What percent of people do you know weren't financially supporting their parents before they turned 40?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m 50 and in all my life have never known anyone to support their parents financially. Some help their parents as a caretaker due to health issues but not in financial ways. However, I know a lot of people who were still getting financial help from parents in their 30s and 40s. Sometimes it’s buying a house and other times it’s paying for private school.

Ugh, that's just pathetic.

+1

If I knew people who were supported by their aging parents, after a certain age (probably about age 30), I would not look at them the same as if they were not supported by their aging parents. Once you become an adult, you have to do for yourself. If you can't afford the new car, new kitchen, private schools, etc. - then you do without. That is what a grown up is about.

We have close friends who receive support from DH's parents. Both worked in demanding professional jobs for a number of years. She now works from home and he is on a fellowship at an agency. They are pretty modest with their spending and are genuinely generous with their time and money. Somehow it doesn't bother me as it might with other folks who were more flagrant with and less honest about their resources.

Nonetheless you sound judgmental and annoying.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t know anyone who supports their parents and I have a pretty large circle.

You may have a large circle, but it’s certainly not a diverse circle. At all.

I literally know no one who is supporting their parents. Our boomer parents are all well off. Even if they claim otherwise. My mother used to tell me that my grandparents didn’t have much money and were barely getting by. I believed her my whole childhood, even when there were odd things - like the fact that my grandparents owned multiple homes and both drove BMWs. Then I became an adult and realized most grandparents don’t own a lakeside home worth close to a million and multiple boats.

[Anonymous]

Ew, David.

[Anonymous]

Yes we do and happy to help.

I'm the foreigner, my husband is the American. We support his parents as well.

[Anonymous]

What do you mean by supporting? I’ve been paying my parents phone bill since I was 25 because in put them on my family plan and then slowly stopped asking them to pay me back. But they don’t *need* that; I just like helping them out after all they’ve done for me over the years. And now my mother is offering to provide a week’s childcare while I’m on a business trip for free so maybe that counts as them supporting me? Basically in my world families support each other and the direction and type of support ebbs and flows over the years.

Most of my friends in their 30s are not supporting the parents financially but some live with them providing medical/logistical support (in some cases kids are supporting parents in out cases parents are supporting kids/grandkids or some mix of the two). A few straight financially support them, either with regular payments or one-offs when they’re struggling. I guess I’d say maybe 5-10% of my friend group have parents who are financially dependent on them without giving back in some other way?

[Anonymous]

None and that includes first and second gen immigrants. In fact that group has a larger percent of people still being supported by parents into their 30s. My neighbors are 1st gen immigrants from India and their parents helped them buy their home and have paid for several upgrades (they are very open about discussing this). They are mid-30s.

[Anonymous]

None.

[Anonymous]

My husband gave money to his widowed mom to bail her out of an impending foreclosure when he was 24 and had just started his first real job. He's now in his early 40s and has been sending her money monthly since his late 20s, and also pays for one-off expenses when she needs it. He has siblings and they help too. He's not an immigrant, he just has a mother who had a combination of bad decisions and bad things happening to her at the worse possible time. He's not going to let her be homeless.

He's the only person I know who supports their parents. Doesn't mean that other people don't do it. He certainly does not talk about it much to others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What do you mean by supporting? I’ve been paying my parents phone bill since I was 25 because in put them on my family plan and then slowly stopped asking them to pay me back. But they don’t *need* that; I just like helping them out after all they’ve done for me over the years. And now my mother is offering to provide a week’s childcare while I’m on a business trip for free so maybe that counts as them supporting me? Basically in my world families support each other and the direction and type of support ebbs and flows over the years.

Most of my friends in their 30s are not supporting the parents financially but some live with them providing medical/logistical support (in some cases kids are supporting parents in out cases parents are supporting kids/grandkids or some mix of the two). A few straight financially support them, either with regular payments or one-offs when they’re struggling. I guess I’d say maybe 5-10% of my friend group have parents who are financially dependent on them without giving back in some other way?

We send our parents 68K per year. It's the most we can give without tax penalty.

[Anonymous]

We do, my husband insisted on buying his parents a new house hoping they would downsize their stuff… that didn’t happen!

[Anonymous]

One of my parents isn’t doing well financially, my parents are divorced. We are white American. I hope I don’t need to support them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My husband gave money to his widowed mom to bail her out of an impending foreclosure when he was 24 and had just started his first real job. He's now in his early 40s and has been sending her money monthly since his late 20s, and also pays for one-off expenses when she needs it. He has siblings and they help too. He's not an immigrant, he just has a mother who had a combination of bad decisions and bad things happening to her at the worse possible time. He's not going to let her be homeless.

He's the only person I know who supports their parents. Doesn't mean that other people don't do it. He certainly does not talk about it much to others.

I feel like I'm in a nightmare.

[Anonymous]

I’m 45 and I don’t know anyone who helps their parents financially. We pay when we invite my parents to dinner or on vacation with us, but I don’t consider that help. We aren’t paying for medicine, rent, food, etc. We just have more expensive taste than they do and it’s easier to just treat them most of the time.

It’s more common in our circle that people have one or both sets of grandparents that pay for vacations, have a beach house they use for free, babysit overnight so parents can go out of town on a trip multiple nights.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No one that I know of. I guess it depends o what you mean by help. We definitely have done stuff for years like buy them nice kitchen stuff, give them gift certificates, pay to bring them on vacation with us — subtle ways to subsidize their lifestyle. But not paying their mortgage until they hit 90, which meant kids in 60s. I think most of us also paid back our college money, which was expected in my family.

My paresnts definitely weren’t rich but like many in their generation had a pension which met the basics until they were decades past retirement with no COLA. It’s not enough now to cover their needs and savings are pretty well exhausted.

I can see where parents with no pension would be in a tougher spot sooner. But most of the older Americans, even blue collar, had pensions.

Subsidize their lifestyle- that is what we do. My parents never ask or even seem to expect it from us, but they have pensions and moved to a higher COLA to be near us. We pick up restaurant checks, buy tickets to events we go to together. I am trying to convince them to join our phone plan as 2 extra lines that I would pay for. They do a lot for us and this is the only way they will accept any compensation beyond “thank you”.

[Anonymous]

Um, 100%? My circle are all academics and nonprofit workers whose fathers were lawyers. We are a downwardly mobile generation. (Older Gen X.)