Reply to AITA for not wanting DH to give MIL 4K to clear a debt

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Op you are in your mid 40s and only have $40k in savings? Why are you so financially irresponsible? 
If you must, loan her the money and then when he assets are sold, you get $4k off the top before the sister. You really are unbelievable. [/quote]

Did you miss the part where I said my husband and I recently bought our first home? Also we have had several
Expensive home repairs lately. And we have spent the better part of our lives digging out of 100K of student loan debt. We are also paying for two kids in child care fill time. We have plenty in retirement, college funds, and we both are intentionally in jobs where we are earning pensions, and we have 15k in a brokerage. But 4k is not nothing to us.[/quote]

That's fair. I think you need to let go of anger and judgment. The past is what it is. She chose to be a homemaker for 20 years and had custody battles. You worked her to get out of student debt and save responsibly. I get it. But you have what you have right now. She isn't going to work full time, forget that. Forgot choices that cannot be changed at this point.

I looked back at your OP. The positives: you say she is a kind person who sacrified a lot financially to help DH. She has 150k in a 401k that she has not touched in two years of retirement. That's a good sign - she's spending what she's earning in SS and not drawing down what she has. That doesn't scream reckless overspending to me. You acknowledge that the kitchen remodel was badly needed, and it sounds like she has been keeping up with the interest only payments, so she's not wrecking her credit. Her house is nearly paid off, she has no other debt that you know of, and she's going to be a paid babysitter for DIL soon. That's not THAT bad. It does seem plausible that if she get out from under this HELOC debt, she could live within her means and it will get easier as the house is paid off.

I agree with you that 4k is not nothing for you and that this can't be the start of paying her expenses regularly. So yes, I agree with your original statement "I feel like if he wants to do this, then there needs to be some transparency on her end,
Eg she allow my husband to take a full look at her finances and assets so there are no more surprises and he can help her plan, which he thinks is unreasonable." I do think that's reasonable. I just would try approacing this with a different attitude. We all can sense that you dislike and judge MIL, and I'm sure that's more apparent in person when taking into account your body and language and tone of voice. [/quote]

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