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I'm lifelong legally single. I just closed on a property Friday. I've met various people at restaurants, bars, etc.., since then. I've gotten the impression from them that being a single male property owner is "weird."
I don't see myself marrying. This "condition" will likely persist. It's unlikely that I'll marry or have kids within the next couple of years.
As you aged and remained or become single, how did you handle it? Logistically and socially? Do you feel discriminated against because you choose to remain legally single?
What is "legally single"? As opposed to "non-legally single"?
As a single retired woman (divorced many years ago), I don't feel discriminated against. But I do feel socially isolated, mainly because the area I live in doesn't have many retired single women. They are either married, or if retired, they weren't career women (they retired from low-income jobs). And most women have kids & grandkids, which I don't have. I'm working on moving (again), to a better area.
Being a retired single woman is probably more common than being a single retired man. Most women over a certain age live alone or are single. They're divorced or widowed.
If there is anything that is held against me, it's the fact that I don't have kids/grandkids. Not that I don't have a husband or partner.
I'm lifelong legally single. I just closed on a property Friday. I've met various people at restaurants, bars, etc.., since then. I've gotten the impression from them that being a single male property owner is "weird."
I don't see myself marrying. This "condition" will likely persist. It's unlikely that I'll marry or have kids within the next couple of years.
As you aged and remained or become single, how did you handle it? Logistically and socially? Do you feel discriminated against because you choose to remain legally single?
Many people make a lot of strange assumptions about people who choose to be single. What I think is more weird is single men who try to move in with women who own a home. These Peter Pan types live month to month, spend every penny as soon as it is earned, and genuinely expect that someone else should put a roof over their heads and a meal on the table. They are the merry grasshoppers in the Ant and the Grasshopper.
Being single or married is a choice, but people who are married tend to judge those who choose to be single as having something wrong with them - as though being independent and self-sufficient is a weakness. It's a hangover from the 19C to view single life as inferior to married life, but times are changing - slowly.
Oh yea,
people think you are gay
weird
you are almost always a team b or c friend
and we pay more for everything, including taxes despite married people claiming otherwise. And if we earn less, or don't work, aren't divorced, we only get the social security we put in. Not someone else's.
And its not always a choice. I would have liked to get married but...idk, insecure, bad choices in men, but not stupid enough to marry someone awful just to be married. I don't compromise well.
As I already stated, it's a legal term for people that have never been married. If you've never been married you are legally "single". If you are divorced or widowed, you are not legally single. You are classified as divorced or widowed. It's a way to legally distinguish people that have never been married to people that are divorced or widowed. It's used for legal papers when buying property.
There are no degrees of being single. You're either single (never married) or you're not. Whether or not any individual likes the distinction is irrelevant.
Say what? Of course a divorced person is "legally single". There not "legally married". When I bought property after my divorce I was listed as "My legal name, an unmarried woman", not legally single or divorced.
I think what the OP is meaning by "lifelong legally single" is better described as "never married". For some reason, a lot of young people say they are "single" only when they are without an SO of any type. In other words, not married, engaged, living with, or in an exclusive relationship with anyone. So "legally single" would be just someone not married, but perhaps has or had a live-in partner, or who is engaged but still "legally" single because the wedding has not occurred yet. It's sort of parsing words a bit, but I get it.
My DH was single, never had a live-in GF, until age 46 when he moved from the home he owned, into the home I owned. My home was larger and had a 3 car garage, and would accommodate both of our stuff better. Later we were married when he was 51. He honestly never intended to be married in his life, and told me of that fact when we were dating. I had been divorced only a couple years and really wasn't looking to be married again. I don't think he ever felt discriminated against while single, and I know no one ever assumed he was gay. He dated and was invited places "as a couple" with his old GFs, and with me before getting married. One perk of being a single guy, at his workplace several older ladies all thought of him as needing to be "taken care of" so they often brought him quantities of home-cooked food that he very happily enjoyed and took home with him.
I can't say that I see any singles being discriminated against in any way other than the usual lack of invites to couples type activities. I don't know why people do that, I always invite whomever I like, regardless of the male/female ratio.
Many people make a lot of strange assumptions about people who choose to be single. What I think is more weird is single men who try to move in with women who own a home. These Peter Pan types live month to month, spend every penny as soon as it is earned, and genuinely expect that someone else should put a roof over their heads and a meal on the table. They are the merry grasshoppers in the Ant and the Grasshopper.
Being single or married is a choice, but people who are married tend to judge those who choose to be single as having something wrong with them - as though being independent and self-sufficient is a weakness. It's a hangover from the 19C to view single life as inferior to married life, but times are changing - slowly.
One of my relatives is going through this now. She owns a home and the man moved in with her. She's trying to evict him as the relationship went down the tubes.
I think what the OP is meaning by "lifelong legally single" is better described as "never married". For some reason, a lot of young people say they are "single" only when they are without an SO of any type. In other words, not married, engaged, living with, or in an exclusive relationship with anyone. So "legally single" would be just someone not married, but perhaps has or had a live-in partner, or who is engaged but still "legally" single because the wedding has not occurred yet. It's sort of parsing words a bit, but I get it.
My DH was single, never had a live-in GF, until age 46 when he moved from the home he owned, into the home I owned. My home was larger and had a 3 car garage, and would accommodate both of our stuff better. Later we were married when he was 51. He honestly never intended to be married in his life, and told me of that fact when we were dating. I had been divorced only a couple years and really wasn't looking to be married again. I don't think he ever felt discriminated against while single, and I know no one ever assumed he was gay. He dated and was invited places "as a couple" with his old GFs, and with me before getting married. One perk of being a single guy, at his workplace several older ladies all thought of him as needing to be "taken care of" so they often brought him quantities of home-cooked food that he very happily enjoyed and took home with him.
I can't say that I see any singles being discriminated against in any way other than the usual lack of invites to couples type activities. I don't know why people do that, I always invite whomever I like, regardless of the male/female ratio.
Agreed. I don't know why people are getting tripped up on that. You can be with a partner for years and be legally single in the eyes of the law.
But, did you discuss your status as property-owning single with people in the restaurants, bars, etc.? In my humble opinion, it’s none of anyone’s business except the real-estate tax authorities. And, they don’t give any discount based upon the number of owners and their marital / partnership status.
You meet people informally and you should conceal your marital status and the fact that you own a house?
Sheesh! I see remarks of a similar nature peppered throughout threads on C-D. U.S. society has gotten weirder and weirder and weirder.....totally paranoic about social contacts.
As for the OP's question, I am much older than he is. But I remember in my small town single male home owners were unmarried sons living in the parental home they had inherited, or a tiny number of unmarried men who were running a boarding house. These were men born in the town, but other unmarried older men lived in the few small local hotels. The locally born life-long bachelors were, I think, fairly well integrated into the community because of church, fraternal societies, working in or owning a local business, etc. - they had lots of established ties.
I never married, but I lived my adult life in Manhattan, NYC from the early 60s to 2000 where there were lots of single adults, and so probably not a fair comparison to a present-day smaller U.S. city, much less a smallish town. I was invited to large at-home social events where I was the only single man, but not a lot of them. Most of my social contacts with married people were spur-of-the-moment invitations to come on over, or eating out with one or two married couples. When I moved to Europe I think being foreign mattered far more than being single, so again not a good comparison...I was an "exotic", so my marital status was of less interest.
Given my generation, I think if I had bought a house as a single guy in a place where there were neighborhoods and neighborliness in the now defunct sense that you would have been assumed to be gay unless you were seen to date women from time to time. Nowadays - judging from the casual remarks on C-D - it seems like people have no real neighbor relationships with the people around them.
Given how much the U.S. has changed in my lifetime, I will be interested to see the responses.
One of my relatives is going through this now. She owns a home and the man moved in with her. She's trying to evict him as the relationship went down the tubes.
They're sneaky with moving in, first claiming that they need a place to store stuff, then a garage for a car, and suddenly they are using your address as their home address. When you try to get them out, they produce something with their name and your address, and that is recognized as their legal right to live in your home. I moved out of my home to get rid of someone like that - drastic, but it worked.
When someone decides that it's a great idea to move in with me, I agree that living together is a fantastic idea so we should look for a neutral home that we can make our own. That usually puts a full stop to the idea of living together.
Singles are more vulnerable to opportunists like this, making it safer to connect with others who have the same values of owning a home. The Peter Pan grasshoppers of the world can live in cardboard boxes when they are old.
I'm lifelong legally single. I just closed on a property Friday. I've met various people at restaurants, bars, etc.., since then. I've gotten the impression from them that being a single male property owner is "weird."
I don't see myself marrying. This "condition" will likely persist. It's unlikely that I'll marry or have kids within the next couple of years.
As you aged and remained or become single, how did you handle it? Logistically and socially? Do you feel discriminated against because you choose to remain legally single?
On the affluent and highly educated left coast and right coast, single is normal. It's not like eastern Tennessee where people get married as they graduate from high school and then pop out kids. Generally, the higher the income level and education level, the lower the birthrate.
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