8 Tips for when Your College Graduate Moves Back Home

It was a beautiful day. You recalled with pride the day your child strolled across the stage to receive a college degree. Driving back home you felt a weight lift from your shoulders. You realized that your role as an active parent was coming to an end. It would be nice to become a friend and part-time adviser to your offspring during the transition from school to the real world. Within a few weeks, the phone rings, and everything changes. Your child needs to move back home for awhile. What do you do next?

Unless there is a huge unresolved conflict or problems with your finances or available space, you should welcome your child back home with conditions.

More than likely, your son or daughter has not lived at home for some time. Even summers were probably shortened with either extra classes or travel. In a real sense, the person who has asked to move back into your home has some of the attributes of a stranger. It is important at this point that some house rules be put into place as a condition of your child's return to the nest.

Charge your child rent.

This goes against the grain for many parents. However, the person moving in is a college educated adult. Your child should have the ability to get a job and pay some rent. This is not punitive. It is a time to teach your child about taking responsibility for their life. If you do not want or need the money, put it into a bank account, and let it grow. You can return it to him or her when an exit is made from your house. The key here is to not let the child know that the money is not being spent until the end.

This extra money may be your ticket to leverage the child to move out later.

Once a child moves back into the family home, it can become a little too comfortable for them to stay. Having a nest egg built from the rent that they paid you for living in your house can be a powerful tool for moving them out. Even if the rent is not exorbitant, it will grow fairly quickly. At $200 per month, it will reach $5,000 in about two years. At the very least, this is enough to pay the initial rent and deposits associated with getting an apartment. If your child has saved a little, it may be enough for a down payment on a small house.

Set curfews for the home.

Many times a curfew at this stage of life is not so much about when to be home, but when company should leave. Young people frequently can get by for long periods of time with only a few hours of sleep per night. This is probably not true for you. Especially on work nights, set a time when the house has to become quiet and company has to leave.

Set behavioral rules.

This is your home. You can and should dictate what is allowed within the walls of it. Do not allow your son or daughter to violate any of your personal moral codes while inside your house. This has to be established before the luggage comes in the door. Your child knows what you believe and how you live. None of these rules will be a surprise. If the person cannot abide by your rules, he or she should find a different place to live. Stealing, drunkenness, unacceptable overnight guests, and a number of other issues need to be ironed out before the agreement is made to allow the child to move in.

Set up a weekly meeting time to discuss family issues at least once per month.

In fact, setting up a weekly discussion for the family is probably a better plan during the first few months. This will give you a regular anticipated time when problems can be addressed and resolved. Some compromises to the original rules may need to be implemented. You may also discover that you missed some points that should have been covered during the discussions before the child moved home.

Give your child the same privacy and space as you would any other adult.

It is important to get past the parent/child relationship. You do not have a child living in your home, but an adult. Treat them like one. This means that they should be able to come and go without having to get permission. It would be good to establish some courtesy guidelines concerning schedules. This is only so that you and your child can know what to expect.

Require them to get a job and keep working.

This should never be an option. Even if your child must take a job that does not fit with the degree that was just earned, learning the value of bringing in money must be emphasized. Taking a lesser job while continuing the job search is not a problem. It is critical that the temporary job is at a time that will not interfere too much with the ongoing search. Letting your child become a freeloader should not happen.