Here’s a story that happened with me.
Shadchan calls and tries to set me up with someone whose parents insist their son-in-law must live in their neighborhood. I immediately say no.
Shadchan calls back and says her parents are willing to negotiate after the wedding. Still not interested but call a friend of mine whose wife is the girls friend to see what is going on. What the shadchan didn’t tell us (she probably didn’t know) is that the girl is an only daughter of elderly parents, who need her to take care of them.
They also felt that the lucky guy will be getting so much (their daughter as a wife and them as in-laws) that he should be willing to forgo something as trivial as living where he wants to.
While the shadchan might have felt it was a silly request, the parents had a legitimate reason for the condition and as far as they were concerned it was not something that could be negotiated.
(No, I did not go out with her.)
Here’s a streimel story with a happy ending.
Guys family insists he wear a streimel, girls family won’t hear of it. The two are already going out and like each other. So they compromise. When they are by his parents he wears a streimel. When they leave the streimel goes into the “spare tire well” as he calls it.
Both families were fine with that and they are now married. (He wore a streimel for the wedding.)