Should stepmother help adults financially?

[Anonymous]

Just wondering what people think about step parents contributing financially to adult children.

Older man married to younger woman. DH already has three kids in their 20s but plans to start having more kids with young wife in the next year or two. The stepmother did not raise the step kids. They were high school/college age when the couple got married.

The husband raised his older kids middle class, paid for college,etc. The wife is from an upper middle class background and intends to raise her family that way. For example, the step kids went to public school but the wife went to private school and will send her own kids to private.

Now adult step kids are asking for more financial assistance. Adult kids see the new upper middle class lifestyle provided by stepmother and think it's unfair. The stepmother works to support her own lifestyle and is also planning financially for her own kids now that step kids are out of college. Step kids will be mid to late twenties when stepmother starts having babies. Is she expected to help support the adult step kids? Should she contribute more to the marriage so DH can use his own money to help out his adult kids? Or should the stepmother just stay out of it and let them work it out for themselves?

[Anonymous]

Regardless of the parents income, these 20 somethings need to stop asking for hand outs. They need to get their own jobs and provide for themselves. What financial assistance are they asking for??!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just wondering what people think about step parents contributing financially to adult children.

Older man married to younger woman. DH already has three kids in their 20s but plans to start having more kids with young wife in the next year or two. The stepmother did not raise the step kids. They were high school/college age when the couple got married.

The husband raised his older kids middle class, paid for college,etc. The wife is from an upper middle class background and intends to raise her family that way. For example, the step kids went to public school but the wife went to private school and will send her own kids to private.

Now adult step kids are asking for more financial assistance. Adult kids see the new upper middle class lifestyle provided by stepmother and think it's unfair. The stepmother works to support her own lifestyle and is also planning financially for her own kids now that step kids are out of college. Step kids will be mid to late twenties when stepmother starts having babies. Is she expected to help support the adult step kids? Should she contribute more to the marriage so DH can use his own money to help out his adult kids? Or should the stepmother just stay out of it and let them work it out for themselves?

Then they should marry someone in the upper middle class who will provide them with this lifestyle, or provide it for themselves. Not the stepmother or the father's responsibility to contribute to their lifestyle anymore.

[Anonymous]

Entitlement generation in action.

[Anonymous]

The stepmother shout butt out. It is the DH's decision to provide or not provide.

Is the stepmother assuming that she will not help her own children once they are all out college? If she's not 100% on that, she shouldn't open her mouth. This is the Dad's call.

[Anonymous]

OP my parents are upper class and I was raised that way. I NEVER expected them to provide anything after graduation. They occasionally will take us on a family vacation (but we mostly pay our own way!), but that's it. Adults need to provide for themselves.

This should have been something that was discussed when you were getting married.

[Anonymous]

Adult kids should not ask for financial assistance.

That said, I've seen this dynamic play out in both sides of my family, and it's not pretty. Even the most self-sufficient young adults will notice if their dad suddenly seems rich (even if money is coming from step-mom). And things will only get worse once there are step-sibs being raised in more luxurious conditions than those in which they were raised. (And just wait until they have kids of their own--differences between the lifestyles of the young step-sibs and the young grandkids will be even more obvious!)

I agree that dad and step-mom need to think carefully about how to ensure that these two batches of kids have good relationships. To do this, money spent doesn't need to be exactly equal, but it does have to be done thoughtfully. And as pp said, does step-mom expect to provide financial assistance to her own kids once they're adults? If so, it would be charitable and loving to make sure that dad's first set of kids get similar help.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Regardless of the parents income, these 20 somethings need to stop asking for hand outs. They need to get their own jobs and provide for themselves. What financial assistance are they asking for??!

One wants to quit his job and move in with dad and stepmom so he can more pursue acting. He also wants to go back to school for an MFA but he thinks loans are a bad idea and doesn't want to be in debt. The daughter wants cash so she can move out of her mother's house and get a nicer car than the old one dad gave her 5 years ago.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Regardless of the parents income, these 20 somethings need to stop asking for hand outs. They need to get their own jobs and provide for themselves. What financial assistance are they asking for??!

One wants to quit his job and move in with dad and stepmom so he can more pursue acting. He also wants to go back to school for an MFA but he thinks loans are a bad idea and doesn't want to be in debt. The daughter wants cash so she can move out of her mother's house and get a nicer car than the old one dad gave her 5 years ago.

DCUM LAFF OF THE MONTH!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Regardless of the parents income, these 20 somethings need to stop asking for hand outs. They need to get their own jobs and provide for themselves. What financial assistance are they asking for??!

One wants to quit his job and move in with dad and stepmom so he can more pursue acting. He also wants to go back to school for an MFA but he thinks loans are a bad idea and doesn't want to be in debt. The daughter wants cash so she can move out of her mother's house and get a nicer car than the old one dad gave her 5 years ago.

DCUM LAFF OF THE MONTH!

I'm the butt out poster, but you can certainly butt in when they want to move in with you!!! NO WAY.

This is a great opportunity to sit down with DH and go over some general policies for financing kids. Agree to pay for college but not grad school? Etc. Make it a family rule. Your kids will be facing the same choices before you know it.

For the daughter who wants money to move out - that sounds like a loan type of situation. DH might agree to lend her $2000 or whatever, but she needs to pay it back $100/month etc.

[Anonymous]

"For the daughter who wants money to move out - that sounds like a loan type of situation. DH might agree to lend her $2000 or whatever, but she needs to pay it back $100/month etc. "

Good luck with that!

These issues should have been settled BEFORE the marriage.

Now, the wife will off as the evil stepmother, no matter what the couple decides.

[Anonymous]

12:41 here- The caveat to everything is that DAD is the one who talks to the kids about all this. Never SM.

[Anonymous]

Lifetime Movie of the Week.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Regardless of the parents income, these 20 somethings need to stop asking for hand outs. They need to get their own jobs and provide for themselves. What financial assistance are they asking for??!

One wants to quit his job and move in with dad and stepmom so he can more pursue acting. He also wants to go back to school for an MFA but he thinks loans are a bad idea and doesn't want to be in debt. The daughter wants cash so she can move out of her mother's house and get a nicer car than the old one dad gave her 5 years ago.

Did you & DH talk about this before getting married? Presumably there was some discussion of how much of his money and assets would be available to dedicate to his new wife & new family he's creating with her vs how much he needs/wants to spend on children from prior marriage? If he had wanted to provide ongoing, major financial support to his adult children, he should have been upfront about that in the courtship process - having an adult child live at home, paying for a graduate degree, buying a car - those are big expenses and a lot of resources to divert out of the marriage.

Anyway, I wouldn't want to provide that to my own grown children and I certainly wouldn't appreciate my husband bank-rolling that kind of dependency in fully able bodied adults, at the expense of our actually dependent children, but your DH should be the one to tell his children no and he should have his own reasons for turning down their requests - he shouldn't blame you or his new children.

[Anonymous]

Daughter who doesn't have enough to move out from mom's place doesn't have enough to support herself - if you agree to give her a sum of cash to move out, she'll need more ongoing support to pay for the rent she clearly can't afford.

Son who wants to move in, pursue acting, and get an MFA without loans - there are ways to save up for graduate school without moving in with your parents. He'll need to do that anyway to save up for tuition, unless he expected the dad to cover that too? If he wants the liberty to be free one week and not the next for acting gigs at they, he should look into temping.