... to ask how much money your adult kids give?

[izimbra]

Adult daughter (24) living at home. Earns about 28K. What sort of contribution would you expect towards household expenses? Our house is so expensive to run, and our household budget is strained - I'm only working part time as I'm a carer for my adult son, and we have an 18 year old at university who we're supporting. My husband's income is keeping us all afloat. We don't charge our daughter rent and she doesn't save any money at all. In fact she has debts. She works full time, and is also studying for a degree with the OU.

When I lived at home my mum made made me give a 3rd of my wage to her, a 3rd was for me and a 3rd was to save.

Does she buy/cook her own food? Chip in with housework? Do her own laundry?

I dud all of that when I moved back home aged 24, and paid £200 pcm. 20 yrs ago.

Do you have three adult children?

one at uni - who you are supporting financially
one who you are a carer for
one who works and does an OU degree

That is a lot of people to support on one full and one part time wage.

But I can see it’s very hard to have different rules for different children without your daughter feeling hard done by. I think I would have a conversation with her setting out the finances and make an agreement with her about how she will contribute, but also get out of debt.

21 year old, earns 28k, pays £250 a month.

Plus puts about £15 a week in the car if i’m picking him up from work (had his motorcycle nicked).

@izimbra can son who is at uni work through the holidays and contribute? They have long hols.

DS pays £350 and pays 1/2 the food shop as there are only 2 of us

bloody hell! I was earning about £650 back in 80's and I had to cough up £400 a month to my parents

DS pays £150 going up to £200 a month in January. We don’t really need the money, but on the other hand he earns more than I do. He still managed to save AND really it’s more a reflection of what it cost to house him.

Your budget is strained and your adult dd is spending nearly £2k a month and has taken two holidays this year?

I would take at least £800 a month from her, deduct a fair amount for bills and food and put the rest in a savings account for her.

her financial situation is ridiculous

At least £100/week. Have you considered asking her for more than you want/need, and starting secret saving for her?

Surely you realise that not everyone can afford to subsidise working adults.

I 100% have different rules for different children. They have different circumstances.
Fulltime education they pay nothing. I don't want them or need them to work. Fully funded in term time by us. Summer work is then spend some save some.
But If one of them works fulltime and lives at home then yes a contribution was arranged. Only had it with dd about a year to be fair and she paid 350 a month out of 2k.
She also propped her sisters up with pocket money Starbucks coffee and lifts here and there.
A full time worker needs to pay her way regardless. We didn't need her contribution but that's not the point.

The different rules are because the children are in different circumstances though. Only one of them is earning a full time wage. It's entirely fair to have different rules in that scenario.

1st wage in 1981 was £35 per week. £15 to parents , £7.50 weekly bus pass and the rest to me. Had to get everything out of this- clothes, toiletries, period products, socialising etc

Your parents were awful. I hope you don't see that as usual. My mother financially abused me as well. A lower scale but she took 2/3 of my £29.50 YTS money

Same for me. I had three years of that before I left home and found out how little that one-third really covered!

Your daughter could absolutely pay more..

Partner and I (but in our early 30s) make €30,000 each. So a little less than what your daughter makes when you convert.

We pay €850 per month, between us, to my parents and do our own food shop. We would be paying at least double that to rent a one bed apartment and then would have bills on top of that.

Here, we both give €100 per week, each. And then pay for the wifi (€50 per month). It's really not a lot. About a 5th of our weekly pay.. we save a shit tonne and go on a few holidays and weekends away throughout the year.

She is taking the piss not paying you anything and even worse to have nothing left each month.

I have one son left at home, he earns £32000. He pays £300 a month but buys his own toiletries plus most of hs food. When energy prices increased he offered to pay more but I haven't needed it so far. But he has saved a 10% deposit for a flat and is now saving for furniture etc.
I am thinking of decreasing his payments so that he can save more also so that I can get used to doing without his contribution.

Has your daughter previously been to uni that you funded? Because if not, I think you are being very harsh on her. She is studying full time just like her brother, only she isn't costing you a small fortune by living out.

100 a week for rent etc.

i would also be talking to her about saving into a LISA for a deposit.

We’ve stayed with my parents between houses and always given £150 each.

I would suggest she needs to cover her costs for food and power for her own self respect as well as respect for you! All part of basic adulting.

For other things it is really up to you. Aside from the impact of her siblings though as she can’t influence their needs.

My son is 25 and earning about 30k he pays us £400 a month which includes food, alcohol etc

My adult son earns £1400 a month take home, he pays me £400, and has £1000 in his pocket.

I don't think it's manageable for her not to pay something. I know that everyone's circumstances are different, but for context when I had to live at home for a year after uni I paid £200 per month. And that was in 1990 on a salary of £8000 a year.