Help with a family quandary -- freeloading relatives/cottage might be sold

In My Humble Opinion
61

Sort of an update, though not much has actually happened, but I think what did is significant.

I think Maria has had a somewhat rude awakening as a result of Dave’s reaction to the proposed sale, particularly his asking her about letting daughter etc. move in to her house in MA. I mean, obviously she knew Cathy was his daughter, and he’d cared enough about her to beg Maria to let her into the cottage, but proposing to actually make that group part of the, well, her home group/family? And she definitely realized that allowing that would essentially mean ‘forever.’

And that was pretty clearly something Maria has ZERO intention of allowing.

And if Dave thought that was a reasonable thing to ask… what did it say about just how much he valued her/their relationship vs. Dave/Cathy?

Mostly I just listened as she talked about all this. It’s all about emotions, and what you really want, and basically I’m not a counselor or psychiatrist or anything.

Maria really isn’t good about taking action. She wants things to go easily, and will put up with a lot of growing discomfort over situations preferably to making possibly hard choices, but she does have limits. And I think she’s decided that she wants the cottage sold and Cathy to be reduced to as minor a factor in Maria’s life as possible. As in, maybe you send her and kid Christmas presents every year and no much interaction otherwise.

Assuming there’s any continuing relationship with Dave. How much does he value his somewhat free ride vs. wanting to support Cathy?

The only advice I gave her was to find an experienced real estate lawyer right away, and do her best to off-load all the conflict/hassles onto him/her as possible. IOW, say "Here’s the property, I want it sold to the Smiths with as little involvement by me in the process as possible, and then just act as if it’s an unstoppable procedure that’s just going to happen and doesn’t require my listening to bargaining or pleas or anything.

IOW, hire the professional to handle it professionally and try to stay out of it.

Lawyers are sort of gladiators for hire, right?

We’ll see what happens.

62

Yes, that seems like the best plan for Cathy. More expensive than doing it herself, but as you said, that’s what lawyers are for. Of course Cathy does have a back channel way to contact/guilt Maria, so she’ll have to be prepared for that.

I will say that this sentence seems unreasonable presuming the “you” in it is Dave:

“As in, maybe you send her and kid Christmas presents every year and no much interaction otherwise.”

Maria is as free as she wants to tell Dave that she herself wants nothing to do with Cathy going forward, including Cathy not being welcome in Maria’s house. But telling Dave that he can’t spend time with his daughter & grandchild is way over the line, IMHO, and she should be fully prepared for Dave to say absolutely not.

63

Thanks for the update! I agree that Maria should toss this to an attorney and let the professional handle every aspect. I also suspect that the attorney will strongly recommend that Maria straighten up her relationship with Dave, making sure that Dave does not have any legal claim to the residence that he shares with Maria. I suspect that Maria doesn’t want to be in court explaining why her “tenant” Dave isn’t allowed to have family members “visit” in Maria’s house for an extended period.

64

Absolutely. No one is going to be fooled that the lawyer is just doing stuff withouth Maria’s consent and control. There will be lobbying (of varying degrees and intensity) to call off the dogs. Maria’s going to have to be able to stand her ground and say “no” and let the attorney do the thing, no matter how much wheedling and begging and emotional blackmail may come out of it.

65

Has she spoken to Cathy about moving out now that she has the offer? She should probably talk directly to her about the situation. Maybe she will move out on her own. Do as much communicating over text or email so there’s a written record. If lawyer$ are going to get involved, it’$ going to co$t a lot. It may be cheaper and quicker to give Cathy some cash to move out. Although she shouldn’t have to do that. If Cathy can’t afford to move out, then Dave should be the one to support her. But that doesn’t sound very likely.

As for Dave, she should be re-evaluating her relationship. It’s really unfair to her that both Dave and Cathy are taking advantage of her kind heart and being financial burdens. She would probably be better off to dump the both of them. This is definitely not the last time that they are going to put her in this kind of bind. If Maria ends up paying off Cathy or taking on large legal expenses herself, then it’s pretty clear how much Dave values her and her happiness.

66

FWIW I read that sentence as @StarvingButStrong speaking to Maria about how Maria might interact w Cathy post-eviction. Not Maria (potentially) speaking to Dave.


Back to the main topic …

With this latest update it does seem the scales are rapidly falling from Maria’s eyes. And now the view out her windshield is pretty darn scary. Everything in life works better when you’re dealing with real facts, not guesswork or, worse yet, hopelessly naive wishful thinking and eyes-closed avoidance.

Good luck to Maria here. But even the best possible outcome is almost certainly a bad one. The most realistic hope is to pile most of the bad on Cathy and Dave in that order, leaving Maria with the largest helping of good that’s anywhere in the messy situation.

Maria thinking in terms of picking the least-bad course of action will work better than her framing this as picking the best course of action. The latter framing easily allows for avoidance; the former less so.

67

I mean probably, but not necessarily. The best outcome (assuming Dave is just a good-natured goof and not an active leech) would be for Cathy to sigh melodramatically and semi-quietly moves on to another situation once it is clear this is going to happen anyway, the place gets sold and Maria gets the cash, Dave shrugs and is verbally if probably ineffectually supportive of both Maria and Cathy. Life goes on with maybe a bit more festering family tension at the holidays.

Will it be that clean? Very, very likely not. Especially if Dave’s griping was not just a brief moment of selfish thoughtlessness. But it would be the best-case scenario. Well, barring a sudden lottery win where everyone genially walks away as millionaires.

68

Although, where’s she going to move? I gather she doesn’t actually have the income to pay rent. Is Dave going to pay her rent going forward?

There’s no reason for Maria to be responsible for the housing of this unrelated adult, but there’s every reason for Dave to want his kid to live someplace safe and decent.

69

Yeah, it’s a not-fun exercise to consider, because the kid and childcare is such a huge complication. But people have done it.

a.) Get a job, any sort of job and get an apartment if possible. Sharing as necessary, as it may very well be. Highly dependent on the rent/labor situation in her area. If she were in San Francisco, forget about it. If in Springfield, MI maybe a little more feasible.

b.) Move in with an understanding friend. Short-term or otherwise.

c.) Move in with an understanding boyfriend with a job. Short-term or otherwise.

d.) Do any of the above while additionally supplemented by dad.

e.) Explore whatever meager social services support programs that might be available. Childcare programs, welfare, food aid, what have you.

It’s a tight situation for Cathy, but…she knew this was supposed to be temporary situation and she had a few years to address it. It it were me I would do as some suggested up-thread and if feasible give her a helping financial hand in terms of cash to move (like pay for movers, deposit on a new place, enough to float them for a month or two on rent and groceries, whatever). There is actually law around that in my area of varying severity. There are no rental evictions allowed for sales around here (and I suspect with very long-term tenants the fact that it was a handshake deal where rent was unstated but de facto in kind for maintenance won’t make a bit of difference to the law). Owner move-in evictions which are allowed can get very pricey in terms of mandatory relocation fees depending on the city.

70

Cathy has been there 5 years, lives with her partner, and has a 2 year old son by “one of the previous ones (partners) living with her” . Clearly for the past 5 years she’s NEVER considered taking any steps to become independent & paying her own way. I refuse to believe that 2 adults can’t find crap jobs in NH sufficient to pay rent at a crap apartment.

71

Oh, but once they move in with Maria and Dave in MA, they’ll be sure to turn things around!

ETA: Sorry, but I could not find an emoji for ‘snort’.

72

Well, childcare for a toddler absolutely makes everything much more complicated than it otherwise would be. However plenty of people have managed it. Not easily, mind you. But it can be done.

But, hey - depending where Cathy ends up, retired Dave could maybe step up and spend more time with his grandkid while his daughter is working a shift at some job somewhere and help out that way. Win, win!

Or…just hear me out now…Maria can supply said free childcare and just let Dave vegetate comfortably! I’m sure she’d be super-duper-happy with that suggestion :grinning:.

73

I can’t believe it’s taken this long for me to realize this, but Cathy is clearly misinterpreting the NH state motto “Live Free or Die”.

74

Mooches gotta mooch. It’s what they do.

75

I didn’t and thus, as per another thread, realized (again) I’m old

76

Make room for me, would ja?

77

One thing Maria needs to keep in mind about the offer is that it’s likely time sensitive. My guess is that the person made the offer somewhat impulsively. They’ll probably go through with it, but they probably won’t wait forever. And there’s a chance they made similar offers on other cottages. If one of the other owners agrees first, then the person will probably buy that cottage instead of Maria’s. But even if the person decides to buy a different cottage or rescind their offer, Maria should still move forward with getting Cathy to move out.