Having your parents ask you for money when you’re an adult can be uncomfortable. On one hand, they raised you and paid for everything you needed until you were old enough to care for yourself. On the other hand, loaning money to family can get complicated and messy.
One woman is feeling overwhelmed after her parents asked her to give them thousands of dollars so they could pay their overdue property taxes, and now she’s struggling to set boundaries with them.
She’s 28-years-old and works in finance. She’s made a good life for herself and has been able to put a decent amount of money into her retirement accounts.
Her parents, who are in their 50s, own a series of properties as investments, and she’s always disapproved of their decisions because they’ve never been financially stable enough to handle all the properties.
In fact, one of the reasons she went into finance and built a successful life for herself is because she learned from her parents’ financial failures.
A few days ago, she received a frantic call from her parents out of the blue.
“[They] frantically asked me to pay the property taxes on one of the properties they own because if they didn’t pay it within 30 minutes, they’d lose the houses. Apparently, they only had until 4:30 pm that day to pay, and they decided to call me at 4:00 pm to ask for this money.”
The property tax money cost over $6,000, as they were behind on paying their taxes, and there was a lien on the property.
Her parents were told that their properties would be foreclosed if they didn’t pay before the tax office closed at 4:30 pm.
Her dad’s bank cards kept getting declined, and as they were on the phone, he was told he needed to pay an additional $5,000 for another one of the properties.
So, her parents needed $11,000 total, and it felt like she was the only option to save them from losing all their properties.
“I felt like I was being robbed at gunpoint,” she recalled.
“I had no time to even think about the decision. I am so anxious about having this amount of money on my credit cards.”
After paying her parents’ taxes and putting the charges on her credit card, she couldn’t help but feel incredibly disappointed in them.
She’s been trying to get her mom to sell the unnecessary properties for years, especially because she doesn’t work. However, neither of her parents would follow her advice.
“I just realized that because I have made myself successful, they see me as a financial backup plan for their poor financial decisions,” she added.
“Even if they pay me back, I never want this to happen again. How can I set a boundary with them?”
How can she set a firm boundary with her parents and get them to pay her back at a reasonable time?
You can read the original post on Reddit here.
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