Woman's relationship shattered when BF finds her post calling him deadbeat. AITA?
'AITA for expecting my boyfriend to pay rent if he moves in with me?'
This is a doozy. I’ve been dating Josh for a year. I should say now that I (24f) don’t ever want to be legally married, and Josh (30m) is divorced and doesn’t want to remarry. We also live in a place where there is no common law marriage.
Still, we want to take things a bit further and we’re talking about Josh and his two daughters moving in with me.
I own a 3 bed/2 bath house in a nice area. Josh rents a 2 bed/1 bath apartment, and his lease is coming up. My mortgage is 1k a month, and Josh’s rent is 1.4k a month.
It was important to me that we would have everything figured out before making the change so that there would be no surprises or disagreements about who pays what.
I figured it would be unreasonable for Josh to expect to just live with me for free, especially since I’d be giving up one of my rooms so his daughters could have a room. I suggested that Josh pay $700 a month to me in rent, half of what he is currently paying.
I would cover the cost of any home repairs, internet, garbage, etc. Then we would split utilities, even though there’s three of them and one of me I don’t mind splitting since that would be about what I’m currently paying, I predict. And since I meal prep once a week I would just get my own groceries and he could get theirs.
When I laid everything out Josh was very unhappy, and said since it’s my house he shouldn’t have to pay rent, and that we should split groceries.
I told him he was welcome to buy his own house and I would move in with him and happily pay rent, while renting out my own house. He was mad at me because he said he’s not in a position where he can buy a house.
We can’t come to an agreement, so I suggested he just find another apartment (the owners aren’t letting him renew) and we could revisit the topic in a year. He’s not happy with that either because rent prices have skyrocketed here and 2 bedrooms now go for around 1.8k a month, and he thinks he won’t be able to find a place he can afford.
I’m a bit frustrated because I feel like $700 a month is a really good deal compared to the likely $1,800 he will have to pay. Since we aren’t going to get married or anything I don’t understand why he thinks I would be okay with him living for free with his two kids. I’m happy to have romance and companionship but shared assets and finances are not something I want in life, I don’t want to support a man.
A mere two hours later, the OP returned with a very abrupt and surprising update:
i showed Josh this post and he thinks you all are wrong. So here’s some input from him: “ Leslie makes 120k a year and I make 30k a year. I’m living paycheck to paycheck supporting two kids with no help from my ex wife.
It’s gotten so expensive here that at this rate I’m not even going to be able to feed my kids soon without going to the food bank. No matter what, they’re going to get fed. But it’s not fair that she owns a house, and can go on vacations or spend 400$ a month getting her hair done when I can’t even buy my kids name brand cereal.
She shouldn’t charge me to live with her because she should understand that I want to be able to spend whatever I can giving my kids the childhood that they deserve. Not for me, but for them.”
Then wildly, AGAIN two hours later...
thanks Reddit. Owe you one and I’m glad I posted here. After a very loud and angry argument with Josh, I broke up with him. Despite pretty much everyone telling him he was wrong Josh insisted that I should basically support the three of them because it’s what would be best for his kids.
He doesn’t seem to understand that they aren’t my kids and no one is going to want to bankroll the three of them. At least no one with a brain.
The point is, I’m young, good looking, i own a house. I can do better than a broke single dad who has no education and a sh*tty job who thinks it’s ok to mooch off me and scream in my face when I tell him no. Hope your next girlfriend is stupid enough to put up with you Josh 🖕🏻. No wonder your ex wife left.
Here were the top comments from readers who followed this weirdly quickly concluded story:
Way to screw up, Josh. He had it good and now he has nothing. Choosing beggar energy for sure.
The entitlement of some people is so unreal. His current rent is $1400/month. He was bringing in 3x the people AND being offered a place that is literally HALF his current rent with free utilities like wifi. He would've had an additional $700/month to use on him and his girls and people are trying to say the situation was unfair for HIM???
There is 0 chance that $700/month covers half the monthly costs of home ownership with things like maintenance.
I think it was his plan the entire time was to wait for the lease to expire then try and strong arm his way into a free ride from her. He's being offered a bigger place at half the rent he currently pays and he still spit at her offer.
His next step was probably dropping from work to 'focus on the kids' while she supports his entitled ass. If it's not okay for woman to be gold diggers, it's not okay for men either.
He probably could have countered at $500 a month (half her mortgage) and gotten an even better deal. But no. Gotta be a mooch.
This feels like another variation on the trend of one person sponging off the other, then going too far.
She’s 24. She has her whole life ahead of her and this guy made it clear he intends to never get married. There’s no reason she should support three people. I’m sorry for those kids but they’re not hers, she will never be their step parent, and John’s whole attitude is sh*tty. Guy wasn’t even willing to contribute at all to OP’s generous offer.