'AITA for telling my sister she can't get a 'discount' to buy our parents' house?'
"AITA for telling my sister she can't get a 'discount' to buy our parents' house?"
My sister (F56) has been living with our mother for the past 5 years since our dad died and covid hit. Mom's dementia meant she shouldn't be alone, and sis & her son (12 yo) offered to move in to mom's house.
Now that mom needs to move to long term care, we can sell her house. Sis wants to buy it for herself and her son, and she wants it at a lower price than we'd get from the market. I've refused and think I might be the AH.
Sis has taken care of my mother for the last few years, doing the shopping, cooking, meds, appointments, etc but she's been getting free rent so it seems like she's already benefited with free housing.
I admit I don't do much for my mom - I live an hour away and I take night school courses. Plus I'm not as patient and can't handle some of her habits brought on by the dementia.
We don't know what the house is really worth, because it's run down and needs a ton of work, and all the other houses around have been renovated. My sister thinks that this house being run down will put it closer to her price range.
For context, neighborhood houses have sold recently for about $1.2-$1.5 million, and she wants to buy this house for $1 M-$1.2 million. A real estate agent recently said he thought could get close to $1.5 M.
I've got another agent coming today and I told sis she'll have to pay full price if she wants it. (She owns an investment rental she could sell, and I own my own home.) My sis called me an AH for ruining her chances at home ownership and for not stepping up with help. Also for context, it's rare to find a house in our city under $1 M.
My mother can afford a nursing home so she doesn't need the money from the sale of the house to live on, but the less my mother spends, the more we inherit when she passes away. And our parents always wanted things divided equally among us. AITA for insisting we sell our mother's house for top dollar?
Let's see what readers thought:
ag012 writes:
Presumably they don't wait, because it could be years, and who's paying the property taxes and maintenance on the house until then?
The sister presumably wants to buy it now so she can do that renovation that is needed NOW, instead of in 5 years. Based on OP's attitude, the sister doesn't want to be paying taxes and expenses on the house, just to have it sold to someone else in 5 years, or whenever the mother dies.
OP is counting free-rent in favor of the sister, but OP isn't thinking about what the cost of care during that time would have been. Let's say rent's $1,200/month for 5 years, that's $72,000 total.
Does OP have any idea what the cost of a live-in care giver is? It's more like $72,000 PER year, so OP's sister has saved the estate at least $360,000 in that time. The difference between $1.5million and $1.2 million is $300,000.
And that doesn't even count the mental load that OP didn't have to deal with, knowing her sister was right there for emergencies, medical issues, etc.
$1 million seems completely fair. $1.2 million seems stingy, but whatever. OP asking for $1.5 million is so out of line.
And this is something I've thought about as I have an older brother living near by my aging parents who does lots of little stuff for them, while I live on the other side of the country. If he ended up moving in with them, or vice versa, I would 100% give him a benefit like this if he asked. I truly appreciate all her does.
obtsu87 writes:
Absolutely YTA. If your mom needed the money to live off of, that would be different. But your sister has stepped up to care for your mom all these years when you couldn't or wouldn't.
My grandmother had dementia and my parents cared for her, and let me tell you, it was horrible most of the time. Your sister has earned a discount. While she did get free rent, it's hard to put a price on the hours and emotional sacrifice that is.
On top of all that, the house needs a lot of work, and discounting at least somewhat for that is completely reasonable. If neighborhood homes are selling for 1.5 mil, your mom's rundown house doesn't comp at that, and probably couldn't even appraise at that.
You'd be uprooting her son - your nephew - after living there for five years in order to scrape some future inheritance. Equal and fair are not the same thing.
plao23 writes:
This is exactly it. The sister didn’t pay rent in dollars, she paid it in labor, and that labor was most likely valued much higher than the market rate for rent.
OP, you didn’t spend time with your mom while her health was declining because you’re too impatient to deal with the symptoms of her dementia? That is especially heartless. My grandmother had Alzheimer’s, and the most heartbreaking moments of my life were her lucid moments.
When she was aware enough to realize that she was losing her mind and she was so scared and sad and there was nothing we could do to stop it. Your mom went through those moments too, and since you couldn’t be bothered to be there for her, your sister is the one who had to witness them.
She’s been through absolute hell to love and care for your mom during some of the hardest moments of your mom’s life.
The very least that you owe your sister is a discount on the house price. In actual reality, you owe her your undying gratitude for taking on a difficult, frightening, and heartbreaking task so that you wouldn’t have to do it yourself.