Parents charge 21-year-old daughter $300/month if she moves in with her boyfriend: '[It is] a made-up number they got for the 'average' cost of a singular phone plan, health insurance, and half of my car payment'

JR Atkinson • Writer and Editor

Sep 29, 2026 10:00 AM EDT

Going out on your own means paying for yourself too.

It's not easy to strike out on your own. You may want to do it gradually, gaining a little bit of independence at a time. But you don't always get this luxury, depending on your situation. Sometimes you have to do a big leap and figure it out on your own. If you have a difficult relationship with your parents, this might be what you end up having to do. You would rather try and fail on your own than rely on them for the things you need to survive. That's the crossroads this young person was at when a decision to move in with her boyfriend presented a new financial reality. Sometimes you grow up bit by bit, and sometimes it happens all at once. It's not easy to leave the nest under any circumstances, especially when things are getting nasty.

Sometimes you're better off asking for forgiveness rather than permission, and this can be a great lesson to learn at a young age. But you have to be ready to face the consequences if you do. The parents in this story clearly wanted control of what their child was doing, even after they were an adult. Control is often a two-way street. This young woman wanted independence, but there was still a lot that she was relying on her parents for. This is a difficult balancing act as you get older.

*_{Representative only.}*
*A young woman carries a cardboard box into an empty room*

Am I in the wrong for not wanting to pay my parents $300 a month because I decided to move in with my boyfriend?

Hi! First time posting but I really need some advice from people who do not know me personally. I (21 F) and my boyfriend of almost five years (20 M), decided to move in together after last semester. My parents do NOT like that we moved in together before we are married (reli_ous

reasons) and told me that if I was going to live with my boyfriend that they would charge me $300 a month. This $300 was a made- up number they got for the 'average' cost of a singular phone plan, health insurance, and half of my car payment. I am still on their phone plan, still on my father's health insurance he gets

from work, and the car (in my fathers name) was supposed to be a graduation present. My boyfriend and I love each other very much and do want to get married. However, I don't want to get married until after I graduate with my undergraduate degree (next year).

The main reasons are because of the financial burden of a wedding and I know that planning a wedding would distract me from my education and my grades would suffer. Recently I came to the conclusion that I have to tell my parents I can't pay them the $300. Not because I want to avoid responsibility, but because

it is putting a MASSIVE strain on my feelings towards them. We have always had a rough relationship because they had me at 17 years old. They have always reminded me of it (telling me things like 'remember we were 17 when we had you' at times when I went on dates with my boyfriend) and how awful of a financial situation they were in and how their parents treated them at first.

My plan is to tell them that I would rather be kicked off of all of their plans and the car switched to being in my name and paying for it myself than give them $300 a month. I understand that it would probably be more expensive to do it on my own, but I just can't keep doing this. Am I wrong?

She was caught between wanting to make it on her own and still trying to appease her parents. Sometimes you can't have it both ways. That's the struggle she was in, though, and she was having a hard time finding her way through it. So she sought the advice of the internet, which strove to give her. Keep reading to see what happened here and let us know what you think in the comments. Flying the coop is always easier said than done, and sometimes requires us to do some things that might make us uncomfortable at first.