To expect Sunday Dinner as the agreement?

[TipJarTroubadours]

Small details changed but the short of it is:

1. We allow people to stay in self contained accommodation for 'free'
2. The only 'cost' is attendance to Sunday dinner
3. Aibu to refuse to let someone stay (or charge them market rent) if they don't attend dinner

The long of it is

DH and I own a residential static caravan site. It has been in DH family a long time. It has great transport links to a major city.

We allow close family/friends to stay rent free whilst they attend uni in the city/start a new job. We have had 15 different people over the years, some for six months, the longest five years.

Currently house DS and nephew who are both at uni and DHs best friends daughter and her partner who has just started an apprenticeship. All four attend Sunday dinner, as have the 15 beforehand.

(For those that are interested, I cook the meal and then they take turns to make/buy a pudding and wash up (most goes in the dishwasher) I have had one with severe allergies who used to bring their own food, and one that was fussy so I used to make them beans on toast every Sunday. )

My sister's son has been living with us since September, I was very clear on the rules- it might seem odd but for a 10k saving a year I expect attendance at one meal a week.- they both knew about this.
Since starting he has attended one, preferring to go to the pub/gym/game on a Sunday. It has been raised with him and we have said if he doesn't attend then we will charge him rent (we have other uni students renting although they are all mature)

I have gone to my parents for half term and have just met my sister and told her the same. My parents and her think I am completely unreasonable to ask him to attend Sunday dinner, I think they are completely unreasonable to expect me to house him for free after agreeing to my rules ( there are costs involved for me, utilities etc plus not being able to rent it out)

I've said he has to attend tomorrow or I will bill them from now until Christmas and if it isn't paid will evict at Christmas.

Am I being unreasonable to expect my nephew to do what he agreed to in return for accommodation? (I don't think I am, even if expecting to attend dinner is unreasonable, he has agreed to the terms, he could have just rented halls)

It’s not just that it’s ’weird’, OP - it’s that it’s coercive and bound to breed deep resentment. You openly admit that there is no shortage of guests at these meals, most of whom are there by choice, so it’s not that you’re lonely or that the gathering falls flat without your nephew. The only reason to be enforcing this rule, then, is to punish him.

The fact that he agreed to it does not mean it was a reasonable thing to request in the first place. Obviously your agreement doesn’t have legal standing, but in law a contract isn’t necessarily enforceable just because both parties agree to it - it also has to be objectively fair and equitable, with no duress or undue influence. An agreement which essentially trades accommodation for a social/personal relationship, which is what yours entails, sounds highly dubious.

It's depressing that you see a person carrying on a family tradition of supporting other family members as abusive. You should probably keep up your therapy. Love.

This is like some weird horror film. It’s very controlling. Just charge a minimal
amount. Is it so you get a free pudding and a washer upper?

How bizarre. Just buy a dishwasher and charge your relative £10 per week for the cost of a dessert.

I can’t get over how weird it is that you demand they attend for your Sunday dinner.

All of the posters projecting their own issues (or their pop psychology catchprhase babble) onto the OP and nephew steadfastly refuse to acknowledge that the nephew actually has three options. He is not being coerced or threatened.

Actually he has four options, if we include going back to live with his parents.

So you'd be happy to host a meal every week where you know one of the guests is only there because they don't want to pay rent for accommodation? Or to have to move somewhere else?

I personally want people to come round because they want to spend time with me. Not because its a condition of living there on certain terms

This. It does sound a bit controlling. Attendance at at least one meal a week would be less weird.

They really aren't. They're fostering resentment and being controlling, because they gain some kind of moral superiority from it. Not because they give a shit.

You REALLY don't understand what controlling relationships are and how they work, do you?

So thanks, but it's really not me who needs the therapy here. Oh, and that put down attempt was a bit pathetic, tbh, but sure it made you feel better.

@TipJarTroubadours- what are you trying to achieve by enforcing the Sunday dinners?

can you answer to why you insist on this? Not why you accepted it from your in-laws, what you want from these meals.

Is it obedience? Is it to see their gratitude? Is it to remind them of your gift? or do you personally gain something from it? If so, what?

Do you enjoy having meals with people you know don’t want to be at your table? They are there because they want free accommodation, not because they enjoy your company. Why would you enjoy that? Do you think you’ll get a perverse enjoyment from knowing you are forcing them to smile and be nice to you when they don’t want to?

What do you get from this that’s worth the cost of rent?

I do think it's a bit bonkers, but I also kind of get it. You want family time as it's important to you, so this is a way of making sure you get it??

Things aren’t always black and white. Why don’t you ask him to do a proper chore instead of something that intrudes on someone's emotional make up like having to sit and have dinner with people in order to have a roof over your head, something I would hate as a weekly obligation. Just give him a household or garden chore. I’d rather earn my rent by mowing the lawn or hoovering.

Of course it's coercive.

OP has generational wealth and doesn't need the money.

The people she is putting up probably do so because to live away for university is completely beyond their means, so the choice they have is either play along with this batshit rule where she lords over them every Sunday and controls what they can do in their own time, or not be able to attend university at all.

I imagine the poor kid probably thought OP was joking when she handed over the keys to the caravan with this stipulation, because nobody in their right mind would think it's reasonable.

Control. That's what she gets.

Her food must be pretty bad if they’d prefer to bring their own.

The OP has made it clear that this is a longstanding family tradition, started by her husband's parents, that aims to give younger family members a significant leg up (no debt, ability to save for house deposit, less financial stress, etc.) if they express interest in being an active and engaged part of the extended family.

Growing those bonds with young adults at a time in life when the young adults might otherwise be scrambling for a place to live, and when older family members may lose touch, is a worthy goal. There is nothing sinister about it. After all, community and "the village" are considered a plus by most people.

She thought she would extend this opportunity, which some 15 young people have joined in to their benefit, to yet another family member.

She doesn't want him to be there "knowing that (he) really doesn't want to be there." At all. She only wanted him if he seemed interested in the arrangment.

He's not interested in the arrangement. He wants the "free caravan during uni" part of it, but not the intangibles that others have found enriching, and he doesn't think it's worth 2 hours per week of his time.

So, he's free to go. Casting the OP as coercive because she is continuing a family tradition of mutal support is so utterly immature and absurd.

So many takers just want the largess and consideration to flow one way; anyone who thinks relationships are GIVE as well as take is labeled "transactional" or "controlling."

Honestly I think this is a fabulous offer for your nephew and it is beyond rude of him to not do what is asked.
He has been shown the warmth and generosity of family and he can’t be bothered
to turn up?! Make him pay. He doesnt
k ow he is born. Also id be disappointed in my sister too - can she not see that this is about family and caring and her son is sticking 2 fingers up to it. I’d be embarrassed if it was my son.
I would be beside myself with joy if someone said I had to come for Sunday lunch every week - I’d break the bloody door down.
just in case you ever think of widening it out the puddings I would bring would be either syrup pudding with Madagascan vanilla cuatard, lemon meringue pie, baked Alaska, pink sponge and chocolate custard or crème brûlée. Just give me a shout when it’s my turn.

You just keep reaching and reaching for ways to denigrate the OP. Why? It says more about you than it does about her.

How many people are you housing free of charge, with no strings attached, pray tell?

Tell them that you’ll let them off Sunday dinner if they pay rent instead - you’ll either be better off financially each month or you’ll get you want, you win either way.

Of course it's controlling.

Offering free accommodation is, of course, extremely generous.

But to say to a what, 18 year old kid that he HAS to attend lunch with her rather than seeing friends or going to the gym or whatever otherwise they get chucked out?

How is that anything other than trying to control him? It's fucking weird and it's deeply unhealthy. Either you offer the caravan for free or you don't, you don't get to dictate to an adult how they spend their Sunday.

The only thing that is unreasonable is that OP has had to make "behave like a socially functioning adult and don't treat us like a Travelodge" an actual rule. I can't imaging staying with someone, particularly family, and not realising this this although unwritten is un-negotiably expected!! Sound like you nephew would be better of in the Travelodge OP

It really doesn't.

That you can't understand what "coercive" means and don't get that this is does speak volumes about you though.

Some people here are very sheltered it seems.

Hmmm as someone who grew up with my parents hosting lots of students from abroad etc in a big house I can sort of see where you’re coming from.

My parents always much preferred the houseguests who integrated a bit to those who just saw it as a free room and had no interest in the family.

Equally though as a young person the idea of being forced to do this would really just make me not want to do it 🤣

That’s a very strange requirement

I wonder if it's because MIL swanned around and lorded over OP, that OP wants her time as the egotistical controller of her husband's assets, who must be bowed down too... it's beyond embarrassing to not care you've got to dress up a "gift" with conditions of control to coerce your own family into eating a meal, bringing you pudding and doing your washing up every single week. OP has no shame and clearly wants her time as... I don't know quite how to describe it, some sort of Lady Muck cross Kathy Bates.

Her mum's disgusted with her. Her sister is. The nephew will leave too. But OP is seemingly quite happy to lose all three of the family she claims this is all about. What a charade. All so she can carry on lording about with static caravans of the family she merely married in too.

That's not true. OP has said that he can stay and not attend the Sunday dinners but he will need to pay rent like the other tenants who are not friends or family.

He has four options; he is a free able adult and is not being coerced:

a) attend the dinners and live free of charge
b) pay rent and ignore the dinners
c) live elsewhere
d) return to his mother's home

Some people here must come from very deprived and toxic circumstances, to be putting an evil spin on the generosity of OP and her spouse. She's offering him £10,000 annual savings in return for becoming part of her community. That's it. If he doesn't like the deal he can choose otherwise.