AITA because my uncle and grandma kicked me and my mom out their lives over a ten year old car?
Hello Charlotte! Love you and you content that you have on here and YouTube! This is a bit of a wild ride so strap in.
I (25F) moved to Ohio last year in August of 2025. It was the best thing for me and my mental health to move away from California although I miss my mom and friends so much. When I first moved to Ohio, I live with my uncle, my uncles girlfriend, and my grandma. I always thought my uncle was the best person in the world alone with my grandma, but I got a big reality check after I moved out the house and moved into an apartment with my boyfriend (25M and we’ll call him J).
Me and J started living together in February of this year and have been together for 7 months. He’s the most amazing man and the man I’ve wised for for years. (J is a huge part of why I got the courage to say what I needed to say to my uncle and grandma). Before moving out to my apartment with J, my uncle (60M and we’ll call him R) had given me a car to drive so that I could be able to get situated with a job near my area and all I would have to pay is insurance and gas for the car. That’s great and all, but the car had sat for three years and was never worked on to make sure it was safe to drive. To give a little context on why the car wasn’t save….1) the thermostat was jacked, 2) the alinement on the car was so bad that my car was slightly swerve into other lanes while I was driving, 3) the brakes were becoming an major problem to the pit the even braking from a distance it took a good press down on the brakes to get the car to fully stop, 4) the gas tank would never let gas just freely flow and the pump would always click every few seconds while pumping gas, 5) the car had a smell of propane inside the car, and 6) the evap system was jacked to the point that my dash kept saying to check the gas cap which is connected to the evap system.
Me and my boyfriend have been noticing these things a lot with the car and it got to the point that I would have my boyfriend meet me at my work and drive home behind me just in case something happened. I had brought these issues up to my uncle about the things were wrong with the car and he kept telling me that either there was nothing wrong with the car or that whatever I said about it after J looked at the car wasn’t what was wrong with that car. (For clarification, my boyfriend has certifications in mechanic work and he was the one who found out what the issues were with the car but my uncle thinks he doesn’t know what he’s talking about).
My mom (60F and we’ll call her S) would ask me about the car I was driving, which was a very very old Grand Prix Pontiac that belonged to my grandpa before he passed almost two years ago, and I told her everything that was happening and she was pissed to say the least that my uncle has put in a car that wasn’t safe and my uncle did not fix it before giving me the car to drive. (My uncle is also a mechanic, but he’s been retired for a number of years and he half ass fixes a car. Seen it with my own eyes). After months of me, my mom, and my boyfriend talking about the car, my mom had decided to make a group chat with me, my uncle, my grandma, and herself asking if it was possibly to maybe trade the Pontiac for my dads 2015 ford focus. (My father passed away 9 years ago before I turned 16 and he was 51 when he passed. RIP dad I miss and love you very much 😢). When my mom had suggested trading the two cars between me and my uncle and asked him if there was anything reason why I couldn’t have my dads car, he basically told us in a nutshell that he did not want the car driven in the winter, which fool never drove the car at all and it was rare to see him drive my dads car, and that he didn’t want me to wreck the car. Ohio is a lot more open on the roads and less people live here and yes I do admit that I don’t have the greatest driving record and I do take 100% responsibility for it and accountability.
After my uncle told my mom that we would not get that car back period, the chat exploded with my mom saying that it was just a car and that he didn’t do his part in making sure the car I was driving was safe enough to drive around. After more screaming and yelling from both uncle and mom, uncle slammed my boyfriend saying that if he knew the car was dangerous to drive why did he let me drive the car and that if I wanted a safer car I would have to have J drive my car and I would drive J’s car which is illegal because were are not insured drivers on each others cars. The whole chat kept on going until he told my mom that he wised my father was still alive and my mother had died instead.
The second part to this entire chat was that after my grandpa had passes away, there was a trust that was worked out with a lawyer and the trust stated that me, my second cousin, my second cousins kids, and my dads brothers who are my uncles got the pay out after we sold grandpas house. Come to find out after doing some digging, my uncles, second cousin, and myself got paid out but R refused, withheld, and spent my seconds cousins money from the trust money that everyone was suppose to get. My cousins kids tried to take my uncle to court and in the end they dropped the court situation with R because he prolonged the process so much that my cousins kids couldn’t afforded to take legal action anymore. Each kid was suppose to get $5,000 each (there are four kids). Sooooo, I took it upon myself to ask aunt (55F and we’ll call her L) about what to do. A little more context is that there is an inheritance that is coming soon to the people I mentioned that got the payout of grandpas house. When my and L talked about the money that wasn’t payed to my cousins kids and about my gut telling my R would try to withhold money from the inheritance from me because of him being pissed about dads car, she told me he can withhold the money all he wants, but at the end of the day he would be in a lot of trouble because I could take him to court and have a very high chance of winning and the court would order him to pay the inheritance out right. Just to put it out there, I would rather struggle my whole ass off than have the fuck you money and change for the worst because money changes people and most of the time for the worst and the better.
In the meantime, because my uncle was petty over a ten year old car, I responded in an even pettier way and called EPA anonymously because I have suspicion that in the ten years my uncle has lived in his house, he has been dumping oil and grease into the pond and pipe lining of his house which is very illegal here. He has a couple other things that are illegal that’s he’s been doing but that’s for another day.
At the end of the day, me and my mom blocked both my grandma and my uncle over this because he’s my grandma totally defended my uncle.
So reddit, AIO over this and being too petty or is this the right amount of petty and after my uncle verbally attacking my mom, my boyfriend, and myself?