Adult Son and money

He needs help and I don’t mean financial. I don’t know much about cryptocurrency, but I think it’s all a bit of a gamble. I get the impression he is your only child, and your mothers only grandchild. Difficult one ....

Oh dear! So difficult for you.

He certainly seems to be taking advantage.

It sounds like he needs professional help with his finances and further help with his mental health. Perhaps it's time for some tough love - if he refuses to go along with that you may need to tell him he's on his own! I appreciate that that brings its own difficulties, but you can't go on like this indefinitely.

I think you will have to be cruel to be kind, and tell him that you are going to change your behaviour from now on, ie not lend him money/bail him out, and therefore his behaviour will have to change ie he has to learn to manage the money he earns or face the consequences of his actions.

Moneysavingexpert have a free course on budgeting at the moment, try and persuade him to watch it. The average rent for a room in a shared house is £400, tell him you will continue to allow him to pay you half the going rate which I assume also includes limitless food, but want him to save the additional £200 to prepare him for independence.

Stop bailing him out of any deals he may make, tell him to move out as he has the money (as he claims he has) and next time he claims to be suicidal, call the police or the emergency line for him to be evaluated by a medical team

Bottom line, stop enabling him
What is the chance he is a product of his environment?

this sounds very hard as I can imagine I would do whatever I could to make sure my son got over such a MH crisis. Did you receive counselling yourself? Do you think it might help re boundaries?

This time next week Bitcoin could plummet and you will be back where you started or even worse he could be in debt in a big way.

He might have Mental Health issues but he certainly knows how to manipulate his parents.

But you know all this.........

You’re not doing him any favours (let alone yourselves) by allowing him a free ride.

If you loved him you wouldn’t limit his prospects by allowing him to think he can behave so badly and continually get away with it.

Time to be tough, for his sake.

I agree with others who say you need to back away. Have you seen solid proof that his investment has now regained its value? Because I’d be wondering about the truth of that.

He is currently furloughed. He is nocturnal and generally gets out of bed around 5pm. He spends his time playing online games. He comes out of his room for only a couple of hours a day.

He clearly has an issue with his mental health but also he is on the spectrum (undiagnosed) which is becoming more and more apparent as he gets older and wasnt noticeable when he was younger. He doesn’t go out, doesnt exercise and uses his bedroom floor as a rubbish bin.

Any proof he truly spent it in crypto? He could have a gambling problem, alcohol, etc

We are unfortunately between the devil and the deep. He is 25, has no qualifications that will get him a well paid job. He is very bright but was unable to complete University as he couldn’t concentrate. We cant throw him out.

He has a younger sister. She is the complete opposite of him, younger, earns plenty of money but is horribly verbally abusive to us. She lives 3 hours away.

If he is not neurotypical, he can ask for help to deal with that.

Plenty of people manage to live productive lives on the spectrum

is he receiving counselling himself then? it sounds like he needs a diagnosis. Has he acknowledged this himself or is it just your observation?

It is all very well us saying this that and the other (like he is 25 he need sto tidy his room etc) but it sounds like getting a dx os much more important.

He doesnt drink. As for gambling I know he does a bit but he spends most of his wages on fast food.

Tough love from me too. Similar story to my BF - she’s got her 40 year old teacher son out of so many financial scrapes when his partner walked out of his home. It was a vicious circle of he spends, she pays in case it ‘upsets him’. Thankfully, she’s now said he’s to stand in his own two feet - although she (rightly) supports him emotionally.
Up here we’d say ‘he’s taking a lend!’

I worry that if he runs up debts then bailiffs will be on our doorstep and the address will be link to county court judgements.

OP

Do you realize how you make all the excuses for your son and you are part of the problem?

Why do you mention a "well paying job"? Go for a paying job!
University is not for everybody, how about learning a trade?

Yes, you can choose make him love out.

About your dd, what does she say that is abusive?

County court judgements = consequences for his actions, he might learn from it

What is your son going to do when you and your mother are not there to enable him?
You are not helping him, you are harming him

Sorry, I misread

So kick him out and your address will be clean

so he has CCJs aswell? were these resolved by your Mum's money? that will put caveats on what he can lend?

why is your daughter abusive?

I'm sorry you are in this situation SecondhandRose but you really need to sort out your priorities. You are worried about bailiffs and being involved with CCJs yet you say you can't ask your son to leave. I think you need to sort out one thing at a time with your son he is 25 not a teenager. Give him a time line when he has to get some help with his financial problems and mental health issues. Then he needs to look at moving out, the present situation is just enabling him to continue manipulating and using you. Tough love definitely or this will just get worse.

I think there is a middle ground here, although it doesn't include bailing him out.

Help him to access support. People in far worse financial straits than him are able to get help with spiralling debts.

They will work out with him how to start making an effort and commitment to paying back.

I would keep him with you on the condition that he promises to get help and keeps at it.

You asked for thoughts. You might regret asking for mine.

This isn’t about money, really, is it? You allow and enable a fully grown man behave like a spoilt teenager in all sorts of ways, and make excuse after excuse to justify it. The adjectives ‘lazy’ and ‘spoilt’ would be used of a 13 year-old who behaved thus.

Of course you were sympathetic when he had a mental health crisis (though I wonder how much of a crisis it was - he certainly knows which buttons to press to get what he wants). If he has continuing mental health problems, he needs to be under the care of a mental health team. If he is neurodiverse in some way, he may need help from a specialist agency to learn to live a normal life. What he doesn’t need is repeated bailing out and cushy free housing without any responsibility.