You two can live with uswhats the point in taking out a mortgage? Youll get our house anyway!thats what my mother-in-law said the other day.
Shes been doing her best to talk us out of getting a mortgage, insisting we just move in with them since their house will eventually go to my husband; hes their only child. But honestly, his mum is only forty-five, and his dads forty-sevenhardly ancient!
Me and my husband are both twenty-five, just starting out with our own jobs. We earn enough to rent a flat, and I really dont want our relationship with his side of the family muddled up by all the little daily stuff that would crop up if we lived together.
His parents are always suggesting we live with them. On my side, my parents have a three-bedroom flat, plenty of space I suppose, but Im not keen on feeling like a guest, tiptoeing around in someone elses home. Same goes for his parents houseI just dont think Id ever quite feel at ease there.
After lockdown began, the landlady of our rented flat asked us to move out so she could let her niece and family stay there. We couldnt find a new place on such short notice, so we ended up moving in with his folks. To be fair, his mum and dad made us feel really welcome. My own mum didnt give me a hard time, but would still point out all the things I was apparently doing wrong. His mums different.
Wed already considered getting a mortgage before, but while living at his parents we realised it made more sense to save what we could. Of course, I wanted us to move out as soon as possible, but renting again would mean wed have to save for much longer.
Even though his parents gave us our space and didnt poke into our lives, they had their own routines that were miles off from ours. Me and my husband felt like we were constantly having to adapt, just to fit in with their ways. On the surface it all seemed fine, but truthfully I never really relaxed there.
From day one, his mum pushed me out of the kitchen. She was gentle about it, saying it was her domain and no one else was to interfere. Problem is, I really struggle with what she cooksshe loves her seasoning and piles on onions in everything.
Maybe that sounds trivial, but its honestly a big deal for me. The one time I tried making my own food, she was really upset, thinking I didnt appreciate her hospitality.
And every Friday, shed do a deep clean of the whole house after work, while wed come home exhausted and just want to fall into bed, but shed be silently miffed that she had to do it alone. I asked her oncewhy Fridays and not the weekend? She just said weekends are for unwinding.
There are loads of little things like that. What keeps me sane is knowing shes not having a go at me, its just her way, and that this situation is only temporary.
Me and my husband agreed not to tell our parents that we were saving for our own place. We paid half the bills and gave them money for groceries, saving the rest. One night, we were chatting about his cousins new car when his dad suggested we should buy one too, but my husband said a house was more important.
How many years will you have to save? his dad asked. My husband explained that we werent saving for a home outright, just the deposit for a mortgage.
You can live here, why get a mortgage? Youll inherit our house! piped up his mum, again.
We tried to explain that we wanted to be in our own place, but his parents thought it was sillywed pay less to the bank if we stayed. When his mum realised we werent swayed, she changed tack: Think about children instead of mortgages!
Her arguments about us all living together became a daily thing. I could brush it off, but it started to get to my husband, and eventually he told me he thought his mum was right.
We dont need a mortgage. Mums got a point. Its peaceful here, no drama. When the time comes, the house will be ours.
Yeah, in fifty years, I teased, a bit bitterly.
After that, my husband started talking more about his parents getting older, needing care, and how a mortgage would tie us downespecially if I went on maternity leave someday.
But I really want to have our own home now and be able to call the shots, not keep waiting till his mum passes awayThat night, when his mum went up to bed and his dad started snoring in his armchair, my husband and I sat on the bottom step of the stairs in the dark hallway. I could feel all my doubts crowded around us, thick as the scented air from his mums leftover onion stew. I told him quietly, I want a space where we can decide what the weekends mean. Where I can cook scrambled eggs at midnight. Where we can argue about billsbecause theyre ours. He looked at me, eyebrows drawn, and after a moment, he just said, Youre right.
We started looking the next day, sneaking glimpses of flats online between work emails, chasing estate agents on lunch breaks. It was a jumble of tiny kitchens, noisy main roads, walls thin as paperbut they all felt like someones possibility. Sometimes, wed pass their house at night after a long day. Warm lights in the living room, the hum of a TV, his parents laughter leaking through the glass. That comfort was never ours to claim.
The day we signed for a small, battered flat with a scuffed linoleum kitchen and sunshine that spilled onto the carpets, we called his parents. His mum got quiet, disappointment audible in her silence, but his dad just laughed and told us to remember spare keys next Christmas.
We moved in with boxes borrowed from the supermarket and mugs wrapped in old T-shirts. That first evening, I made a pot of soup that tasted nothing like his mums: gentle, simple, unseasoned except for a dash of hope. We drank it sitting side by side on the kitchen floor, listening to the clatter of traffic outside and feeling, for the first time, completely at home.
There are no promises in mortgages, or inheritances, or even marriageonly the slow building of a life, one choice at a time. And as the sun set behind our window, painting gold lines across the walls, I realized: sometimes you have to choose your own story, no matter whose house you leave behind.
