Living with stepchildren can be hard and requires a lot of patience and understanding. For one man, the situation became too difficult, so he found a drastic solution.
Here’s what happened.
In November 2022, my wife died, leaving me with her three grown children. Even though I had been in their lives for over ten years, they always made it clear that I wasn’t their parent. Their real father moved to the Philippines after retiring.
The stepchildren, aged 21, 22, and 25, had trouble with the high cost of living in our city. We let them live with us without paying rent so they could save money. The youngest is still in school, and the other two have jobs.
But after their mother passed away, they stopped helping around the house. I paid for all the bills—electricity, water, internet, and other utilities—and even bought food for the youngest. I was frustrated, so I hired a cleaning lady to keep the house clean.
Eventually, I decided to sell the house. Its value had gone up a lot since I bought it, and I could retire comfortably in the Philippines. The house sold quickly, and I moved to my cabin. Each stepchild got $10,000, and I told them about the sale. They weren’t surprised; they had seen the “For Sale” sign and knew about the open houses.
Now, they are upset about losing their home. While they grew up there, they only treated it as a place to sleep. I think their late mother would be disappointed with their behavior.
They pooled their money together to get an apartment, but with only my gift, they will likely face financial problems within a year.
People stood on his side.
- “Raise your hand if your parents gave you $10k when you moved out. No hands? You separated from leeches.
- “They were disrespectful to you and your home, and you weren’t obligated to continue providing for them, especially after they became adults.”
- “You gave them nearly two years to start picking up after themselves and acting like they wanted to live there. They didn’t. If seeing for sale signs and open houses didn’t get them to realize that that’s not really on you. You also didn’t have to give them money to be on their own, but you did.
You’ve done enough, considering that they’re adults. It sounds like if they had been picking up after themselves, you probably wouldn’t have wanted to sell.”
