Michelle Singletary - WAPO finance expert has three failure to launch kids in their 20's living at home - RENT FREE

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone else read Michelle Singletary's article in the WAPO about her three young adult children who are still living at home - rent free? She claims they are saving for retirement, good grief. She has lost all credibility. I can't take her seriously.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/02/14/financial-cut-off-adult-children/

OP, call a realtor today and take his or her advice on list price without saying a word, assuming your adult children don’t live locally or exist.

Michelle’s adult offspring will probably get in a bidding war to buy it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is only a problem if you buy into a certain dated and US-centric vision of what a middle-class family should live like.

Indeed. It’s the norm elsewhere.

[Anonymous]

My adult dd lives with me, I've also had another dd who lived with me until shortly before marriage.

I don't charge rent. DD pays all her own bills outside of rent. She also helps me with yardwork (it's me, her and a minor dc) and with my eldercare if needed. She works full time, finished school and is building a side hustle into a business. I actually barely see her!

Why should she pay 1-2K for some rental somewhere, she still would hardly spend time there with her schedule. Instead, she's saving, investing and building a business.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone else read Michelle Singletary's article in the WAPO about her three young adult children who are still living at home - rent free? She claims they are saving for retirement, good grief. She has lost all credibility. I can't take her seriously.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/02/14/financial-cut-off-adult-children/

I feel like you don't know her style/mindset at all. She is incredibly conservative financially. Basically no debt ever except a mortgage that you should not stretch to afford. Doesn't matter if interest rates are negative and you can have roommates for a few years or live on beans and rice until you don't have to stretch. She'd still tell you not to do it.

She was being interviewed on some NPR show in the last month and talked about this - saying that they had a sit down conversation and this plan was thought through/it was a conscious decision and not because the kids couldn't live anywhere else.

We have close friends who are pretty financially well off and always were. Yet they lived with his parents their first year of marriage to save for a down payment.

NP here. She is incredibly controlling, in ways I believe triggered by her own childhood. I have followed her for years and have enjoyed her column but her method would not have always worked for me. I remember her columns about her own daughter applying to college and how she allowed her to apply to her "dream school" knowing that she (Michelle) would refuse to pay for it (school was OOS Chapel Hill). Her daughter got rejected and ended up at the only school Maryland residents should ever attend according to Michelle, College Park. The entire situation was sad and manipulative. What if the daughter had been accepted, why wasn't Michelle more upfront about the costs with her daughter and was just hoping she'd be rejected and why did she write about it all and have it published.

She is not financially savvy, she is just terrified about being poor again, and I get that. I was poor as a kid too. But she doesn't offer leveraged advice, just save every penny, under your mattress.

I used to read her articles years and years ago. This assessment is correct. She is also isnt a parenting coach. No different than Dave Ramsey. Financial advice to the lowest common denominator. Definitely ignores opportunity costs, stock market gains and compounding. I always cringe when I hear the advice to prioritize debt repayment over retirement even with an employer match and considering the tax savings.

Kids living at home to save money is fine. From a financial perspective it's a great strategy.

When my kids are older I will insist that they live on their own for a bit to gain independence, get to know themselves and so I can ensure they can stand on their own two feet not just financially. Personally, I lived with roommates, came home for a year and saved money, moved on my own.

I do not regret the time I spent living solo before I was married. I learned a lot about myself and my own standards. I knew who I was before I was married and that person was different than the kid who still lived with parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:[google]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Her advice makes sense for people who grew up poor, made it to the middle class, and are terrified about being scammed or wasting/losing their money. Which makes sense based on what she's shared about her background. And it is good advice for a lot of people. But it would not work for everyone. Things like paying off her low-interest mortgage early are emotionally comfortable but not economically wisest. Having kids live at home is good for some families, but not all.

It's a really sad state of your relationship with your kid if "it's not good for you" to have your 23 yo kid living at home, if you have space.

We don't have the space (downsized to a 2 bedroom condo as soon as last kid went to college---had been planning that for 6+ years). So it's tight when kids are home from college. If one gets a job in our area (VHCOL) we will help them with rent, if needed, the first few years. We would even rent them a place in our luxury condo building (one of the top 3 buildings in the city) if it works with job location---so they are close by yet independent. But if we had a 3-4 bedroom place we would let them live with us. All while giving them their independence and encouraging them to save $$$.

I guess I just don't understand why you wouldn't want to let your kid live at home if you could. They can still become independent adults, and are well on the way to doing that if you let them.

Sure is easy to judge when you deliberately moved into a 2 bedroom condo as soon as your last kid went to college. Seriously.

Yes, we wanted to live in the city, that was always our plan for retirement. By the time we implemented this, first kid was out of college and in a job 2K miles from home, so not coming back to live with us anytime soon. Younger kid lives with us on all breaks and over the summer. We also have a 2nd home, but it's also different than where the kids grew up. It's in a calmer/more rural area that is only 45 mins from us. However the kids don't want to live there.
However, if either of our kids ever decide to come live in same area as us, we will help them rent a place nearby, ideally in our building. We would have to do that because there is no way a 22/24yo could afford to live in our building on their own. But we would happily welcome our kid back to live with us if there was space. Unfortunately, I'm not purchasing a 4 bedroom condo in the VHCOL area/city we live in on the off chance my kids want to live with us for a few more years. Cheaper to help them rent a place in our building should the situation arise that the kids are working in our city.

No one needs your life story. But perhaps a little perspective as to maybe you shouldn't be so judgmental when you actively and purposefully sold your home and then moved into a place too small for your adult children to move in with you. Listen to yourself.

I have perspective. Apparently you cannot comprehend. We already knew 1 kid was not coming home to live (wouldn't have moved if they were coming home and needed a place to live). The other has a room to live in whenever they are home, but they are 3K miles away at college 8-9 months of the year, and most likely staying in that area after college. So yeah, if my kids want to "live at home" we have solutions in place (rent them a 1 bedroom place for $4-5K/month that we would pay for).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I find this set up a whole lot less off-putting than parents helping their adult MC kids with a down payment or daycare expenses.

You can build more family wealth that way. Get your kids launched and on the property ladder through an earlier inheritance.

We gifted DD $250,000 for a down payment - only stipulation is it had to be a 15 year mortgage. We made the numbers work for their budget.

That is weird and controlling

+1. Do not get the "must be 15 year mortgage". Gift your kid a downpayment and let them figure out the rest

[Anonymous]

I do genealogy and I see on the old censuses that it was common for adult children to live with their parents, even after they married and had children. If everyone can get along, and expectations are established and enforced, what's the problem?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid is graduating in May and got a job back in the area. He has to commit three years to the office locally and can then transfer to another office. He doesn’t want to live in the area permanently. I’m letting him move into my basement with some ground rules. We’ll be roommates. I come and go and have my own life and I expect him to do the same. I’ll be collecting fair marker rent from him with the intention of investing it and returning it to him once he transfers somewhere else. He’s 22, has no debt and has $150k in a brokerage account (gifts from grandparents over the years that he hasn’t touched). He understands compound interest and has seen it work its magic in his account so that is the start of his retirement. He’s also intending to max out his 401k. He wants to use the rent money I collect for a down payment on a house wherever he ends up. I think he’s being smart. Without a roommate he’d be looking at spending at least half his take home pay on rent. I don’t see the problem.

It is entirely possible to have your adult kid living at home while they are still actually adulting fully. In this case, why would he waste money on actual high rent? Instead, he will have a nice downpayment for a home in 3 years. Only thing he's "giving up" is paying ridiculous rent. You can live with your parents and still have a life, as long as neither side is controlling.

[Anonymous]

Different strokes for different folks. If some kids want to live with their parents after college, ok, that's cool. My brother did that and he's still there. He's 41.

I would not have been able to do this because of my pride and need for independence. And that's ok too. I have had roommates, sublet a studio from a friend for next to nothing to live on my own, shacked up with a boyfriend, etc. It was invaluable for me to learn to live on my own, pay my own bills, hustle when I needed to, be independent. I once had 5 part time jobs while being in grad school to be able to live on my own. I couldn't put a price on it.

I have plenty, plenty saved for retirement. I could not live with a parent like Singletary, who is probably going over their bank statements and making sure they donate 10% of their income to their church, that their big purchases as justified (according to her), that they take on NO debt, etc. I would explode.

[Anonymous]

I am surprised that she is not charging the kids rent, as much as a penny pincher she is. Does she not see the lost income opportunity?

[Anonymous]

Why are people on DCUM always so worked up about what other people are doing with their lives?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I still like her advice. I’m ok with her kids living at home.

It seems opposite to her advice for raising independent children. Advice for thee, not me.

What? If they live at home while working they save money which helps them become financially independent. How can you not see that?

And this absolutely is in line with the sort of things she advises: if you have a way to save money, do it. Don't spend money on things that are unnecessary. Like rent - if you have a free place to reside, why not take up that offer as long as you are happy and content there?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I find this set up a whole lot less off-putting than parents helping their adult MC kids with a down payment or daycare expenses.

You can build more family wealth that way. Get your kids launched and on the property ladder through an earlier inheritance.

We gifted DD $250,000 for a down payment - only stipulation is it had to be a 15 year mortgage. We made the numbers work for their budget.

That is weird and controlling

“Here’s $250,000 if you get a 15 year mortgage.”

Sign me up! Especially if the payment would be the same due to the family help.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I find this set up a whole lot less off-putting than parents helping their adult MC kids with a down payment or daycare expenses.

You can build more family wealth that way. Get your kids launched and on the property ladder through an earlier inheritance.

We gifted DD $250,000 for a down payment - only stipulation is it had to be a 15 year mortgage. We made the numbers work for their budget.

That is weird and controlling

“Here’s $250,000 if you get a 15 year mortgage.”

Sign me up! Especially if the payment would be the same due to the family help.

obviously most are not going to turn that down. But it is a tad bit controlling to require a 15 year mortgage. If you have that type of$$$, why wouldn't you let your kid just get a 30 year mortgage? They can get more house and not need to "upgrade" later. So financially it's not the best plan and it's controlling.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why are people on DCUM always so worked up about what other people are doing with their lives?

It’s not just people on DCUM. It’s boomers.

I just called my mother and she attacked me when I answered a question she asked about how my job works.

Common Boomer high. Always on the attack/judgement train.