Do you charge your late teen rent?

[MarzipanMice]

My DS is 19 and has just started his first full time job. He’s just above the minimum wage level by a few pence per hour. He has a car which requires a lot of maintenance due to its age and his car insurance is expensive. He’s fairy good with his money and puts a set amount aside into savings each month. DH feels we should start charging DS rent, but I’m not sure I want to just now. Maybe if he was on a higher wage, but I’m not keen just now.

what do you do? And if you charge rent, what do you charge?

And if he moved out, would you need to get a lodger to cover the loss of his contribution?

i think it’s fair enough to ask them to provide enough to cover their food costs, maybe a small amount towards energy bills, (the latter depending how much they were actually at home.)

But to try to charge something towards the actual accommodation on the grounds that they’d have to do it if they weren’t living at home and they need to learn to stand on their own two feet, pay their way in life etc, surely that’s just profiting off them living there if the room would just be sitting empty if they weren’t using it?

Proportional to what they earn feels wrong. Would they eat more food the more they earn? No. Turn the radiator up higher in their room the more they earn? To me, it should just be a set amount, after working it out fairly. That way, too, the more they earn the more disposable income they have, which is an incentive for them to try to increase their salary.

With dd it helped that she moved to another city aged 18 to take up a job offer & so loved & paid rent & bills in a shared house.

when she took a job closer to home & moved back in paying keep wasn’t a big thing & a lot cheaper than she was used to.

Ds is still a student but at one point talked about a year out. As he’d not made any effort to find work at that point we said fine but if you are not in education you have to pay £50 a week keep, don’t think you can stay at home for a year playing piano & gaming.

My in laws never charged their kids board. Dhs sister was 10 years older. She was still living at home in her late 20s working full time and not paying anything.
meanwhile Dh went to uni & didn’t get a full grant but his parents “couldn’t afford” to contribute.

Taking a small amount towards food or whatever isn’t about the money, it’s about teaching them to be responsible adults. I don’t have any young adults living at home right now paying rent as they’ve currently all flown the nest, but have in the past and would again. It’s how they learn.

Call ,it rent ,board or whatever its still going to be alot cheaper than living away frim home ,if you can afford to subsidise fully grown adults earning an adult wage good for you many can't,
All I would want is the equivalent to what I lose in child benefit and universal credit for him , ,im a carer to my severely autistic younger son which is why only my Dh works .

For those parents taking rent and saving it themselves with a plan to return it to their sensible offspring later please reconsider.

Instead of taking rent my teenager started putting the "rent money" into a Lifetime ISA. For every £4,000 saved each tax year the taxman adds £1,000 AND interest is accrued. The money can only be accessed to buy a first home without losing all the tax benefits. So long as your offspring is sensible it's a win-win.

To be honest pitching in would be much more helpful and preferable than the money but we’ve been round in circles with that so he chose rent over chores. He has to clean up after himself obviously and his laundry is not my problem and to be fair there’s not much I do for him around the home. But yeah I would have taken someone mowing the lawn, running the hoover around and emptying the dishwasher over a bit of rent!

No

I'm hoping my impulsive 20 yr old DS will be less impulsive when older. Ie not buying car parts, car gadgets, car bits. So yes he tells me he saves and he does. But he could equally squander those savings tomorrow on car related stuff. The tiny contribution he gives me each month is at least safe. And as others have said he is contributing.

DS17, will be charged rent when he turns 18 , we own the house so won’t be for that but something towards the bills. He’s not getting a free ride. Especially as he won’t be able to work due to various medical reasons, he gets pip and will be getting universal, but he barely leaves the house, only for college 2 days a week so bills will skyrocket. It will probs only be about £150. But he needs to contribute something as will be using utilities more than anyone else.

My point is that he was doing those things two weeks ago. The costs to the OP hasn't increased.

The OP won't be getting child benefit anymore.

If I could afford not to take it, I would tell DC to put "rent" in an ISA or something to save towards house deposit from the beginning, and make decent pension contributions.

In reality I'm low income and topped up by UC - I'd lose single person Council Tax discount, child benefit and child element of UC so him leaving education would be expensive for me and I'll likely have to have a contribution from him if he carries on living here.

Yes, and he is now an adult earning money and able to meet those costs himself, not a schoolchild.

Edited to add - just as he has, I would hope, have taken more responsibility for contributing to household chores as he got older. I wouldn't expect a 3 year old to take a turn cooking dinner, but that's no reason to say a 23 year old shouldn't. As your children grow up they take on more responsibility for contributing to the household.

Do you have rent to pay yourself? We don't charge ours rent because we have a house we own outright so it doesn't cost us any more for ds to live with us than it would if there was just the two of us. Same with heating and council tax - we would still pay these bills if he was not living with us. he buys a lot of his own food also so doesn't cost us much. If we had rent to pay or I was a lone parent and would otherwise have a single occupancy discount on council tax then i would see things differently. We know our ds is saving plenty each month towards a house deposit.

No we don't charge rent but if working full time / not in education the expectation is that they max out a LISA, so £4k a year. I think that's a good compromise. We don't need the money so I'd rather they put money aside for their own future.

I think this would be a great idea. If you charged him £300 a month and saved that for him, he would have c£10k by the time he’s 22. You’d then also have the funds available to cover his costs (food/energy) if you needed or your circumstances change.

I charged mine £25 a week about 10 years ago, honestly l needed the money single parent and they ate alot of food.
Since then my circumstances have changed and after/during covid they both lived here for some time, l didnt charge but expected them to buy thier own out of normal food. For example my daughter liked fresh coffee we dont buy it so if she wanted to she could.

Thank you for all the responses on this. DS is responsible with his money and does save into ISA’s and has a LISA. We are fortunate not to need rent from DC and I personally would prefer for him to save towards his future.

DH and I are from different upbringings. DH is an only child, lived comfortably growing up and didn’t pay any rent or contribute to the household when he started work and earning for himself. He had a car bought for him and all his insurance and driving lessons paid too.

I was one of 3 children, lower income family. I had a weekend job from 12yrs old and got my first full time job at 16, I earned £70 a week. I was charged £20 a week rent as soon as I had the full time job. I had bus fare and tram fares to pay to get to work and bought my own lunches etc, plus driving lessons once I turned 17. I was left with about £10 per week after rent/transport/driving lessons. I was never able to save for my future, which is why I’d like DC to have the opportunity to save rather than charge rent.

It's good that you are considering this from different perspectives.
So often on MN you read " I had it tough and had to pay / struggle, therefore all young people should".
My upbringing was very poor and there was a period in my teens when I supported my parents as the only earner.
Things were very different for my DC and they had a comfortable upbringing which I tried to do differently from my own. Paid for driving lessons, bought them a car, subsidised uni. When they came home after uni and were working I took no money from them. We also helped them financially when moving out to rent and later to buy. Because we could.

It's really not tax efficient for a parent to save rent money for adult children. Please get them to consider a LISA if you are in a position not to "need rent" from them.

Since my eldest go her first job at 16, she’s been expected to send me 10% of whatever her monthly earnings are. I’ve put it in a separate savings account on the agreement it’s hers when she moves out.

I think it’s helpful to experience a percentage of your earnings disappearing before you have a chance to blow it!