To think my son should take ALL his suff?

[toconclude]

DS(31) at last in position to buy his own house - been renting nearly 10 years. Aibu to ask him to collect all the remaining books/other bits and bobs amounting to a half dozen large storage boxes which currently occupy his old room and some other corners of the house since he moved out to live a considerable way away? He is reluctant as his DP has stuff too and he's right that technically we have space. Honestly, I would like to clear it. But us getting rid of it altogether obviously a nono without his agreement and it has sentimental value to him.

[NeverForgetYourDreams]

I left home at 19 into rented and my parents put all my stuff on the drive and said whatever I didn't take would go to the tip! It made me collect it all :-)

[Goingdownto]

Things don't tend to have sentimental value until you are further away from them in time - there are things I've kept that wouldn't have interested me in my 20s. And vice versa I suppose

[onlinelinda]

He needs to collect it. I can think of 2 separate instances where, when stuff was finally collected, it was thrown away by the owner. They don't want it; they want you to enable them to delay the decision.

[canigooutyet]

What is the point in all this stuff boxed up for decades forgotten about and only opened up when the parents have died?

Why should the parents be responsible for stuff they don't want? If something happened to the house it would be them doing all the insurance stuff, not the actual owners.

Stuff stored for decades in the loft space, who is left to move it all if any works need doing there?

If it's that sentimental or treasured to you why leave it with someone else? Surely these are the things that you want to personally protect?

Are parents expected to never move because of all this stuff they don't want? All because you don't have the space for your stuff.

Why should they pay for things like skips to move your crap, haven't they cleaned up after your arses for long enough?

Surely the mature, responsible thing would be to ask parents about keeping some stuff there, and making your own arrangements to move it from A to B without assuming someone else will do this.

It's not about getting rid of all traces of ever having children. It's about finally reclaiming a large proportion of your home back from your kids. When you think, from the day they move in to the day they move out, their crap is everywhere.

Even though mine have been and taken a lot, I still open a cupboard or something and find a cup that they claimed. The chip in something, a dent, a stain that won't go. The towel from the hair dye disaster that is still in use. Sometimes walking past a random thing I burst out laughing at a memory from long ago. To get this from their crap, I'd have to go through it all.

[MereDintofPandiculation]

I don't think I cleared all mine until I was in my 40s. I moved out at 20. It's partly sentimental - feeling that in some way the home I grew up in is still in some sense my home. So get him to take it if you are no longer happy to have it, but realise there are emotional overtones - he may feel he is being ejected from your life as well as his stuff. Please don't take the hard line being advocated by some posters.

[toconclude]

@anon5000

Why would you tip your own sons possessions? He wasn't the bloody lodger and he is still part of your family. You don't have to stop being nice and helping your children out when they move out.

At no point did I say I wanted to in fact quite the opposite, so not sure where the hostile attitude is coming from?