When you have a friend or family member in a wheelchair, it can be very helpful to install a ramp or other accessibility option to help them.

What would you do if you purchased a home that doesn’t have an area where installing a ramp would be convenient?

That is what happened to the couple in this story, and their extended family is upset that they aren’t prioritizing the ramp.

Check it out.

WIBTA for not building a ramp to our house for disabled nephew?

My wife and I recently bought a new house.

After we closed on the house my sister came to see it and asked when we would like her husband to install a ramp.

The ramp is for her son, who is in a wheelchair.

He and other nieces and nephew used to come over to our old house all the time to hangout with our kids.

My sister husband, who works in construction, previously installed a ramp in our old house as well as my brothers house because he and my sister want their son to feel welcome in everyone’s’ home.

Our previous house was very standard and installing a ramp was easy.

This new house however sits up high which means it needs a very long ramp.

After measuring according to specifications we’ve realized that we cannot install a ramp unless we get rid of some of our homes features.

That sounds beautiful.

Our front yard is a tiered garden.

It is my wife’s favorite feature as she is an avid gardener.

We probably would not have bought this house if not for the garden as we had our eye on another.

If we built a ramp leading to the front door it would cover the majority of the tiered garden.

The only other option is the side door (we do not have a back door). The side door however leads directly into the driveway that goes up alongside the house to the garage in the back.

If we built a ramp in this area it would make the driveway too narrow for many of our vehicles.

We have very limited parking on our street so we would basically lose half our driveway parking.

I also wouldn’t be able to get my old muscle car in the garage where I had planned on storing it.

I’ve explained this to my sister and she is unhappy about our reasonings.

Especially the one for the front door.

Yes, but it isn’t her house.

She says she gets the parking problem, but the garden is just a cosmetic thing and not worth making her son feel unwanted or like a second thought.

Other family is also unhappy because now our house is unusable for family parties since nephew won’t be able to come.

We do family parties on a rotating system between me and my brother since we’re the only ones with big enough homes.

Outside barbeques are great in the summer.

I said we could do the family parties out in the back yard in the summer.

It’s big and has a lot of trees and a large canopy area where we can put some nice outside furniture and barbecue.

The garage also has a bathroom that is accessible, so it shouldn’t be a problem for nephew to come so long as everyone hangs out outside.

They think it’s unreasonable because it will be too hot to stay outside the whole time and people will need air conditioning.

Yeah, that is a hard situation.

If they go inside to cool down nephew will feel left out.

My brother also doesn’t like that the burden is now on him to always host.

Especially since he will always have to host for thanksgiving and Christmas which are the most hectic holidays.

AITA?

That is a very difficult situation, but you can’t change your whole life around to accommodate your nephew.

Take a look at the comments to get some additional perspectives.

Great summary of the situation.

Here is a good point.

Here is a great suggestion.

This commenter says it is their house, not the relatives.

This person has a great suggestion.

They can’t accommodate everyone.

This is definitely a touchy subject.

If you liked this post, you might want to read this story about a teacher who taught the school’s administration a lesson after they made a sick kid take a final exam.