as well!

DO NOT give them a key. Your instinct tells you it's a bad idea. Listen to it.

No one has a key to our house other than me and DH.
My PILs used to have a key to DH's house and kept it after I moved in with him, and they would let themselves in when we were out at work for random reasons (getting something non essential from the garage for example) but they also did it when we went on holiday, snooped round the house, took our dirty laundry (and the bath mat from the en suite that we never used), passed comment on how I stored things in my wardrobe to BIL and SIL and read papers in the office (a bill from a hotel stay)

I am a hugely private person and that was all too much for me so when we moved into our jointly owned house no one had a spare key, and the same for our current house.

PILs have a spare key for BIL and SIL's house and just let themselves in whenever they fancy, which I find strange. I think I would find it less odd if they called prior to turning up, but they just turn up unexpectedly and arrive in their lounge.

At our last house we had a driveway with electric gates controlled by remote fob or entering a code. But our gates were solid wood so if you entered the drive with the code, for to the door and no one was in, the gates would be shut and you'd be trapped.
We only had 3 fobs (me, DH and my mum - because she lived 45 mins away on the bus and didn't drive so wouldn't be randomly popping round)
Almost all of my in laws queried why they couldn't have the code to the gates or why we couldn't order new fobs... crazy SIL reckoned she should have a fob in case she drove round to ours and it was raining which meant she couldn't get out of the car to press the buzzer for us to open the gates!
DH told her to ring his phone if that was the case... plus I can count on 1 hand the amount of times she came round to our house!

Don't do it. Gave a key to my ils and they used to use it. Saying they didn't want to disturb us by knocking on the door. Once almost caught us (myself and dh) in the act and another time let themselves in while I was on my own in the shower and as I wondered around in next to nothing I bumped into fil. I took the key away after that.

They are blurry on boundaries but they aren't nasty, I honestly don't think they'd go that far.

That’s exactly what DH says. I haven’t told him his mother was gloating to mine about getting a key cut without our knowledge.

Why wouldn't you tell your DH?

I was thinking that @TorviBrightspear - if I found out my MIL had done that I'd go nuclear and DH would too.