If you got a big financial leg up from your parents …

[anotherside]

I’m talking a significant amount, at least enough for a comfortable house down payment. So say at least 20-30k and then all the way up to £millions.

So if you received a big cash/property gift from parents, have you always been entirely grateful for it? Or is there some part of you that wishes they hadn’t given you it, in order that you could have achieved (or tried to achieve) everything completely independently.

Wouls be interested to hear thoughts on this (along with how much you actually received if willing to say, as a leg up of say £30k vs £300k vs £1 million is qualitatively pretty different).

My mum gave me £100k to buy my ex husband out. She downsized after my dad died, so I view it as inheritance. This enabled me to stay in the house with the children. Otherwise I’d have had to move to a very small flat in a less nice area, my children would have had to move schools and I’d have a very long commute. Needless to say, I’m beyond grateful.

Why would anyone not want to receive free money from their parents?

My son is 2, so we're still working on this, but imagine this:

100k pension contribution when they're 18, could easily grow to 1.5m by retirement.
50k house deposit.
50k education/other.

All enabling someone to, for example, work as a nurse or social worker etc etc. Even at much lower sums, this kind of early support, with a compounding effect, could make for a very easy life without worrying about pension or housing security.

I think the puritans have a lot to answer for in socialising the idea of struggle as necessity!

I have had absolutely nothing from my (wealthy) parents apart from a private education (when it was a lot cheaper!) so have nothing to add except, for those that may be interested, there is a most excellent book written by Dr Eliza Filby called Inheritocracy.

It’s so interesting, I massively recommend.

I would be interested in why you want to know these things? And how it relates to your situation?

Our total is under £1 million and we know they’ll be capital gains but hopefully they will miss inheritance tax. We rent 3 properties but may have to sell earlier if things change. I would hate to have to do that to my 3 lovely long term tenants.
we put 3 of our properties into a trust to try to protect but nothing is certain.

The most important thing is that it’s appreciated by your family. In our case it is.

I totally disagree. Zero help here either and if I’m completely honest I think my achievements are far more impressive and worthwhile than people who had help. And if my parents had money (which they don’t) I’d much, much rather they spent it on living life to the full for themselves. My approach to life is to always put myself first so I’d be a hypocrite if I didn’t think they should do the same.

My DH and I have had well into 7 figures. Eternally grateful, but still work hard.

I’ve had significant financial help. Initially, a large 6 figure sum when my mother passed away when I was 21.

My dad was a high earner and invested a similar amount of money (once split equally between siblings) which he shared out a few years ago.

I’m extremely grateful for it; it’s allowed me to purchase a beautiful house with significant acreage. Frankly, I could never have had a house or lifestyle like this without that help (although I’m somewhat unsure about calling the inheritance help!). Both my partner and I work full time in reasonably paid jobs in the public sector and we still have a decent mortgage to pay but with house prices as they are, it would never have happened.

However, I would obviously much rather my mum hadn’t passed away so young. I’ve also had comments in the past about our house/land and I feel do feel uncomfortable when that happens as it wasn’t down to my own hard work.

I had a decent amount of savings in a building soc when buying first property. I was in one of those stupid accounts where you had to wait or pay a penalty if you wanted immediate access to money. My parents gave me money for the deposit so I didn't have to pay the penalty. I paid them back but they would only accept half. This was many years ago so it was about 2k.

Inheritance from parents came much later. My parents were very prudent and lucky to be able to spend most of their lives in their own home only needing to spend some on care and home modifications for my mum who suffered sight loss.

I got a deposit on a small house from my father when my grandmother passed away, very grateful as we were private renting and probably would never have been able to afford our own home. Shortly after he died and we got a lot more, while I’m grateful that we now have a lovely home and a very low mortgage, I found it quite overwhelming, I feel it’s family money rather than my money and at the time felt very stressed about it.

I turned down the offer of help from my in-laws as it came with strings attached.

Well I agree with you @Holluschickie. I wouldn’t give huge lump sums to my kids and when I die it’s being split between charities. My kids would be privileged enough to work things out for themselves so I’d rather it went towards causes furthering societal equality across the board. Incidentally, it is the middle class obsession with keeping the money in the family that’s made the housing market what it is and screwed over everyone else and while I have the means to join that demographic if I wanted, I have no desire to.

I was gifted a 30k house deposit 20yrs ago.
Eternally grateful. I don't expect Christmas or birthday gifts and just ask for a token gift. It left me very secure as a single parent.

He ( my sons partner) gets to live in a gorgeous house with a very low mortgage
he really hasn’t put any money into it at all

I gave them money for pretty much all the furnishings from beds to sofas tv white goods garden furniture new carpets the lot

they have both been amazingly lucky and I know that they both appreciate that they have had a lot of help financially

if they were to split my son would get his deposit back and then any rise in equity is shared 50 -50 between them

i think it’s fair and sensible to do this and his partner had no issue with it

if they did have an issue I would assume they were money grabbing assholes as without my sons money they would never have been able to live in a beautiful house with a tiny mortgage and I would have advised my son not to go ahead and buy completely on his own

We bought the house we live in now (we've been here 27 years) with a big mortgage, for then -- it would be trivial now. We paid it for five years out of earned income, and sometimes it was a bit tight to get to the end of the month. But interest rates on our mortgage in 1997 were around 6 or 7%, so when I sold my miniscule flat in London and paid off our family home mortgage, in a much cheaper area, it was a success.

Twenty five years on, and we are nearing 70. It is time to live in a smaller house where we can walk to everything. I still plan to do Pilates twice weekly and do one or two Spanish conversation classes every week, but I don't want to hoover 1800 square feet of unoccupied carpet. When we find the right place, we will downsize, and our child will get the excess money; we hope it will be early enough to avoid inheritance tax.

Yes massively grateful. I have an incredibly comfortable life (which will become even more so next year) and I’m so thankful to them for that.

One of my best friends has had A LOT of help from her parents .. expensive fancy university and living expenses fully paid, private school all the way, her apartment paid in full ( small but worth about 1mm pounds) a fancy car, an allowance even now that she’s definitely a full grown adult.. she’s never been employed
she was complaining about money being tight and how she wished she had a high flying job and I pointed out eventually she would inherit around 7-10mm gbp.. she told me “ that’s not that much”
I almost choked … I think if you help your kids too much you can also ruin them…

I am nervous of the helping kids out too much too! Have seen the repercussions and it’s not good. Kids should not feel entitled to be looked after financially in adulthood but I think increasingly that’s the case.

I think it's a tough balance to find.

Yes I got a totally unexpected amount from family. It was put to very good use.

Not me, but DH parents helped him and his brother with their first house purchases. I am not sure exactly how much and how much was paid back but in the 10s of thousands. We are always between ourselves saying how grateful we are and it has meant we can live in a much nicer area and property than we would otherwise have been able to, even though we both work in decent jobs. We definitely don’t take it for granted.

My parents offered to match whatever I put forward for the deposit on my first home. This meant I ended up with a 20% deposit. I was able to buy a larger home with a lower mortgage than had I not had their help. The extra bedroom allowed me to have a lodger, and their rent covered my mortgage. Net result being that when I got married and had children we could afford for me to be a SAHM.

I tried to repay my parents when we moved house, but they refused any repayment.

At no point have I felt that there were any strings attached to this interest-free-loan-turned-gift. Neither do I feel in any way undermined by the fact that I had saved so much myself due entirely to my dad's investment advice and the way he managed my investments. They ask for nothing in return.

I am grateful and privileged, and I appreciate it.

Inherited wealth is not good for society, and yet everyone (well with a few exceptions), hates IHT!

I find this really odd to say this as a blanket statement.

My DH was orphaned at 18, it was absolutely essential that he have the family home and some modest savings. Probably an estate worth c. £200,000 in total in 2007. We have obviously had no childcare help, no funded trips to Center Parcs, no deposit help, no help with decorating from DH's side. DH had no family home to live in to save for a deposit, nowhere to go back to in uni holidays and no help with his first car. It would have been catastrophic if his parents had willed everything to the proverbial cats' home!

Contrast with my mum who still has her beloved mum around, my mum is now in her 60s with her own "estate" worth probably £800,000 so doesn't need the money in the same way. Cats' home would be a fully appropriate use of my nan's cash.