“My Boyfriend’s Roommate Owes Him Over 10k in Back Rent”
I knew this was a serious problem over a year ago, when he owed my boyfriend 2K, and I begged my boyfriend to get rid of him. I was upset because I was paying for most of the things we did when this loser first moved in since my boyfriend had other debts he was trying to clear, and he would then go without necessities like food because this renter didn’t give him what he owed him. My boyfriend has kept him there because this con-artist has made promises to put him in these projects and make him famous! Not one of the contracts or projects since he has moved in has materialized, and now, two years of excuses later, he owes my boyfriend roughly $10,000. I said it’s time to throw him out, especially since there’s no lease and no proof of what is owed, if he tried to sue him.
Now the roommate’s dad just died. Even though he owes my boyfriend $10K and is “a multi-millionaire’s son,” he asked my boyfriend for $2K cash (at Christmas time) so he could pay “his shared portion of funeral” to his brothers, when the mother is still alive. MY BOYFRIEND ACTUALLY GAVE IT TO HIM; he is not family or a friend!
My boyfriend has no problem telling me off and defending this idiot’s behavior when the topic comes up. However, he has no balls to tell this wimpy man that time’s UP! Even when my boyfriend told him months ago that I may be moving in and he may need to move out, he replied, “I might not be ready to move out yet” and my boyfriend didn’t say anything more to him.
I hate to stand by and watch someone financially take advantage of my boyfriend and string him along with promises of stardom and paying him back eventually. I get sick listening to him brag about this person, telling others about what he has promised him. Am I wrong to tell him it’s time to grow a pair and get rid of this con artist? Or should I just walk away and let him crash and burn alone if he won’t get rid of him, even though I love him and he says he loves me? It would kill me to keep quiet and watch this continue – it’s like watching someone die. — Exasperated
It’s time to walk away and to say a little prayer of thanks for the con artist that he was able to expose so many of your boyfriend’s flaws before you actually moved in with him or committed yourself more than you already have. Your boyfriend is the wimp. He’s cheap, naive, foolish, has terrible judgment, and he doesn’t seem to respect you very much. I’d also be wondering if the empty promise of stardom was truly the only reason your boyfriend continues to let a man live with him for free for two years. If it is, the crash and burn you mention is going to be epic, and you should distance yourself as quickly as you can…
***************
If you have a relationship/dating question I can help answer, you can send me your letters at [email protected].
Yep, you need to walk. BF is being a dick to you and pretty much an idiot. Also, even without a lease this could take a LONG time to kick him out. Freeloaders like this will learn or know the laws and he could spend tons of money getting him evicted if he doesn’t go willingly.
At this point, without a lease and proof that he hasn’t been paying him, I don’t even think he has a leg to stand on to get what’s owed to him, ever. It will be his word against the tenants and that’s why I think it’s time to cut the losses before they get any bigger.
“I was paying for most of the things we did”: if someone is taken advantage of here, it is you. All what you say about your boyfriend, you could apply it to yourself. You are being used, mistreated, disrespected.
Your BF can do what he wants with his money. He can host a friend (?) for free.
You can only decide what you want to make with your time, your affections, your expectations, your money. Kick him to the curb.
Yup -you’re paying more than 50% of your activities because your bf can’t pay because he’s paying down other debts and is paying for his loser roommate.
Get out. Get out now. If you stay, then you have to give up and understand this will always be how it is.
He is holding out to get paid. He doesn’t want to believe his roommate is who you say he is because it makes him a poor judge of character. Kicking people out isn’t easy. The roommate has legal rights and if he doesn’t leave quietly, your boyfriend will have to evict him which is an ugly process. Also there is probably an activity that the two of them are sharing in that makes extrication difficult.
Neither of you is exactly great with numbers… your boyfriend is currently owed $12,000. Not $10,000. At any rate — the larger question remains… who’s the bigger fool here? The fool or the fool who dates him? I say the latter.
This part really stuck out to me: “My boyfriend has no problem telling me off and defends this idiot’s behavior when the topic comes up. However, he has no balls to tell this wimpy man that time’s UP!”
Your boyfriend has very clearly chosen this guy over you. For whatever reason, he cares more about his roommate than his girlfriend. Idk maybe the guy has compromising photos of him, or maybe he just doesn’t give a crap about you. Give thanks that you dodged the bullet of moving in with your boyfriend, because you surely would have been stuck with two loser roommates and not the just one you were dating, and then move on.
I was having the same thought. Seriously, leave these two to be with each other in this continuous financial hot mess. Let your (hopefully now ex) boyfriend be so he can find out the hard way and crash n burn on his own. You do NOT want to be dragged down by either him or the freeloader roommate.
Huh, this is almost exactly the plot of the classic Jack Black film “School of Rock”. Are you Sarah Silverman? Any chance the roommate is going to use your bf’s identity to get a substitute teaching job, then turn his life around through his dedication to making art with his new lovable-rascal students?
You absolutely should dump this guy. Why are you even with him? You don’t respect each other, and you don’t even really know if he loves you! There’s nothing to save here. Be grateful that you weren’t financially entangled with him.
I was thinking the EXACT same thing, Vathena!!!
No relationship is worth all of this- financially or emotionally. MOA please!
Respectfully, am I the only one here who got a vibe that this LW is almost equally pissed that SHE can’t be the one to take advantage of her boyfriend’s doormat tendencies?
There sure IS an awful lot of angst over the fact that she (gasp!) must pay for everything…
No you are not!
Same, that’s why I called out the 50% – if she’s pissed because they go to olive garden and she’s paying 2/3 the bill, or always footing the grocery bill and chipping in to the cable bill, then yeah, she’s right to be angry.
However… if she’s ordering 2/3 of the bill or expecting him to pay because he’s the man… then nah, she’s just mad because someone got the gold digger role first and doesn’t have to give oral to get the money.
I totally agree. Her tone when she talks about telling her boyfriend what to do makes me imagine her standing there and screaming at him about what a doormat he is.
Your BF’s roommate is probably entitled to some squatter’s rights by this point so he’ll likely never leave. This situation is too perfect with him. MOA, LW. Your BF will never stand up for you or side with you if something serious happens…
You are the one dating a con artist.
Its really not LW business what boyfriend does with his finances and he doesnt seem to be the one upset about it. I didnt read in the letter that he was confiding his frustration to her. His money his choice. Him telling her off is because its not her business. He doesnt owe her any explanation. If she feels she is being taken advantage of then she should leave the relationship.
Well If she knows he’s telling her. And it is her business if they are discussing living together.
Becasue shes intrusive and wont leave him alone about it. And even if they live together doesnt give her the right to intervene in his finances. His money isnt her money. They are not married. If she doesnt like the set up she doesnt have to move in.
Allornone Saying if he can’t pay the rent that’s his business, well it will be your business when you share a lease or you’ll be evicted. Just saying someone else must do it doesn’t magically make it so b
When they move in together, it will be her business to an extent. I have no idea how much money my boyfriend has and couldn’t care less what he spends it on PROVIDING he’s able to cover half the rent, the electricity, and our streaming services while I cover my half of the rent and all the groceries and household needs, just like we discussed before moving in. If he can’t, then that’s a problem because I might not always be able to cover it and bills still need to be paid. OP’s boyfriend needs to be able to contribute to the household expenses and she needs to be able to depend on that. If they make similar wages (I don’t know that they do), ideally, he should be paying about half. But if he’s giving away so much that he can’t cover his agreed upon share, that would definitely be her business as it could impact her on a number of levels from credit score to possible eviction.
You for sure need to read Wendy’s advice on what you should’ve discussed before moving in.
No its not to any extent unless you combine your finances together or are legally married. Which is taking a big risk if you are not legally married. It doesnt change if its a sister, bf, gf, or bff that you are living with and splitting bills with. It’s a risk you are taking when you choose to go in with a person. No different then going in own a loan with a person you don’t share income with. Its a risk. Yes you do discuss bills and etc but you cant dictate to a person what they do with their money regardless of relationship status. BF/GF are in legal terms roommates nothing more unless the state the person resides in can claim common law and they have to fall under the common law statue. If your bf/gf dont have money for food or rent and are carelessly not helping pay bills then you get out and if you see since before then duh you dont do it. Courts hate when people play house with no legal binding because they fight over the petiest shit such as furniture they went in together on then its a fight for who should get what or who owes who what. My husband never had any say about finances prior to our engagement and we discussed our finances during our engagement period.
Poppy, when you move in together, you do need to know some basics about your partner’s finances, beyond just “can you cover the rent?” You want to know that there’s nothing big going on behind the scenes that could blow up, and that they could handle some emergency expenses. And if moving in is a step toward marriage, then you do need the full picture of their finances well before you’re legally married. You’re right that if you’re just living together it’s not necessarily your business what they spend their money on, but it’s really dumb to be legally bound to someone on a lease and heading toward engagement or a marriage license and have literally NO idea of their financial picture.
More like he tells her all about it as a way of explaining why he is always broke… the LW is right to be irked.
However she knows she knows. He could just be bitching, she could be intrusive, but he is still choosing to tell her so it became her business.
he really wants to be in these films, enough to not care about the money. You’re never going to be able to compete with this. I’d move on were I you, and find someone who isn’t so preoccupied elsewhere.
Am I the only one who thinks they’re lovers in the nighttime?
Why even bother with the LW though? I dunno. Seems very doubtful.
True, BGM. It’s his age is what made me wonder. A lot of folks from older generations don’t seem to have abandoned the closet.
True, true. True.
Your boyfriend is a gullible sucker. And the lure of being famous is more important to him than… eating. Just dump him. If you stick by him any longer, YOU are the gullible sucker.
LW, I think you need to leave this guy. If you choose not to, I do have an idea.
So I think your boyfriend really likes to feel needed and feel helpful. I am guessing that this con man can show a problem and let your boyfriend be the hero. While you are badgering him and belittling what he thinks are “good deeds”. Most enablers are the nicest people you will ever meet. So I would suggest that you start asking your boyfriend for help more and really be appreciative when he does. When you talk about the next steps in your relationship, focus on the positive. But if you call him “This man’s bitch” , it drives him away from you and towards the man that is kind to him.
I think that you’re being kind of hypocritical here. If you don’t like how your boyfriend is doing things and if you feel like it’s unfair to you, then dump him. You’re doing the exact same thing that he’s doing — sitting around watching things go badly and doing nothing about it. You don’t have to have a boyfriend who lets a con artist walk all over him any more than he has to let a con artist walk all over him. After this much time, you have all the evidence you need to know that your boyfriend doesn’t care that this is happening and he isn’t going to fix it. For you to continue to stay with him is just as ridiculous as him letting the guy keep living there.
So, LW is all in and supportive of her bf, if only he could turn into an entirely different person. That’s not how it works. That’s not how it can possibly work. You take him as he is or you MOA. Sure, minor changes to annoying actions might be possible, but you’re seeking an entire personality transplant.
I think the roomie is the full-time bf and you’re the side-piece.
The boyfriend does NOT love or respect you or himself. He respects the non-paying roommate more than you and he is a moocher, taking your money rather than being the man. The roommate may have done you a great service by exposing the true character of your boyfriend. Emotions hurt but losing everything you have will hurt more. If you stick with the foolish boyfriend, you will be more foolish than him. So sorry about the bad news.
LW why are you with this guy?
Someone that tells you off? Someone you have to financially support because he’s short money? BTW, how much have you paid to cover the boyfriend ever since this roommate moved in?
MOA. You are conning yourself that this guy is worth it.
Surprised no one has mentioned the possibility this is elder abuse, which increasingly takes a financial form ( social worker here) and IS other people’s business and reportable. The fantasy part, the reactive anger…all textbook. Bad judgment is one thing, but early signs of cognitive decline are another. ( Before anyone calls me ageist…I’m in that demographic myself).
Let him and his Lover live in peace.
YOU are the only fool here. That’s clearly his true partner since 1- they live together. 2- he defends him against you. And 3- he’s his sugar daddy.
De Nile is a river in Egypt….
Oh, no…I think her boyfriend is a con man as well and she is HIS mark. She should dump him ASAP and thank her lucky stars they never got married. I don’t know if he’s a romantic partner with his roommate or not but that sounds very possible and even likely.