AIBU to buy younger children cars when eldest did not get one?

[CoffeeRevelsfan]

My DD is 20. I’d saved £8k in her CTF which she got when she turned 18, she’d used £3.5k of that to buy a little run around car, then a few months later won £10k on the lottery, so bought herself a better car.

my DSD is turning 18 in a few months, and my younger DS in a years time. They will both have £8k in their CTF’s, same as older DD. DH and I have been talking about buying a little run around car each for DSD and younger DS given that older DD got a leg up money wise with her lottery win and was able to buy herself a car, but I’m not sure if older DD will feel like we’ve given the younger 2 something that she didn’t have.

we are not rolling in money and have to save hard for any big purchases. DH and I had quite different upbringings - I had to pay for every driving lesson, test, buy my first car, pay for the insurance etc alone, whereas DH had everything paid for him. I feel that buying DSD and DS a car is something that I never had and would love to do for our children, and DD had a lottery win so although we were not in a position to buy her a car, she was lucky enough to buy herself one with her lottery win.

are we being unreasonable to buy the younger 2 cars when we were not able to do the same for older DD?

And what you describe is neither fair nor equal.

This. I find it bazaar you'd try to even up a win your eldest DC got for herself. If she gets a better job and earns more would you try to even that up too? Treat your DC the same. £8k is a nice amount for them. If you treat younger DC differently you'll lose your eldest child.

£8k is a very decent pot to buy a car with and saves a lot of resentment.

So you gave your DD £8k but her brothers would get £11.5k each?

Classic treatment of the elder daughter there. Her lottery win is irrelevant to the money you give to your children and I hope good luck continues to find her.

Just keep it simple and let them use the CTF how they want, I'd be pissed off and resentful if my parents bought a sibling a car each after I'd paid for it out of my money. The lottery win is also irrelevant.

Let them all decide for themselves how they want to spend their £8k. It's a good way to learn how to get value for money. They may well decide to play the lottery too.

You can save money for them but do it at your own pace, when you can, not with the turning 18 deadline. Cars are generally not an investment and will only lose value. It'll likely be more useful to get a larger gift towards a house deposit in 10-15 years.

Treat them all the same. They all have the means to buy a car if they need one. Alternatively, give them all the same amount now. Don't engineer resentments when you don't need to.

You are over thinking and fixating on the win, I thinkyou don't have to give her the money back she made a choice to buy her car.

Mine were too old for the CTF but wasn't the purpose to save and spend for the future, which your dd did let the others do the same.

Unless they really need cars for their work, cars are a money pit.
Let your younger two purchase their own.

Maybe allow them to borrow your car sometimes for a couple of years.

In my further posts I said I’d save up to give her back her £3500 for her first car.

Indeed. I got the shitty end of that stick all my life, except it was the older two were taken care of but by the time it came to me, there was no money left. On the flip side, I was told if I wanted to go on school trips, I’d have to pay for them myself because the others didn’t get to go. The only reason they didn’t was because it was around the time of the school strikes in the 80s and there were no trips.

It pissed me off, and still irks me 40 years later, particularly when my mother claims she treated all of us the same.

YABU. You gave your oldest daughter cash, and she chose to use some of it to buy a car. The fairest thing would be to give your two youngest children the same amount of cash and they can choose to buy a car with it or not. The fact your eldest was lucky enough to win the lotto should be taken out of consideration. It's nothing to do with what you give the youngest. What if the eldest had saved her salary or received a bonus and used that to upgrade her car? Would you feel it's unfair that your youngest didn't receive that money, even though they didn't work for it?

At the moment they each have 8k. That's fair, and more than enough to buy a car if that's what they want to spend the money on.

I really don't understand why you think you need to give them all more money.

£8k two years ago is worth more than today due to inflation. Something fair would be to inflation adjust your sons ctf to match the value of your daughters today. We're having to do something similar as my youngest child is to young to have a ctf unlike her siblings

Mine got £500 plus interest as we couldn’t afford to top up and that’s the government contribution. Just start saving for her?

Treat them the same. This happened to me when younger, my older brother was bought a car and then when I passed, they didnt get me a car and it always hurt!

If you're dead set on this, why don't you wait until you've saved enough to gift them all £3500 at the same time. The younger ones can still buy a car from the 8k, but I don't understand why you both feel the need to do this. You could wait, put the money away and gift them an amount for their first home or wedding maybe.

I agree with those treating all DC equally. Also if they have to manage their income to save for one, will be useful skill to have.

I’m a bit confused about why you’re over thinking this. Each child has £8k to do what they wish. Your eldest bought a car for £3.5k. The other 2 have the same amount of money and they can also use at least £3.5k to buy a car. Therefore they’ve all had exactly the same

the fact that your older child then won £10k on the lottery and upgraded her car is totally irrelevant. That’s her own money

Tell your other kids to buy a lottery ticket and if they win £10l they can also upgrade their car. I can’t work out why you are giving this headspace

Everyone always say treat them all the same- but it is rarely what happens.
my Mum bought my brother a car, taxed it and insured it and gave him more money when he upgraded to a better car- but she would not even pay for me to have driving lessons, still less buy me a car. It was the way it was in my family , so i accelted it, it doesn't mean I didn't feel resentful though.

But OP you gave her that money to start with? Where did the original 8k come from?

No. My sil was given her dad's car when he had a stroke and couldn't drive. It was basically brand new. My wife and her brother got £2k each "to make it fair".

Sil was 60 at the time...it still rankles.

Mil doesn't like to be reminded that sil git the car to drive them around when she has never taken them anywhere apart from shopping (where mil buys her shopping) and the hairdressers (yep mil pays for both of them).

The lottery win should be treated entirely separately as something good that happened to DD. You and DH had no hand in it so you shouldn’t it as a reason to give her siblings more.

Give siblings the same as you gave DD and no free car. Or give DD the same as you plan to spend on her siblings.

If I was DD I wouldn’t have told you about my lottery win if I knew you would use it against her like this.

Well that’s a series of terrible financial decisions - a CTF (loss making) and then a car purchase (decreasing value every day)

They all had/ have the same fund so the others should buy their cars out of their fund as DD did. The lottery win is neither here nor there. If I was your DD I'd make sure i kept any further good fortune secret from you! My mum used to try similar things, I soon learnt not to tell her anything.