Adult son paying rent

[Askaquestion123]

Myself and OH are retired and relatively comfortable. Our adult son who lives with us has had a long period of unemployment due to poor mental health. He’s just got back into work, earning around £1300 a month. He pays for a counsellor weekly but doesn’t spend much otherwise.
UP till now we have charged him a proportion of his benefits.
What should we ask as a contribution each month now in view of the fact that he wants to move out and rent at some point so needs to save ? I just don’t know what is fair.

Ds pays £225 at the moment

Yes, it is a low wage, but his job is physically exhausting and he's struggling with it.

Just wanted to say that when I mentioned him being on a low wage, I wasn’t in any way meaning that negatively, I hope it wasn’t taken that way. I only mentioned it as that would affect how much I’d ask for in your position. It sounds like he’s done really well to get to a position where he can work after having mental health issues so he (and you) should be very proud. I hope he continues to do well.

I’d charge nothing, but make him pull his weight re cooking and laundry and cleaning. That way he can save to move out, and learn how to take care of himself and a household.

Thank you. That was heart warming post. He’s been very very low for a long time so it’s a turning point for him.

@Askaquestion123 mine is earning just over double what your son is.
Personally I would work out your utilities and food and divide by 3 if he is using roughly a third. If he eats out a bit, knock off a bit more off.
Mine gets well fed, from Waitrose and M&S so can't complain on his board 😃

We have a similar situation with our lovely 29 year old son who is on the autistic spectrum and lives with us. He’s on a low income despite having a good degree. We “charge” him £500 per month purely so that he starts to develop some kind of idea re the costs of real life. We have discussed it in detail with him so that he knows that he would need a lot more than that to be able to live independently, which he would love to do in the future. We do however save all the money he pays us each month so that he will have it available when he is ready and able to find his own place. He knows that this is accumulating for his future use. We are fortunate that we can do this and see it as helping him take a step towards an independent future as, unfortunately, we feel it unlikely that he will find more lucrative employment which enables him to make use of his many talents and qualities.