As a college student living away from home for the first time, there’s a lot to learn. For most this pivotal stage in life is where they really learn how to do chores, and how to cook and clean for themselves – not to mention learning to do their own laundry! It’s a great place to learn too, since everyone else is on a similar journey, and surrounding yourself with like-minded folk who are in the same place in life as you has so many benefits socially as well as psychologically as you become an actual adult.

And one of the hardest lessons to learn is budgeting. Because as an independent adult you learn that your supply of money isn’t bottomless, and you sometimes have to budget hard to avoid fines and other repercussions. That’s why the woman in this story wasn’t willing to contribute toward a new TV for a shared living room – especially since there was a perfectly good one there already. But her roommates didn’t like that at all.

Read on to find out what happened.

AITA for taking away my air-fryer and microwave after roommates won’t let me use their new TV?

I’d like to start out by saying that I know that this is very petty of me.

There are three of us living together, my sister (22, female), me (23, female), and my cousin (21, female). We all moved in together at the beginning of this year.

My sister and cousin have been talking about buying a new giant TV for the living room and asked me to split it. I told them I was fine with our current TV and didn’t have money to spare for a big purchase. I use the TV once a month anyway.

We all three are in college and working part time, so thats a lot of money. But they decided to buy it anyway.

Let’s see how the situation with the new TV was.

I didn’t touch it for the last month that they’ve had it.

But a few weeks ago I sat down in the living room with them to hang out and they were trying to find something to watch. They switched to a service and I noticed it asked for a pin.

I asked them why they put a pin on it. They looked at each other and giggled but didn’t respond.

I asked again, and they again ignored me completely. I thought there was some weird inside joke or something and forgot about it.

Now, there is growing drama in this household.

Utilities and rent were due at the beginning of the month, and I am in charge of gas and electric (the two most expensive ones).

I told them how much they owed me prior to the 1st, and both of them said that they didn’t have the money at the moment and I would have to wait a few days.

I told them that I needed that money because I would have a hard time paying rent and the utilities on time without it.

On top of that, we got a notice that our rent was short a couple dollars for the last two months. I went in and paid it to avoid a late fee.

Let’s see where the real problems started.

Yesterday my boyfriend and I were home alone and we decided to watch Harry Potter. We turned the TV on and discovered that they had locked every single app on the TV.

Now I understand it’s their TV, but no one was home and I wasn’t interfering with anyone. The living room is a shared space, and we have an entire open bottom floor.

If I wasn’t going to be allowed to use it, I feel like they should have put it downstairs instead of taking up the entire living room wall.

At no point were any rules with the TV mentioned to me, and I feel like they locked it with the intent that I would find it to be hurtful. I have bought things for the apartment and at no point even thought to hold it over their heads.

Read on to find out how she reacted.

Thats where the microwave and air-fryer come in. I bought the microwave and the air fryer was a gift.

When my sister came home I asked her about the TV and we got in a fight. She said that I’m not allowed to use it because I didn’t put any money towards it.

In most cases I would agree, but I’ve had no problem sharing my things with them and they couldn’t even pay me on time for the utilities on top of that.

I told her if they didn’t want to share their things with me, then I wouldn’t share mine with them. I took them and locked them in my room (we have a stove/oven so it’s not like I took their ability to cook).

I’m still missing a third of the utilities as I write this.

AITA?

While this might on the face of it seem a bit petty, the truth is she is of no obligation to share her appliances if her sister and cousin won’t share theirs.

Because the way they’re behaving is completely petty and hypocritical in itself. She was honest in not being able to contribute to a new TV, but they bought it anyway.

If they don’t want to share it, but they’ve put it in a common area, don’t expect to be able to share her appliances either.

Let’s see what the Reddit community made of this.

This person thought she was right to be petty.

While others encouraged her to take it further.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a woman who wants peace and quiet by the pool, but finds guests and loud music instead.

Meanwhile, this Redditor pointed out that anything in a common area should be shared.

The fact is that if they didn’t want her to use the TV, they shouldn’t have put it in a shared space. Because putting it up on the living room wall, and presumably taking away the old TV, meant that there was no TV for her to watch anywhere but in her bedroom. And you don’t always want to spend all your time cramped in your bedroom, especially when you have company. Honestly, they were just being petty because she didn’t want to chip in – and maybe she would have been more inclined or able to chip in if the others actually paid their bills on time.

And yes, taking away her appliances from the shared kitchen is petty, but it’s no more petty than putting PIN codes on all the TV apps so that this woman couldn’t actually use the TV. In taking away her personally owned appliances from the kitchen, she’s giving them a taste of their own medicine, whilst upholding the rule that they’ve seemingly decided on, that if you don’t own something then you can’t use it. So here’s their lesson: be petty and don’t share your stuff? Expect others to be petty and not share their stuff in return.