shared family beach house - issue with damaged item

[Anonymous]

my husbands family (3 siblings) co-own a beach house and they allow family members to use it. As a result, many of us will leave items there, like beach chairs, year round. Rule is if it is an item that is stashed away and the owner hasn't stated it is for the house to share, you leave it alone or ask to borrow.
We purchased an expensive boogie board last year at the end of the summer season and was used for 2 days. we put it away in the shed, where the owners keep their stuff, not the main shed.
Today, my brother's cousin sent a text to say that the boogie board was damaged by a friend's child and they will reimburse us at 50% since it is used. my husband explained that we just bought it last year and we want it fully replaced and that he should have asked if he could borrow it (we would have said no, as there are other boards for house share. our board was in a different shed so no way to confuse). And the cousin even said he was curious to see how it road and while at the beach, a friends child was jumping on it and it cracked.
Husband and cousin got into an argument and cousin agreed to pay us the full cost to replace. Also want to add that my kids picked this specific one because of the colors and of course, it isnt available anymore so another reason we are annoyed.
One of the owners, my husbands aunt called to say that we made too big of a deal over this and we should have let it go, esp. since we don't pay for the rental.
Fwiw, everyone keeps stuff there that our off limits to others so it isnt just us.

[Anonymous]

Is there a question here? The cousin agreed to pay for it. Ignore the aunt as this isn’t her fight. Next time label the board with a note to not use.

Move on.

[Anonymous]

I'm confused. Is your husband one of the owners of the beach house?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm confused. Is your husband one of the owners of the beach house?

No, one of his parents and aunt/uncle own the house.

[Anonymous]

I’m also confused. Isn’t your brothers cousin also your cousin?

I can’t follow this

It’s a free beach house. I probably would have just taken the fifty percent. Label your stuff please do not use or take it home with you.

Personally I think this idea that you leave stuff there and no one else uses it is unrealistic.

[Anonymous]

I wouldn’t have asked them too pay for full replacement. If it was so special/irreplaceable, you shouldn’t have left it there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm confused. Is your husband one of the owners of the beach house?

No, one of his parents and aunt/uncle own the house.

And these people are generous enough to let their DIL's brother's cousin's friend use it, and then don't lock up the owner's stuff?

I'd take my stuff home in that circumstance.

[Anonymous]

Are we talking about a 40 dollar boogie board or a 400 dollar one?

[Anonymous]

I think it was petty and penny-pinching to insist on full cost replacement and would have been more graceful to tell the cousin not to worry about it. But then it was also petty and penny-pinching to assign depreciation of 50%. So in classic DCUM fashion everyone in this story sucks.

[Anonymous]

Since it isn’t your beach house, I would have been pissed but taken the 50% and never left anything of value there again.

[Anonymous]

It was stupid to leave it there if it was so important. You should not have insisted on full price; how cheap of you. This should have fallen under the category of lessons learned and you should have moved on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:my husbands family (3 siblings) co-own a beach house and they allow family members to use it. As a result, many of us will leave items there, like beach chairs, year round. Rule is if it is an item that is stashed away and the owner hasn't stated it is for the house to share, you leave it alone or ask to borrow.
We purchased an expensive boogie board last year at the end of the summer season and was used for 2 days. we put it away in the shed, where the owners keep their stuff, not the main shed.
Today, my brother's cousin sent a text to say that the boogie board was damaged by a friend's child and they will reimburse us at 50% since it is used. my husband explained that we just bought it last year and we want it fully replaced and that he should have asked if he could borrow it (we would have said no, as there are other boards for house share. our board was in a different shed so no way to confuse). And the cousin even said he was curious to see how it road and while at the beach, a friends child was jumping on it and it cracked.
Husband and cousin got into an argument and cousin agreed to pay us the full cost to replace. Also want to add that my kids picked this specific one because of the colors and of course, it isnt available anymore so another reason we are annoyed.
One of the owners, my husbands aunt called to say that we made too big of a deal over this and we should have let it go, esp. since we don't pay for the rental.
Fwiw, everyone keeps stuff there that our off limits to others so it isnt just us.

You made too big of a deal about this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think it was petty and penny-pinching to insist on full cost replacement and would have been more graceful to tell the cousin not to worry about it. But then it was also petty and penny-pinching to assign depreciation of 50%. So in classic DCUM fashion everyone in this story sucks.

This!

[Anonymous]

One of the owners is my husband's father. The other 2 owners are the dads brother and sister (cousin's mom).
The boogie board was $275.
The child that broke the board wasn't staying at the house, but they were all at the beach at the same time.
We have other things at the house that we allow others to use and these are in the main shed or in the house. I disagree with some of you about just letting this go. The rules of the house were clear. We have not had issues in the past 12 years that we have been using it. If it was me who damaged something, I'd replace it, and we did this once when we bought a new beach umbrella when the old one another cousin contributed broke as I was opening it.
Glad the cousin finally agreed to compensate us and annoyed his mom is getting in the middle.

[Anonymous]

Wow, you are very unappreciative.