July 17 2007: Forced Monetary Independence
Car problems solved.
My parents are going to buy a new smaller car - their intended new profession will require them to spend a lot of time driving from site to site, and our current family sedan isn’t as fuel-efficient as they’d like (e.g. they’d spend over $70 a week on petrol). They’re going to buy a smaller coupe or hatchback - about $40 a week on petrol.
So, they offered our current car to me…at the normal asking price for a car of that ilk. Yeah. I’m paying my parents for a car. You’d think they’d at least just give it to me as an early twenty-first birthday present, considering I haven’t had any Christmas or birthday presents from them since I was fifteen, and haven’t taken a cent from them since that time either.
If you count that as $100 average for each ’special occasion’ present, and $20 a week average (the way most other people my age scrounge from their parents), they ‘owe’ me a good $6200 worth of money-posing-as-parenting - which is coincidentally, about the value of our car at the moment.
*shrug* Life sucks. At least Europe next year remains a possibility now, though China this year is still out of the reckoning.
10 Responses to “Forced Monetary Independence”
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Chantelle on July 17 2007 #
Okay, I think something ate my comment.
But the gist of my message was: Can you at least bargain with them? Even a little bit? Get it down to about $5000?
Reply: As far as they see it, they’re already doing me a favour.
Chantelle on July 17 2007 #
blah, they could at least give you a better price. My parents “gave” me a car to drive, but it’s basically they own and I just drive it. Makes me nervous (considering it’s a nice car too) because I’m always afraid I’m going to dent it or some accident happens.
maybe you can find someone to carpool with? save gas, money, environment? but it’s tough though.
marilyn on July 17 2007 #
I never even got a weekly allowance from my parents, but it paid off in the end with my mum buying my first car, and my laptop.
Well at least they are doing you a favour and your car problems are sorted
Bobbi-lee on July 17 2007 #
Well, something’s better than nothing, I suppose. You take what you can get in life, right?
Jack on July 17 2007 #
Wow. You should let them read this blog post, it might turn up to be quite an eye opener.
Juice on July 17 2007 #
@Juice: Why? Because they’re teaching Amanda to be self-sufficient and independent? Sure, I can see how that would be an eye-opener. Not.
I’m unsympathetic because I got bugger all as a kid either; did me no harm. :p I have a lot of respect for how grown up you are and the kind of family values you have - I don’t think you’d be the same if you had been given everything on a silver spoon like the majority of kids/teens/young adults today.
Jem on July 17 2007 #
I’ve “loaned” (that means my parents stole it from me) something like $3,500 but is actually closer to $4,000 because I was lending them money/buying them things long before that. I need a car too and I’ll be paying for it by myself, hopefully I’ll be getting my money back (I doubt it though). My dad would probably offer to sell me his Volvo sedan (13 years old), but the brakes are shot and it’s always in the garage and he’d probably demand top dollar for it the dimwit :P
Becky on July 18 2007 #
Wow, what an ungrateful little bitch you must be. Wingeing about the “millions” of hours you had to work to save for some frivolous holiday. What about the hours your parents worked to feed you, clothe you and educate you. As for the car. Sheesh. You’ve got some cheek implying that they owe it to you simply because they haven’t spoilt you enough the last few years.
I hope you have your own kids soon so you can see for yourself the sacrifices they force you to make.
Reply: Wow, what part of “I have paid for everything myself since the age of fifteen” did you not understand? That includes: food, clothes, going out, university fees, holidays, rent, everything. Did you neglect the fact that I’ve pay my parents $100 food and board every week since that age? Feel free to yell at me once only if you’ve been self-sufficient since the age of 15, or when more than half of Australian teenagers do the same as I have for the past five years.
Grello on July 24 2007 #
wow your parents have been asking you to pa rent since you were 15? That seems rather harsh… well I don’t know your family’s monetary situation but I know that my parents never really could afford much, but wouldn’t dream of making me work. They were happy I had a chidlhood…
And Grello should read at least a few of your posts before making claims about your personality.
Reply: My parents have never been particularly well off, so if I can help out by taking the burden of providing for me off their hands…well, why not? I earn enough at my part-time job to do so, so it’s never really been an issue.
Vera on July 25 2007 #