You have said this multiple times throughout this thread. Why in the world does he have to move to a city you like? You can certainly give your thoughts on the pros and cons of certain cities, but that should be the end.
What do you mean you both agree? He doesn’t need your agreement. He’s an adult. He can take a job anywhere he wants to, and he doesn’t have to ask Dad for permission.
Wow. Talk about helicopter parenting. I’m glad I went into the Air Force after I graduated from college and never moved back home. I expect my kids to be on their own anywhere they want to be after I finish paying for their college and not to move back ‘home.’ Maybe some will think I’m harsh, but my kids will thank me later for making them independent and not think they can just come back whenever they think it’s convenient.
My husband agrees with you. My beliefs are not as strict.
Very often, a young person who graduates from college in May or June has been admitted to a graduate program that starts in August or September. Or the young person may have accepted a job that starts at some point during the summer or early fall (some jobs obtained through on-campus recruiting start as late as September). Not allowing the young adult to come “home” during the gap period after graduation and before the start of the new plans seems mean to me. Why penalize a young person who is obviously taking steps toward independence by making them spend their savings on a summer sublet?
I also don’t think there’s any harm in parents signing as guarantors on a lease if needed (as is often the case in certain cities). The alternatives are usually (1) not taking a desired job in that city, (2) living in a dangerous neighborhood, or (3) enduring a long commute from far out in the suburbs. Why inflict this on your child?
Valuing independence is a good idea. Being a purist about it may not be.
@GoNoles85 I think your wife is a very smart lady. I think you should listen to her.
I won’t go into it but my D had the poster child of a bad relationship. She figured it out in the end but if she hadn’t we value our relationship with her and would have accepted her choice in a life partner. I need to support her choices right or wrong.
It sounds like this moving home or your approved city is all about this girl. It’s his choice good or bad. Try as you might it just drives a wedge into your relationship.
I agree with your wife.
You need to “get a life.”
Just stop with the city you approve of crap.
You are not limited to those two choices. There is a happy medium. And as our children become adults, there should be less parenting going on (specifically the “monitoring,” “suggesting,” and “threatening” variety you mentioned earlier). Our role needs to shift to giving advice WHEN ASKED, providing moral support, and biting our tongues when our ADULT children make life choices we wouldn’t necessarily make for ourselves.
I’m left wondering if your offers of $$$ are not actually a clever way of making sure you can continue to exert control and have a say about which locale your son chooses as his landing spot.
I’m not suggesting that letting go is easy. But let go we must.
If he is helping to pay the bills then he can continue with the “city he approves of crap” all he wants. Money has strings attached, and if the son doesn’t like it, then he doesn’t have to accept the money.
Perhaps the OP is more controlling then most of us here, however, different things work with different families. He only wants the best for his son and has a hard time letting go. I’ve seen far too many neglectful fathers who really don’t care very much, and I’d give the benefit of the doubt to one who cares too much, as long as he is not abusive or threatening. I don’t think insulting GoNoles for a different style of parenting is constructive.
No, actually it doesn’t. Gifts don’t come with strings. My in-laws loaned us money for our house (we paid cash and they funded 80% of it), and even then there were terms we absolutely refused (DH’s name being the only one on the deed was just one). Use money to control your kids at your own peril. It’s not as simple as the children refusing the money. It can severely, permanently damage your relationship.
I don’t consider giving your child money for support as a “gift that doesn’t come with strings”. Here kiddo, I give you this money for rent and hey, you can buy drugs or gamble it away, no strings. If you are providing support, you certainly CAN declare what it is for, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Yes, you might be controlling your child in that way, but they don’t have to accept the money. You just said there were terms you refused, so they could have said “forget it”, then. Those terms were unacceptable.
My sister borrowed a lot of money from my parents, and even though they were paying it back on time, there were hard feelings on both sides. My parents were annoyed that they were spending money on things they deemed excessive (like cable tv and short vacations), and my sister felt uncomfortable and pressured. She told me the Dave Ramsey line was dead true, “The borrower is slave to the lender”. Loaning money can be a huge problem, which is why I give money when it’s necessary, not loan it. But if I give my kids money for a specific purpose, they need to use it for that specific purpose.
Good grief, the man in question is too old to be “parented” - he could be a parent himself. He’s approaching his mid-twenties with a graduate degree, a significant other, and job offers. Time to acknowledge that he is all grown up.
Many years ago, when my older brother was younger than @GoNoles85 's son, he was in love with a young woman. My parents thought he was too young to be so serious about someone and succeeded in convincing my brother of that. The young woman wanted to marry my brother and wasn’t willing to accept that. I don’t think they would have married immediately but the whole idea of waiting until my parents thought they were ready drove the young woman away. She didn’t like my parents interfering in their relationship. They broke up. My parents were happy about it. About a year and a half later, my brother married someone else my parents couldn’t stomach. They were married for 30 years before my brother walked out. He’d been miserable for most of them.
I honestly can’t count the number of times my mom said how sorry she was that she and my dad had interfered. While my brother and his girlfriend were young to marry, my parents certainly liked her much more than the woman he did marry. I too think my brother would have had a much happier life if he’d married her.
The problem here isn’t the financial help @GoNoles85 has offered; the problem is the purpose of the offer is to break up the couple. It’s one thing to say “I gave you this money for a rental deposit. You can’t spend it taking a vacation.” It’s another thing to say “You can live at home for free or you can move to a city I approve of and I’ll help you, but if you stay in the college town where this young woman is, I won’t be helping you.” I get the impression that is what GoNoles85 is doing. That, IMO, is wrong.
We gift our kids money with no strings but would be unhappy if it were squandered. I think if we felt it was being poorly used, it would lessen our interest in gifting future funds. We have been very pleased with how carefully our kids have handled their money and been pleased to give them additional money. S has mostly used his for investing in index funds and retirement accounts, while D has been carefully stretching hers and using it for living expenses.
Based on the OP’s subsequent posts, I detect a short memory. And he’s out a billion dollars. 
I wouidn’t think of giving my son money with strings attached! We helped plenty with getting him set up after college (1st/last months, rents, security deposits, finders fees, etc., It was our pleasure and thankful we could afford to do so. I imagine it can be very difficult for most kids straight out of college to afford to do that on their own.
To have strings attached is just mean.
Please don’t do what my son in law’s parents did. They own a farm and expected him to live on it and inherit it. He chose to marry my daughter and head off to the coast of Alaska when it was the first teaching job she could find. The parents refused to attend the wedding even though it was a few miles from the farm (I drove 1000 miles each way overnight to attend). Her husband has now become our son since his parents disowned him. Two summers ago the kids visited other relatives in WI and the parents refused to see him if my daughter was present. They spent the entire summer except that one week with us.
Do your best to keep a relationship with your son.
I agree that weighing in on the girlfriend thing is rarely a good idea. I have never said a negative thing about a girlfriend until after a breakup, and then it was minor. Never want to make them choose.
@busdriver11, If your kids are buying drugs or gambling, you have other, larger issues than what we’re discussing.
OP is talking about gifting money to his son. Unless he has a contract, he has no control over how his son spends that money. I also get the impression that he hopes to lure his son away from the girlfriend by offering him money to be someplace else. Controlling where another adult lives is just wrong.
Gifting or lending your children money only if you retain control over where they live makes them 2nd class citizens because they can only live where you say they can. It makes girlfriends and wives 3rd class because they can only consider the places the parent and their child agree upon. No prudent woman would marry someone under those conditions or bring children into such a marriage.
It might make OP happy if he scares the girlfriend off because he may have an easier time retaining control over his son. But OP won’t live forever. Does he want to see his son with a strong woman who’s capable of looking out for his interests or one who will cave to the whims of others? He may consider, too, that gambling that it’s the woman who will be driven away is a risk, and one that can’t really be undone. The reality is that when you put your children in a position to choose – your parents or significant other – there’s no guarantee that they will choose you.
There can be lasting consequences if parents make kids choose or uncomfortable about their SO. This can lead to the SO not wanting to spend time with the parent and can really limit future relationship, including with any kids of the relationship.
You seem really bent on this “no rent” thing why? What is his degree in? Most young professionals I know rent for mobility purposes, so they can go to the next adventure easily.
No guarantees anymore in the housing market these days.
I would never want my adult child back home unless they wanted to be home. Socially how weird would that be, friends, get togethers, just being a 20 something with other 20 somethings, all for the sake of pocketing a little money?
If it is so easy to match or double it why not just give him some money and let him live his dream in whatever city that may be?
Or is the money tied to him living at hom specifically buying a house specifically?
Seems weird to move home at 23 to me