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Dear Amy: Stepparent wants to give adult daughter the boot
Dear Amy: My wife's daughter (age 26) has lived with us for the past five years. She pays rent of $400, including everything. Her boyfriend of three years also lives with his parents, but he pays them no rent. They party every weekend, and then she stays the weekend at her boyfriend's parents house.
I added tougher rules at our house in hopes they would get a place of their own. It hasn't happened. We don't allow him to spend the night here and we insist that when we go to bed, he must go home. He bought her a "promise ring," I believe to keep her from nagging about their next step.
I love my stepdaughter, but as a parent I feel we need to give her a bigger push to move out and become self-sufficient. She talks about staying here until her school loan is paid off, but at the rate she's paying, it would be a decade before that happens.
I seriously believe her boyfriend has no intention of ever moving from his parents' house. It seems so strange to me that they don't seem to want a place of their own. I try and encourage our daughter to save money so that they could buy a house, but each time I bring it up, she gets defensive.
Any suggestions?
— Frustrated in Portland, OR
Dear Frustrated: The last thing you should do is encourage your stepdaughter to cohabit with her boyfriend. Nor should you point her/them toward buying a house. Her boyfriend sounds completely dependent on his parents, and you can assume that he will remain so.
These two are not candidates for cohabitation or homeownership.
The way to put the squeeze on your renter is to gradually increase her rent until she is paying roughly market value. Then it will be obvious that she can afford to live elsewhere. You can discuss this with her as a family, helping her to set goals and a timeline, and then you should start the clock running. Depending on where you live, she might be able to afford to rent a room in a group house. This would be a good option for her; it would get her further out in the world and might provide an incentive to work more, party less and get on with her (own) life. I assume she would prefer this to you and her mother controlling her romantic choices in your home.
I added tougher rules at our house in hopes they would get a place of their own. It hasn't happened. We don't allow him to spend the night here and we insist that when we go to bed, he must go home. He bought her a "promise ring," I believe to keep her from nagging about their next step.
I love my stepdaughter, but as a parent I feel we need to give her a bigger push to move out and become self-sufficient. She talks about staying here until her school loan is paid off, but at the rate she's paying, it would be a decade before that happens.
I seriously believe her boyfriend has no intention of ever moving from his parents' house. It seems so strange to me that they don't seem to want a place of their own. I try and encourage our daughter to save money so that they could buy a house, but each time I bring it up, she gets defensive.
Any suggestions?
— Frustrated in Portland, OR
Dear Frustrated: The last thing you should do is encourage your stepdaughter to cohabit with her boyfriend. Nor should you point her/them toward buying a house. Her boyfriend sounds completely dependent on his parents, and you can assume that he will remain so.
These two are not candidates for cohabitation or homeownership.
The way to put the squeeze on your renter is to gradually increase her rent until she is paying roughly market value. Then it will be obvious that she can afford to live elsewhere. You can discuss this with her as a family, helping her to set goals and a timeline, and then you should start the clock running. Depending on where you live, she might be able to afford to rent a room in a group house. This would be a good option for her; it would get her further out in the world and might provide an incentive to work more, party less and get on with her (own) life. I assume she would prefer this to you and her mother controlling her romantic choices in your home.
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He talks about "we" but only when talking about adding tougher rules or trying to get her to move out, everything else is "I". I am also a little head-tilty at his being so specific about "my wife's daughter" at the beginning and then "our daughter" later on.
That combined with the fact that he does not seem to be able to just say "okay honey time to move out" suggests to me pretty strongly that he and his wife are not in accord about this, which seems an Issue.
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My gut-vibe is "YOU want her to leave, but her mother is totally happy with things as they are and you know any outright argument is going to end up with you losing and probably looking bad to boot and so are seeking stealth ways/backup from the advice columnist."
Now I could totally be wrong and the word-switches are legit meaningless and he and his wife are totally in accord? But just, that's my very first question: okay where's your wife on this? Because that's really important.
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And obviously this is the kind of thing that always winds up being a question in agony-aunt type situations, but it just means that even as an advisor based just on this I'd still be going "okay what does your wife think? First step: you two get on the same page about all this."
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