To ask for help with financial pickle

[ShoebillStork]

In 2009 FIL had a win on the Premium Bonds. He gave us £10,000 to invest for DS (at low risk) and the money to be given to DS when he's 18.

I put the money towards a loft conversion. DS is 18 soon and I'm due to remortgage for a better rate. How much do I need to release for him so he gets the £10k plus what it might have gained in interest since 2009.

And should I encourage DS to get a Help to Buy ISA with it?

@ShoebillStork if you do not answer to FIL, only talked to him to facilitate seeing your son then I concede your point that it does not matter if he is livid. If there is no relationship then there is no rift or reason to worry about him being upset. I understand. Well goodbye and good luck with it all.

I like the sound of an investment option that would give me a 50% return on my capital plus the full-time use of the thing bought with the capital.

I take back most of my points which were made due to my incorrect belief that FIL being unhappy about the lack of investment would cause family problems, or matter at all.

if you do not answer to FIL, only talked to him to facilitate seeing your son then I concede your point that it does not matter if he is livid.

Depends what FiL says to DS about it really. If he's livid and tells DS why he's livid then that should create some fine family drama.

Depends what FiL says to DS about it really. If he's livid and tells DS why he's livid then that should create some fine family drama.

Tbh don't think he's bothered.

@JuneJustRains

I like the sound of an investment option that would give me a 50% return on my capital plus the full-time use of the thing bought with the capital.

Buy a house, wait ten years, you're likely to do a lot better than that.

OP isn't worried about FIL , she was joking in the first instance .( he'll kill me ...)

OP 's pickle was doing the Maths on the interest.

Yep that's it👍🏻

OP your still a low life thief!

Thanks for the thread OP have some well deserved

Get some fresh air Lins

Buy a house, wait ten years, you're likely to do a lot better than that.

You weren’t housebuying in the negative equity years, were you? It scarred a few of us. But I take your point.

@linsey2581 you're still barking mad!

I would work out what your house is worth now and what your house would have been worth without the loft conversion. If his money paid for all of the conversion then the difference is all his. If the conversion was 20k he gets half of the difference in value. If you paid 30k for it, then a third.

I would also check that this amount is more than compound interest at a decent rate of return for safe investment - maybe 3% - to be sure he got a good deal by "investing" in your property instead of bonds or similar.

Oh good lord is this still going on?! @ShoebillStork you have the patience of a saint to continue to respond to some of these comments.

Glad you settled on a % … and I applaud you for orchestrating a win (Grandpa get’s to be the hero), win (DS not only got a cool room of his own but 15K), win (you didn’t invest in the magic beans that apparently offer no risk and double/triple returns) situation.

Well done OP.

£10.000 is a lot of cash, added to that interest to boot. The money is safe op didnt spend it knowing it would go forever. OP is able and willing to add to the initial total, what's the bloody problem. Money is safe isn't that the main thing. If op had invested in an isa, poor son wouldn't get much of a return, as those of us who have a little put away know too well

@SuperSecretSquirrels

Thanks for the thread OP have some well deserved

I agree, this thread is hilarious!

@ShoebillStork I love your responses - the humour nicely balanced with weary resignation as the financially & legally illiterate rallied to the call. Not to mention those seeking moral sainthood 🤣
Best post was £10K x 25% = £125K so give him that..... This should go to Classics.

As one of the financially and legally illiterate posting on this thread, I'm not seeking moral sainthood.

Generally I try to do what's right. Appropriating someone else's money for your own purposes and then covering it up by bunging a few quid at them in the hope that nobody will notice isn't the right thing to do. Ultimately, I think her son is losing out on about £15k, but we will never know.

I have no doubt she'll get away with it, but it lacks integrity. If she was in your family, would you trust her to administer a power of attorney or execute a will? I wouldn't.

the financially & legally illiterate rallied to the call. Not to mention those seeking moral sainthood

Perfectly legally and legally literate, thank you. As well as the possessor of a modicum of integrity - it’s a mark of how shit our society is when it’s a quality to be sneered at. As @evilkitten says, some of you certainly aren’t to be trusted around other people’s money.

Financially and legally even!

Best post was £10K x 25% = £125K so give him that..... This should go to Classics.

You're easily pleased. I said my post had lost a decimal place when I noticed. It was an example and I did assume most people would be able to do the sum and figure out the result for themselves, and the OP probably did, but it seems not everyone is that capable.

No AmaryllisNightAndDay you will go down in MN folklore as the innumerate fool who suggested an 18 year old lad should get £125 thousand return on a £10k investment and we will all love you for the silly old thing you are

And all for a missing dot.

evilkitten
Where would this extra £15,000 have come from?

How would the £10,000 have trebled in value over 12 years as he is already getting back the £10,000 plus interest

@Bythemillpond If she'd invested the money in one of the products available specifically for childrens' investments that were available in 2009 - I named a few earlier - then that's a ballpark of the amount that would be returned. As I said earlier in the thread, my children were left £5K over a similar timescale; this was invested in the F&C product, and with dividend reinvestment etc. is now worth £16K. That's a middle of the road product - so not mega returns. FTSE returns - so a basic low cost tracker fund - would have given £23,501 over the period.

Over the same period, premium bonds would have paid back £11,268 on average, and a savings account £12,285. If the OP was paying her son personal loan rates, then he'd be getting £26,382.

There's been a lot of posts saying 'what's the problem, he's getting £15K?'. Well, yes, he is. But that's based on an arbitrary figure of around 3.5% as an interest rate, and is incredibly poor for an 'investment'.

So where's the extra £15K? The OP is keeping it as house equity.

evilkitten
But would the FTSE etc be considered a safe investment that doesn’t lose money as that is what the investment should have been.

I have never heard of a fund that can guarantee trebling your money over a 12 year period that is considered a safe investment