Boomer parents who don't help their children

[hoarderofthedough]

I will preface this by saying that my own Boomer parents DID help me and my sibling, and I will be forever grateful. They were wonderful.

BUT.....my DH's mother, on the other hand is the opposite, and it's giving me the rage. I wondered whether anyone else had experienced similar?

She is super rich, and by that I mean a multi millionaire. She lives in a 6 bed mansion, has around 8 properties that she rents out, providing an income of circa £10k a month, and she lavishes it ALL on herself and her boyfriend.

Her daughter (my SIL) lives in a tiny house in an awful (dangerous) part of town, and doesn't have a pot to piss in. Scrimping and saving, not able to put the heating on in winter, no treats ever - and all the while MIL is jet setting to exotic holidays, always in business class....with not one thought for her DD and grandkids welfare.

On the rare occasions we meet up for a meal, MIL will let DH and SIL pay. Or at best the bill will be split - but never are we treated with her paying. However, she is very happy to treat her boyfriend to lots of things.

She's almost 80 now, and still has no thoughts of gifting money to avoid inheritance tax.

Anyone else experience this? I find it truly baffling, because if I was in her position I would be filtering down money to my adult kids regularly.

Exactly-have you and your husband encouraged her to see you both regularly? Invited her out often? Or did you favour your parents-a lot of people seem to only invite the maternal grandparent to baby things/ wedding planning etc. I always included everyone, as although there's no money in the equation in our families, I wanted everyone close and to have good relationships.
Now maybe you tried again and again OP, and she blew you off, and I'm sorry if so. But you can't generalise from everyone born between 1945-1965 (?) as that just isn't the case. Just as not all of us millennials are snowflakes crying for Napster, not all boomers are the same.

Indeed!

Well, my wealthy parents rarely treated anyone. My father actually said that if he could he would have all his money cremated with him.
That didn’t surprise me one bit.
As it was, when he died he left everything to some obscure organisation.

At least you have a get out clause for chief arse wiper in their older years.

Interesting!

I have been extremely fortunate and live a truly lovely life, but it was self made rather than being gifted to me. Yes, my kids do have certain privileges that others don’t, but at the same time we’ve set them up to want to be successful in their own right. Of course they will inherit our money eventually, but I don’t want them thinking they can just have what they want when they want and do nothing with their lives.

Two years ago, at which time it was her own mother who was the rich skinflint, and OP appears to be the SiL.

🤣🤣

Sadly, some people are very grabby and selfish with money, and the more they get, the worse they get.

I love watching my kids benefit from the (very humble) wealth i've built up over the years. I like to treat myself, but that's just a fleeting reward feeling, seeing my kids benefit gives real satisfaction. I could certainly never watch them struggle if i were in a position to help.

My dad was always very careful, but very generous, with money. He'd help out if there was a genuine need and a good cause. My mother is more of an emotional giver, money means nothing to her, she'd give us her last pennies and live in the gutter if she had to, thankfully none of us 5 kids is grabby, and we're cery grateful for any help we got over the years. It's obvious that it has given our parents a lot of satisfaction supporting us and our families to succeed. I feel the same way.

I agree with you OP, this is an extremely sad situation that i would find very hard to witness.

From an inheritance tax point of view plus the wish to help your adult kids out YABU. My mum gifts money to us all the time and in the main we then pass it on to our kids in their late 30s. Mum has a huge pension and only ever really spends if she comes out with us and is no longer bothered about spending on things and cannot travel alone. Before you say anything she will never be claiming assistance with care costs so deprivation of assets won’t apply. I cannot understand why OPs MIL is so selfish especially as she was gifted a lot from her parents. Just reinforces my view that a lot of very wealthy people are extremely selfish and have no empathy. Thank goodness my mum isn’t like that. We follow her lead with our kids.

My dad is always the first to help any of his family out if we’re stuck. My mum on the other hand wouldn’t give you a couple of pence if you were short in the shop. It’s always been the same with her. Her entitlement to money is quite hilarious, she keeps all of her own- as she should really but like I said wouldn’t help anyone out, but by god she expects her children to foot her bill for everything. Meals out, holidays, phones etc. Yet doesn’t even have life insurance or a funeral plan…. We were apparently the assholes for reminding her if it’s not paid, we weren’t footing the bill.

We all view it as, she’s never once helped us in our time of need, so we wouldn’t help her. For example, sisters car was off of the road needing a new clutch, she was about £100 short of the money to get it fixed. Mum had won 6k in bingo the week before, she couldn’t help with the money as a loan as she was ‘skint’ although sister was going to be able to pay it back less than a week later!

Yawn. Made up post just to try and annoy ‘boomers’. Think you’re the horrible one. Go and find some good to do.

Ah. Well spotted.

I'm more pissed off with grown arse whingers assuming they have an entitlement to the parents money rather than live within their means.

Maybe that’s how she got so rich in the first place - by being ruthless!

Surely with wealth parents, children had the opportunity for a decent education and the opportunity for university or further training? That should have prepared SIL to be an independent adult.

It is unreasonable to be wanting MIL to avoid paying tax.
Everyone should pay their taxes and not evade.
Everyone uses public services so they should pay tax - OP you are being unreasonable as avoiding tax seems to be your main reason that the MIL gifts money now rather than waiting for any inheritance.

The term ‘boomer’ has become as derogatory as ‘Karen’ was and there has been a backlash over that. The boom years were to do with America booming because they were selling the steel that was needed in industry, but had been used in this country for munitions and so on.

One of my children went to university. I paid the fees. They were also helped with housing costs, which enabled them to save enough for a mortgage. The other had a house deposit as a gift. We are not in a position to do the same for grandchildren, although they have had money given to them regularly over the years. We are now downsized and worrying about the increasing cost of living, like most people. The family will get whatever there is at some point, but we need what we have to be able to run one car, put food on the table and heat the house in winter. We aren’t holidaying abroad, going to theatres and restaurants, although I’d love to.

Children like this are the reason why people leave all their money to charity.

Gosh, it's always the inlaws that so many MNetters want to get their hands on their money before they're even dead.

Awful to go through life eyeing up other people's purses and wallets.

I think your MIL is wise to you OP, I hope she doesn't give you a penny. How many times now have you posted about this and obsessed over this? Marry for money did you and finding out you're not getting it must be a bitter pill to swallow.

Was he generally a likeable and congenial man?

I can’t understand it either. I would go without for my children.

Oh, it appears that this is made up garbage.

Maybe try getting a life, instead of envying the lives of those around you :)

My childhood was very deprived. I'm not sure how I was lucky to spend a lot of it hungry or having to wear a school skirt three sizes too big because my parents knew they wouldn't be able to buy a new one every year.