Mom Says It’s ‘Weird’ and ‘Greedy’ to Charge Adult Kids Rent for Staying in Their Childhood Home

A mom is questioning why other parents choose to make their adult kids pay rent to live in their childhood home.

In a recent post on the U.K. parenting forum Mumsnet, the mom shared that she has a friend who charges her 17-year-old daughter rent and she finds it “weird.” She said her own parents did the same when she was growing up.

“Am I the only one who thinks it’s setting your kids up for failure and greedy to charge your kids for staying in their childhood home?” she asked, explaining, “I’d want my kids to be able to afford their own place, not make it harder for them.”

The mom concluded her post by saying that if she did charge her kids rent, she would “pretend to and then give all [the money] back” to them later.

In the comments, some fellow parents suggested that it depends on the situation.

“If an 18 year old has a job and is still living with their parent, and the parent isn’t financially well off, why should the parent still continue to pay for the child’s lifestyle? Maybe the parent/s have struggled for years to pay bills, working hard etc. — the child should pay their own way,” one person wrote. “If the parent is financially well off and can afford to not charge rent, fantastic.”

Others took the stance that any kid older than 18 should be paying their own way regardless of the parents’ financial situation, unless they are still in school.

“My view is if a ‘child’ is over 18 and working full time (not in education) then yes, of course they should pay, mainly because it teaches them financial responsibility,” a commenter said. “Life is not free. Having your full income as pocket money is not a good life lesson at all.”

However, quite a few commenters agreed with the OP (original poster), saying they don’t believe in charging kids rent for to live at home because they see it as a way to give them a leg up in a tough economy.

“I don’t charge [my] 19 year old daughter rent because I’m encouraging her to save money for a house deposit. It’s hard enough for young people to get on the ladder these days, why would I want to set her back even further?” one person wrote.

But one commenter disagreed with the assertion that making kids pay rent sets them back. “On the contrary, they learn the value of their labour and budgeting skills,” the user wrote. “One of the tasks of parenting is teaching these aspects of adulthood. Mollycoddling teaches them nothing of value and is actually a real disservice to them.”

Another person agreed, pointing out that if kids are not required to pay rent, they “get used to having a salary but no living expenses.”

“It becomes very difficult to motivate yourself to move out,” they argued.