Pushing DC to leave home

[Mariearistocat]

Have name changed for this as looking at previous threads I am very much in the minority for my opinion.

I don’t understand this obsession with getting DC out of your house as quickly as possible. There seems to be some MN obsession that as soon as DC turn 18 they need to be looking for somewhere else to stay. I only ever see it on here, never in real life. The amount of responses i see on threads here about giving deadlines to make your DC move out.

Leave laundry on the floor. Chuck them out. Don’t wash their plate after dinner. Chuck the out. Spent money on what is deemed a frivolous item. Chuck them out. What happened to just having conversations with them and setting rules and boundaries and making sure that they are respected.

I don’t know if it’s a competition on how well someone child’s doing that they have moved out. I could never imagine asking my children to move out. They are late teens, paying rent and each have their own jobs to do and I have no issue with this continuing for however long they wished to stay here. This is their home too.

Am I the only one?

1) as an 18 year old I was desperate for my independence from my parents, so I struggle to understand why a young person age 20+ would want to continue living in someone else's house where they are subject to someone else's rules and decisions

And this recent post exactly illustrates my post.
Some of the " I was 18 once so I know all about it"

You really really don't.
You have to go through the experience of being a mother to an adult child to understand.

Being that age once yourself does not count.

I struggle to understand why a young person age 20+ would want to continue living in someone else's house where they are subject to someone else's rules and decisions

When I was a young adult there were no real "rules and decisions" to deal with in my parents' home. Nothing that had any particular negative impact on me, that's for sure.

Financial stability isnt everything but it does help in life

Which is surely why more people in their 20s live at home these days? I think the vast, vast majority of young adults still at home are working hard and saving up money, compared to a small minority of people slobbing about doing nothing and living off their parents.

My DD will move out when shes good and ready. as long as she is showing me shes willing to work/study hard then I have no issues. I hope she stays with me forever. We chose to have them they didn't ask to be born! My dad would have me back In a heartbeat!

@JauntyMcGinty

I want my kids to leave because it's my job as their parent to make them independent. I want them to have opportunities and broad horizons. I want them to explore and have more fun than they'd have living with me. And I want them to know that the second that they need something they can come back. I'm going to cry now because I really just want to barricade the door and keep them forever.

This is the perfect answer

@Macncheeseballs in an ideal world I would love to see my DC meet someone, settle down and would very much love to have grandchildren but that is not my choice to make. As long as they were happy and had a good social life it wouldn’t bother me that they stayed single no.

And no I don’t want them to stay to look after me, I just pointed out that it’s not always a one way street when children stay with their parents.

So I left home in my mid 20s, moved across the country to live with my now fiancé. Secured my dream job back in home city and brought my partner with me.

It made no sense to rent somewhere in the city and pay money to an unknown landlord, when my mum had a 3 bed house and lived on her own.

7 years down the line and we're all still living under the same roof. It's not a problem because my mum brought me up to be a nice person who evolved in to a considerate adult, who found someone of a similar nature to marry.

My mum gets an income from the house she worked bloody hard to pay for, she had her family around her and we get to live in a house beyond our means. I can't ever think that we wouldn't be welcome to live with her. For a brief period over the summer, my sister was back home as well as she suffered a relationship breakdown. It was fine because we're all adults who are respectful of others' boundaries. I can't ever imagine telling my children they're no longer welcome to live with us.

That is absolutely disgusting. At 25 I was nowhere near ready to move out! Why have kids. 25 is the cut off? You should be ashamed of yourself. And guess what? I dont care if you dont like my opinion. Your poor son

It isn’t, it’s normal. If your kids can’t live independently by the time they’re 25, your parenting has been pretty dismal.

Wow !
I have a Ds nearly 21 and Dd nearly 18 and it’s out home as a family and when they are ready to fly the nest they will I would never ever tell them to get out !!
As long as their respecting house rules and being respectful I see no problem with them being home 🏡
I lived by myself aged 17 and Db was left stranded at 15 when my Df decided to piss of to south of France !
Dm had her own life new partner
My children are to precious to me and I know what it’s like to have parents who don’t care and unsupportive keep your kids as long as u can I say (just my opinion )

I agree that most people commenting on here will not have actually experienced having an adult “child” living with them. I have had both of my adult sons at home now and again for short periods and It is not easy to have other adults living in your house. As parents part of our job is to bring up our children to be independent adults who can cope out of the nest. I would be worried about any adult past their early 20s who showed no signs of wanting to leave home. I would be questioning where I went wrong.
I also wonder if some parents can’t bear the thought of “empty nest syndrome” and also only having their partner in the house. I’ve known people who have ignored their relationships whilst concentrating on their kids then find they are left living with a stranger when the kids go.

Wow to the poster who said their house wasn’t their DCs home, how cold and unfeeling . Surely it is their only home until they move out.

I’m in London and bought a lovely flat at 23, 100% deposit in those days. There’s no way my DDs (late teens) will be able to do that. One will still be at uni.

There will always be a place in my home for both of them.

@NoIDontWatchLoveIsland

1) as an 18 year old I was desperate for my independence from my parents, so I struggle to understand why a young person age 20+ would want to continue living in someone else's house where they are subject to someone else's rules and decisions

2. I had a few friends who in their twenties used the availability of free accomodation at home to effectively defer adulthood, shirking taking on any responsibilities. Without exception, those friends are all now worse off as adults. When they eventually decided to grow up, move out and support themselves, they were several years behind the rest of us in progressing a career, saving for a home.

Financial stability isnt everything but it does help in life, and being too dependent on parents can prevent some young people from developing important life skills and.... you know, growing up.

I love being at home and my parents love me being here. Also, I'm not subject to rules - really the only difference if I lived alone would be I wouldn't have to worry about being quiet when others are sleeping. The majority of people I know around my age (21--25) still live at home, only one of them doesn't.

That being said, I can completely understand why some people would want to leave home depending on their relationship with their parents and their own personality.

my son's nearly 20 but is on an apprentice wage of 15K he can't afford to move out but I make sure that he puts into an isa each month for a house purchase in the future. I guess it depends how you bring them up, I don't think I'd be keen on them moving girlfriends or boyfriends in (i have daughters too) I think maybe living together is just that. Its getting your own pad and living together!

Someone made the point on a WFH thread that the benefit of the office is meeting people with different perspectives and from different walks of life.

I think the same applies to living independently, especially with room mates. It's a bit like working in retail - it presents you with challenges that will help you develop as a person and understand other people better.

I wouldn't want any child of mine to only know my home, my standards, etc, especially before living with a partner. Plus there will be a minimum 32 year age gap between me and my children - I think that learning from peers is underrated (I learned to do laundry from a lovely second year guy when I moved into halls).

My daughters mental health has suffered throughout the pandemic and living in a bed sit has not helped as she was eating, sleeping and working in the one room. I did not hesitate to say she could move back in with me. I’d do the same for my other children too. If there’s a need and I can help, then I will.

A lot of these responses are based on DC moving out and then nothing ever going wrong. That’s all well and good, but as I said in my earlier post, DD had moved out but found her relationship had become abusive. Then what? I have read countless threads in “relationships” of women wanting to leave an abusive partner and the advice is “do you have family you can stay with”. It is not a “failure to launch” if your DC have moved out but then find that relationship breakdown, job loss or whatever has left them in a difficult situation. Wouldn’t you then want to help them if you can? Hopefully all these people posting will never be in that situation and their DC will have happy and successful lives with no need to ever return home. But don’t judge those whose lives don’t pan out that way. It is not a failure on behalf of the adults or the DC, it’s just that life turns to shit sometimes, that’s how it is.

Its not their home. Its mine and my husband's. They only get to share until they can get a place of their own. Adult children need to make their own home. Not live in mine

Wow. When does it stop being their home? On their 18th birthday?

My children are mid/late teens and I'll be encouraging them to move off and away after uni for sure.

I'll always be there for the odd year that their job doesn't work out, a boyfriend or girlfriend leaves them or they need a place whilst saving up for a little while.

However I don't want them to live with me into their twenties and thirties without leaving and the last thing I'll be doing is making it so cushy they want to stay. I know at least three families where the parents, who are reasonably wealthy, have made annexes or converted the barn or made mini-flats in their houses for their children, one just staying in the family home. They are now entering their lat thirties to mid forties and their parents are wondering why they do min wage jobs or have difficulty holding down a job, have lovely partners but aren't getting on with having children, and are just generally still living as if they are early twenties at most.

I think it is really important as a person to strike out on your own, fine to retreat for a bit if you need to, I've lived a couple of times at my mums for six months once and three years another time, so that would be fine with me, but not to just come home from uni (or not go at all) and sit.

I'll be using the money to give them a deposit if I have enough, not converting the roof or annex and wondering why they are still sitting there a decade or more later.

My friends 'child' is 28, pays the bare minimum treats her like a maid and does sod all in the house but it's his home and she will never ask him to leave. I'd have bought him a suitcase and helped him pack by now!

@sticksticks

Its not their home. Its mine and my husband's. They only get to share until they can get a place of their own. Adult children need to make their own home. Not live in mine

Wow. When does it stop being their home? On their 18th birthday?

There are no words ....

What an eighteenth birthday gift

I've also noticed that a lot of adult children that live at home end up quite content with not very well paid jobs. I think that's because pretty much all their money is their money, paying only a little into a household pot. If they earn only £1000 a month that would be a poor standard of living on their own, but in a household where mum and dad only ask for a token £100 they are wealthy. Part of the drive to do well in life is to have a reasonable standard of living and that gets taken away from at least some young people (fair enough if they then save £800 each month for a deposit and leave but I haven't seen that happen so much, usually they just have a nicer life with takeaways and clothes).

I struggle to understand why a young person age 20+ would want to continue living in someone else's house where they are subject to someone else's rules and decisions

If you’ve bought your kids up well, there doesn’t really have to be rules as such. My kids are 17 and 12 and don’t need rules. They’re fully functioning people and we all respect each other. Our eldest is at college, comes and goes as he wants, he respects us and his home. Both kids do stuff that needs doing in the house. They already understand that we all have to be considerate of each other, it’s not really rules.

Our home will always be their home. Equally when they’re ready to move out, we’ll be very happy for them.

A lot of answers that I see on here is that children living at home are lazy, entitled and lack life skills. Can I just ask why that is a cause to ask them to move out.

Surely if they have become this way then it’s because the parents have allowed this attitude and that you need to take steps to remedy this, put in house rules, we have a rota in our house for everyone.

If you made them move out without really sorting out the issues that you helped create are you not just putting this problem on to someone else ( roommate, partner etc.)

It’s really economic changes in larger society that determines whether most adult children live on their own or in a multi-generational household. It’s not bad/good parenting or a bad/good adult child that determines the “normal” for the times.
Now is a place and time where the U.K. housing crisis has only gotten worse since it was first identified as a crisis twenty years ago, so it’s not surprising more adult children are living in multigenerational households. It’s also not surprising that elderly are also moving in with their adult children too! It makes economic sense for relatives to join households because you reduce living costs for all concerned.

@Mariearistocat

A lot of answers that I see on here is that children living at home are lazy, entitled and lack life skills. Can I just ask why that is a cause to ask them to move out.

Surely if they have become this way then it’s because the parents have allowed this attitude and that you need to take steps to remedy this, put in house rules, we have a rota in our house for everyone.

If you made them move out without really sorting out the issues that you helped create are you not just putting this problem on to someone else ( roommate, partner etc.)

Exactly.