Anonymous wrote:Empty nest seems a strange time to move to a larger house!

+10000

I would personally wait until the youngest was out of college and buy a home for your new needs. Why couples hang onto a 5br family home for ever and ever is so stupid. It's empty. Get rid of your crap. Once I was 20, I would've much rather visited my parents in a condo in DC than schlepped back to Chantilly every holiday. My HS friends would've met me out downtown.

No they won't think of it as their childhood home because it isn't and that's okay.

And eventually where mom and dai es becomes the parents house.

Don't waste.o ey on a large home. Downsize

Empty nest seems a strange time to move to a larger house!

My parents moved to a nice new home after I graduated. I loved the new him and still look forward to visiting them. It was all positive.

Your husband is right. It's fine to move once the kids are in college.

We moved to DC from the burbs when our youngest was a college sophomore and she survived.

We are thinking of doing the NOVA-to-DC move when our kids are in college. I want somewhere walkable. How has the financial/tax hit been?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:adults are allowed to have lives. they are allowed to want to move. By the time kids are in college they are more than old enough to accept and deal with this.

This x1000

Agree. I could not have cared less about this as a college student. I mean, I may have felt put out if they wanted to move from NYC to rural Ohio all of a sudden since that seems like annoying logistics but even still. Their life to live.

My parents moved when I was in college. The new house had a bedroom for my brother with all his stuff. There was a shared room for my sister and I , but it was not our things- just bland decor. My sister had been out of college for a few years and was fine with it. She already had a place to move her things. But for me it felt very much like I was not welcome to come home for more than a few days. All my things were boxed up and I was asked to purge a lot of it. It wasn’t a home for me. It forced me to launch pretty quickly.

It worked out fine. I never “needed” to go home for an extended time. I have a great relationship with my parents, but I wish they had waited until I felt more settled on my own. I don’t know why they felt the need to move when they did. It very much felt like they were just really excited to start their post-kids in the house life. Which is sort of weird when you are the kid. And that age, when you are figuring out who you are and where you want to be… it just felt like they abruptly forced me to grow up. (I know that is a bit of a selfish take… but Just sharing how I felt… good or bad… that is my experience.)

So it’s now really important to me to not move when my kids are that age. There are so many changes and new adjustments kids have to make. I know how unsettled it made me feel to know that I really didn’t have that safe comforting space to go home to. I don’t know want to do that to my kids if I don’t have to.

Bare minimum. My kids will have a room, with their things, space to store their childhood memorabilia until they are ready to sort through it. I don’t want it to ever appear like I have purged my life of them or forced them out before they were ready to let go.

No. If you want to or have to move, move.

Nah home is where you guys (the parents) are. We moved internationally and back again. My kids feel like our new home is home even though they never spent any time in it during HS. I did keep all their furniture and decor as they liked it so that probably helps - when they walk into their bedroom it feels like their bedroom.

Anonymous wrote:adults are allowed to have lives. they are allowed to want to move. By the time kids are in college they are more than old enough to accept and deal with this.

This x1000

You are absurd. Some families move regularly. Because of my father's job, I moved every 4-5 years as a kid, and each time it was to a different country (not county)! We are considering moving back to our home country once our youngest graduates high school. My parents moved one last time, after I left home, into their forever home.

adults are allowed to have lives. they are allowed to want to move. By the time kids are in college they are more than old enough to accept and deal with this.

Ask them.