Imagine renting an apartment from your mom. You’d think she’d treat you as good as or possibly even better than a typical tenant since you’re family. What would you do if she acted more like a greedy landlord than a mother?

That’s the situation the person in this story is in, and they’re pretty upset by it.

Let’s read the whole story.

AITA for canceling a visit with my mom after she put being a landlord first?

Situation is a bit complex emotionally, but maybe not legally.

1-2 years ago I have moved to a new city and began renting an apartment from my mom and her husband. They own a couple of units in a semi-popular city.

They charged me market rent or slightly above market rent (it was not cheap), we signed a lease, whatever. After a year, it went to month to month.

They were typical landlords to us in the sense that they ignored us half of the time, but we always paid rent on time, were good neighbors to the other tenants, etc.

But they were more than just normal tenants.

Additionally, I had helped them with their business multiple times for free, offering services that would probably have totaled up to 1k-1.5k.

Plus helping them out with like house sitting, pet sitting, airport rides, etc.

Things normal family members should do for one another.

It can be really stressful when a pet is sick.

I got a job offer in another state, so we formally ended the lease and began to move out.

A major complication during this is that my dog (originally my mom’s, but the dog picked me as ‘her’ person), went into congestive heart failure. This took an overwhelming toll on my mental health and financials.

The dog is stable-ish now.

My mom knows about this and how distraught I’ve been and when moving, I told her I’m going to need my entire(or as much as I can get) deposit back to help with the bills from the dog and move.

This would be so frustrating!

She agreed so long as the apartment was clean, which is fair.

My partner and I with the help of a friend deep cleaned the apartment, aside from the walls which she told me not to worry about since she’s going to repaint them regardless.

She saw the apartment and agreed it was good to go and we’re all settled.

The issue came when they sent our deposit back and she went back on her word. They took $500 for “cleaning and painting fees” even when they assured us they were not going to do that.

The mother is treating them worse than a typical tenant. They’re family!

When I asked her why, she accused me of not deep cleaning the house.

I requested photos of what was needed to be clean(which she refused to provide) and why she still charged us for painting when she said not to worry about it.

At first, she said those conversations never happened and when I sent proof of those conversations her argument shifted to “You’re lucky we didn’t change you more, you should be grateful it was only $500.”

She knows we needed that money for an upcoming surgery for my dog (left atrial decompression) and I was in total shock.

Yeah, the mom definitely has her greedy landlord hat on.

She was supposed to come visit us in our new apartment in mid-September, but I ended up canceling the visit.

She’s always been kind of selfish and never there for me, but even this surprised me. She knows the depths of how hard we’re struggling and still took the money when they’re plenty wealthy.

$500 is a lot of money, but it feels more than just the money for me. She went back on her word and put being a greedy landlord first over being my mom.

AITA for canceling the visit over this?

You’d think a person’s own mother would give them a break instead of pulling greedy landlord stunts like not returning the deposit for bogus reasons.

Let’s see what Reddit had to say about this story.

Here’s a suggestion.

This is good advice.

The mom doesn’t sound like a very good person.

Another person guesses at what the mom was probably thinking.

A mom who chooses money over her children is a really bad mom.

If you liked that post, check out this story about a guy who was forced to sleep on the couch at his wife’s family’s house, so he went to a hotel instead.