PARENTS LIVING WITH ADULT KIDS SHOULD KEEP THIS IN MIND.

Are you among those parents, who’s grown up child live with them? Don’t worry, you’re not the only one. According to a report by the Pew Research Center, living with parents is the most common living arrangement in America where about thirty percent 22-29-year-old millennial’s live with their parents.

There are many factors that can lead to this including changes in the job market and the economy which makes it difficult for young adults to support themselves, and fewer young adults moving in with romantic partners or roommates.

For many parents, the peace and quiet of a child-free home after spending a decade of waiting for them to finally grow and move on with their lives is short lived, if it even happens at all. Its heard from so many parents whose children either never left home or returned after a brief experiment with the adult world that parenting a child and parenting an adult are two entirely different phenomenon.

The parameters shift from homework and curfew to new issues, running the gamut from how to handle overnight guests to finding a job. Not only are the logistics tricky, you’re also worried about their future.

While this trend to live in with parents might be beneficial for many families who tend to spend more time together, it does present its own set of unique challenges.

Is it fine to have house rules and expectations when your child is an adult?

How to set limits and boundaries with an adult child?

What if you actually want your child to move out?

Here are a few essential tips for parents living with adult children at home:

Understand that things have changed: Parents should acknowledge that their kids have grown up. While you will always be their guardian and mentors, your parental authority should be changed. You can’t hold them to the same exact rules they had as teenagers in your home.

Constant invasion in their privacy, telling them how to sit and stand might be a way of showing concern for you, but for them it comes off as toxic. Being in a vulnerable age they expect to be independent and like to keep their matters to themselves. Parents should always understand and respect this.

Remember that some amount of conflict is normal: It can be hard for parents to watch their child make decisions they might not agree with. Adult children can be resistant to rules or expectations set by their parents as they expect and demand independence.

Going out into the world alone and learning to support oneself is not something easy!

Remember that this tension is common and indicates that you and your child are going through some age-appropriate differences.

Since they grew up not in the same environment as you, they have different opinions, values and mindsets. Just because you don’t share mutual outlooks doesn’t mean either of you is wrong. And besides even if they are, you should find a decent way to make them understand your perspective not by grounding them or being loud but by having a modest conversation with them.

Come up with a living agreement:  Yes, the adult living with you is your own child, but being the owner, you get to set your own house rules and limits. What are you willing to provide except accommodation and how will you be paid back?

Some parents ask their children to contribute to the household by pitching in to pay bills and expenses, while some come up with certain chores that everyone participates in.

You should sit and discuss your house rules including things such as noise, chores appointed, overnight guests, or drug/alcohol use. Being allowed as an adult, to live in with your parents is a privilege that you are providing them.

If they defy any rule set by you, you are allowed to take the privilege away and kick them out. Or simply start taking rent or penalizing them just like you would to a stranger.

Yes, it will be difficult and might strain your relationship with them for a while but it will make them more responsible and mature with matters as serious as this.

It’s not the permanent solution; Out of love, some parents might allow their kids to live with them for well, forever. That is just another way of spoiling them.

Before letting them in and after they turn 18, you should make it clear to your children that you expect them to move out after a certain time.

Contracts can be renewed, after week, months or maybe years, but they should not be open ended. You should keep pushing your children to stand on their own feet and learn to survive in the rapidly growing world.

And when they are ready to move out, you should never stop them or express grief as this will only help them to grow.

A Wall Street Journal recently rued a headline that the “Percentage of Young Americans Living with Parents Rises to seventy five percent high”. Apparently, the New York Times weren’t wrong when they said that the Boomerang Kids Won’t Leave!!