Living At Home After A Certain Age

[Sister Havana]

Originally posted by cutiepatootie
I must of lived a sheltered life because i lived at home til i got married....minus the few yrs i was away at college..... but i moved out at 28/29 when i got married and now i am divorced and i live in my OWN brand spanking new home with my lil roommate.... my 4 yr old son and our barney the dog

[hijack]
I have a dog named Barney too!
[/hijack]

Thanks to the last couple posters for not making me feel like SUCH a loser. I'm 30 and I still live at home...moved back here in December 2001, thinking it would just be a few months til I found a permanent job. (I had one from 1996-2000 til I quit to return to IU full-time.) Well, I still don't have one. I've had a few temp jobs but nothing at the moment. Believe me I WANT to move out but until I get a permanent job it isn't feasible.

[mu_agd]

Originally posted by OohTeenyWahine
II was paying $850 a month for my one bedroom apartment in town. That's a lot, I know -- but that's the avg month's rent for a one bedroom in Hawaii (where cost of living is ridiculous).

$850 seems like nothing to me.. f'ing cost of living in boston...

i moved back home after school for a few months while i was looking for a job. but i wasn't complaining all that much since it was summer on cape cod! but once i got my job i moved to the city on my own. i have friends that still live at home though. sometimes it's not as easy to move out for some, they can't afford it or whatever.

[aephi alum]

I don't see a problem with people moving back home if there's a reason (job loss, divorce, spouse dies, etc). It can be a good way to save some $$ and get some emotional support from the family.

I myself couldn't have done it. My parents' house isn't set up with a separate entrance, plus there's the whole "their house, their rules" thing - to this day they look at me and see an eight-year-old. Also, I'm married and own my home.

[33girl]

Every situation is different. This is another one of those situations that I don't think you can say you need to be x number of years old.

However, if you are an adult still living with your parents you need to contribute in some way. If not financially, then in other ways. I never paid rent after college, but I did help out my mom & grandparents with things my mom physically couldn't do. That was more important to my parents than some check.

[Lady Pi Phi]

I'm 23 and I recently took sometime off rom school. I am living at home with my parents until I go back to school (god willing it will be in spetember). I love my parents to death, but I hate living with them. Unfortunately, I can't afford to live on my own in Toronto on the money I am making (I mean they might as well pay me in peanuts...at least I'd be able ton eat then). So because of economic reasons I still live at home. I know if and when I go back to school in september I will be living with my parents still because I will be staying in Toronto to go back to school.

I don't think I'm sheltered or emotionally retarded...I'm just too poor to live on my own right now.

[swissmiss04]

In some cultures living on your own before marriage is seen as something sad. If I knew my parents would take care of everything, it would be a cool arrangement. However in my situation I couldn't wait to get out and I still feel that way. There's no way I could live w/ the rents more than a few months to get on my feet. And even then it would be a last resort. I can't f*cking STAND these people who are lazy who just sponge off their parents until their 30s and never even offer to lift a finger or chip in for anything. I know someone in this situation and I have absolutely zero respect for him. Each to his own, I suppose

[Taualumna]

Originally posted by swissmiss04
In some cultures living on your own before marriage is seen as something sad. If I knew my parents would take care of everything, it would be a cool arrangement. However in my situation I couldn't wait to get out and I still feel that way. There's no way I could live w/ the rents more than a few months to get on my feet. And even then it would be a last resort. I can't f*cking STAND these people who are lazy who just sponge off their parents until their 30s and never even offer to lift a finger or chip in for anything. I know someone in this situation and I have absolutely zero respect for him. Each to his own, I suppose

Yeah, but the parents from those cultures expect their kids to marry young. They probably wouldn't expect their 40 year old son/daughter to be hanging around at home, even if they live in their parents' basement or garage apartment.

[honeychile]

I'd just like to say Never say never!!

When my fiance's father was dying, he moved back home to help his mother (physically & financially) - and spent several happy moments with his dad, memories he would never trade.

When I was going through a nasty divorce, I really had no choice but to move home or to a women's shelter. I moved home.

In both cases, we got out once the matters got settled. I know that my parents wouldn't take any rent, so I put the same amount in a savings account for when I got a new place.

While I certainly wouldn't recommend that everyone lives at home until they marry or whatever, I think that you should realize that, in some circumstances, it can be a real blessing. It's a matter of attitude, after all.

And let's face it, many of us on this board will consider taking their parent(s) in someday, when they're old. Circle of Life, people.

[alikat2]

Wow.....$850/month for a one-bedroom? I live in a small town in rural PA, where the cost of living is very low. My one-bedroom is $400/month, utilities included. The people who grew up in this area (I am a "transplant" ) are shocked by how expensive it is!! But I digress.

Anyway, I don't really see anything wrong with living at home into your 20s, as long as it's for financial reasons or something like that. If you're just living at home because you're too lazy to move out on your own.....and yes I have known people like this....that's a different story.

But I'm not really one to talk. My family lives only a little over an hour away from my current place of residence, and I visit them a few times a month and my mother picks up the tab on all my groceries and does laundry and stuff.......so sometimes I might as well be living at home.

[aephi alum]

$850/month for a one-bedroom is actually a pretty good deal for Boston (or, apparently, Hawaii). When I was a grad student, my husband and I shared a one-bedroom on-campus apartment (read: a glorified closet) for which we paid something like $700/month, and that was after the school's subsidy. Off-campus you could easily pay $1000+. And that was a few years back.

Anyway, I have a relative who moved back in with his parents "for a few months" following a messy divorce... he's still there 30 years later. (!) He makes substantial contributions toward the rent, though, and looked after his mother until she went into a nursing home a little while back.

[DeltAlum]

As a side note, I looked at a very small studio apartment in Manhattan (maybe 20x20 max) with bathroom and kitchenette for $1500/mo.

Back to the topic, parts of this will not be popular, but here goes.

First, after finding my first TV job immediately after college, I never lived at home again. Mrs. DeltAlum spent about a month after graduation at home planning our wedding and never went back home. Nor did any of her siblings.

However, our middle daughter had an apartment for a while and then came home for a while. And, our oldest came home for a very short time after a divorce.

Neither stayed long because we enforced some rules on them. They weren't nearly as strict as they had been in high school, for instance, but we felt, and I still do, that if they wanted consideration from us, we deserved some from them. (Neither paid rent, which might have changed things somewhat)

The one that was the worst was, while not trying to impose any kind of curfew, simply asking them to let us know when they expected to get home at night. Granted that they were both in their 20's, the problem is (was) one of being awakened by the door opening, etc. It's a heck of a lot easier to roll over when you hear it (and we did hear it), look at the clock and say to yourself -- Oh, that's Number One, than worry about a burgler, etc.

The other side of that is waking up at 3:00 AM and not having heard the door open and wondering if they had been in an accident. You simply can't turn off your parenting instincts simply because your kids are "of age."

In many ways, it can be a "lose, lose" situation, but again, it's a matter of consideration.

[Lady Pi Phi]

My parents still ask where I am going, and who I am going with and what time I expect to be home if I go out. I don't mind at all. Sometimes it's a little annoying, but I don know they do it because they still worry about me.
But I also call my parents and let them know if I'm not coming home or whathave you because I don't want them to worry too much about me.
It's a small sacrifice to make.

I moved out when I went to college and never went back. I was raised the same way as Kappaloo... that once I was old enough to hold down a job and/or go to school, I was expected to live somewhere else. My parents still helped me financially while I was in college, but they felt that it was important that I live on my own so that I could develop "life skills". I could have moved back in with them if I'd needed to, but they made it clear that they'd rather help financially first rather than see me return home.

As far as dating... I dated one guy who lived at home with his parents. He was still in college, so I understood... but I do have to say it was very wierd that he didn't know how to do laundry, cook, anything like that.

[Lady Pi Phi]

Originally posted by Ginger
As far as dating... I dated one guy who lived at home with his parents. He was still in college, so I understood... but I do have to say it was very wierd that he didn't know how to do laundry, cook, anything like that.

Living at home with your parents is one thing, but I would never date a guy who couldn't cook, clean or do his own laundry. That's just sad.

[OleMissGlitter]

I dated a guy last year who still lived at home in a separate apartment "wing" of his mother's house. I understood why he still lived at home, his mother was dying of cancer, but his sister and his other brother lived there too. It was too much for me! There was always someone around and asking questions and talking! No private time! Anyway, he was a great guy, just a weird living situation. I almost moved home this summer to live with my parents when I was laid off, thank God I found this job so I got to stay in Oxford!