Repercussions of letting friend live with you

Posted: Jul 14, 2016

My husband and I let an old friend of ours move in with us a few months ago. We had originally thought he was just coming to visit for a few weeks, but apparently, his intent was to move in. He traveled across the country to get here and showed up with no money. For the time it took him to find a job (which was probably at least 2 months and he really wasn't looking that hard), we were feeding him the entire time, which is not something we could afford. We were already struggling to pay our bills and feed ourselves before he got there. He finally gets a job bringing home about $265 a week. He did buy some food for the house and cleaning supplies, but doesn't offer to help with the rent or anything like that. Our lease is getting ready to end and we needed to let the apartment complex know what we are doing, which he knew. He also knew how much we were struggling financially. We really can't afford the rent here anymore, so we decided that he would either have to start paying $500 a month rent or we would have to move somewhere much smaller where there wouldn't be room for him (the $500 is what we would be saving by moving). We were going to talk to him when he got home from work, but when he got home, he told us he just found out his 85-year-old father who had cancer only had a week to live, so we didn't bring up the rent. The next day, he leaves in the morning like he is going to work, but never comes home. We tried calling and got no answer. We were really getting worried about him and then I found a comment on Facebook where he said he was on a bus to go home to see his dad. We try calling and texting him asking if he is staying there or coming back. He finally answers, saying he will be back in two weeks and he had bad reception and will call when he gets off the bus. He never called. My husband finally texted him about needing him to pay rent or we would have to move and told him we needed to know what he was going to do by Tuesday. Tuesday comes and no answer. My husband texts him again and apparently his dad has since passed away and he gets pissed off at my husband for bothering him. We both explained to him that we were sorry about the timing, but we had to give a decision to the apartment complex. He just went on to say my husband is no friend because he won't let him grieve and if he didn't leave him alone he would come here and f**k my husband up. I understand he is understandably upset about his dad, but when my mother was dying, I still had to deal with other things in my life. I would just like some opinions from some other people about the situation. We just needed him to say whether he would be willing to pay rent or not when he got back so we could give the decision to the apartment and then he could have had all the time in the world to grieve. Thanks for listening! ;