To send adult daughter to her room??

[Auntieobem]

Dd is 19, finishing off 2nd year st Uni so has been home for about 3 weeks. Has one exam to go- next week.

She does virtually nothing round the house. Will help.wash dishes if nagged, will do one load of washing a week if nagged. We're giving her £250 a.month to top up her student loan. She's just started to look at volunteering over the summer. We pay for her phone.

Her room is a tip. Dirty and clean clothes covering the floor, rubbish lying round the bin, damp towels on floor etc. I asked her to spend 30 mins tidying it. She said no. That she'd do it tomorrow. She always says that. I told her in that case she could go sit in her dirty room. I want to treat her like an adult, but she behaves like a 11 year old and is so entitled!

Sigh - I don’t have any concrete evidence for this, its more a view I’ve formed. It applies to boys and girls but because I have a daughter so that is my concern. I have many friends who I grew up with and I have met in later life I see the women who have grown up like this turn into very incapable women. I don’t know if unconsciously they take on a view that they need or deserve to be looked after financially from men. My female friends like this despite being bright are the ones who are not financially independent they don’t have money of their own and are reliant on hubby - and they don’t seem to think they should. All our kids are 18 or older and despite moaning about being bored have not done a days work since first child, they moan that husbands can’t pay for their gym classes anymore - despite the fact one was made redundant and was working like a maniac to find new job - he talks to my DH and says he would love to take his work down a bit for a better life balance but can’t. My point is this sort of molly codling is creating women who see dependance on men as normal and deserved, we need to be creating strong independent women who can be successful in work if they choose, who have choices and are not imprisoned by a glitter coated servitude. No matter how many gym classes you go to or spa days - its still servitude. Oh and two got divorced and got the shock of their lives when the outcomes they expected was’nt handed to them on a plate and christ listening to them having had to enter the real world - you’d think they were fighting in the somme!

Stop topping her loan up.

If shes got plenty why does she expect you to top it up? Tell her while she's not helping she can do without your financial support to add to her large amount of savings

It’s tricky at this age, because you can’t take approaches like you’d take with younger teens. If I was you I’d sit down with her and figure out how much money she needs a month - if she doesn’t need you supplementing her with £250/month then there’s no need to give it to her. But the cost of living nowadays is awful.

With the room situation, I’m an advocate for letting them keep their room how they decide to keep it. Most people grow out of messy rooms in their early twenties. However be stern with the wet towels/dishes to make sure the mould doesn’t return. Dry clothes and bits and pieces won’t cause mould.

About the volunteering, I’d definitely be firm and insist she gets a paying job. People with jobs during sixth form/university are the most responsible and well-rounded individuals in 99% of scenarios. Especially if you are giving her money, make at least an 8 hour week job a requirement.

Finally with chores, don’t do any of her washing and she’ll run out of clothes. Make sure she does her dishes. Past that, there’s not much need. Enjoy them being home from uni.

So your answer is to encourage girls to clean over studying? I think it's the other way round. Make her tidy all the time and she'll be like these friends of yours, only capable of being a mum and housewife. Get her degree and she'll be much more likely to have a career. And tidying up might cine with age or maybe her future husband can do the lions share of cleaning!

Disgusting. have you not spoiled her OP? Tell her she'll need to move out if she doesn't respect your home and everything you do for her and mean it!!!!!

She might vey well do it with her 20k savings and op doesn't want to kill all trust in their relationship, just have no mould! Bit extreme, along with the suggestion of removing her bedroom door.
Honestly are some of you parents with adult children who actually talk to you? She's only 19, yes an adult but jeez.

I'm sure if she gets a bf that floor will be sparkling ✨️

You said people like that, ie the ops daughter who is messy, don't succeed? That they stay home?
I think you'll find it's the ones who like cleaning who stay home after babies!!
What on earth do you mean then? It's exam time and you think tidying should be the focus? But uni is the priority surely?

@Boomboom22

You are on the money!!

I’m absolutely appalled at all these women coming on here banging on about the girl doing housework

WHEN SHE HAS EXAMS

How bloody medieval.

If it were my kid I would be cutting them slack and supporting them as much as I could to achieve as highly as possible.

Yes read the riot act once the exams are over, set boundaries and responsibilities.

But for heavens sake let her focus on what is actually going to be important to her career! And it isn’t being susie homemaker.

Take her door away like in freaky Friday

Also all this let’s stop her maintenance loan top up payment…. Awful… just awful… yeah let’s fuck her over financially because she isn’t doing the dishes in exam weeks!!

“The maintenance loan is given to help towards student accommodation and living expenses. The amount of loan you receive can depend on your parent’s income. The loan is influenced by your parent’s earnings. Simply put, the higher the family income, the less loan you receive. In this shortfall, parents are expected to help cover costs which the maintenance loan can’t.”

https://blog.moneysavingexpert.com/2016/09/how-much-are-parents-supposed-to-give-their-children-when-they-go-to-university/#:~:text=There's%20no%20way%20parents%20can%20be%20forced%20to%20contribute&text=In%20fact%2C%20the%20only%20option,were%20living%20off%20that%20money.

You are not considered an independent student until either you have lived away from home for 3yrs or you are 25.

Until either of those two things happen, the parents income is taken into account and the funds reduced due to it. With the expectation that the parents will make up the shortfall so their child receives the same as those on full funding. Because their offspring is still in education and they are responsible.

So angry at all of this pushing OP to subject the daughter to financial penalty. Putting her at a disadvantage compared to peers, punishing her for saving/receiving extra from grandparents, and giving her a hard time during exams. Just ACE parenting right there.

OP, the fact that she has built up 20k in her account suggests to me she is borrowing too much. Is there a way to reduce this as you're able to top her up? Student loans can be such a burden later in life. And to everyone obsessed with students working while in uni, that's much easier said than done. I would have struggled if I had to work during term. It has a big impact on the students ability to concentrate on their studies, and if parents have the ability to help, why not?

@oliviapsu Student loan is the cheapest easy money she will get. Advised to take the max you can.

She isn’t borrowing loads - her parents are rightly topping up her finance. A lot of the balance has come from parents and grandparents.

She can save it for a deposit on house.

While all her friends are renting for years on end.

Damn fb ads showing too many mums net ads, I had to sign up to chip in here.

You need to have a proper heart to heart with your daughter, it's amazing you have the ability to just hand her £250 a month and obviously it's because you care - but it's not really doing her any favours. You don't want to come at her guns ablazing, but try and motivate her to want to do better for herself and own sense of pride.

I totally flunked my A levels due to leaving home at 17 and being unable to focus through that sh*tstorm. But I knew I wanted to earn a degree, I worked 3 jobs to support myself - in a school to gain experience for applying for studying education, picking up shifts in a care home and then supporting young adults with SEND transition out of school to assisted living. Got accepted onto an Education degree, I wrote a blinder of an essay to prove my work experience could negate the fact my A levels kind of sucked.
I studied full time, for 3 years, whilst working at a police 999 control room. Still got a First Class degree, working didn't mean I couldn't study.
Some weeks I'd miss different lectures, because I worked a 24/7 shift pattern, but lecturers were great in sending me slides and friends would give me a run down. In my 2nd year, aged 21, I bought a house with my now husband as we'd both been working and saving like mad since I'd started working at 17. Both of us grew up in housing association homes, and wanted to make ourselves and family proud - they just didn't have additional income to send our way so we had to go out and get it. I am 29 now and look back on those years as one of the highlights of my life, feeling completely self sufficient and it gave me self belief that I'd never had before then.

I'm not someone saying "back in the day we did this" and it was 50 odd years ago, it was fairly recent history lol. Your daughter should be able to tidy a room and get a paid part time job. Your £250 a month should probably have conditions, or perhaps come to an end while she is back home and she can then move forwards by looking to support herself and pay her own bills. This will also help her build a better credit rating, having an income, her phone direct debit from her own bank - it'll all help her in the future.

@Lolly1994 I’m presuming living in a housing association property that your parents were low earners and you qualified for full finance support? And still needed to work the hours you did/miss Uni due to high living costs or something along those lines.

I think you did great and it’s a lovely story that you were able to do this and still achieve a 1st, you must be very bright.

But if you received full finance due to low income parents…. And then are expecting OP’s daughter to not have comparable surely that’s double standards?

So the daughter can't find 30 minutes per day to keep one room clean and tidy? If she was living independently she would presumably be the one to do her shopping, cooking,cleaning etc and that would take much longer,finals or not she shouldn't be living in a tip.

She’s still studying which can be pretty stressful. I’d recommend closing the door to her bedroom. She is quite cheeky to say no to your requests to tidy up. Most teenagers have messy rooms.

My daughter is in student accommodation, she keeps her space very clean and she works to help pay for everything, with some financial support from me. On the other hand, her flat mates are actually disgusting and live in relative filth. That would be fine if they didn't affect others but unfortunately it spills out into the shared areas. Really horrible to live with.
None of them have job's so don't pay their way. I wonder if it would make a difference to them if they weren't just being given everything. Who knows.
I'd stop her money, get her to start contributing and , social anxiety or not, get a paying job. Social anxiety is not an excuse for this behaviour and in all honesty, I'm assuming there is a point to this education and a plan of paid employment at the end so a bit of practice would help.

Why are you treating her like a child? Handing her pocket money and letting her have a school holiday? Give her responsibility just like she would have in halls ...cooking, cleaning etc and tell her the money stops for the holidays she needs to get a job plenty of waiting, bar staff etc out there ..... me at students on that loan are living out.... which sounds like her problem she's not getting the uni experience

Still appalled at all this resentment surrounding students being given money by parents - because the parents are deemed able to afford it… and it’s what the gov expects you to do…

They must pay their way, have immaculate accomodation and get top grades!! They must jeopardise their future professional career options to work in tesco.

Although Jim from the estate gets 7k a year our Joanne from the posh area must get nothing because she’s a responsible adult…. Meanwhile we’ll book a holiday in Dubai.

Still think they can work to cover extra costs if they want.

But parental contribution should be as it’s assessed by student finance not some arbitrary number dreamt up by parent for “some support”. Primarily the responsibility lies with the parent first, the student second, as child is in third level education and parents are deemed financially responsible until they are 25 or have lived independently for 3yrs.

I would personally say if she wants the money, she needs to chores and tidy her room otherwise the payment stops. I went to uni full time, lived at home rent free until I finished uni and worked 5 days a week (5 hours a day) I never had a day off and sometimes had work and uni in one day. They need to work to gain responsibility so think she should be at least getting a temp job in the summer holiday. I would help my kids if I can afford to as well but they would need to be following my rules.

@jannier OP’s daughter does live in halls. She has only been home for three weeks as it’s exam time and presumably she thought she could rely on some support and peace and quiet.

The OP is giving money to top up her maintenance loan, which was reduced on account of parental income. It is not “pocket money”, it is to put her on equal level with students coming from low earning backgrounds who get full loan/grant.

That’s it. Not a hand out. But what the gov say parent should be doing to support their child in education.