Advice on teens

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Peysobe

New Member
Hi, I'm new here and just found this site. I just turned 50 last month so I guess I qualify now :) Anyway I have a bit of a different situation and could use some feedback. I had my children later in life so even though I'm 50 I have a 17 yr old son and 9 yr old little girl. I talk things over with my mom all the time but thought an extra set of ears might be helpful.

Sorry this is so long. My son is a junior this yr in hs and desperately wants a car. A lot of his friend are just handed cars hy their parents. Since I am a bit older and more old fashioned about things I sometimes don't understand the younger parents and things they do. I try to stay cool and up on trends to relate though.

I told my son if he got a job after school and paid for half the car his dad and I would pay the other half...needless to say he's not too happy. He's a really good kid with great grades and on varsity football but he can have that teen attitude at times :) Do you think I'm being unreasonable on this matter.

I would have asked on a parents forum somewhere but like I said I seem to have different ideas about how kids should be raised than those parents 10 years younger than me. I'm just trying to instill some responsibility but i hate always being the bad guy :) Any thoughts???? Thanks
 

Hi Peysobe and Welcome to the forum. If your son has good grades and is into sports he sounds like a well grounded and responsible kid.

Kids today want it all and they want it now so your kid is no different than most in wanting instant gratification by means of a set of wheels.

Offering to go half is fair, I don't know what price range you are looking at but it could take some time for him to earn the other half. Any way you could pay the whole thing up front and deduct from his earnings with the understanding that a missed payment means the car stays in the driveway until caught up.

It is a different world from yesterday, for some rural areas having your own car is a necessity, don't know if that is the case here.
 
Hi, Thanks for answering! We had thought of that about buying and letting him pay us but wasn't sure if we or he would hold to the bargain :) We do live sort of rural so he can't walk to places but I am a stay at home mom so have been driving him everywhere...which I don't mind but he hates hence the attitude he's been giving :) I think my husband and I might have to rethink and maybe do the upfront buy but then really stick to our guns about the payments. I hope I survive the teen years and to think my daughter hasn't even entered them yet...they are definitely not for the faint of heart. Thanks for the advice!!
 

We live in a rural area and we still have a 17 yr old daughter at home. At the moment we have a second car but contemplating going down to a single car. She catches a bus for school but uses the car for going to a part time job. The added insurance cost for her to be on the policy is $1200.

She is a good kid, "A" student, involved in school sports etc. She puts gas in the car and she contributes a portion of her pay towards the "insurance cost".

Its not a lot but she's learning that there isn't a free ride anywhere and that includes when you're living under your parents roof.
 
Same here, the insurance price will go up the same for us. Even though we live comfortably we are not well off enough to just dole out cash for all the ins, gas, payments etc. It's nice to know I'm not the only one who feels this way. I know I have enabled him by being his taxi all the time but now that's not good enough :) I have told him that he can drive my car to work after school when he doesn't have practice and on the weekends to his job (which he doesnt have yet) or I can drop him off and pick up so it doesn't tie up the car for me. Anyway, I'm going to keep thinking for a while before I do anything. Thanks for the help!
 
I think you are spot on. We let her use the car when we're not...that will have more of an impact when we go to one car. If we have something planned, well sorry hun, we'll drive you or you can find another way and by the way, you owe me $20 for gas.
 
I'm going to throw something out here which deals with living in a rural area. I can remember missing out on so much as a teen as far as after school activities when the family moved to a rural area.

I could no longer do track, cheerleading, any of the activities where practice was after school as the bus went on it's schedule, not mine. My friends still took part, I was left out....And I resented it big time.
 
Mizzkitt said:
I'm going to throw something out here which deals with living in a rural area. I can remember missing out on so much as a teen as far as after school activities when the family moved to a rural area.

I could no longer do track, cheerleading, any of the activities where practice was after school as the bus went on it's schedule, not mine. My friends still took part, I was left out....And I resented it big time.
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Fortunately with both of us being retired we can pick her up if she runs late with school activities. I was in the same boat as you, lived in the country and my parents weren't in a position to do that. Very isolating to say the least.
 
Haha:) I think first thing I will do is see if he actually takes the initiative to get a weekend job and then discuss the car after that. He's trying to put the cart before the horse I think. I will just see if he can get and stick with a job and look like he's trying before I even stress over this any more :)
 
Peysobe said:
Haha:) I think first thing I will do is see if he actually takes the initiative to get a weekend job and then discuss the car after that. He's trying to put the cart before the horse I think. I will just see if he can get and stick with a job and look like he's trying before I even stress over this any more :)
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I also gave each one of my Children the "lecture" before they turned the wheel of our cars. Zero tolerance for any suspected drug or alcohol use while driving. Zero tolerance for any drugs or alcohol in the car period. Zero tolerance for anyone being in the car that was under the influence of drugs or alcohol. And zero tolerance meant they would NEVER drive any of my cars again period.

I also told them because of the Insurance implications they were one ticket or one at fault crash from never driving our cars.

So far out of 4 children we only had one that tested the waters and lost. He was a good example for the other ones that the old man was dead serious.
 
We have a friend who's 30+ year old son does not know the value of $$$$. He has been of and on living at home with his parents. They just recently bought him his 3rd car and they say he is slowly paying them back. He is telling them he will be getting an apartment closer to his job in July..He is on his 3rd job and is making &15 an hour. Time will tell.
 
Ken N Tx said:
We have a friend who's 30+ year old son does not know the value of $$$$. He has been of and on living at home with his parents. They just recently bought him his 3rd car and they say he is slowly paying them back. He is telling them he will be getting an apartment closer to his job in July..He is on his 3rd job and is making &15 an hour. Time will tell.
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We have a son who decided to quit school, not work, wouldn't respect the rules of the house (they weren't very complex), believed he should have our car at his beck and call, wouldn't lift a finger around the house,

He left....and it wasn't by his choice, but ours...he was 18. He's now 21 and hasn't changed.
 
My question is, if he is participating in sports,how is he going to have enough time for a meaningful job.

Our school district practice starts in the AM with a morning run. Practice picks up again for two hours immediately on dismissal.
He then has his normal school work and being in high school, I am sure a few other assignments that will consume more than a few hours.

I would sooner buy him a cheap car rather than watch his school work suffer.
 
James said:
We have a son who decided to quit school, not work, wouldn't respect the rules of the house (they weren't very complex), believed he should have our car at his beck and call, wouldn't lift a finger around the house,

He left....and it wasn't by his choice, but ours...he was 18. He's now 21 and hasn't changed.
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Our house "rules".

NO drugs, alchohol. (Alcohol only when you became of age and as long as you lived here being or getting intoxicated was not an option - I despise drunks)
NO smoking. You want to smoke, go for a walk around the block.
You helped out around the house.
Using the Car had rules as I mentioned previously.
You either went to school and did your best or if you quit, you worked.

If you didn't respect the rules then obviously you needed to move out.
 
I tried to stay out of this because I don't have teenagers now nor boys. But, when we did have teenage girls, anything they had to pay for and replace if they damaged it, they took better care of it and it worked! Now, both of them have teenagers and they are making them help pay for gas, insurance, etc. I'm not sure about the cars with our grandchildren but I do know they're paying for their gas, etc.
 
My daughter ran with an affluent crowd in high school. We were far from affluent; her father worked with abused and delinquent children and I ran a non-profit that didn't pay it's director an obscenely high salary.

She was the youngest of her crowd, so she got to see all her friends turning 16 and getting new Mustang convertibles and top-of-the-line Hondas and other high-priced cars for their 16th birthdays. She started asking what kind of car she was getting for her birthday. Much to her dismay, I had to point out that there was no federal statute that stated that everyone got a car at 16. A certain amount of attitude ensued, further assuring that she wasn't going to be getting a car. Unfortunately, while we were away a couple of weeks before her birthday, my mother bought her a modest used car. I was plenty ticked, because my mother knew about our wishes.

The deed was done, so we sat down and hashed out some rules about the use of the car and the requirement to pay her own insurance and gas. Since she had held down a good job since she was 14 (yes, 14....her first real "job" was at 12), she was able to do that and still maintain a straight-A average.

Later that year, she traded in the car and bought herself a new Toyota. All I can say is, when the kid wanted something, she worked out a way to get it. She was born that way and is still that way.
 


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