Money Moral Dilemma: Should we return the furniture we thought we'd been given for free?

gerrag

1): Have a chat with your mum and see what she thinks about her neighbour, and her past/present/future relationship with him. She may need to rely on him for help currently, or further down the line.

2): Based on that chat, make your decision.

That said, I think the neighbour is extracting the waste liquid. A gift is a gift, and you were more than kind enough to make a donation that you could reasonably afford, in recognition of his son's Marathon Run.

Well done, you!!

His gift, and your donation are non-related/non-conditional, unless otherwise agreed beforehand.

Stand your ground for now, but bear in mind what the outcome might be for your mum going forward.

confusedgranny

I wonder if he mentioned the son's fund-raising at the time he gave you the furniture. So in HIS mind it was a transaction while in your mind it was a gift.
If so maybe you could apologise for misunderstanding him and ask him to return the £100 and take the furniture to sell.
But he should have said - yet another mindreading failure.

Pollycat

MSE_Kelvin said:

My mum's neighbour gave us some furniture, which we believed to be a generous offer to help us furnish our first home. To show our appreciation, we donated £100 to his son, who ran the London Marathon for charity last weekend. The neighbour has now said he could have sold the furniture for much more than £100 and believes we should have made a larger donation. What should we do: return the furniture to him, increase the donation, or stick with our original understanding of the offer?

The word in bold is key.

For anyone to give any sensible opinion, the exact words that went with the furniture changing hands needs clarification.
Otherwise, this is just  case of 'Chinese whispers'.

pollypenny

Does this greedy man realise that secondhand furniture is worth very little?  

Abbafan1972

pollypenny said:

Does this greedy man realise that secondhand furniture is worth very little?  

Unfortunately though, I think a lot of charity shops don’t seem to have received the memo. 

NYCSavage

The furniture is yours.  There’s nothing else to say.  Although, if they continue being petty then you can too. 

I’d script a letter that basically thanks them for the DONATION of furniture.  Then, admit that the furniture is worth considerably more than £100, so if they want it back so bad, as it is now your property, they can have the option to buy it back at the current value of £#### if they want it so badly. 

gloriouslyhappy

Tell them you are sorry there has been a misunderstanding, and to please collect the furniture and return the donation so that both parties have what they started with, and that if you haven’t heard from them by x date you will consider the matter closed.

tindella

Seems to me that now you've given £100 as a donation to his son, he thinks you can afford to give him some money for the furniture! I would explain that you could only afford the donation because you didn't have to pay for the furniture, so he should ask his son for the £100 - if he can live with taking money way from a needy charity.

drodbar

Absolutely keep it.  I used to know somebody who gave conditional "gifts", thinking that he could guilt-trip you and control what you did with them.  Usually he would say things like: "Oh well, I gave you £150 for your birthday, now you should be doing x,y,z for me". 

My outlook is that once I give somebody a gift, it is no longer mine.  After that point, I have nothing further to do with that item, regardless of whether the new owner decides to keep it, burn it, sell it, or smash it into a thousand pieces. It's their's, not mine.  Likewise, that furniture ceased to belong to your mum's neighbour when they gave it to you.  

Ignore the guilt-trip they seem to be playing and keep the furniture. It is yours, after all.  

fabulous_at_any_age

You accepted furniture as a gift. That to me says no strings attached. As for your donation of £100 I understand. It was a freewill donation and should not linked to the furniture you were offered. Tell the neighbour you had understood the furniture was a gift and does that still stand?