Bought parents house - having issues with expectations

[PinkyBrain853]

I couldn’t figure out what category to put this under so thought maybe relationships was best, though to clarify it’s to do with my relationship with my DF. We agreed to buy my DF’s house earlier this year - we were pleased as it’s a huge property and made moving easier. It’s lovely and we were interested in it anyway, but he really pushed for it.

My DH and I both work in high-pressure jobs so work a LOT Monday - Friday, we are expecting a baby, and have a 10 yo. Our weekends are spent A) trying to turn this house around B) catching up with people we haven’t seen in months due to clashing patterns and C) desperately trying to find some time just to chill out and enjoy each others company.

I had a blazing argument with my DF last night because he was angry he couldn’t come and stay with us this weekend as we have plans. He says that his plan when he moved out was to come and stay every 3 weeks and that we agreed (we did not). I have never sworn in front of him, never mind at him, but I absolutely lost my sh*t. He started being manipulative and asking where he’s supposed to stay when he wants to visit, and that “well I just won’t plan to visit you so often - I know where I’m not wanted” (he’s talking bs- he was coming for a doctors appointment…which he currently has almost weekly!!! Which is a whole other problem as I can’t cope with him staying every week, it disrupts EVERYTHING as you have to make sure he’s seen to and fed, as a “guest”)… and so he could go to the pub with his friends at the weekend) and started with the “well fine I guess I’ll just have to book hotels when I come down”. I was SHAKING with anger. He has a bad habit of also saying “I can’t believe I can’t even get to stay at MY house” - it isn’t his house!!! He wanted us to buy it so it didn’t go to a stranger!!! I have told him that if this is going to be an issue, he needs to make a decision right now as we’ll sell to someone else and I’ll get a different home. Low and behold - he doesn’t want this! He can’t understand why he can’t stay over even when we have other actual guests staying or plans for other people to be here. I tried to explain to him that if I invited him over for a night, I wouldn’t then invite other people over - because it’s rude. He said it isn’t and that it would 😂🙃

I kind of just needed to sound off because I’ve been really upset about it. I told him the situation was stressing me out and his answer was “well what’s the point in that, just stop letting it stress you out” - im not like him and I can’t cope with arguments etc. I can’t just forget. I know this will come up again and that’s why I’m so stressed. He seems to think it’s a personal thing against HIM. This will eat at me for weeks. He’s retired and doesn’t understand that we’re busy people. I explained it’s not about not wanting to see him, but that genuinely our weekends are currently fully booked! Not to mention I am VERY pregnant.

Am I being unreasonable? Am I going crazy for not agreeing to let him stay every 3 weeks? I feel like as a married adult woman with a family, it is ridiculous to expect me to live my life on a 3 weeks schedule because he wanted us to buy his house and move an hour or so away. He could just drive up and back if push came to shove!! It’s not ideal but our other parents do that when necessary.

Ultimately it's your house now and he needs to let go of it - it sounds like the stretched-out-over-several-days appointments are a way of him being back in his old house, catching up with his mates and having a nice dinner service and bed ready for him, every few weeks.

Quite understandably that doesn't work for you as you're too busy and he sounds quite demanding as a guest.

You've told him as much.

Now stick to it. And if he says, 'oh I may as well get a hotel' then say, well, yes, it might be better. For a few seconds of discomfort you've held your boundary.

Remember that if you say yes to him you're also saying a big fat no to your own peace and family time - isn't it worth being firm?

I would apologise for shouting at him on the phone but not necessarily for what you said to him.

On the point above - give him one more opportunity to collect 'his stuff'. Tell him to collect it on X day. Anything left in the house/garage/shed/wherever that was his will be put in a skip after that date. If he wants it back, he takes it back. End of discussion.

The next thing I would do is visit wherever he lives now. I would be very clear (icy cold and calm when dispatching this information to your parents) that the house is no longer his.
"I want to be crystal clear Dad in what I'm saying here - you sold your house to me and to DH. It is not your house any more. I will put it on the market and sell it to whoever wants to buy it if I hear ANY more of 'this is my house/why can't I visit/why can't I stay/etc.' from any one. DH and I could have bought any property on the market but we agreed to pick this one. You signed over any rights you had on the day we bought the property. Make no mistake about this. Your house, your home, is where you live now. Not where you used to live. That's is now my home. If you cannot deal with that, it's going back on the market and you have no say whatsoever in who it gets sold to because you've sold it to me and to DH. Now, I don't want to mention this again. I don't want this to become an issue so let's move past this."

Would he be able to deal with you saying this to him in a calm "I'm not going to get cross or raise my voice" voice?

I haven't had quite this nightmare, but I did have older relatives who acted as if 38 hour work weeks were carried out by a clone and that mysteriously, REALLY we had as much spare time and energy as they did...

Luckily I worked in a mainly male industry and took to copying the pragmatic attitudes of my colleagues, who crushed FOG(Fear, Obligation and Guilt) under their sensible hiking boots and would just say,
"No, not this week, we're having someone over" etc.

sounds like he sees it as his house still so thinks he should be able to stay and do what he likes

you have to have some boundaries sit him down and say its not your house anymore you cant come when you feel like it its not fair on us

@Sweetpeasaremadeforbees He’s really argumentative anyway and quite a hot head, so I’m not even sure if he was taken aback or not! He’s very much one of those people who can argue with someone and be horrid, then just goes on straight after like nothing has happened, so these things don’t bother him. Most of his side of the family seem to be like that - my sister and I never get how they all just argue with people and then almost forget straight away 😂😅 I’m not planning on reaching out to him this week to see where he ends up staying or how things go (if it was serious appointments he was coming for I would, but it’s not), but he’s already been in touch because - like I said - doesn’t have any issues with arguing then feeling like nothing has happened!

A good few years back my sister and I went on holiday with him and there was a humongous argument about half way through - so bad that we had to leave the property at 5 in the morning because he was becoming violent with one of our party and had them by the neck against the wall because they said “you’re being a bit of a tube, they just want to go to bed.” The argument was because we were tired and wanted to go to bed when it got to 3 AM. He went blind rage because he was so drunk he didn’t realise what time it was and thought we were trying to go to bed at 10/11PM (he said this the next day). The following day we went back to try and collect our possessions and he went crazy at us to ask how we could dare come back after arguing with him like that. He told us he was going to throw himself off a bridge because we wouldn’t care. My DH has to explain to him that it wasn’t 10/11 - it was 3AM and that was why my sister and I wanted to go to bed. Just like that, he completely changed his tune like nothing had happened and went back to being lovey dovey. We couldn’t do that because (hopefully understandably) it was an absolutely horrific situation - he couldn’t understand why we couldn’t just carry on with the holiday as normal, or why we aren’t keen to go away with him again.

You sound really mean and ungenerous.
You bought it but it was HIS HOME so he will always have an emotional stake in it.
. You say it's huge and you have only one child, so there must be spare rooms where he could stay for a night every few weeks or so, very little effort on your part. All you need say is "You know where everything is in the kitchen. so just help yourself to breakfast, drinks and snacks"

In a huge house, it's perfectly feasible to have more than one weekend guest so his presence would in no way be "rude" to your other friends.

Dear God he sounds like a psychopath nightmare.

In the nicest possible way OP, I think your upbringing with him as a parent has left you with awful boundaries. You'd be perfectly justified just to tell him to fuck off IMHO.

I still have an emotional stake in my old house, maybe I should go and stay for the weekend 😂 (You don't sound mean at all, op- you sound like an absolute saint for putting up with as much as you do!)

Your latest post cites clearly abusive behaviour. You, not surprisingly, have terrible boundaries.

I think you need to do some work on these. In the meantime, stop engaging so much on this issue, repeat calmly, I'm sorry that doesn't work for us and move the conversation on as soon as possible.

As someone who also bought their parents’ home believe me it’s just a world of problems. He won’t ever stop seeing it as HIS house. Unfortunately that’s just how it most likely will be!

OP, Its very unusual to sell to a family member at full market price. In your position I would be worried you will end up as his carer. What if his relationship breaks down and he has a stroke etc. while the GP /NHS has your address listed as his home?

Utter bollocks, it's not his home now, if he wanted to keep it as his home he shouldn't have bloody sold it to his daughter. If OP had friends over, having her dad there too would totally change the dynamic, I wouldn't want my dad sitting there whilst I had friends over. Only person being rude here is her dad

Actually, something that I've just thought of which might be a great way to mark your territory (so to speak) is for you to change the front door of the property (not just the lock but the whole door). It changes the appearance of the property and can start the process of someone realising that they don't own the property any more and it's not 'their' home any more.
Would you be able to do this?
I think it would also show your father that you're asserting your design choices over your home and it's establishing a new boundary that it's not his home to just pop by any more.
I don't know if you have plans at some stage to change the appearance of the house by painting the exterior walls or changing the windows for example but each of these are things that to a previous owner, are immediate and visual indicators that they don't live there any more.

@2bazookas Hi, I posted a bit further up that while it’s a large home the rooms aren’t currently working as they should due to the fact we have been doing a lot of renovation in time for baby (and also to make it our own). There are 6 bedrooms - 1 is the master room, 1 is our 10 up’s, 1 is a guest room, 2 are offices and 1 would normally be a second sitting room but it is currently a dumping ground with no usable space as it’s where things (his old belongings and things that don’t have a home while we reno) are living. His presence if I had people staying over ALL weekend isn’t an issue, but if we (for example next weekend) are having a friend over on the Saturday and a family member who we haven’t seen since March round on the Friday, I don’t personally think it’s fair to expect them to share what’s going on in their lives with someone else who they don’t know or don’t want to share these things with. Because he would be very present and sit in the living room with us - he doesn’t see a problem with that.

@LookItsMeAgain we are in the process of doing this actually! (Or have been quoted and are just waiting for a date to get in done) - more work just because they’re so old that they’re all letting out so much heat and the doors don’t all lock properly any more! But I hadn’t thought about it making a difference like that before now actually :)

You can untangle some of this by being clear that is not DF, he is the seller of the house you bought. Treat him as such where appropriate eg. hiring skips to clear his stuff, informing GP that he has moved. Further practical steps:

Return to sender any mail still arriving for seller/DF.
Tell people still calling for seller/DF that he no longer lives here.
Change the locks if you cannot trust that seller/DF handed over all the keys.

Tell seller/DF that if he has errands in your area he should book a hotel. Tell seller/DF he should not expect to stay with you unless you issue an invitation. Tell DF this won't be for quite some time as you are very busy settling into your new home with DH, DC, and new baby.

OP, if you want good boundaries around your home you have to set them and stick to them. If you want your father to treat you with respect and care you have to insist he does or not interact with him at all. This does not have to involve any drama. Set the boundaries, take the practical steps, and stick to them.

I agree with pp suggesting some therapy to help you establish healthy boundaries.

@Popatop how do you deal with it? 😅 I am okay at handling the being told I can’t renovate things, but the overbearing entitlement to stay over whenever he wants is the issue!

We have a room in our house which is my mothers room and she can come and go as she pleases and we will continue with whatever we have planned. She is included in dinner plans with some friends whom we have known for years and whose company she may enjoy

However she understands she has to fend for herself when here and I won't be waiting on her . She pitches in helping with drops and picks for the kids, getting bits of shopping, mending buttons and zips etc

Your father sounds horrendous OP. I think you should stop pandering to him and really set super strict boundaries. He only comes when you invite him into YOUR house. And I would really reduce the frequency of his visits. But then if my father had behaved the way he did during that holiday, I am not sure I would still be in contact!

But then if my father had behaved the way he did during that holiday, I am not sure I would still be in contact!

Exactly. Especially if there are now children around to witness it.

Good point. It kind of sounds like his plan was that

1. you pay him market value for his house

2. you move into his house while he chooses to stay there or at his partner's place as he chooses, while you take care of his needs at "his" house and his partner takes care of him at her house

3. you all live together as he gets older so you can be his carer

Yikes.

All the things @Stravaig said. Excellent advice.

I recommend you have a look at the 'Stately Homes' thread. To be frank, the man sounds like a selfish abusive bully.

'and then moaning about the fact he can’t go to the pub with his friends'

Why can't he stay with one of them if it's so important?

I suspect his temper and inability to listen is very severely affected by the alcohol @PinkyBrain853. Can’t say I blame you for not wanting him to treat your place as a drop in centre

Your post about the holiday puts a very different slant on things. It takes him from annoying old duffer to a physically and verbally/emotionally abusive arse, especially in drink. So a hard no to being a boozing base for his pub nights every three weeks.

Sounds like he thought that keeping the house in the family would give him a holiday home that he could crash at whenever convenient.

Reminds me of my Fil. Actually once overheard him say that when your kids buy a house, it’s also your house really because they’re your kids so their property becomes yours also. Was serious too. Was a total narcissist. He had a key for emergencies and used to let himself in whenever passing for a cup of tea. Turned up at half past ten at night once. We were getting ready to go up to bed when we heard the key turn in the lock. He even brought a friend round for a cuppa when we were out. I can look back and laugh now, he’s been gone a few years now but at the time it drove me absolutely batshit.