My house my rules?

[Onlycoffee]

I keep seeing this on mn usually in defence of "house rules" for adult children, sometimes also young adults and teens.

For those who say that, is it not your children's home as well?
What age does it stop being their home?

I'm not talking about where there is abuse, aggression, complete disregard for other members of the household, but more when parents seem to be trying to control their children under the banner of "my house my rules".

Aibu to think my house is also my children's house, so allow them autonomy and not try to control them, or
Yabu and, I don't even know because what is the alternative? Drive my kids away and make them feel uncomfortable in what apparently isn't their own home anymore?

The house belongs to my partner & I- we pay all the bills, organise the maintenance, decorating, gardening, replacement machines when one breaks down etc.
It's my children's home, and always will be, regardless of their age.
But I do expect common courtesy and respect - that's how they've been brought up; keep the place clean & tidy, say if you'll be in & want to eat with us, if you're staying out overnight/ away for a few days.

My eldest are in their first year of uni & the other 2 still at secondary school so it's early days for us.

i agree with you. MN are really weird about young adults.It's like they reach 18 and suddenly it's not their home anymore. Posters on here always trot out the 'your house, your rules' bollocks.

I actually don’t know what’s appropriate- I’ve a few years yet but when Ds hits18 he won’t suddenly have an equal say to DH and I in how our house runs. I want him to feel welcome and comfortable here and it is his home but it’s not his house. If he wants full autonomy to live as he wants he will have to move out. DH and I don’t want to live like students just cause we live with a student.

There are rules everywhere though for the cohesion of society and that applies to domestic homes too.

For me,

• the kitchen shuts at 9pm - no cooking after then, helping yourself to cereal or fruit etc is fine.
• No food in bedrooms
• Noise needs to be kept down after 9pm too and not disturbing other people in the home.
• If DD was older and going out late at night then we would have a no strangers staying over rule
• Friends leave by 9pm on a school night and 10pm at the weekend unless sleeping over - largely as that's when I'm happy to play taxi till.
• We don't shout or swear at each other.
• No smoking or vaping.

These are simple and fair and either for safety or to maintain the community of the house. The house is mine, if the oven gets left on overnight or food is spilt in the bedroom I will be the one paying for it to re rectified

You don't have to control and set domineering rules, you can have a conversation with your older or adult children, set out the problems and ask them for their input into the solution.

I've never really thought of it being my house, it's always just been the family home.

I often wonder exactly this, when does your child become a lodger!
Our home will always be our home which includes our children no matter how old they are. I feel very sorry for the children who are no longer thought of as part of the family and are wanted by their parents once they reach a certain age. I could never do that. Children are for life and their home should always be with the parents unconditionally.

i agree with you. MN are really weird about young adults.It'se they reach 18 and suddenly it's not their home anymore

I see the opppsite, they turn 18 and can do whatever they like and parents are awful if they take rent from their kids. No responsibility or accountability.

My kids will always have a home here, but I’m paying the mortgage, I keep and maintain the house and so while they live here I’ll expect them to contribute to the household, keep their rooms tidy, help with housekeeping. I’ll expect them to show me the courtesy of not bringing random people home for the night and not wandering in at all hours of the night.

If they want complete freedom to do whatever they like they can also take on the responsibility for housing themselves.

But it isn't their house? It belongs to - and has been paid for - by the parent or parents.

Otherwise then everything a parent owned would be somehow equally owned by their child - their savings? Their pension? Their car? Their clothes/possessions?
The adult child does not get equal say in what happens to the house or any other thing listed above.

It is their home and I don't think many people are advocating routinely throwing your 18 year olds out on the street but they don't get an equal say in the house or how the household is run.

Cleaning up after themselves, not smoking in the house, not taking other people's possessions or going through their private things, making sure the door is locked, not making loads of noise late night, not being rude or unpleasant to other people in the household are perfectly reasonable requirements for living with other people - if an adult child doesn't like those rules, they are free to live somewhere else where they can do those things

@HPandthelastwish
I understand the theory of your rules but in our home many of these wouldn’t work.
dd (20) and I both work shifts so no cooking after 9pm would be like saying no cooking after 4pm for people working normal hours. We don’t get back till 10/11pm and not always possible to eat at work. I’d rather be cooking chicken in the air fryer than buying fast food on the way home!
same with visitors - if noise is reasonable levels visitors are welcome until much later than 9/10pm

i have often wondered how other families navigate household routines when one or more people work shifts.

I dont understand rules in families, it sounds so regimented, why not just behave considerately without the needs for formalities

Not using the kitchen after 9pm is bizarre to me, it's sounds like a 70s boarding house.

@Nomorecoconutboosts well DD is an older teen in her GCSE years so that's not an issue for us.

In my family dad worked night shifts and dinner was reheated if you weren't there for the meal.

But I'm thinking less about a proper meal, prepared sober after a shift and more adult children that come home drunk with a load of friends in tow leaving a mess all over the kitchen which often gets cited on MN.

"My" home will always welcome my child, but the equation does shift a bit as that child becomes an adult and is capable of supporting themselves. While I don't have a strict set of rules, I like a low-key, orderly household and an adult child can either conform to that or live somewhere that better suits them.

It's really not unreasonable to want to have things (mostly) your way once the kids reach adulthood.

Some households have specific rules so certain members can learn what is reasonable in that situation - it can be easier for some teens to learn "no cooking after 9pm" than "it is unfair on other people in the household if I create lots of noise and mess in the kitchen late in the evening which I may well not tidy up properly". Teens don't have great empathy skills - their brains are pretty selfish for a few years so a rule can help rather than them struggling to consider the impact that being noisy and messy will have.

But your daughter is 20 and so perhaps your household doesn't need rules like that - it is just a principle that members of this household are considerate of others and so if someone gets home late and needs to eat, they do so quietly. No radio on in the kitchen while cooking, no banging cupboard doors, putting the dishwasher o. etc. Using an air fryer isn't inherently noisy so a considerate cook would be fine. Likewise with visitors and noise. Not disturbing the rest of the household is the principle - your desire to have your friends round and listen to music is not more important than someone else's desire to go to sleep.

But as I said, teens are often quite bad at empathy. It's like toddlers - you give them rules like "don't touch that cooker". Actually the cooker when it is cold is not a problem but toddlers aren't able to compute that so it is better to have a clear rule than muddy the waters.
Teens can be a bit like that (not all of them) but they do grow out of it. In the meantime, some clear rules can help household harmony until they are developed enough to function on principle.

Another my house, their home.
Having not landed on my doorstep at 18, they would be fully aware of certain home expectations regarding family life. Which included bed making, open doors, no dishes in bedrooms and garbage emptied daily.

Everyone has 'rules' of some description, even if they aren't official. Like replacing the toilet roll or not leaving your shoes by the front door.

One person's strict rules and 'being a lodger in their own home' is another person's simple household rules to keep everything ticking along.

As an adult, paying for my own home, I can leave my shoes wherever I fancy. Could I do that in my parents' home? No. And to be honest if you share with a partner or even in a house share etc., you still have to be respectful of other people.

If you don't want to be mindful/ respectful of others then you need to live by yourself.

I'm back with my parents and DD4 after a relationship breakdown. All being well my house will go on the market this week. I've lived with my parents as an adult a few times. There is a big difference between moving back in after uni and now.
I willingly offered to pay rent this time, they are drawing their pension and I work ft. They save me a small fortune in wraparound care and I couldn't continue to pay my share of the mortgage and market rent.
I am not the tidiest and we have too much stuff despite a storage unit but I try to make sure we don't encroach too much on their space.
However, the basic principles of moving back home after education are the same. Pay a proportion of your income as 'keep' and be courteous i.e don't wake everyone up making a noise/communicate if you won't be home for tea. It works for us as a stop gap but we're all looking forward to our own space again.

Yep, Unconditional love is what you’re supposed to give your offspring.

My sons are 33 and 22. Only the 22 yr old lives at home. It's a much his home as it is mine.

It’s normally said after something pretty controversial isn’t it though? Like someone’s 25yo staying up until 3am shouting at their computer. In that case, I think it’d be perfectly acceptable to say no, that’s not okay… my house, my rules.

It was said several times on a thread about an adult DD not making their bed. How an unmade bed impacts on the rest of the house I'm yet to find out.

It’s my home and my adult children (sometimes) live here, so it is their home as well, but there are definitely unspoken agreements that make living together more pleasant.

I guess for me it boils down to mutual respect. My children aren't older teens/young adults yet, (they're 11 and 9) but I think when they are, I would try and adopt a culture of mutual respect. I feel that using the phrase "My house, my rules" is really confrontational. I would be more inclined to have an open discussion along the lines of "Xyz isn't working for me, how can we fix this?" I think if we are wanting our teens/young adults to respect the living space, we need to create an environment where this is possible. It is fine to have house rules, but the conversations surrounding this need to be based on mutual respect.

Yeah fair enough I didn’t see that thread so can’t comment. I think anything that impacts the rest of the house inhabitants I feel it’s fair to say though? Like leaving extreme mess everywhere, anything to do with smoking, inordinate noise etc? Like I wouldn’t say my house was a democracy in that regard…

Yep, Unconditional love is what you’re supposed to give your offspring.

Unconditional love doesn’t always mean you’re suited to living together. I expect my children to show consideration and respect - as adults that means respecting the other people who live in the house and respecting the property that I own. If they want to rock up drunk in the middle of the night with whoever they’ve picked up at a club that night they aren’t being respectful of me or my home. I will still love them, but they’d need to live somewhere else if that’s the lifestyle they want to have.

There are some achingly desperate to be cool parents on MN, including this thread, who don't want to acknowledge that families, like society, thrive on boundaries and expectations.

So my boundaries for my DD20 are that she can live in a hovel whilst at university if she choses but our home is to be kept clean, she let's us know if she's staying out and, whilst her boyfriend can stay over, randoms can't.

Many on MN would argue "but she's an adult!" Indeed she is but in this family being an adult means following a few rules that help make ours a very happy home.