Advise me oh wise ones, holiday woes, not sure who's cheeky (is it us?)

[RebeccaWrongDaily]

My sister has a holiday home overseas.She offered it to us for no charge (they use ours regularly) for ten days at the end of May beginning of June.
We have booked flights.
Chatting to her earlier this evening, she's said to me that some friends of hers (who I also know well, well enough to attend their wedding) are going to come over for a week while we're there.
This couple are going through severe marital woes, one has had an affair, the other is throwing themselves into the bottle.
They also have very small children (two toddlers) Neither parent is particularly attentive at the best of times. My DH has a tendency to be a helicopter parent. The villa has a pool without a fence. My children are pre-teen and 9.
I have clear visions of us spending the middle week listening to the parents bicker / have make up sex whilst we collectively stop their children from drowning and pick up the slack of early mornings etc.
Would you still go? Would you book somewhere else? Would you challenge your sister?
We stand to lose about 2k if we just don't go, and then would want to book elsewhere by the way which would be an additional cost. Are we cheeky fuckers for expecting sole use of the house?

YANBU, your sister is well out of order if she didn't tell you they were going before you booked flights! I wouldn't want to lose the flight money though. Have they booked flights? Can you stop them going?

Hi,

I don’t often post replies, but this made me want to as a recent family fall out is bugging me.

I’d ask your sister if this other family have definitely paid for flights....and say if they have you will book alternative accommodation.

Tell her it’s because you never assumed that sharing your holiday homes between your families would include sharing with other people & wouldn’t have booked flights for that time period if you’d have known she was still offering it out to her friends too.

If she chooses to put you out then you can decide on future plans for letting her use yours as and when.

I wonder if she accidentally (over a glass of wine, hearing this woman’s woes) double booked?

Do the same to your sister when she wants your house. Invite the worst family you can think of to share their holiday!

In your place I’d be fuming. Your sister is incredibly rude just to assume you want your holiday gate crashed by people you would have no intention of holidaying with. You’re a better person than me, I’d have told her what I thought in no uncertain terms when she told you. I’m with a lot of the other posters insofar as 1. I’d be giving your sister what for. 2. Booking alternative accommodation. Some folk have said that maybe you could just rent somewhere for the time they’re there, but I bet they’ll leave it looking like a bomb site and you’d be the poor buggers doing the cleaning!

Ps - I wouldn’t bet letting her use your holiday home again either...

Very rude of your sister. I'd first check that the other family have really booked their flights. Then see if you can pay the airline a fee to change your flights, or book alternative accommodation in the same area as your sister's villa. Depends what's cheaper. If you're only going for 10 days I'd look for somewhere else for the whole holiday - not worth doing a day or so in a villa, then somewhere else, then villa again
And I'd explain to your sister how unfair she has been and never lend her your place again

Would she expect sole use of your house, or would you expect her to share? I think if it’s the latter then you would have to suck it up. However, if she gets sole use of your holiday home, I would be suggestiand the same at hers.

If you choose your words carefully you can imply that she is being unreasonable and that this would detrimentally affect her future use of your holiday home without having to be that blunt, and hopefully she will see the error in her ways. Otherwise I think you really will have to be quite honest and open about it, and as a result of this you’ll be thinking twice about her access to your home.

I’d be fuming!! How rude! Inform your sister promptly that she could be liable for the young children drowning in their pool and you do not want to have to worry about it! This would actually cause a big issue if my sister did this to me!!

This would be a huge NOPE NOPE NOPE from me and I'd lose my shit with DSIS

Holiday time is to relax and get away from it all. To have DSIS decide you can just share that holiday with a very dysfunctional family under marital stress without consulting you first AFTER paying for your flights???

Fucking hell, I'm livid on your behalf.

There'd be a big family fall-out over this if it were me.

I would book somewhere else for that one week (& hope the parents look after their kids properly themselves when there!), seriously you are getting the other week(s) free and this couple may have chosen that week because they know you will both look after the kids and give them a break! If you are ok with it, and happy to go with they expectation that it will be exactly as you describe and give them a chance to maybe have a needed break, then go for it:)

Your sister is out of order.
If I were you I would book an AirBnB for the entire time, to make use of the flights, and ensure that your own holiday home is ‘unavailable’ to your sister for the foreseeable future.

Have you spoken to your sister again OP?

Got to love the "just book another place" crowd. Maybe op can't afford to? And why should op when she was originally promised?

Have a conversation with her that she needs to go apologise to the other family that there had been a mistake before they have booked their flights. If they have already booked their flights, then she will need to come to an arrangement with them over sorting out an alternative accommodation, even if that is her paying.

Point out that she has used your holiday home with the idea of sole use and you expect the same or you will have to consider charging from all the times she used your accommodation to cover the costs of you finding an alternative accommodation as it is not going to be safe, nor work.

Don't give her the option of you paying out - she has to pay out for any mistake she made. Her fuck up to resolve. She wants them to have a cheap holiday - she can pay for that rather than it be at your expense. Because that's what it will be, at your expense rather than her.

She sees that she is helping two families get a cheap holiday and "extra company" rather than ruining a holiday for at least one family but possibly two. And possibly ruining a friendship.

Staying in a house with somebody else's toddlers in a nightmare in the making, not a holiday.

Take 2 toddler gates with you and 4 of those door handle covers that toddlers can't open. Put gates at top of stairs to protect them unless parents are downstairs and sober. If one story, put in hall to keep kids next to parent's bedrooms. Everyone in your party can relax.

It almost sounds like they would not have bothered telling you if you had not been chatting.

I know what I would do. I would book alternative accommodation, but I would not tell anyone.

I would guess that these friends planned this out for the reasons you are suggesting, they want servants for the week. If you don't tell them then they will still expect servants but will actually have to do things for themselves.

I would also withdraw the use of your holiday home.

Your sister obviously has not taken your feelings into account, and has thrown you in as a marriage fixer/child minder/home cleaner. This way you prove that you are not, and you are not a rollover.

That sounds horrendous! Why would your sister think that is ok? She should have offered them a different week!
Book somewhere else, let your sister know that she was at worst uncaring and at best thoughtless.

My inclination would be to speak to/email the couple and say that you have been told they are coming for a week. Say that it would be great to catch up with them but you're aware that they are having relationship issues at the moment and don't want these to spill over into your family holiday. That you don't want them arguing, etc. in front of your two children (who are older so will definitely pick things up if they're not right). Also ask if they've been before and are aware that the pool is not safe for unattended younger children - say that you are happy leaving yours to swim/play, etc. but that your two children cannot be left in charge of the younger children around the pool and thus they will need to supervise their children themselves.

Lay the rules down now …. with any luck they may decide it's not worth them going!

I have had similar happen to me .
Invited to now ex MIL hoilday home .
When we get there she is next door at sister place so is her sister and toddler grandson .
FIL did not want to stay next door but in mother laws house with us FIL is a disabled man.
What i insisted on is that we a family had our hoilday. We went to all places that we wanted to go to in area .
And we did not interact with them at all .
And we never went back .
So i suggest that you go enjoy lazy days when other family is not there . When are there you get up and go out all day get back about
10sih and all go to your rooms .
I would also do what someone else suggested and a lock boxes for things like ipads so that little don't get hold of them.
Make sure your kids rooms are near you that week.

If you can find and can afford to find somewhere to stay while the other family are there even better.

Two centre holiday, and next time make sure she agrees you get exclusive use

I'd be furious, it doesn't matter how well you know this family, your sister should have asked you about it BEFORE arranging for someone to gatecrash your holiday. So you'll only get 3 days when they're not there? Is there just one kitchen/bathroom? The hassle of any cooking, shopping, getting under each other's feet etc. would annoy me. Is it somewhere you'd go for days out or just a relaxing around the pool sort of holiday?

If you can afford it, I would 100% go somewhere else for the week.

The single factor of their inattentive parenting and an unfenced swimming pool is enough for the week to be stressful.

It's a recipe for disaster, or at least a pretty un-enjoyable holiday. I would be pretty annoyed at being put in that position once flights had been bought and make it clear to my sister that I was not happy and would not want to be put in that position again.

However, a teeny weeny part of me thinks that this kind of occasional, annoying inconvenience is the price you pay for enjoying the advantage of relatively low-cost holidays in a family-owned holiday home. If you get the benefit of 6 holidays there over the next 10 years and 1 is spent sharing with Mr and Mrs Tetchy, then I think you have done alright.

Unless you can get alternative accommodation I would go, put down firm boundaries and take plenty of excursions!

It is a cheek to not as you first when they use your holiday home and you have not done this. I just returned from a friends villa who did the same to me. I am ill, so needed to slob around but as I was alone, they told me their elderly friend also needed a break and would be there. I had already booked my flight so would lose the money, if I backed out. I ended up being her carer. Had to wait hours at the airport for her, supervise her in the pool as she feared she would fall, do all the cooking, cleaning, take her out and put up with her company which was not pleasant and boring. I got no thank yous and she never said please or thank you to staff, so I was constantly embarrassed. I wish I had just booked a hotel somewhere else instead. I think you should do the same, as you will not get the relaxing holiday that you wanted.

@RenoSusan or maybe the toddler's actual PARENTS could provide baby gates?!