"AITA for throwing away my SIL’s and BF's stuff after they left it in the flat for 3 weeks?"
Quick backstory: my wife and I lived in my mother-in-law’s flat for eight years. We moved out recently into my mother-in-law’s house for the last two years so we could save extra hard for a proper place. My sister-in-law and her boyfriend moved into the flat, swapping with us.
They lived there for two years and completely wrecked it. It was genuinely disgusting. They did strange DIY plumbing for a fish tank that leaked and ruined the kitchen cupboard, painted the walls poorly, made dart holes in the door, broke the bath panels, tore handles off the windows, left everything filthy, and let the appliances become covered in grime.
They completely undid all the maintenance and care we had put into keeping it sellable, but I tried to let it go. They moved out on October 22. Except they did not actually move out properly. From what I can tell, they took very little with them: the fish tank, clothes, computers, and a few bulky items.
They left everything else, with stuff strewn all over the flat. They had rented a van, had use of three cars, had five or more friends and family helping, and had two weeks off work. My mother-in-law has been on their case every day asking what is happening with the flat and reminding them that it needs to be cleared so repairs can begin.
Every day my sister-in-law gives the same answer: “We need to do a dump run.” Little to no action ever happens, maybe one box or item a week. Eventually, my mother-in-law asked me to start working on the flat by ripping up floors, measuring, filling holes, and getting it ready to sell. I walked in on Friday the 14th and it was awful.
There were trash bags in the living room full of food that had started to rot. There were flies everywhere. The smell was terrible. Most of the junk was still all over the floor, like they had moved out in a rush and never returned.
My sister-in-law even texted me saying everything in the living room was rubbish and then tried to get me to send photos of every single item so she could tell me where it should go. I refused. I moved everything into the bedroom because that floor was not being ripped up. I told her I had done this, and she said they were doing a dump run in the morning.
But the bedroom also needed repairs. The ceiling was peeling badly and needed fixing. The walls had more holes to be filled and a huge number of sticky tabs holding Velcro and decorations that tore off paint when removed.
Saturday came and they did not show up. Sunday came and they did not show up. I was told they went to Kent for the day. It turned out they had stayed home doing nothing. At that point I lost my patience. I am not proud of it, but I had reached my limit.
I went over and started throwing everything into the communal skip. I was not sorting items carefully. I was angry. But the truth is they had three weeks to get their things. They had daily reminders. They knew I was working on the flat and preparing it for sale. They still did nothing. They should have been offering to help.
My wife and mother-in-law joined me later. My mother-in-law even texted photos to my sister-in-law asking what she wanted to keep. Still, neither my sister-in-law nor her boyfriend came over to make sure anything important was not being thrown out.
For context, I filled an entire communal skip, and then we filled the back of two cars. The flooring took up some space, but it was only a fraction of the total amount they had left behind.
On Tuesday night, my sister-in-law finally went to the flat, rummaged through what was left, and realized some “important items” were missing. Then her boyfriend went over, and suddenly there was panic.
They went through the skip and found some things. Now they are acting like I maliciously threw away priceless heirlooms instead of the junk they left sitting in the flat for almost a month. The whole thing feels like a giant dismissal of everyone else’s time and effort, with no care or accountability on their part.
To be clear: I was not trying to hurt them. I was not trying to get rid of anything valuable. I just needed the flat cleared so I could do the work. They had three weeks, daily reminders, multiple vehicles, and time off work. They still left the place in a state that would have shocked a landlord after an eviction. So, AITA for finally snapping and throwing everything out?
Here's what people had to say to OP:
_Awkward_Raspberry_ says:
NTA, you have more patience than I would have had. And the audacity to act all mad because you trashed their stuff, please.
Traditional_Car_8219 says:
Nope. I would have done the same thing.
alleghenysinger says:
NTA. These people are horrible and your MIL is too nice.
OrbitsCollide99 says:
NTA - they acted like squatters so you dealt with them appropriately.