To expect my dd to pay for her driving licence ?

[Firsttimemom3]

Did 18 years old is on her gap year. She has a good job well paid and saving for uni next year. We have given her a lump of money for her 18th, we do not charge her rent, we pay for food, phone and extras. We were meant to pay for her driving licence but we just had a massive vet bill, we are stretched. Am I unreasonable to expect her to pay her driving licence ?

Well, OP. She's made the choice clear for you then. You can't be expecting to tell your parents to eff off whilst still in their house and they're doing everything.

She can pay for her licence herself. It's for her own good anyway.

I think if she’s been given money for her 18th and has a good job then it’s not unreasonable to expect her to pay something. If you mean the license and lessons then it will be pricey though. And it might take her longer to save for uni. It’s quite common for kids to be gifted a block of lessons, maybe 10, to start them off. But by no means do you ‘have’ to do it.

If you offered to pay it seems a bit rotten not to now.

My son has an apprenticeship, he works 4 days a week (college 1 day), he earns £315 take home pay a week.

He doesnt pay us rent
We pay his mobile contract
I pay the family unlimited 'spotify' that he is a member of, it would cost £10 a mth less if he wasnt)
We pay his Gym membership (this went from him playing in a football team cisting us £30 a mth, to him wanting to finish football to do gym work instead)
He gets lifted from work EVERY DAY amounting to 18miles per dgets plus he then gets lifts into town every week for his driving lesson, then WE hang around for an hour to bring him back home.

The only thing he pays for is the £40 driving lesson.

Im actually looking at this all written down & belive we pay for too many things for him ...

Back to drawing board and saving myself a bit of cash!!!

She is an adult. Most of my friends with teenagers don't do any where near as much as you. Some of their teenagers have part time jobs, and would never dream of asking their parents for money-they pay for all their own stuff and some pay rent-this used to be the norm, but it is much harder for kids to get jobs now, so they can't all do this, but they definitely don't ask their parents to fund something non essential. Gen Z is less likely to be in a hurry to drive (according both to friends and many online articles) so unless she urgently needed to learn for a job, say, unless you're very rich I wouldn't worry about it.

It depends where you are.
Here ( NW ) lessons are £35 ( 1 hour ) or £330 for 10.
That's for a manual car, automatic cars are more expensive.

Completely unreasonable. It is your duty to pay for her license and lessons. We're far from well off but we paid for all three of our children with a lot of scrimping and saving.

It’s a matter of what you can afford. Don’t feel guilty.

I was going to say that you could offer the option of paying herself now or waiting until your finances have recovered a bit. Then I saw she had sworn at you which would make me tempted to put the offer on hold anyway until her attitude has improved and matured enough to drive …..

I have an 18 year old and initially said we’d pay for 10 lessons… but she doesn’t get paid well in her part time job and is saving for uni so making her pay just meant we’ll have to support more at uni in September. We ended up paying for it all. I wish we’d said she had to pay half the insurance but we covered that too without thinking.

that said, if she’d told me to fuck off i would do exactly that and she would be paying for the lot.

Mum and dad paid for mine and I intend to pay for my little girl.

I can’t believe anyone thinks you are unreasonable. Your circumstances have changed and you can’t afford it, you’re already propping her up, she works and she speaks to you like shit. I wouldn’t pay either, she needs to learn

She told you you to fuck off? Great. Now she can suck up a lesson in basic respect and good manners…by discovering that ungrateful, entitled, sweary people don’t get driving lessons/test/car/insurance paid for.

And while you’re at it. Stop paying for her phone until she contributes to keeping the home clean and tidy.

I’m afraid you’re being unreasonable. I realise that you’ve already been very generous but you promised something and now you’re going back on your promise.

No

You are enabling her to be a spoilt brat.

How much was the lump sum - did she spend it, thinking the driving lessons would also be covered?

What led to her telling you to fuck off? I can't picture that being the start of the conversation.

just finally got my license in my thirties. I wasn't able to learn when I was 18 due to lack of money and because my mum was not able to help me pay for it... she is very lucky you are able and willing to help her as much as you do, and should apologise to you

If my dc told me to fuck off I would and I’d take my money with me.

That would permanently kill any idea of you paying for any of this if I were in your shoes. I'm afraid you have rather spoilt this little miss.

I so wish there was still a laughing reaction. How is it a parents' duty to pay for a licence and lessons? What if the parents can't afford to pay for them?

If you really had to do a lot of scrimping and saving then, to be honest, I think you are fools

Sorry for only coming back now ! We had a good chat and she profusely apologised and I have apologised for taking her by surprise with the change of plan. We are going to pay 3/4 of it - I hadn’t realised how expensive it was

If she’s got a good job she can pay for it all.
You’re not charging her rent so that’s very generous, so she has plenty of money to spare.

To answer your question about the lumps : it was 10 grands we gave her. We put money aside for her all her life and we have given it to her on 18th

Ha no way 😂