Am I getting ripped off?

Post Reply New Topic

I'm 23 and live in a house with my mom and 17 year old sister. My dad has been living in a hotel since October due to some family issues that I will not be discussing. I've had a job at Costco for almost 2 years now. I'm part time, but that really means nothing there because your hours are not "set" I could be working 40 hours one week, 32 the next, 24 after that, and then 36. I make nearly 12 bucks an hour and have insurance, benefits, 401 K, all that good stuff. Being payed twice a month I'm making roughly a little over 800 a month depending on how much I worked and all that.

Recently my parents decided I should start paying rent to help out with thing, especially in light of our recent family situation. I thought that was fair enough. Just so people know, my dad is not like cut out of our lives or abandon us or anything. He stills pays the bills, brings groceries over, helps out with things around the house that need to be done, pretty much nothing really else is different hes just not allowed to live here anymore for the time being, but as of a couple weeks ago my mom has allowed him to come over during the days as long as hes gone by the evening.

Back to my original problem though. Gas and insurance comes out of my own pocket a long with the rent. I was paying $70 bucks a month for my car insurance, now for whatever reason my dad tells me that its gone up to $130 due to an accident I had in July when I accidentally backed into my aunt's car. It was just minor things pushed in the head light and damaged the front, but it wasn't like I totaled the car or anything, it still ran, and to be honest I'm not even sure if my aunt and uncle were in a hurry to fix it anytime soon because my dad had to be badgering them for the insurance info and what not so he could file the information with our insurance and be done with it. I'm not an expert at these things, but I don't understand why its going up nearly EIGHT months later after it all happened? So to adding that to my "rent" fees, I now have to pay $580 a month.

My mom constantly goes on to me about how I should start saving up for a car and my own place. I don't see how I can be doing that when nearly an entire paycheck and half is now going out the door for this. And then today I sat down and really started to think about all this. Right now my house hold consists of myself, my sister, and our pets. My sister is a junior in high school right now with no job. Thats not a big deal because honestly I know I couldn't see myself being able do what I do at Costco now and be in school at the same time. My mom however does not work and has not had a job since 2 years before I was born, (1986). Why am I paying for all this when I'm hear the least?

My mom does very little to nothing around the house. Most of the household chores are done by my sister and I, though more so my sister now because I'm at work a lot and not in the house to be able to do them. Her routine consists of sitting in front of her computer all day long playing the sims 3 or answering tech support questions on the sims 3 facebook site. She seldom cooks, infact when I had brought my new girl friend over a couple weeks ago I think it was the first time she had cooked anything since xmas night. Most of the meals around her consist of whatever we can slap together in the fridge or some frozen entry like a hot pocket for microwavable bean burritos. Because cooking is just way too much work for her. Her idea of doing laundry is pushing the buttons on the machines after my sister has done all the sorting and loading on her own.

She keeps trying to dump our recently diagnosed diabetic dog with my dad at his hotel because "shes too much work and hurts my mom's back". I'm not sure how the dog is hurting my mom's back because my sister is the one thats doing all the bending down to give the dog her insulin shot twice a day, my mom has not done it once, I've done it a few times so I could learn how incase my sister was somewhere else, but obviously I'm not doing it a lot because I'm at work most of the day, but I atleast made the effort to learn how so I could say I did it. She keeps telling my sister that she can't have her license because we supposedly can't afford the insurance. My sister lacks a lot of common sense and honestly I could see her getting into an accident the moment we turned her loose alone in a car. Normally I wouldn't have a problem with that thinking. However....her toy poodle that we had for 8 years recently died a couple months ago. We're getting a new one this friday and according to my sister costs $8000 dollars. I don't know for sure as I haven't done research on prices of new dogs, but I don't imagine there cheap. I don't understand how we can afford an $8000 dog just fine but we can't afford insurance for my sister to drive.....you wonder why I'm thinking something is off right now.

The dog had only been dead for 4 days and she was already looking for a replacement, I'm sure hes gotta be rolling over in his grave right now. I'm starting to wonder if all this "rent" money is being used towards this new dog. People at work are telling me that for what I'm having to pay now I could get myself a decent place of my own. I'm thinking I should maybe start to look into it because I'm not really liking how my mom can live here and not pay anything while doing practically nothing to contribute to house hold and has no job.

Maybe I'm just ranting, but all this is really making me scratch my head and wonder...

You might well want to break that long wall of text down into paragraphs. It will make it much easier to read and will thus ensure you a better chance that your post will be read and replied to.

SectorStar,

1. I agree with Tequila...break that text up to make it more readable and;

2. You are definitely getting ripped off. In Roseburg, OR, the cost of living is low enough to support yourself (with a roomate or a couple of them) on what you make if you are conservative with your cash.

Another option is the transfer to a Costco somewhere else. I live in Boise, ID and we have a Costco here and the cost of living isn't a lot higher than rural Oregon and it is a lot lower than urban Oregon like Portland. I have known people that X'ferred between Costcos in the Pacific Northwest.

Since you are 23, your parents charging you rent is to be expected but it does sound like you pay enough that you could get your own place. It also sounds like your Mom and Dad have their own issues to work out.

Good luck!

You could probably move out. If you do, don't contribute to your family's financial mess. They need to learn to function on their own.

I don't really feel like the cost of living here is too much. Honestly I'm not too keen on moving if I don't have too. I just don't like how I seem to be paying the most when I'm living in the house the least, and my mom is basically living there worry free off of me and my dad's hard earned money and doing very little too nothing.

They're taking as much as they can from you. It's best to move on and not tell them where you've gone.