Adult DC not allowed by parents to go on holiday

[goosemoosebooth]

The situation is an adult in their 20’s, graduated from uni but working in a minimum wage job while they try to find their first graduate job. Parents have allowed their DC to not pay any board until they get their full time graduate job as DS is only on minimum wage.

However, DC is not allowed to go a holiday abroad as part of this agreement as that is a waste of money that they should not be spending when working only minimum wage job.

What are your thoughts?

My thoughts are that these parents want their kid standing on their own 2 feet asap. I don’t actually think thats a bad thing. There are plenty of threads on here about how it’s impossible to get on the housing ladder, having no rent to pay is a massive boon and a great opportunity to stash away some money.

I think they are massively unreasonable. They've just finished uni, are a grown adult and if they want a holiday should be allowed to pay for one and go using their wages they earned. I personally can't ever imagine trying to tell my twenty year old daughter she wasn't to go on a holiday, paid for with her own money, regardless of her salary. I also never took dig money off her.

Sounds fine. The graduate can pay the going rate or leave if they don’t agree to the ‘house rules’. Can’t have it both ways surely.

The adult child may be on minimum wage but is presumably working full-time? What exactly is the adult child saving for? A car, deposit on a flat/house? What expenses does the adult child have to pay for out of their salary? Rent clearly isn't one of them. Is the adult child not particularly good with money? At 20 I had to choose between going on holiday with my then boyfriend to the US or buying my first car. I chose the car. Of course I wanted both, but I couldn't afford both and my parents made it clear they weren't contributing to either of it. It's part and parcel of learning to be an adult, to be given the responsibility to make a sensible choice on their own! The adult child should make their own choices, and if it's wrong then they have to take responsibility for those choices!

Come back op and tell us more. You have a good range of opinions now, tell us who you are!

Hmm I can kind of see this from both sides - I’ve seen young people living at home rent free whilst spending all of their earnings on fun things and not saving a penny. OTOH it is pretty controlling to say that an adult is not allowed to go away.

Ultimately, this isn’t a good recipe for happiness on either side. We took money from DS towards his food from when he started his apprenticeship. I think it’s better that young people get used to paying some money towards their living expenses and learning to budget, and also for our POV 17 year old boys are expensive to feed.

The young person in question may also be in the MW job for quite a while so this doesn’t seem to have much planning for the future behind it.

Does the young person even want the graduate job they’ve trained for? I ask as a lot don’t and seem quite happy to continue with whatever they’ve been doing PT at uni .

Some holidays abroad are cheaper than in the UK, couldn't they give a monetary amount for a holiday. He could go 5 star in the UK, but can't go 1 star abroad, makes no sense.

I’d want the parents side of the story on this to be honest

He's an adult so can decide how to live his own future.

Parent's sound horribly controlling.

I knew one like that growing up, parents the same. He ended up escaping for good. Had barely any contact with them. Was an only child too.

Well done parents! It is admirable to see some parents with a spine.

I think it’s relevant how this arrangement came about. Was it the child saying “it’s so expensive to rent, I really want to save, you don’t understand how hard it is, I hardly seen anything, please let me live here and you continue to buy all my food and pay all my bills because I just want to focus so hard on saving”, and the parent agreed even though really they want to downsize and move areas and now have to delay that plan. If so, I can see an irritation from the parents if what they’re now planning is a really expensive luxury holiday.
Or maybe they’ve been on five holidays this year and the parents are saying look you’re not actually saving anything, we’re just funding your holidays by paying for everything else.
But obviously the actual situation may be nothing like what I’ve described. Basically, the wider context matters.
Although I will say that they can’t “forbid” anything. They can just say well if you can afford the holiday you can afford rent/food

Control freaks

sounds awfully hard work for both sides most adults unless parents and adult children really close wouldn’t want to sustain this long term. Adult child who has graduated therefore experienced independence now working but Adult child being treated like a child been told because reside under parents roof telling them what can can’t do. Twenties are for living. I can’t imagine trying to stop someone in their twenties from choosing how to live life. I would be moving out as sounds stifling.

This.

How long ago did the young person graduate ? What are they doing with all their wages, given that their parents are paying for all their food and board ?

This has made me sad. That stage in life is a great time to travel, when you're young, free and can take cheap holidays in term time.

His parents are mean.

Yes I was. Many reasons for that - among them it was some time back when things were cheaper. Took me 8 years. In a shared house back then rent was about £50 a week.

I also lived very cheaply in a in the north of England for several years full of drug addicted prostitutes on my doorstep. Sometimes I couldn’t even afford the heating going on.

I also bought a cheap house in a shithole in the north of England some years back.

I spent very very little on anything when I did have some more money - I didn’t change my lifestyle to match my salary. I did have the odd holiday very cheaply.

I have mixed feelings about it - things are different now and in the south I can’t imagine how anyone buys at all.

Its made me independent and I don’t depend on anyone for anything. But the style of parenting I had was like that. I wasn’t checked up on for revision etc at college. It was my problem to solve.

Their house, their rules if adult child doesn’t like it perhaps they could move out

If the parents can afford for their adult child to live with them then personally I think it's a nice couple of years, even on minimum wage, when your money isn't all going on rent and bills and a couple of holidays should be part of that.

As an adult child I would have preferred to pay some board to them and do what I wanted with the rest of my money.

I think they are controlling and treating an adult like a child. It won't end well for them in the long run.

I’ve a DC who graduated last year and got a job at the local supermarket then packed it in to set up his own company, we still take dig money but fully support him in his endeavours. We may, may not hand it back to him in the future. He’s been skiing and gone on a sun holiday, he is young and we want him to enjoy life before the reality of real work and providing hits him. I never understand people who don’t take dig money, I gave my mum part of my wage from the age of 14.

Holidays abroad are not essentials and adult dcs living at home and being subsidised by parents should not be prioritising them. Many people can't afford to go on holiday. I love a holiday and post a lot about them on MN but I never went anywhere much in my late teens/early 20s because it was unaffordable. Back than it wasn't really an expectation. (we'll forget about Argeles Sur Mer 1987 where I lost a stone in weight as we had no money for food)

Whereas quoting Kate Nash at me is intelligent?

It’s true. There have been a spate of these threads where for whatever reason the OP hides the sex of whoever they’re talking about, and it makes the whole post was so clunkily and for what? Nothing, nine times out of ten.

The OP hasn’t bothered to return anyway. Pointless thread. So tedious.

I have an adult DC living at home atm without paying rent or board (apart from the occasional bottle of wine or ingredients for a dinner she'll cook) as she is doing a Masters degree. She has a part-time job from which she earns about £200/week and savings from the jobs she had for a couple of years between her degree and her Masters. She is 24. The thought that I could, or would even want to, prevent her from going on holiday is absolutely laughable!

Think to yourself what this holiday is costing them, and how much do actually really want or need that money? Everyone deserves a break, don't be a killjoy unless you absolutely cannot afford to be one.

If your AC was spending it all on drink, drugs, expensive hobbies, luxury brands, designer clothes etc I'd understand you better. But ... a holiday?

You mentioned the word agreement in your OP… so I take it the adult child has agreed to the terms? If that’s the case then they can’t really complain, can they?

These are the times when I wish there was a button where I could do things like request, “show me the responses grouped by who is on track with their pension fund?” Or “show responses by who always pays for holidays with savings vs debt”