AIBU to refuse family use of our home for holidays?

[SayingNoToFamily]

I'm really cross about this and don't know if I'm being unreasonable. Please help me mumsnetters. I have name changed in case this is outing. Sorry, it is long, so as to avoid a drip feed.

Back story, until very recently we owned a holiday house (just sold it this month). Half of the house belonged to me and DH and the other half was owned by DH parents. We bought our half off another relative and have owned our half for a long time, approximately 20 years.

The house is in a holiday location and has been used by DH siblings (and their partners and school aged children) as a holiday home for all of that time. They never offered any money for their stay. We didn't use it very often as we were not living in that country until a couple of years ago.

Unfortunately it appears that DH siblings viewed the house as something they were entitled to use, rather than a privilege. Obviously their parents also owned half of the house, which makes a difference to how they viewed it. On some occasions the house was left dirty after the siblings had used it and when we arrived to use it we had to clean it. They have also used it without asking, as they all have a key.

We now live in a different holiday location, about 3 hours drive away from the house, so don't need to go there for holidays anymore. But more importantly we have never rented the house, so we didn't ever benefit financially, but it cost us money in terms of maintenance. This is the reason for wanting to sell.

DH siblings have had many years of free holidays, at our expense, mainly during school holidays, when accommodation is expensive. Sadly for them with the sale of the house this has now come to an end.

There is a school holiday coming up here very soon. We as a family (me, DH and our DCs) are going overseas for the holidays, meaning our main house (our permanent family home) will be empty. One of DH siblings, who would usually go to the holiday home, has messaged him to say she doesn't know how she's going to entertain her DCs over the holiday and asking if our house is on offer to them.

I am really annoyed about this. It feels like after years and years of having free holidays in the holiday house at our expense, they now want to use our own home as an alternative.

I don't want them to use it. I don't want the stress of having to get our house ready for guests when we we're already preparing for our own trip. I dont like the idea of other people using our home when were not there. But also I think this is really cheeky and they seem to expect us to still be responsible for providing them with a free holiday.

I think allowing them to use our own house now is effectively sending the message to them that this is now their holiday home, as a replacement and sets a precedent that whenever we are away they can use it. AIBU to not want them to use it?

DH does sort of agree with me on this, however instead wants to tell them they can come to ours when we are there for a 'beach holiday'. Whilst I don't have a problem with then coming to stay for a couple of days when we're here, I don't think he should be starting to offer them 'beach holidays ' in our house at this point, being so close to the sale of the holiday house, as in my opinion it's still giving them the impression that we're responsible for providing them with holidays.

Any advice welcome. Thanks for reading!

Hard no.

My siblings could come and go from my house though it would be space dependent especially if it allowed them to access the sea. Id also appreciate the contact the cousins would have
So I just see it as you and your partner having different expectations.
For the sake of throwing in the other view it's an adjustment living with a partner who has different parameters around space and family and can feel confining.

I never said that welfare claimants are scrounging, just used the analogy of one group of people paying for the lifestyles of another group of people. Just like taxpayers and welfare claimants.

As the saying goes, you have a husband problem.

Outline in detail the workload that would come with letting his relatives stay , including all cleaning, safe storage of valuables and documents, additional cleaning, additional laundry, dealing with pest control issues due to them leaving food mess everywhere. Ask him where he is going to find time to do all this additional work, as you’re not prepared to do it. And he’ll need to do some of it as soon as he steps in the door after his own holiday.

Entitled SIL can pay for her own holiday like the rest of the world. Or ask her parents to sort it out for her, as they seem happy to allow her to be a freeloader.

@SayingNoToFamily Just say "Sorry, that won't be possible. We're not comfortable having anyone in our home while we're not there." End of.

I think it’s the phrasing that is annoying. ‘She doesn’t know how she is going to entertain them… ‘. Firstly, that’s not your problem to solve, and secondly she can book a trip to Disneyland like anyone else.

You’ll be swamped with requests if you start this and then they’ll just be turning up. I would say “no sorry, the holiday home wasn’t always left in a pleasant state after others had used it and we often had to clean it and clear up, over the years we had to pay for the home and then clean it, so no we won’t be letting out our home. “

@SayingNoToFamily
No I'm not a tidy person and neither are our DC. I have suggested to DH that he uses that as a reason why DSil can't stay, but not sure that will put them off from asking in future

Do not give a concrete reason to justify telling them no. They will glom on to this and explain how your reason can be solved and the barrier removed.

The statement has to be firm like:
”This is our home and having others use it as a holiday place does not work for us.”

I’d suggested encouraging your DH to steer clear of getting in to justifying your response, that’ll just open the door to debate. Keep it to a simple ‘That won’t work for us’.
If he wants to be helpful he could suggest some nice rentals in a nice area.

Why not help them out? They’re family.

Definitely this. Keep it simple and avoids them asking again in the future hopefully

They already have helped them out (for years) but don’t want to continue this anymore. Being family doesn’t mean you should spend your life being taken advantage of.

@SayingNoToFamily

You have been taken for granted for years in a holiday home and now they are moving possessively on to your family home.
Left it a mess. Didn't ask but assumed. Had the gall to expect to have it when you needed it.
Don't be a fool.
Nothing will change as they will come to view this the same way given an inch.
No is a complete sentence.
They are CF of the highest order.

You need very clear boundaries and you need to tell your DH that you need to be allowed to protect your home space.

DO NOT GIVE THEM KEYS.

Have any of his siblings offered their home for free to other family members when they are not there?

He doesn't need an excuse, no is no, if she pushes then the reply is 'why are you trying to change my mind about my family's home, its not going to change. Its not a holiday home'

They have, by letting them use the holiday house for free. Extending your main home to let family members live in for a holiday is a bit of a stretch in terms of ‘helping them out’.

Well exactly. What encouraged me to hold the line with current visitors and not let them stay with us is that when we visited their home location in the past, not only were we not offered accommodation- which is fine we prefer to have our own space- but they couldn’t even host us for one meal and we met at a local diner.
Yet apparently it’s fine to expect weeks of hosting including meals and laundry at our place.DH reminds me of this when I am wavering.

I honestly don’t see the issue. We’d do it, and do similar, in my family.

If we can’t even extend generosity to our loved ones it’s no wonder our society is falling apart.

Yeah I live in London and when we’re away always offer to family/friends if they want to come and stay. Appreciate this situation has a lot more history but lots of people saying no one would ever let anyone else stay so wanted to offer an alternate perspective.

Absolutely not in a million years. This is beyond cheeky and ridiculous. Your DH needs to put his foot down.

Thing is when you’re a naturally generous person, it’s hard to understand the mentality of more grasping people and it’s upsetting to realise that family members see you as a cash cow to be milked for as much as you can give. It’s not pleasant when the penny finally drops that you see the relationship differently than they do.

Unbelievable cheek to think they could use your family home as a holiday home and unbelievable that your husband would think this was ok. I would definitely be prepared to die on this hill. It would be a definite NO, NEVER EVER. I would rather not go on my own holiday than allow this to happen. Tell your husband this is not going to happen.

We often have family stay in our house when we are away. I like having someone there rather than leaving it empty. The difference is we are also welcome to stay in their homes - my SIL has a property abroad that she actively encourages us to use - and they leave the place clean and tidy.

I don't see a problem with them asking. But it's your home so you are perfectly entitled to say no if you aren't comfortable with it.

"DH siblings have had many years of free holidays, at our expense"
Not sure what you mean by this. How was it at your expense? Surely if you were paying for the property anyway, they didn't cost you any extra. If you were rarely using it then you benefitted from a more regular presence rather than it just sitting empty?

Just say to Dh and family, ‘no this is our home. We no longer have a holiday home’. Give them a list of nearby accommodation if they want to explore the area. End of conversation.

Sorry one more from me then I am off from work.

We live in a city where accommodation is expensive. I have no problem letting people use the spare room for a couple of nights,happy for them not to incur high hotel costs and generally enjoy having visitors. But there’s a huge difference between a short stay - like OPs family does - and someone taking the absolute mickey and beginning to treat your house like their home, talking about their annual family visit to your location.