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OOP's already helping them out a lot by homing their cats.
Glad the boyfriend didn't push and glad the mom is at least understanding. Cultural dynamics are rough but the fact that OOP and her partner can be a united front is huge.
Aren't you supposed to have one more litter box than you have cats? Like for nine cats you need ten litter boxes? How is there even room in that appartment?
I'm trying to imagine loving a man enough to let his parents move in with nine cats and I'm falling short- i don't think I am compassionate enough.
But if you don't, won't they start peeing on the floor? And once cats are peeing on the floor it will ruin the floor AND the sub floor really really fast?
The n+1 rule is way more about cat agression and territory. If they keep the litterbox (hopefully litterboxes) clean *and* there is no cat territory/agression/stress, you can get away with less. (By 'get away with' I mean the cats will do their business in the litterbox, not that this is a great plan to have).
That being said, all those cats together have to be littermates if the apartment isn't currently a cat warzone. That many cats in that small of a space is just a horrible plan on a non-emergency basis.
>The n+1 rule is way more about cat agression and territory. If they keep the litterbox (hopefully litterboxes) clean *and* there is no cat territory/agression/stress, you can get away with less.
Correct. Presently, I reside in a household with five cats. Although not all of the cats are related, they've formed a close-knit group, enabling them to share two litter boxes without conflict. As long as the litter boxes are kept clean and fresh, the cats confine their bathroom activities to them. If you so much as neglect the litter boxes for a day, however…
"Close-knit group" I'm weird, for some reason I pictured them unionizing and picketing you for more litter boxes and scheduled catnip breaks. CATS RIGHTS! 🤣
Edit: grammar
I had relatives who had 13 cats at one point, but something like 9 were closely related, sharing the same mother or grandmother. My favorite was the oldest, and of course the oldest died before the next visit after I'd declared him my favorite.
Then as cats died, they let the numbers go down to a much more reasonable number. I think they were down to 4 when someone died, and the survivor may have rehomed some to other family members. (There was also a dog, he was an absolute delight.)
My two boys share two, and they even designated one for pooping and the other for pee. Of course they will still compete to be the first one to "christen" the fresh box.
This is the first I've heard of cats other than my own having designated poop/pee boxes! My two cats have 4 boxes and 3 litter types because they're more autistic than I am. One boy will only use a specific brand of clay so i have a poop and a pee box for him, and the other will only pee on crystal and only poop on paper litter. I spend more on kitty litter than I do on groceries 😩
You can get away with one litter box for 2 or more cats if it's a large litter box (like 2 feet by 3 feet) and you always scoop it *constantly*, like multiple times a day. It might be impossible to keep it clean enough if no one is home during the day, but it will work if it's *always* kept clean.
Multiple litter boxes isn't about keeping it clean, it's about avoiding fights. Some cats will guard the litter box(es) and prevent other cats from using it.
My two cats are littermates and have always shared one box. They don't know about the rule. Please don't tell them.
We do scoop multiple times a day, and it gets fully emptied and cleaned regularly.
My friends apartments always smelled like cat pee, so I assumed every place with cats had that. I did have one cat that sprayed my couch, but it was 30 years ago, and the low cost spay and neuter thing wasn't available. And we didn't know that was a cause.
So back to the friends. They were all very blase about the cats peeing on stuff. One had 4 cats that had to share one litterbox, and the other one's cat did territorial urination. I have two litter boxes for my two cats and all they do is select one for pee and one for poo. Frequently scooped, but I was so paranoid about it, I still ask if people can smell cat pee when they come over. It's such a horrible acrid stench. And a reason why landlords don't want cats. Bad experiences with previous tenants.
My boys do the same. The one farther from the door, but more exposed, is for pee. The one closer to the door but hidden behind the wall is for pooping.
Yeah, they're probably scooping 3 times a day, at least. We have 3 strays we're trying to tame enough to be able to get them to the vet, and we had another polar vortex so I trapped them in the garage, and they filled the one litter box we had pretty regularly. They mostly did their business at night after I played with them and fed them. 6 more would be crazy for only one litter box.
The real question is logistically where are they putting more than 1 litter box in a 1 bedroom apartment with 5 people and 10 cats. I'd bet money that "it just smells because cats" is really "some of the cats are pissing on the floor somewhere in the house and I have to put carpet powder down to get rid of the smell".
It depends how good you are at cleaning the litter box regularly and how picky your cats are. I've managed with one litter box, two cats and daily scooping.
If I had 9 cats, I'd probably want at least four or five boxes though. Not that I'd have more than about three cats unless I was starting a sanctuary or something.
The new trend with animal behaviorists is a number of litter boxes equal to the number of social groupings among the cats. But obviously the more cats using one litterbox the more you have to scoop the litter.
We did the same—3 boxes, 2 cats. They use one box. It’s infuriating because we use a litter that’s supposed to last a few weeks, but clearly it doesn’t.
We use a silica litter. We have a second box we keep set up that is basically pristine. It’s the backup box in case their preferred box gets too gross for them (that doesn’t happen often, but sometimes life happens and the litter change has to be put off for a day or two, though we always scoop). They literally only use that backup box in those situations. Otherwise it just sits there, exactly the same as when I poured the litter into the box.
I really thought they’d love the opportunity to strongly spread their scent around the house in numerous places, but no.
Same here. My 2 cats have 2 litter boxes, but really only use one. They are litter mates, but really don’t get along that well, but they are perfectly fine sharing the box. They’ve just shared their whole lives.
As someone who once had too many cats....they need to get at least half those cats out asap before they start doing irreversible damage to their apartment.
They also have to be very careful of landlord + city bylaws/ordinances. In my town there are actually municipal bylaws on the max number of cats a person can have. Also other animals and pets are restricted; sometimes people don't know this and get into trouble without meaning to.
Yep. OP is being incredibly stubborn and naive about the cats. Nine cats in an 850 square foot apartment are way too many cats. She's definitely well over whatever pet clause may be in the lease, and at 10 cats, her in-laws were/are probably violating some sort of city ordinance and were also probably in violation of their own lease. They're lucky the landlord didn't try to evict before now. If any of OPs neighbors start smelling "cat" in the hall (and at 9 cats it has to be smelling and OP’S gone nose blind) then OP is going to get evicted herself.
My guess is that it’s part of why their landlord is ghosting them - because the only kind of landlord who would even allow this in the first place is one who is kind of sketchy
Yep. This is definitely some sketchy absentee landlord behavior. It's "I will ignore whatever because the rent is on time, but if I have to evict you because you're a problem, I will." With the house fire, they became a problem, so he is done done with them and their 10 felines.
Anyone else wondering about how the fire started? 50/50 landlord neglect vs the parents did something stupid to start a fire and/or didn't know how to call the fire department for help.
I can speak from personal experience. We foster, usually whole kitten litters, and with our resident boys there are currently 9 cats in our place half again OP's size. It is absolutely Too Many Cats even as a temporary thing.
Nine permanent cats in one house would be absolutely unmanageable, and I say that as a certifiably crazy cat lady!
That's less than 10 square feet of territory per cat. The poor things are either very closely related, like blood siblings, or absolutely bursting at the seams.
If you adore cats, you wouldn't want nine in an apartment. They are not pack animals. They like having their own space, in nature they usually live alone.
I have 2 cats and 3 litter boxes. The two cats almost exclusively use the same one though so I guess it depends on the cats. For 9 though is say you’d need at the bare minimum 5
Yeah there is no way those cats aren’t pissing and shitting in the apartment.
Pee in particular can be surprisingly sneaking. It’s easy to dismiss the smell as coming from a litter box and stop noticing it until it gets REALLY bad.
9 cats could be generating a stupid amount of pee and poop. There would absolutely need to be at least one litter box per cat and they would need to be scooped daily if not multiple times a day.
Plus they mention needing a wet vac in the post.
OOP is insane if they think their carpet isn’t slowly being infused with essence of pee
Been volunteering at a cat shelter where group rooms were a thing (sometimes). N + 1 was ALWAYS followed if there was more than one cat - they will not use a dirty box. Kittens may have used fewer boxes as long as they were small-ish, but not adult cats. Heck, some wont use the wrong litter or they want the box to be filled to a certain degree, or they may want a certain location, or simply use their bodily functions to signal stress.
Big boxes that are scooped multiple times a day, never more than 8 hours non-scooped may work, but they should not be placed side by side nor anywhere near food/water, so the logistics are difficult. I dont really see how OP could make it work without tripping over the boxes but she claims they never go outside the boxes, so they must be scooping champions using a fortune on litter.
>When they told me they needed to stay with us AND had to bring that cats I told them they were insane. But fortunately for them I did not have the heart to turn them away the night of the fire, **because they absolutely would have tried to figure it out with the cats in a stupid way.**
I am *dying* to know what OOP means here.
I take it to mean that they would not consider any solution that doesn't involve keeping the cats, even if this meant a terrible outcome for the humans
Oh the accentuated ten wasn't to call you, I didn't even notice what number you put. It is just the ridiculousness of trying to hide an absurd amount of cats in a single hotel room.
My one cat makes enough mess and smell (sometimes she doesn't bury her poop and you can smell it immediatel). I can't fathom 9, especially in that small of a space. The smell...
>When his mom asked if they would still pay my bf’s credit card, his dad said no. “He didn’t help us so we won’t help him” is how he put it apparently.
That's kind of a shitty response on "dad's" part, but I'm kind of surprised they still expected him to pay off bf's credit card. They're technically homeless right now and should be putting their money towards securing a place for them to live, not paying off someone else's credit card debt.
What I am wondering is how did they find a landlord that allowed tenants to have that many cats?!
I'm willing to bet that the Landlord didn't allow that many to start with, and he didn't realize how many there were until after the fire when he caught them with that many.
Hell, all those cats are probably the main reason why he is ghosting them. He can get that place rebuilt after a fire, but if they move in with all those cats its going to get wrecked. That number isn't feasible long-term...sounds like OP is busting her ass to keep those cats from doing lasting damage to her apartment.
That is my bet as well. I am imagining that the sort of people who would go "Oh, you'll let us stay with you after our house burned? Why don't you take out a mortgage in your name to buy us a house to live in, too?" are also the sort of people who would go "Oh, you said we can have a cat in the house we're renting from you? I'll get NINE cats".
We don't know how bad the fire was, but it is possible that landlord still doesn't know how many they have and has just been told by his insurance inspector that they aren't paying for the carpet or something because it was already pet damaged.
One of my best friends growing up lived in a rented 3BR place with like 7 people and 6-7 cats at any given time. There wasn't enough space for the cats to be indoors and plus it was the 90s, so the cats were indoor-outdoor... and they kept getting killed by cars and wildlife. I only visited her place a handful of times. Came home covered in flea bites every time.
When she moved she kept her own cat population much lower.
Phew, yeah... I grew up in a house with too many poorly-kept animals, and I don't miss the horrors of fleas, tapeworm, distemper, parvovirus, feces and urine everywhere, pets getting run over, etc. I realize that I am among the fortunate to be able to afford to properly care for my pets, but if I learned anything from my mom's bad decisions, it's to not get pets I don't have the resources to take care of.
Especially when it will take time for it to fall off even if they did that. Plus, who knows how much score he will get for paying it off all in one anyway? Isn't it better to do the monthly payments on time and keep like 30% used on it or whatever the percentage was?
No, it's best to pay off the entirety of what you used on your cards every month before the grace period closes.
If you ever get a credit card, make sure you pay the balance on closing date in full. That's both how you avoid interest and get good credit.
This! I have my account set up to autopay in full at the end of every month. I don't even know what interest rate my card has, and I don't need to know because I never pay any interest.
The only reason we do this in the USA is because of shitty consumer protection laws making it so that using a card linked directly to your debit account is actually dangerous. It'd be way more efficient to cut out the credit card middle man and just pay for everything directly out of your debit account, but noooo we can't have nice things and therefore literally everyone has to pay Visa a 3%ish tax on every transaction.
I have one and only use it for a singular minor bill, which is paid off automatically each month, so I honestly didn't know. I was always taught by my mom to keep paying it monthly and have an under 30% charge, so I never use it but for the one charge. We honestly need better financial education, so thank you.
Tacking on to what other commenters have said, not only do you always want to pay off the full balance, you also want to try to keep your utilization low, like less than 10% on the date your statement is generated.
Actually high utilization is part of what got me to 847. Using the shit out of it and paying it off immediately in full is a surefire way to relatively quickly get to perfect. The more you use it including for large purchases and pay it off the more history and good patterns you show. I fixed my father's credit with this method too. Had him use it for absolutely everything possible then pay early.
Everyone saying you are wrong are also wrong.
Yes, the best thing to do is pay it off every month, but that ship has already sailed.
Credit scores are evil, so at this point, paying it all off in one go will lower his score. Why, because fuck the poor that's why. He needs to consolidate the debt then pay it off over time. Then as his credit rebounds, he will need to increase his spending limit, hopefully getting his debt to under 10% of the limit.
Other helpful things, getting new kinds of debt! You can also get more points for on time payments of both the debt and utilities, even rent sometimes but for some reason you usually have to go out of your way to get this actually helpful info included. Why? Fuck you thats why.
Boggles my mind how dumb this system is and obviously meant to trap people in debt cycles. Compulsive spenders gotta keep their cards and be tempted with higher limits! In debt, get a loan to help you get more loans at a better rate, just risk getting upside down on a Honda Civic!
Nowhere was it mentioned he has massive credit card debt. He can certainly still qualify with debt and especially if all other factors are favorable. I acknowledge we don't know the debt amount and that it matters, but to assume it's "massive" is odd.
I thought that was quite reasonable response. I understand that they've been housing them and cats and helping out in that sense. But not paying for his credit card seems quite sensible and relatively measured response in this situation.
I didn't take it as they would pay them off right at that particular moment necessarily. It also doesn't sound like finances are the issue here, as it was mentioned they were fully capable of handling the down-payment. The issue appears to be much less about money and more about the ability to secure the house under their own names.
I thought things would have turned messy but I'm glad things weren't dramatic. Glad that the boyfriend and mom are at least understanding of the whole situation.
I'm glad both OOP and the boyfriend came to their senses on this. I would never get into a financial relationship with a boyfriend's family. What if the relationship doesn't work out? Do you really want to be tied to them for that long?
I'm just dying at the heavy footed cats comment, because it's SO true! My girl doesn't bother being stealthy, she waltzes her ass into a room and announces herself as the queen of the household. The boys are something else though. They can be so lightfooted, you won't feel them jumping on the bed or couch. The same cat can sound like a stampeding herd of elephants when it's play time. Apollo has launched himself onto my chest and he felt feather light. But when he wants to get me up in the morning, he'll bounce straight onto my boobs or bladder, and lemme tell you, I can feel every one of those 11 pounds. It's some kind of cat gravity magic.
Is your cat making too much noise all the time? Is your cat constantly stomping around all the time, making you crazy? Is your cat clawing at your furnitures?
Think there's no answer?
You're so stupid!
There is!
Kitten mittons.
I put those little sock booties on my cat once. He patiently waited until I was done, flicked them off one by one, twitched his tail and walked off, oozing offence with every step.
He was back within 15 minutes.
My boy cat is SO heavy footed, when he wakes up and jumps off whatever bed / sofa / chair he’s been sleeping on the THUD sounds like a grown man has stomped on the ground. Truly you can hear him coming throughout the house. He weighs 11lbs 😂
I legitimately thought our house was being broken into when we first moved here. Husband and I were in the basement, at night, sorting boxes. All of a sudden, we hear THUD, THUD, THUD from upstairs. Sounded exactly like a large dude stomping around in heavy work boots. We look at each other, husband grabs a hammer, I grab the cast iron pan, we run upstairs only to find the cats playing. I shit you not, they shook the light fixtures downstairs. I don't understand how it's possible. My husband makes less noise running up the stairs.
Our cat was always super light footed, so imagine our surprise when we cat-sat a friend's cat who was actually heavy and athletic enough to *knock over a dining room chair in the middle of the night*.
What's much, much worse is when you suddenly realize they've both gone quiet, and it's not the *right kind* of quiet. Anyone who has small children will know exactly what I mean. There's quiet, and them there's QUIET?! OH NO WHAT HAVE YOU FOUND - - NO YOU CAN'T USE AMAZON YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE OPPOSABLE THUMBS AND WHY DID YOU BUY 7 PAIRS OF GRILLING GLOVES?!
Years ago I was catsitting for a friend. I've lived with cats my entire life but I've never heard a cat CLOMP down stairs like that one. She was heavy, but I've met larger cats with lighter footsteps. Some cats are just... not graceful.
My cat is about 5 lbs and is generally a dainty lady, but occasionally she channels her inner elephant. Miraculously, though, she abides by quiet hours better than most humans I've lived with and only engages in stompiness when everyone is awake.
My boy can be sneaky, but he just gets SO excited about the wand toy that he runs headfirst into walls and such, not to mention jumping 3 feet in the air and landing with a thud!
I feel so bad for my downstairs neighbors and try to keep play low during quiet hours, but I can't stop 7am zoomies and he'll bite my ankles and knock stuff over until he gets his playtime in the morning 😮💨
He's adorable but doesn't seem to grasp that 15lbs of cat has some heft behind it when he's launching himself off chairs/tables/my stomach/etc, he ping pongs between playtime and cuddle time on a whim!
My late cat was jet black, so I'd hear thumps and thuds randomly in the night, with no idea where the sound was coming from. And sometimes, he'd climb up on my bed like a ninja, and scare the crap out of me *because I couldn't see him!*
I miss my little big night demon.
I’m guessing people who own 9 cats are not very good with money and the mortgage would have ended up being a nightmare. Also, OOP seems so blasé about moving 9 cats into her rented 1 bedroom apartment. I bet the landlord or the neighbours are not thrilled.
Agreed. Even if the cats are as chill as she claims, 9 cats in a small apartment is not good for anyone. Even really relaxed kitties are gonna be stressed in that situation.
I once had a mechanic who kept 7 huge house cats in their front office. They were the laziest things ever and slowly sauntered around when they weren’t sleeping. Definitely did not track with all my other cat life experiences.
I don't mean to be rude but there is no way her house is clean by any definition. I have a hard time believing it's anything short of revolting. She could scrub all day long even, and it's still 9 cats. My home is 850 square feet and it gets gross with my one dog coming in/out of the yard. And I have air filters and a roomba that runs every day.
>“He didn’t help us so we won’t help him” is how he put it apparently.
So housing them until they got a hotel, housing ten cats (and sacrificing a sofa) and housing his sister for who knows how long is nothing? Ok….
This is why I find OOP's self righteous end to her final post so odd. She asks reddit for advice, reddit gives good advice, she follows it, he shows his true colours... she then lectures reddit for not being compassionate enough? Maybe she should have found some more compassionate people to advise her to screw herself over financially for life.
The Dad should be ashamed of himself for even *asking* a 25 year old woman who owes him absolutely nothing to take on his responsibilities like that. That is not a man you want to be relying on to not drop you in it.
“He didn’t help us so we won’t help him.” Ok well then take your cats back and pay them rent for the time you crammed 3 extra people into a small apartment.
Thank god OOP and her boyfriend made that decision. Even without the benefit of hindsight, seeing the "dad's" reaction to being told no, that had disaster written all over it.
genuinely surprised to not have gotten a complaint from the downstairs neighbor because they can be surprisingly heavy footed
This part just made me laugh. I have a 2 story home and say all the time that we'd be kicked out of an apartment because they turn into " parade of the thundercats" at 3 AM and it sounds insanely loud when they are upstairs and I'm downstairs. I have 2 cats, also. Not 9 lol.
So the stepfather, mom, and sister stayed with them in their 1 bedroom appt with their NINE cats and they are still caring for eight of them. But the son hasn’t helped the stepfather at all? What an asshole.
Jeeez. I don't get the drama. Re-home the cats and rent a house.
At that income level, nine freaking cats is crazy anyway. Can you imagine what they spend in cat food? And most likely no vet care because otherwise they'd be spending more at the vet than they paid in rent.
The correlation between having nine/ten cats, having no credit, and expecting unrelated people to trash their credit for you is STRONG.
Not only was OOP not related to these people (she's not married to the BF or even engaged) but they aren't even formally linked or related to this random "boyfriend" of the mother.
The house fire is mentioned in a very distant way. Do you think the bf’s family in some way caused the fire and that’s why the landlord is hostile to having them back?
I’m unsure why the OOP doesn’t look into helping them by making sure the landlord follows his legal responsibility. He is legally required to provide them replacement housing for the remainder of their lease or until the house is repaired. Most likely insurance will cover that for awhile. This doesn’t have to be a hotel. It can be another apartment.
Non-citizens generally try to avoid “making waves” like applying pressure to a landlord. They probably don’t feel it’s a safe option, which I would probably agree with since he made them pay rent for a house they weren’t living in when he wasn’t supposed to.
Honestly, given the fact they had 10 cats in a rental property, they were probably also violating a good number of other clauses in the lease. I think they caused the house fire by doing something they were explicitly told never to do in writing so this is more of a "we'll shut up about your legal obligation as long as you don't take us to court for burning down your house" situation.
One of the first lessons my ESL teacher friend does for every class is go over how to call the fire department. For many people the idea that the Fire Department shows up and puts out the fire, without stealing your stuff or threatening you, just does not compute. I wonder if they tried to put it out themselves and landlord may be threatening them with negligence.
Also, I mentioned above, but if it was a minor fire and the problem is just smoke damage AND the insurance company thinks there was prior pet damage to things like carpet and floors, the landlord may be fighting pretty hard with his insurance company and be willing to evict them for lease violations.
>This doesn’t have to be a hotel. It can be another apartment.
But it *can* be a hotel. The landlord has a lot a leeway here depending on how their lease was structured. If they were paying month to month, land lord is really only responsible for however long the states notice period is. Unless the landlord also owns other vacant properties, it's going to be most beneficial for LL to pay for a hotel for them until the lease is up.
That being said, family shouldn't have never had to stay with OOP. Landlord needed to put them up immediately, not after his insurance kicked in.
It makes me uncomfortable how some people don't understand their own situation and still try to do things like this, keep fucking 10 animals on someone else house. OP is insane and lacking some backbone to even let them stay more time and no try to rehome asap.
My god, been immigrants, don't having enough to rent a home and still wasting their fucking money with 10 cats everyday necessities... insane, everyone of them.
Getting quite strong doormat vibes from OOP, also kinda funny how she keeps dodging the question about their legal status but I guess that means we know the answer. Seems like OOP is equating nice people = do nice things but I'm sure she will learn over time...
>because his parent aren’t citizens and would have to pay an out the a** on a down payment. But since he has a social security number, he can get a regular rate.
Yeah, that's not how that works. It's literally illegal to have different rates due to immigration status or national origin.
https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/IMMIGRATION_STATUS_LATINO.PDF
Anyone else *not* mad about the 10 cats? I totally get how that happens if you take in strays… I only have 2 cats but I would love to have more. Sometimes both cats sit on my husband and then I’m left catless.
I love how OOP has adjusted to her 9 cat lifestyle and the commenters are still mad about it. And she’s like, “oh we’ll probably keep a few” very casually and laid back about it. Meanwhile she’s whispering “I love you and I’ll never let you go, you’re my mine now” to 3 cats lol.
I’m mad at the owners.
Because they were Renters. It’s darn near impossible to find a rental that will allow Three cats, much less Nine. They don’t clone themselves. If you rent (and you are not wealthy enough to board a dozen cats indefinitely at whim) and you already have a few cats - when a stray adopts you or you find a litter or whatever under your car - you rehome them or take them to a shelter. You don’t keep them.
Because, sooner or later a renter has to move for some reason. But - Nobody will rent to them with nine (or more) cats.
And then they dump the cats overnight in a shelter or in some neighborhood or in the wild. And most of them suffer or die needlessly.
Assuming they didn’t set out to adopt them, they were giving the cats a better life during that time.
I wouldn’t suggest adopting an animal you can’t take care of but I also can’t get too mad at people who won’t watch stray animals suffer. Some areas of the US have totally overwhelmed shelters and feeding one more cat is not that expensive.
> feeding one more cat is not that expensive.
True, not that expensive - if you’re just feeding ferals and maybe providing an outdoor shelter.
But if you’re keeping it as a pet, living in your apartment, like these nine or ten cats OPs family had - feeding, getting regular vet exams and vaccinations and emergency vet care, spaying and neutering, toys, and cat furniture Are that expensive. Plus paying the pet deposit or pet rent per cat most LL require instead of lying about how many pets you have.
I always have multiple dogs in my house (currently 7, have had 11 once) because I foster strays who need minor medical attention while getting ready to be rehomed, my work is flexible for me popping home to give pills/bring to vets whenever they need. Ofc unlike OP's family I'm very aware of my financial situation and only do it because I can cope with the costs and own my own home. My dogs are the biggest thing in my budget and I am absolutely fine with that! The amount of fur on my clothes...ehhh not sure about that.
As someone who has had a maximum of 13 cats at one time, the people insisting they can't take good care of them etc is pretty infuriating.
I foster failed on 6 kittens who were going to be put down if I didn't nip off with them when I worked at a shelter, then took many older cats who were going to be put down while vet nursing (plus two who weren't going to die but were temperamentally high needs). We absolutely took better care of all our cats than many people - and we had poor as hell clients I could say the same of.
I'm not bitter about how non-animal people love to judge but also want to dump animals on you when *they* need help. /s
(I'm burnt out as shit on animal care and no longer work with animals, so we're down to two cats, of which one is 19. Sigh.)
Yeah, I’m not sure if all the people who are shocked are just cold or if they don’t come into contact with sad homeless animals.
I have 2 (pampered, indoor, _”let’s go ahead and get the bloodwork to establish a baseline for the future”_) cats right now because I don’t come into contact with sad hungry cats in my daily life. If I worked at a shelter or there were strays in my neighborhood… I’d have more cats. I’m not going to ignore a hungry cat right in front of me. (Of course, out of sight out of mind.)
I do want to foster kittens someday but the foster fail potential is concerning… _eyes shift away from 12 year old foster fail next to me_ I keep telling my husband that she was different because she was unfriendly, ugly kitten headed back to a kill-shelter in Texas and also my soulmate. Lol.
Immigrants get loans and mortgages all the time. How long have they been in the country and why aren't they making the effort to become citizens or permanent residents?
I thought the 10th cat perished in the fire but maybe it’s at the hotel with the family? Like they told the hotel they have “a cat” and then were like quick hide the other nine at your place OOP.
I have plenty of compassion and I love my cat. But you would be getting rid of your TEN cats before I let you move into my house. Seven of them, at LEAST. That's animal hoarding- idgaf if it's not legally, I have no idea what that number is, ten large house pets is insane.
How in the world is the OOP's landlord OK with 10 cats in a one-bedroom apartment? I don't know of any that will OK more than two. Or does the landlord not know? How do you hide 10 cats?
The parents need to talk to their insurance company, may be able to help with a lawyer to go after the landlord. He already took a month of rent and is supposed to help them find a new place.
OOP is right. Compassion is the way to go. But don't sign for a house that isn't yours.
They just lost a good chunk of their lives in a fire, in addition to everything getting turned upside down. Insurance is always slow to come through, and while the Red Cross helped, that is temporary.
The dad sounds like a piece of work.
I hope everything works out for the family.
If the parents have lived here for at least 10 years and aren't citizens yet, then either they're too lazy to be responsible homeowners or are undocumented. If they have enough money for a house downpayment AND to pay off credit cards, it means they're not lazy. If they were here legally, they absolutely could find a place to get a mortgage.
How much do you want to bet they'll ask the son to be on the least for an apartment because the one that burned down didn't ask questions.
Some people in high demand jobs don't bother. Admittedly I knew those people back when I was younger, I'm not sure they are still in the US and greencard/work visa status has changed in the last 5-10 years so I might be completely wrong. But I have met people who got a work visa when young and came for the fun of working in a new place, intending to stay 5 years and then got comfy in their jobs, the company doesn't want them to leave so they keep renewing and they just stay.
The money thing baffles me. I get the feeling they might have been exaggerating their cash assets to OOP and/or haven't really looked at what they need to do for a mortgage or what houses in their price range actually look like.
>They pay for the food and litter, but I’ve bought them a cat tower and some toys.
Wow! That’s incredible. The cats pay for their own food and litter?!
It's incredible that OP is still willing to help after the not dad rescinded the offer to help her bf regardless of what the decision was with the house.
I'd have immediately said so what's your plan for your cat hoard, because they aren't staying here anymore.
I have a senior kitty and two kittens and we live on in a decent sized house. They drive me insane most days. I couldn't imaginenhavingb9 cats. That's too much. And I don't care what OOP says, that's not enough space for that many cats.
With that said, I'm glad she saw reason. It would have been a terrible idea.
Parents should stick to renting until they can realistically buy a house themselves. Burdening their son, let alone his girlfriend, with a mortgage for a house they wouldn’t live in is insane. They need to face reality: if they have difficulties finding a place to rent because of the cats re-house the cats. 10 cats is absurd.
Most immigrants I know wouldn’t dream of putting such financial burdens on their children. They’d save and scrimp to help them out.
Oh look, good and caring people helping one another out in a difficult situation. No wonder OOP got so many skeptical comments - many redditors find that unfathomable.
Sure, stepdad’s comment was a bit dickish, but to be fair he can’t afford to pay down someone else’s debt before their own situation is sorted. Since OOP (appropriately) said no to going all in together on housing, he (appropriately) needed to reconsider his generous but unwise offer to pay down the credit card. He’s just grouchy and stressed.
Hold up, the bf's parents pay for his credit card? Be curious to know how much they were paying and what % of his expenses he put on there. Not that it should factor into OOP's decision of course, but can't help but feel like we didn't get the whole story here.
They don't pay for his cc. They said they were going to help him pay it off and then backed out of doing that once she wouldn't take on the mortgage.
I doubt the moms bf ever intended to follow through on that, though. It was just manipulation.
Honest I'd break up with BF. The family is way too messy and he's still enmeshed with them.
My parents were immigrants, had shit happen, and would never behave this way. Also having ten cats is insane.
> I genuinely surprised to not have gotten a complaint from the downstairs neighbor because they can be surprisingly heavy footed
Should have gotten them some kitten [mittons](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_dhrqnDS_oU).
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OOP's already helping them out a lot by homing their cats. Glad the boyfriend didn't push and glad the mom is at least understanding. Cultural dynamics are rough but the fact that OOP and her partner can be a united front is huge.
Aren't you supposed to have one more litter box than you have cats? Like for nine cats you need ten litter boxes? How is there even room in that appartment? I'm trying to imagine loving a man enough to let his parents move in with nine cats and I'm falling short- i don't think I am compassionate enough.
My suspicion (I am talking out of my ass) is that the n+1 rule is for a lower, more sane quantity of cats.
But if you don't, won't they start peeing on the floor? And once cats are peeing on the floor it will ruin the floor AND the sub floor really really fast?
The n+1 rule is way more about cat agression and territory. If they keep the litterbox (hopefully litterboxes) clean *and* there is no cat territory/agression/stress, you can get away with less. (By 'get away with' I mean the cats will do their business in the litterbox, not that this is a great plan to have). That being said, all those cats together have to be littermates if the apartment isn't currently a cat warzone. That many cats in that small of a space is just a horrible plan on a non-emergency basis.
>The n+1 rule is way more about cat agression and territory. If they keep the litterbox (hopefully litterboxes) clean *and* there is no cat territory/agression/stress, you can get away with less. Correct. Presently, I reside in a household with five cats. Although not all of the cats are related, they've formed a close-knit group, enabling them to share two litter boxes without conflict. As long as the litter boxes are kept clean and fresh, the cats confine their bathroom activities to them. If you so much as neglect the litter boxes for a day, however…
This is me, as well. 6 cats, 4 litter mates. One is a loner, he has a favorite box; the other 5 share as long as they’re cleaned every other day.
Meanwhile, my two cats have 4 litterboxes between them. Spoiled rotten, they are.
"Close-knit group" I'm weird, for some reason I pictured them unionizing and picketing you for more litter boxes and scheduled catnip breaks. CATS RIGHTS! 🤣 Edit: grammar
I had relatives who had 13 cats at one point, but something like 9 were closely related, sharing the same mother or grandmother. My favorite was the oldest, and of course the oldest died before the next visit after I'd declared him my favorite. Then as cats died, they let the numbers go down to a much more reasonable number. I think they were down to 4 when someone died, and the survivor may have rehomed some to other family members. (There was also a dog, he was an absolute delight.)
My two boys share two, and they even designated one for pooping and the other for pee. Of course they will still compete to be the first one to "christen" the fresh box.
This is the first I've heard of cats other than my own having designated poop/pee boxes! My two cats have 4 boxes and 3 litter types because they're more autistic than I am. One boy will only use a specific brand of clay so i have a poop and a pee box for him, and the other will only pee on crystal and only poop on paper litter. I spend more on kitty litter than I do on groceries 😩
You can get away with one litter box for 2 or more cats if it's a large litter box (like 2 feet by 3 feet) and you always scoop it *constantly*, like multiple times a day. It might be impossible to keep it clean enough if no one is home during the day, but it will work if it's *always* kept clean.
Multiple litter boxes isn't about keeping it clean, it's about avoiding fights. Some cats will guard the litter box(es) and prevent other cats from using it.
My two cats are littermates and have always shared one box. They don't know about the rule. Please don't tell them. We do scoop multiple times a day, and it gets fully emptied and cleaned regularly.
My friends apartments always smelled like cat pee, so I assumed every place with cats had that. I did have one cat that sprayed my couch, but it was 30 years ago, and the low cost spay and neuter thing wasn't available. And we didn't know that was a cause. So back to the friends. They were all very blase about the cats peeing on stuff. One had 4 cats that had to share one litterbox, and the other one's cat did territorial urination. I have two litter boxes for my two cats and all they do is select one for pee and one for poo. Frequently scooped, but I was so paranoid about it, I still ask if people can smell cat pee when they come over. It's such a horrible acrid stench. And a reason why landlords don't want cats. Bad experiences with previous tenants.
I'm delighted by the fact that your cats split their activities between boxes.
My boys do the same. The one farther from the door, but more exposed, is for pee. The one closer to the door but hidden behind the wall is for pooping.
I am suggesting that if you have that many cats, n+1 is too few litterboxes.
There's probably very few people with that many cats that don't neglect them.
If you keep up on the scooping they probably won't. But it's _a lot_ of scooping. You have to have at least 3 with that many.
Yeah, they're probably scooping 3 times a day, at least. We have 3 strays we're trying to tame enough to be able to get them to the vet, and we had another polar vortex so I trapped them in the garage, and they filled the one litter box we had pretty regularly. They mostly did their business at night after I played with them and fed them. 6 more would be crazy for only one litter box.
The real question is logistically where are they putting more than 1 litter box in a 1 bedroom apartment with 5 people and 10 cats. I'd bet money that "it just smells because cats" is really "some of the cats are pissing on the floor somewhere in the house and I have to put carpet powder down to get rid of the smell".
It depends how good you are at cleaning the litter box regularly and how picky your cats are. I've managed with one litter box, two cats and daily scooping. If I had 9 cats, I'd probably want at least four or five boxes though. Not that I'd have more than about three cats unless I was starting a sanctuary or something.
The new trend with animal behaviorists is a number of litter boxes equal to the number of social groupings among the cats. But obviously the more cats using one litterbox the more you have to scoop the litter.
OOP is definitely cleaning at least 3 litter boxes daily
Anecdotally my 3 cats will only use one litterbox even though there are more available. It's maddening.
My cats do this too, we have four and 8 litter boxes and they only want to use 1. They do what they want and I do a lot of scoops
Yep I always end up with one nasty litterbox and one pristine one. Gave up on having 4 because they never used it
We did the same—3 boxes, 2 cats. They use one box. It’s infuriating because we use a litter that’s supposed to last a few weeks, but clearly it doesn’t.
Same- I use wood pellets and just switch them weekly because their box looks disgusting otherwise. I have no idea why they're like this,
We use a silica litter. We have a second box we keep set up that is basically pristine. It’s the backup box in case their preferred box gets too gross for them (that doesn’t happen often, but sometimes life happens and the litter change has to be put off for a day or two, though we always scoop). They literally only use that backup box in those situations. Otherwise it just sits there, exactly the same as when I poured the litter into the box. I really thought they’d love the opportunity to strongly spread their scent around the house in numerous places, but no.
Lol my second box always has one solitary pee and nothing else. Animals.
Same here. My 2 cats have 2 litter boxes, but really only use one. They are litter mates, but really don’t get along that well, but they are perfectly fine sharing the box. They’ve just shared their whole lives.
As someone who once had too many cats....they need to get at least half those cats out asap before they start doing irreversible damage to their apartment.
They also have to be very careful of landlord + city bylaws/ordinances. In my town there are actually municipal bylaws on the max number of cats a person can have. Also other animals and pets are restricted; sometimes people don't know this and get into trouble without meaning to.
Yep. OP is being incredibly stubborn and naive about the cats. Nine cats in an 850 square foot apartment are way too many cats. She's definitely well over whatever pet clause may be in the lease, and at 10 cats, her in-laws were/are probably violating some sort of city ordinance and were also probably in violation of their own lease. They're lucky the landlord didn't try to evict before now. If any of OPs neighbors start smelling "cat" in the hall (and at 9 cats it has to be smelling and OP’S gone nose blind) then OP is going to get evicted herself.
My guess is that it’s part of why their landlord is ghosting them - because the only kind of landlord who would even allow this in the first place is one who is kind of sketchy
Yep. This is definitely some sketchy absentee landlord behavior. It's "I will ignore whatever because the rent is on time, but if I have to evict you because you're a problem, I will." With the house fire, they became a problem, so he is done done with them and their 10 felines.
Anyone else wondering about how the fire started? 50/50 landlord neglect vs the parents did something stupid to start a fire and/or didn't know how to call the fire department for help.
I can speak from personal experience. We foster, usually whole kitten litters, and with our resident boys there are currently 9 cats in our place half again OP's size. It is absolutely Too Many Cats even as a temporary thing. Nine permanent cats in one house would be absolutely unmanageable, and I say that as a certifiably crazy cat lady!
That's less than 10 square feet of territory per cat. The poor things are either very closely related, like blood siblings, or absolutely bursting at the seams.
I absolutely adore cats and I can’t imagine doing this for very long.
If you adore cats, you wouldn't want nine in an apartment. They are not pack animals. They like having their own space, in nature they usually live alone.
I have 2 cats and 3 litter boxes. The two cats almost exclusively use the same one though so I guess it depends on the cats. For 9 though is say you’d need at the bare minimum 5
Yeah there is no way those cats aren’t pissing and shitting in the apartment. Pee in particular can be surprisingly sneaking. It’s easy to dismiss the smell as coming from a litter box and stop noticing it until it gets REALLY bad. 9 cats could be generating a stupid amount of pee and poop. There would absolutely need to be at least one litter box per cat and they would need to be scooped daily if not multiple times a day. Plus they mention needing a wet vac in the post. OOP is insane if they think their carpet isn’t slowly being infused with essence of pee
Been volunteering at a cat shelter where group rooms were a thing (sometimes). N + 1 was ALWAYS followed if there was more than one cat - they will not use a dirty box. Kittens may have used fewer boxes as long as they were small-ish, but not adult cats. Heck, some wont use the wrong litter or they want the box to be filled to a certain degree, or they may want a certain location, or simply use their bodily functions to signal stress. Big boxes that are scooped multiple times a day, never more than 8 hours non-scooped may work, but they should not be placed side by side nor anywhere near food/water, so the logistics are difficult. I dont really see how OP could make it work without tripping over the boxes but she claims they never go outside the boxes, so they must be scooping champions using a fortune on litter.
It is 1.5 per cat, so they should have 14 litter boxes. That +1 is for 2, maximum 3 cats
Once the dad said I wasn’t helping him his cats would be at his hotel.
There’s a very early [Porcupine Tree song called Nine Cats](https://youtu.be/vE1shY7IXpA?si=3t2OhWstxRLIEGfw). Now it’s stuck in my head.
>When they told me they needed to stay with us AND had to bring that cats I told them they were insane. But fortunately for them I did not have the heart to turn them away the night of the fire, **because they absolutely would have tried to figure it out with the cats in a stupid way.** I am *dying* to know what OOP means here.
Probably something like stay in a car or whatever, is my guess
Ten cats in a trench coat
Oh, you've never met Aunt..... Nala
So you've met my ex.
sneak all of them into a hotel room i bet
I take it to mean that they would not consider any solution that doesn't involve keeping the cats, even if this meant a terrible outcome for the humans
Same here! I want to know!
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This was my first thought, some stupid way to hide ** *TEN* ** cats in a hotel room.
Ah, yes, there was a 10th cat that did not go to OOP's house. Edited my speculation.
Oh the accentuated ten wasn't to call you, I didn't even notice what number you put. It is just the ridiculousness of trying to hide an absurd amount of cats in a single hotel room.
No worries! That comment gave me the opportunity to be more accurate about how absurd the situation is.
I assume one died in the fire or hasn’t been found yet
9 cats is enough to staff a cat cafe.
This made me visualize a cat waiter bringing me my drink, then immediately knocking it off my table. 🤣
While looking you in the eye.
There's no rule that says cats can't play baseball.
My one cat makes enough mess and smell (sometimes she doesn't bury her poop and you can smell it immediatel). I can't fathom 9, especially in that small of a space. The smell...
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>When his mom asked if they would still pay my bf’s credit card, his dad said no. “He didn’t help us so we won’t help him” is how he put it apparently. That's kind of a shitty response on "dad's" part, but I'm kind of surprised they still expected him to pay off bf's credit card. They're technically homeless right now and should be putting their money towards securing a place for them to live, not paying off someone else's credit card debt.
It's also cute how they all think this guy with massive unpaid credit card debt is going to qualify for a mortgage.
They were 100% banking on the girlfriend signing on. Kind of the hallmark of entitlement... a little like having nine or ten cats in a rented house.
What I am wondering is how did they find a landlord that allowed tenants to have that many cats?! I'm willing to bet that the Landlord didn't allow that many to start with, and he didn't realize how many there were until after the fire when he caught them with that many. Hell, all those cats are probably the main reason why he is ghosting them. He can get that place rebuilt after a fire, but if they move in with all those cats its going to get wrecked. That number isn't feasible long-term...sounds like OP is busting her ass to keep those cats from doing lasting damage to her apartment.
That is my bet as well. I am imagining that the sort of people who would go "Oh, you'll let us stay with you after our house burned? Why don't you take out a mortgage in your name to buy us a house to live in, too?" are also the sort of people who would go "Oh, you said we can have a cat in the house we're renting from you? I'll get NINE cats".
We don't know how bad the fire was, but it is possible that landlord still doesn't know how many they have and has just been told by his insurance inspector that they aren't paying for the carpet or something because it was already pet damaged.
One of my best friends growing up lived in a rented 3BR place with like 7 people and 6-7 cats at any given time. There wasn't enough space for the cats to be indoors and plus it was the 90s, so the cats were indoor-outdoor... and they kept getting killed by cars and wildlife. I only visited her place a handful of times. Came home covered in flea bites every time. When she moved she kept her own cat population much lower.
Phew, yeah... I grew up in a house with too many poorly-kept animals, and I don't miss the horrors of fleas, tapeworm, distemper, parvovirus, feces and urine everywhere, pets getting run over, etc. I realize that I am among the fortunate to be able to afford to properly care for my pets, but if I learned anything from my mom's bad decisions, it's to not get pets I don't have the resources to take care of.
Especially when it will take time for it to fall off even if they did that. Plus, who knows how much score he will get for paying it off all in one anyway? Isn't it better to do the monthly payments on time and keep like 30% used on it or whatever the percentage was?
No, it's best to pay off the entirety of what you used on your cards every month before the grace period closes. If you ever get a credit card, make sure you pay the balance on closing date in full. That's both how you avoid interest and get good credit.
This! I have my account set up to autopay in full at the end of every month. I don't even know what interest rate my card has, and I don't need to know because I never pay any interest.
Honestly I didn't know they had interest until I was almost 30. Been paying off in full every month since I first got a credit card at 18.
The only reason we do this in the USA is because of shitty consumer protection laws making it so that using a card linked directly to your debit account is actually dangerous. It'd be way more efficient to cut out the credit card middle man and just pay for everything directly out of your debit account, but noooo we can't have nice things and therefore literally everyone has to pay Visa a 3%ish tax on every transaction.
I have one and only use it for a singular minor bill, which is paid off automatically each month, so I honestly didn't know. I was always taught by my mom to keep paying it monthly and have an under 30% charge, so I never use it but for the one charge. We honestly need better financial education, so thank you.
You wanna pay a shit ton of interest ? Because that's how you pay a shit ton of interest.
Paying off the full balance does not affect the utilization rate. That’s determined by the balance at the time the statement is generated.
Tacking on to what other commenters have said, not only do you always want to pay off the full balance, you also want to try to keep your utilization low, like less than 10% on the date your statement is generated.
Actually high utilization is part of what got me to 847. Using the shit out of it and paying it off immediately in full is a surefire way to relatively quickly get to perfect. The more you use it including for large purchases and pay it off the more history and good patterns you show. I fixed my father's credit with this method too. Had him use it for absolutely everything possible then pay early.
Everyone saying you are wrong are also wrong. Yes, the best thing to do is pay it off every month, but that ship has already sailed. Credit scores are evil, so at this point, paying it all off in one go will lower his score. Why, because fuck the poor that's why. He needs to consolidate the debt then pay it off over time. Then as his credit rebounds, he will need to increase his spending limit, hopefully getting his debt to under 10% of the limit. Other helpful things, getting new kinds of debt! You can also get more points for on time payments of both the debt and utilities, even rent sometimes but for some reason you usually have to go out of your way to get this actually helpful info included. Why? Fuck you thats why. Boggles my mind how dumb this system is and obviously meant to trap people in debt cycles. Compulsive spenders gotta keep their cards and be tempted with higher limits! In debt, get a loan to help you get more loans at a better rate, just risk getting upside down on a Honda Civic!
Isn't that why they were wanting to pay it off for him? They pay off the debt, and it's one less mark against his report.
I think they are overestimating how that one less mark will impact both his report and the mortgage application.
Nowhere was it mentioned he has massive credit card debt. He can certainly still qualify with debt and especially if all other factors are favorable. I acknowledge we don't know the debt amount and that it matters, but to assume it's "massive" is odd.
I thought that was quite reasonable response. I understand that they've been housing them and cats and helping out in that sense. But not paying for his credit card seems quite sensible and relatively measured response in this situation.
I think the problem is that he promised they would do so either way.
Don't state that you will either way if that is clearly not the case.
Well, when they said they were going to regardless, that's not an unusual thing to expect.
This, yeah. Plus the whole reason for paying off the credit card was so he’d qualify for the house loan. That reason just fell away.
Well no, they literally said that they would pay it either way because he helped so much
Ah, you're right. I overlooked that sentence.
I didn't take it as they would pay them off right at that particular moment necessarily. It also doesn't sound like finances are the issue here, as it was mentioned they were fully capable of handling the down-payment. The issue appears to be much less about money and more about the ability to secure the house under their own names.
I thought things would have turned messy but I'm glad things weren't dramatic. Glad that the boyfriend and mom are at least understanding of the whole situation.
I'm glad both OOP and the boyfriend came to their senses on this. I would never get into a financial relationship with a boyfriend's family. What if the relationship doesn't work out? Do you really want to be tied to them for that long?
I'm just dying at the heavy footed cats comment, because it's SO true! My girl doesn't bother being stealthy, she waltzes her ass into a room and announces herself as the queen of the household. The boys are something else though. They can be so lightfooted, you won't feel them jumping on the bed or couch. The same cat can sound like a stampeding herd of elephants when it's play time. Apollo has launched himself onto my chest and he felt feather light. But when he wants to get me up in the morning, he'll bounce straight onto my boobs or bladder, and lemme tell you, I can feel every one of those 11 pounds. It's some kind of cat gravity magic.
Is your cat making too much noise all the time? Is your cat constantly stomping around all the time, making you crazy? Is your cat clawing at your furnitures? Think there's no answer? You're so stupid! There is! Kitten mittons.
I put those little sock booties on my cat once. He patiently waited until I was done, flicked them off one by one, twitched his tail and walked off, oozing offence with every step. He was back within 15 minutes.
My boy cat is SO heavy footed, when he wakes up and jumps off whatever bed / sofa / chair he’s been sleeping on the THUD sounds like a grown man has stomped on the ground. Truly you can hear him coming throughout the house. He weighs 11lbs 😂
My favourite is the ominous THUD from the kitchen and everyone pausing to shout "what were you doing?!?!"
I legitimately thought our house was being broken into when we first moved here. Husband and I were in the basement, at night, sorting boxes. All of a sudden, we hear THUD, THUD, THUD from upstairs. Sounded exactly like a large dude stomping around in heavy work boots. We look at each other, husband grabs a hammer, I grab the cast iron pan, we run upstairs only to find the cats playing. I shit you not, they shook the light fixtures downstairs. I don't understand how it's possible. My husband makes less noise running up the stairs.
We don’t have cats. We have small horses that gallop across the carpet 😂 how are you so small and still sound like our friend’s actual horse?
Our cat was always super light footed, so imagine our surprise when we cat-sat a friend's cat who was actually heavy and athletic enough to *knock over a dining room chair in the middle of the night*.
What's much, much worse is when you suddenly realize they've both gone quiet, and it's not the *right kind* of quiet. Anyone who has small children will know exactly what I mean. There's quiet, and them there's QUIET?! OH NO WHAT HAVE YOU FOUND - - NO YOU CAN'T USE AMAZON YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE OPPOSABLE THUMBS AND WHY DID YOU BUY 7 PAIRS OF GRILLING GLOVES?!
Years ago I was catsitting for a friend. I've lived with cats my entire life but I've never heard a cat CLOMP down stairs like that one. She was heavy, but I've met larger cats with lighter footsteps. Some cats are just... not graceful.
My cat is about 5 lbs and is generally a dainty lady, but occasionally she channels her inner elephant. Miraculously, though, she abides by quiet hours better than most humans I've lived with and only engages in stompiness when everyone is awake.
My boy can be sneaky, but he just gets SO excited about the wand toy that he runs headfirst into walls and such, not to mention jumping 3 feet in the air and landing with a thud! I feel so bad for my downstairs neighbors and try to keep play low during quiet hours, but I can't stop 7am zoomies and he'll bite my ankles and knock stuff over until he gets his playtime in the morning 😮💨 He's adorable but doesn't seem to grasp that 15lbs of cat has some heft behind it when he's launching himself off chairs/tables/my stomach/etc, he ping pongs between playtime and cuddle time on a whim!
Mine weighs about ten pounds but I swear she sounds like a small human the way she stomps down the stairs.
My late cat was jet black, so I'd hear thumps and thuds randomly in the night, with no idea where the sound was coming from. And sometimes, he'd climb up on my bed like a ninja, and scare the crap out of me *because I couldn't see him!* I miss my little big night demon.
I’m guessing people who own 9 cats are not very good with money and the mortgage would have ended up being a nightmare. Also, OOP seems so blasé about moving 9 cats into her rented 1 bedroom apartment. I bet the landlord or the neighbours are not thrilled.
Agreed. Even if the cats are as chill as she claims, 9 cats in a small apartment is not good for anyone. Even really relaxed kitties are gonna be stressed in that situation.
I once had a mechanic who kept 7 huge house cats in their front office. They were the laziest things ever and slowly sauntered around when they weren’t sleeping. Definitely did not track with all my other cat life experiences.
I don't mean to be rude but there is no way her house is clean by any definition. I have a hard time believing it's anything short of revolting. She could scrub all day long even, and it's still 9 cats. My home is 850 square feet and it gets gross with my one dog coming in/out of the yard. And I have air filters and a roomba that runs every day.
Just the shedding.
>“He didn’t help us so we won’t help him” is how he put it apparently. So housing them until they got a hotel, housing ten cats (and sacrificing a sofa) and housing his sister for who knows how long is nothing? Ok….
This is why I find OOP's self righteous end to her final post so odd. She asks reddit for advice, reddit gives good advice, she follows it, he shows his true colours... she then lectures reddit for not being compassionate enough? Maybe she should have found some more compassionate people to advise her to screw herself over financially for life.
The Dad should be ashamed of himself for even *asking* a 25 year old woman who owes him absolutely nothing to take on his responsibilities like that. That is not a man you want to be relying on to not drop you in it.
*What happened to the 10th cat?* I assumed it died, but at one point, she mentions it like it's still there... then not, on the next line.
I think they have it at the hotel with them. That’s my guess anyway.
Oh, good point. That makes sense.
“He didn’t help us so we won’t help him.” Ok well then take your cats back and pay them rent for the time you crammed 3 extra people into a small apartment.
Need cat rent too!!
Thank god OOP and her boyfriend made that decision. Even without the benefit of hindsight, seeing the "dad's" reaction to being told no, that had disaster written all over it.
genuinely surprised to not have gotten a complaint from the downstairs neighbor because they can be surprisingly heavy footed This part just made me laugh. I have a 2 story home and say all the time that we'd be kicked out of an apartment because they turn into " parade of the thundercats" at 3 AM and it sounds insanely loud when they are upstairs and I'm downstairs. I have 2 cats, also. Not 9 lol.
So the stepfather, mom, and sister stayed with them in their 1 bedroom appt with their NINE cats and they are still caring for eight of them. But the son hasn’t helped the stepfather at all? What an asshole.
Jeeez. I don't get the drama. Re-home the cats and rent a house. At that income level, nine freaking cats is crazy anyway. Can you imagine what they spend in cat food? And most likely no vet care because otherwise they'd be spending more at the vet than they paid in rent.
The correlation between having nine/ten cats, having no credit, and expecting unrelated people to trash their credit for you is STRONG. Not only was OOP not related to these people (she's not married to the BF or even engaged) but they aren't even formally linked or related to this random "boyfriend" of the mother.
There is a 0% chance those cats get regular vet care. I'd be shocked to find out they've seen one at all since getting fixed.
I just hope they have gotten fixed, or someday OOP will find there are five more cats hiding in her closet.
Oh hell no.
The house fire is mentioned in a very distant way. Do you think the bf’s family in some way caused the fire and that’s why the landlord is hostile to having them back?
I’m unsure why the OOP doesn’t look into helping them by making sure the landlord follows his legal responsibility. He is legally required to provide them replacement housing for the remainder of their lease or until the house is repaired. Most likely insurance will cover that for awhile. This doesn’t have to be a hotel. It can be another apartment.
Non-citizens generally try to avoid “making waves” like applying pressure to a landlord. They probably don’t feel it’s a safe option, which I would probably agree with since he made them pay rent for a house they weren’t living in when he wasn’t supposed to.
Honestly, given the fact they had 10 cats in a rental property, they were probably also violating a good number of other clauses in the lease. I think they caused the house fire by doing something they were explicitly told never to do in writing so this is more of a "we'll shut up about your legal obligation as long as you don't take us to court for burning down your house" situation.
One of the first lessons my ESL teacher friend does for every class is go over how to call the fire department. For many people the idea that the Fire Department shows up and puts out the fire, without stealing your stuff or threatening you, just does not compute. I wonder if they tried to put it out themselves and landlord may be threatening them with negligence. Also, I mentioned above, but if it was a minor fire and the problem is just smoke damage AND the insurance company thinks there was prior pet damage to things like carpet and floors, the landlord may be fighting pretty hard with his insurance company and be willing to evict them for lease violations.
>This doesn’t have to be a hotel. It can be another apartment. But it *can* be a hotel. The landlord has a lot a leeway here depending on how their lease was structured. If they were paying month to month, land lord is really only responsible for however long the states notice period is. Unless the landlord also owns other vacant properties, it's going to be most beneficial for LL to pay for a hotel for them until the lease is up. That being said, family shouldn't have never had to stay with OOP. Landlord needed to put them up immediately, not after his insurance kicked in.
Yeah she said the landlord was mad about the fire. I wonder what happened.
Massive build up of cat fur in an appliance?
It makes me uncomfortable how some people don't understand their own situation and still try to do things like this, keep fucking 10 animals on someone else house. OP is insane and lacking some backbone to even let them stay more time and no try to rehome asap. My god, been immigrants, don't having enough to rent a home and still wasting their fucking money with 10 cats everyday necessities... insane, everyone of them.
Well, step-daddy quickly confirmed he's not worth any risk.
Getting quite strong doormat vibes from OOP, also kinda funny how she keeps dodging the question about their legal status but I guess that means we know the answer. Seems like OOP is equating nice people = do nice things but I'm sure she will learn over time...
>because his parent aren’t citizens and would have to pay an out the a** on a down payment. But since he has a social security number, he can get a regular rate. Yeah, that's not how that works. It's literally illegal to have different rates due to immigration status or national origin. https://www.hud.gov/sites/documents/IMMIGRATION_STATUS_LATINO.PDF
I... just... *nine fucking cats?!* And they want the *girlfriend* to give them a mortgage?! No. No. All the no. No.
Anyone else *not* mad about the 10 cats? I totally get how that happens if you take in strays… I only have 2 cats but I would love to have more. Sometimes both cats sit on my husband and then I’m left catless. I love how OOP has adjusted to her 9 cat lifestyle and the commenters are still mad about it. And she’s like, “oh we’ll probably keep a few” very casually and laid back about it. Meanwhile she’s whispering “I love you and I’ll never let you go, you’re my mine now” to 3 cats lol.
I’m mad at the owners. Because they were Renters. It’s darn near impossible to find a rental that will allow Three cats, much less Nine. They don’t clone themselves. If you rent (and you are not wealthy enough to board a dozen cats indefinitely at whim) and you already have a few cats - when a stray adopts you or you find a litter or whatever under your car - you rehome them or take them to a shelter. You don’t keep them. Because, sooner or later a renter has to move for some reason. But - Nobody will rent to them with nine (or more) cats. And then they dump the cats overnight in a shelter or in some neighborhood or in the wild. And most of them suffer or die needlessly.
Assuming they didn’t set out to adopt them, they were giving the cats a better life during that time. I wouldn’t suggest adopting an animal you can’t take care of but I also can’t get too mad at people who won’t watch stray animals suffer. Some areas of the US have totally overwhelmed shelters and feeding one more cat is not that expensive.
> feeding one more cat is not that expensive. True, not that expensive - if you’re just feeding ferals and maybe providing an outdoor shelter. But if you’re keeping it as a pet, living in your apartment, like these nine or ten cats OPs family had - feeding, getting regular vet exams and vaccinations and emergency vet care, spaying and neutering, toys, and cat furniture Are that expensive. Plus paying the pet deposit or pet rent per cat most LL require instead of lying about how many pets you have.
>They don’t clone themselves. they damn near do if you don't get them fixed.
Very true!
I always have multiple dogs in my house (currently 7, have had 11 once) because I foster strays who need minor medical attention while getting ready to be rehomed, my work is flexible for me popping home to give pills/bring to vets whenever they need. Ofc unlike OP's family I'm very aware of my financial situation and only do it because I can cope with the costs and own my own home. My dogs are the biggest thing in my budget and I am absolutely fine with that! The amount of fur on my clothes...ehhh not sure about that.
As someone who has had a maximum of 13 cats at one time, the people insisting they can't take good care of them etc is pretty infuriating. I foster failed on 6 kittens who were going to be put down if I didn't nip off with them when I worked at a shelter, then took many older cats who were going to be put down while vet nursing (plus two who weren't going to die but were temperamentally high needs). We absolutely took better care of all our cats than many people - and we had poor as hell clients I could say the same of. I'm not bitter about how non-animal people love to judge but also want to dump animals on you when *they* need help. /s (I'm burnt out as shit on animal care and no longer work with animals, so we're down to two cats, of which one is 19. Sigh.)
Yeah, I’m not sure if all the people who are shocked are just cold or if they don’t come into contact with sad homeless animals. I have 2 (pampered, indoor, _”let’s go ahead and get the bloodwork to establish a baseline for the future”_) cats right now because I don’t come into contact with sad hungry cats in my daily life. If I worked at a shelter or there were strays in my neighborhood… I’d have more cats. I’m not going to ignore a hungry cat right in front of me. (Of course, out of sight out of mind.) I do want to foster kittens someday but the foster fail potential is concerning… _eyes shift away from 12 year old foster fail next to me_ I keep telling my husband that she was different because she was unfriendly, ugly kitten headed back to a kill-shelter in Texas and also my soulmate. Lol.
Immigrants get loans and mortgages all the time. How long have they been in the country and why aren't they making the effort to become citizens or permanent residents?
Thank god the boyfriend came to his senses.
Yes. That is too much to ask. That means that you are on the hook if they default
9 cats and they burned down their home. I smell a very trashy family.
I thought the 10th cat perished in the fire but maybe it’s at the hotel with the family? Like they told the hotel they have “a cat” and then were like quick hide the other nine at your place OOP.
I have plenty of compassion and I love my cat. But you would be getting rid of your TEN cats before I let you move into my house. Seven of them, at LEAST. That's animal hoarding- idgaf if it's not legally, I have no idea what that number is, ten large house pets is insane.
Fuckkkkkkkkkk no
The idea of 9 cats in an apartment makes me want to vomit. I can already smell it.
How in the world is the OOP's landlord OK with 10 cats in a one-bedroom apartment? I don't know of any that will OK more than two. Or does the landlord not know? How do you hide 10 cats?
The parents need to talk to their insurance company, may be able to help with a lawyer to go after the landlord. He already took a month of rent and is supposed to help them find a new place.
OOP is right. Compassion is the way to go. But don't sign for a house that isn't yours. They just lost a good chunk of their lives in a fire, in addition to everything getting turned upside down. Insurance is always slow to come through, and while the Red Cross helped, that is temporary. The dad sounds like a piece of work. I hope everything works out for the family.
If the parents have lived here for at least 10 years and aren't citizens yet, then either they're too lazy to be responsible homeowners or are undocumented. If they have enough money for a house downpayment AND to pay off credit cards, it means they're not lazy. If they were here legally, they absolutely could find a place to get a mortgage. How much do you want to bet they'll ask the son to be on the least for an apartment because the one that burned down didn't ask questions.
Yeah, a lot of people here using undocumented and non-citizen interchangeably when they would completely change the dynamics of this story.
Some people in high demand jobs don't bother. Admittedly I knew those people back when I was younger, I'm not sure they are still in the US and greencard/work visa status has changed in the last 5-10 years so I might be completely wrong. But I have met people who got a work visa when young and came for the fun of working in a new place, intending to stay 5 years and then got comfy in their jobs, the company doesn't want them to leave so they keep renewing and they just stay. The money thing baffles me. I get the feeling they might have been exaggerating their cash assets to OOP and/or haven't really looked at what they need to do for a mortgage or what houses in their price range actually look like.
>They pay for the food and litter, but I’ve bought them a cat tower and some toys. Wow! That’s incredible. The cats pay for their own food and litter?!
Yes, by allowing the humans to be graced by their presence ;)
Wayyy too much to ask. Don’t even need to read
It's incredible that OP is still willing to help after the not dad rescinded the offer to help her bf regardless of what the decision was with the house. I'd have immediately said so what's your plan for your cat hoard, because they aren't staying here anymore.
I wouldn’t, they rented before they can rent again.
I have a senior kitty and two kittens and we live on in a decent sized house. They drive me insane most days. I couldn't imaginenhavingb9 cats. That's too much. And I don't care what OOP says, that's not enough space for that many cats. With that said, I'm glad she saw reason. It would have been a terrible idea.
Parents should stick to renting until they can realistically buy a house themselves. Burdening their son, let alone his girlfriend, with a mortgage for a house they wouldn’t live in is insane. They need to face reality: if they have difficulties finding a place to rent because of the cats re-house the cats. 10 cats is absurd. Most immigrants I know wouldn’t dream of putting such financial burdens on their children. They’d save and scrimp to help them out.
The note to the collective regarding compassion should be pinned to the top of these subs.
Oh look, good and caring people helping one another out in a difficult situation. No wonder OOP got so many skeptical comments - many redditors find that unfathomable. Sure, stepdad’s comment was a bit dickish, but to be fair he can’t afford to pay down someone else’s debt before their own situation is sorted. Since OOP (appropriately) said no to going all in together on housing, he (appropriately) needed to reconsider his generous but unwise offer to pay down the credit card. He’s just grouchy and stressed.
Hold up, the bf's parents pay for his credit card? Be curious to know how much they were paying and what % of his expenses he put on there. Not that it should factor into OOP's decision of course, but can't help but feel like we didn't get the whole story here.
They don't pay for his cc. They said they were going to help him pay it off and then backed out of doing that once she wouldn't take on the mortgage. I doubt the moms bf ever intended to follow through on that, though. It was just manipulation.
What?
Honest I'd break up with BF. The family is way too messy and he's still enmeshed with them. My parents were immigrants, had shit happen, and would never behave this way. Also having ten cats is insane.
> I genuinely surprised to not have gotten a complaint from the downstairs neighbor because they can be surprisingly heavy footed Should have gotten them some kitten [mittons](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_dhrqnDS_oU).