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AIBU?

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Original poster

Bloody entitled grown up children!

327 replies

PhaedrasChocolate · 29/08/2018 13:50

May very well get lambasted for this, but i need to vent.

I have a 21 year old dd. She is currently transferring to a different university as she hated her course last year. She's been staying with her bf all summer, she doesn't live with me.

I woke this morning to a WhatsApp telling me I need to hurry up and log on to some student accommodation portal and accept being guarantor for her new place...

She's never asked me to be guarantor. This is the first I've heard of any if it, I've had no emails, don't know anything about the portal.

Apparently if I don't do it by the end of today, she's got nowhere to live Hmm She was breathtakingly rude to me on the phone and I'm really pissed off.

Anyway. My point is this. Am I the only parent of dc this age that thinks they are a generation of selfish, entitled little shits? Are they all like this? Me and my mum shouted at each other for a couple of years until I left home, but we had a good relationship after that and still do.

I just don't know how to deal with her. I love her madly, we used to be so close, and then around 17/18 it all changed. I foolishly thought I'd got away with it because she was still lovely as a 15 year old....

How do I deal with this? I don't want to alienate her any more than I have already, but she treats me horribly a lot of the time, and I don't want to put up with it.

OP posts:
Prezel1979 · 29/08/2018 19:30

The halls probably require guarantors, and that’s the option she’s booked assuming you will do it. Suddenly refusing may not be constructive, if she’s not expecting it - more likely to alienate her. You’ve got to educate people out of entitled behaviour. Tell her calmly that you can’t just inform someone they are to be a guarantor, it is a big (adult) financial commitment and she needs to follow adult behavioural norms with you. Which is, to collect all the information, bring it to you, ask you politely if you could do it and you will consider.

As it is deadline day and you do not yet know if you can decide immediately she will also need to see with the accommodation about an extension. Up to her how she does that or how she explains it.

Neither her being suddenly left hanging (unless there have already been lots of clear warnings building up to it, or you just doing it, are good outcomes. If she has a day working hard to sort out her own problem, she will remember the lessons of that much better than any lectures or angry refusals.

katielouise3 · 29/08/2018 19:30

@AhNowTed

So who do you think will stand guarantor if not the mother?

And what if 'the mother' cannot be guarantor? Hmm

Bad (or no) credit record/low income/on benefits?

Do tell us all........ You do seem to be the font of all knowledge!!!!!!!!!!!

And better to be 'hysterical' and very cautious, than breathtakingly naive and clueless, and get yourself into a pile of financial shit you can't get out of! Hmm

fattyboomboomboom · 29/08/2018 19:30

DocJimmy - lippy and mardy is upsetting and frustrating too. Chinese water torture.

Missingstreetlife · 29/08/2018 19:31

I think they do become human again about 25. Having to go to work helps

Dungeondragon15 · 29/08/2018 19:34

People are saying that all students have a guarantor but that can't be the case as many parents will not sign, particularly if it means that they are liable for the whole house. It must be possible to pay the whole term in advance and whilst some may not be able to afford this, many will. How is the student loan paid for example. Do they they receive a lump sum for the term? I will be giving my children a lump sum each term too as I'm sure many other parents do. They can pay the rent in advance with that.

SchadenfreudePersonified · 29/08/2018 19:36

Nope, nope, nope, do not be a guarantor - if it goes tits up whether it was your daughters fault or not you will get lumped with the costs

Take heed of Fuckpants - these are wise words.

abacucat · 29/08/2018 19:37

Not a pearl clutcher. Just someone whose relatives have not gone to university and so I didnt know this about guarantors. Actually more likely that poor people like me will know this, rather than well off people.

Motoko · 29/08/2018 19:40

may be interested to know that I signed the guarantee form for my DS and I haven't been in paid employment for 19 years and have no income of my own!

But you have money from somewhere to live on I assume? IE, you're married or living with a partner, or have money from somewhere else? Or maybe you own your house, with no mortgage. You wouldn't get credit otherwise.
OP has said her daughter has only had her to bring her up since she was 7, so it sounds like OP is a single parent. She also has a younger child. On a minimum wage job with one dependent, OP probably receives tax credits, so I really doubt she would be accepted.

ReservoirDogs · 29/08/2018 19:42

Seriously it will be different for different tenancies re the guarantor.

Some want joint liability for whole jouse.
Some will allow just the proportion for that student.

Some do not even require a guarantor.

I refused to be guarantor for my son on a joint liability basis. It turned out the ither students' parents had not understood tgeir legal obligations. The students found a different property that did not need guarantors.

There are ao many anecdotal stories on here and just because it was the situation for you/your child does not mean this is what it is for everyone!

Cloudyapples · 29/08/2018 19:43

She’s 21 - not a child. Unless you can afford to pay her rent if she cant, do not sign to be her guarantor. She’s an adult so she’ll have to start acting like one and figure it out herself.

AhNowTed · 29/08/2018 19:44

@katielouise3

'the mother'? I said her mother as, and correct me if I'm wrong, it is her mother who is asking.

But feel free to twist my words to support your agenda.

Font of all knowledge I am not, but having gone through this twice, one just finished and the other with 2 years to run, as guarantor I am guaranteeing my own DC and no one else.

The question remains, without a guarantor the student is unlikely to secure accommodation.

AhNowTed · 29/08/2018 19:46

@ReservoirDogs

Fair enough

DocJimmy · 29/08/2018 19:54

DocJimmy - lippy and mardy is upsetting and frustrating too. Chinese water torture.

Of course, I was a lippy and mardy little twerp and I cringe at the way I spoke to my parents in my late teens and into my early 20s! They tended to roll their eyes and wondered who this curt, monosyllabic oaf was who'd emerged in place of their previously polite and likeable son. I grew out of it by the time I finished university, they saw it as a phase and knew it was a difficult time for us both, me adjusting to adult life and making multiple cock ups and then as empty nesters.

They didn't see me as an terrible person, but an immature and not especially nuanced person not dealing with situations very well. Unless, there's a back story to this, the op whilst understandably annoyed, might think about whether her reaction is proportionate.

Gemstonemama · 29/08/2018 19:58

I really feel for you OP, although I'm on the other side of this now as a new-ish Mum I was once the 21 year old on the other end of the phone!

My own situation is too outing but my DM and I were alone from my early teenage years with little or no support from my DF. I was pretty easy mostly for my DM, but completely didn't get her P.O.V and she took on everything - not just financially, my rage, rudeness, fear etc not to mention she was extremely alone when I left for uni.

The best thing she ever did for me? She made me stand on my own two feet and explained that she couldn't be my financial crutch, be it as a guarantor or provider. She helped me in whatever way she could, but with this boundary in place I quickly learned to be resourceful and to appreciate her support. No university will let a student be homeless - I met with student chaplaincy and the team responsible and found accommodation more suitable for my situation. I have to admit I didn't do this very gracefully but it really helped me to understand my DM and now years later our relationship is very open and honest.

By being honest she treated me with respect and taught me a life lesson, I was entitled but needed to know opportunities have to be found and fought for, not handed to me on a plate and not given by my DM! It didn't make her less of a mother to me, plus in true entitled style she still did my laundry for me on my trips home 🙈 the whole thing made me a better person, lots of 21 year olds are selfish but by 25 get nicely rounded I found!

GreenGingerAndRum · 29/08/2018 19:58

Our 19 is similar OP thinks nothing of swearing at us, and then pleading poverty, having gone out and spent all their money.

Totally fallen out with their father, my husband, due to the incredibly rude behaviour, it only serves to make my life more difficult.

Teenagers are so self obsessed, can’t read a book, but can perfect a self photograph ( which would have got you ridiculed years ago) and amazing at makeup, yet live in a pigsty.

Not my pigsty full of clean clothes, but a pigsty of filth.

BeautifulPossibilities · 29/08/2018 20:03

You have to say no eventually and that's how she will learn to be an adult and stand on her own two feet. Especially with that kind of attitude

GreenGingerAndRum · 29/08/2018 20:09

The lady who wrote about poor relatives who haven’t gone to university...

if you are deemed to be low income, you can get a nice big loan, if you are deemed to be wealthy, no matter what your circumstances, other children, mortgage, existing debt, outgoings, your child will get the minimum loan, and you either pay for them in addition to this, whether you can afford it or not, or they need to work, or both.

AJPTaylor · 29/08/2018 20:09

When my dd went, i think i was guarantor on her 2 sets of halls and her year 2 flat.with the flat i was very clear both to her and in the contract that it was only her rent i was guaranteeing

HeckyPeck · 29/08/2018 20:28

Those of you who say that the agency won't accept the OP as a guarantor because she doesn't earn enough may be interested to know that I signed the guarantee form for my DS and I haven't been in paid employment for 19 years and have no income of my own! I do, however, have an excellent credit rating so I'm guessing that was good enough for them. (And yes if DS did default I could afford to pay his rent!)

Very different situation though as OP couldn’t afford to pay the rent if the DD doesn’t pay.

LightastheBreeze · 29/08/2018 20:34

They also look at things like if you own your home and stuff like that, they also look at your credit rating.

nonevernotever · 29/08/2018 20:43

BTW @aynrand the demographics who came up with the millennial generation regarded it as covering those born between1982 (i think) and about 2004, though they reckoned the boundary between millennial and generation z can't be completely defined until later, so it is perfectly correct to describe young adults now as being millennial.

nonevernotever · 29/08/2018 20:45

Demographers not demographics

IAmAllAstonishment · 29/08/2018 21:00

Hmm As a mature student I was shocked to find out that guarantors are 100% expected by any student landlord. They catagorically won’t rent to students without one.

So I appreciate that as an adult with a careful approach to finances you may consider this an ‘option’ but If you don’t guarantor for her she won’t get anywhere to live, end of. It’s not really an ‘option’ it’s just expected of you as a parent if you want your child to be able to study.

I knew of a girl whose parents refused to guarantor last year, think they were trying to make a point as she’d been overspending. Anyway she couldn’t find anywhere to live and ended up dropping out.

DisgustedofSouthend · 29/08/2018 21:15

it is not just students who need guarantors though. An awful lot of rented accommodation needs guarantors.

Bluelady · 29/08/2018 21:26

If you're not a student you only need a guarantor if you've got a rubbish credit record or can't satisfy proof of income.