Has your son ever seen a statement of the amount in this account? |
Gifts are just that—gifts. FIL could have given them diddly-squat and it wouldn’t be “strange”. |
If the grandfather and parents are actually interested in making a more pleasant Christmas, why not decrease the college fund contribution by $20 and drop a Jackson in the card? |
If your paying for your kids’ college without loans, you are not umc. At that point your just wealthy. |
I dunno, and it wouldn’t be appropriate for OP to ask because gifts aren’t an entitlement. FIL can give whatever he wants, or nothing at all. Beggars can not be choosers. |
The simple reality is that it isn't irrational, nor does it make you a bad person, to expect Christmas gifts from close family members, assuming you celebrate Christmas. A college find contribution isn't a conventional gift. It would be like the grandfather giving his adult child a cash gift with a stipulation that it needed to be deposited in an IRA. He could do that, and it would be generous. But it would also be weird. If you do weird things, then you're going to sometimes get weird, and perhaps even inappropriate, reactions. |
Bizarre argument. I’m serious. A kid should not need a token $20 in a card to feel like he “got something” at this age. He will BE in college in 4 years, debt free, and he is old enough to recognize that without needing a widdle pwesent from grandpa on cwistmas morning to feel special. |
Sure, but it's quite strange the grandfather can't figure that out on his own. Something can be generous and weird at the same time. This is one of those situations. The empty card is the cherry on top. Why would he do that? |
It’s 3 or 4 years away from paying off for this kid. Not 50 |
Expecting a Christmas gift from a grandparent doesn't make you a bad kid. |
So you seem to agree it's weird to give gifts with stipulations and delayed enjoyment. But you think this case should bother someone less because you don't want to think about what it would feel like to the recipient. Again, don't get me wrong, the reaction of the kid wasn't good. But was entirely understandable and predictable. And that one reaction doesn't make him a bad person. |
Show me where I wrote he is a bad kid. |
Everybody….this person is posting on DCUM, not Bumblef**k urban moms.
The DCUM demographic is primarily full pay for their kids’ college no matter what school they attend. If my FIL puts $200k in my kid’s 529 that is a gift to me and my wife. He just saved us $200k. We would thank him profusely. I don’t even know if I would tell my kid. This is not the forum for OP to get much sympathy. |
Yes it does. Especially to verbalize that to them. I’m sure this kid got plenty of stuff from his parents. He needs more? He celebrated Christmas with some gifts already. That is fine. He shouldn’t expect them from other family members too. So greedy. My in laws don’t celebrate Christmas in the traditional sense. They are immigrants. They never get Christmas gifts. My kids have never once brought it up. |
Uh, what? It isn’t a gift to you, at all. It is for your child. YOU aren’t obligated to pay for their college. The only person with an obligation to pay for college is the one that wants to attend. You do know that plenty of kids go to college on their own dime, right? Sometimes it is a case of parents didn’t save, sometimes parents don’t want to pay. |