How much rent to charge a working teenager?

[GNfan]

Curious to know people's thoughts. My teenage daughter, aged 18, has just secured her first job as a (gap year) teaching assistant at a school near our home, and will continue to live with us until she goes to uni in Sept 2023. She will earn £12,000 for that, which to her seems a fortune, and is actually more than I earn for a part time shop job. Dad earns enough for us to not to have to charge her rent/upkeep at all - but that would seem wrong, and not a very good way to teach her about life. Any thoughts on if/how much we should charge her per week?

If you don't actually need the rent from her I would charge her a small amount and put it in an account to save- help her out in the future with something.

To me it seems wrong to charge your 18 year old rent to live in her own home. Especially if it’s not needed. What about having her contribute to groceries and a couple of evening meals every week. Handing over money to her parents doesn’t help her learn to budget for the weekly shop or prepare a meal. Just a thought.

Maybe you could divide the cost of running your home (food, bills, wifi, etc) into 3 and base your rental price on that? How much would a room in a shared flat locally cost?

We take 20% of our adult sons earnings.
We don't need the money but I save it for him, he doesn't know that.
We also told him he needs to be saving a portion for the future so he actually sends us 50% of whatever he earns, give or take, sometimes it's less if he's planning something expensive.

None- my parents charged me loads but it would have been much better to be told to save towards a deposit/rainy day fund or some fun! They charged me full market rent for my room plus bills, food etc and as a parent I don’t get it. I won’t be doing this with my kids. If you can afford the bills just ask that she buys a food shop once a month. This or let her use the money for some life experiences/travel. She’s only young once and I don’t think charging to stay home really teaches much as it’s totally different to paying real bills in your own place that you have responsibility for.

Nothing, I found once they started earning and buying their own clothes,paying their own phone bills and funding their own social life I was better off anyway.

If you don't need to the money, maybe open a savings account and put in the rent you do charge her without telling her, and then gift her the money towards a deposit on a house when she reaches that point in the future.

Agree chores as part of adults sharing space, plus planning, buying and cooking a family meal a week.

In addition I'd expect a SO of the cost of renting a shared room in a flat (still a bargain, much nicer place and no other bills) into the household account.

So long as it didn't leave the household short, I'd bank that as s surprise leaving present.

I wouldn’t charge anything but I would enforce saving for university.

This feels wrong. Just get her to contribute to a food shop every now and then, or maybe help out more at home

She's on a gap year? So she's going to university next year? I wouldn't charge her rent but I'd have a proper discussion about saving for university and encourage her to put away half of her wages. If she comes Back to live with you after university that's when you should start charging rent IMO.
(disclaimer, this doesn't apply if you really need a contribution- for example if you lose CB and UC by your DC turning 18 and you need them to make up the shortfall)

I'd just ask her to put X amount in a savings account. Have her take on some of her personal expenses like hair cuts, phone etc? I wouldn't charge rent.

I would take £100 of her and save it for her but not tell her that's what I'm doing. Let's her experience bill paying and money planning. Then when she moves out give her it back for furniture ect for her first home.

I wouldn’t ut would suggests she pits aside something to buffer her for uni.

My DC are 22 and 23k and i charge them £140 (it’s going up to £170 next month). For the amount the OP’s DC earns I think I’d ask for between £60 and £100.

Sorry that should read my DC are 22 and 23 and earn 24k and 25k.

Make her save 50% - she will need that at Uni more than you need some nominal sum of “rent”

We charge DS (19) 250€ a month. That covers 'rent', utilities and the extra cost to have him insured to drive our car. He's no longer in education and works interim jobs. 250 seemed reasonable, although not reflective or real life costs.

He's welcome to eat with us so long as he makes some of the meals and does the dishes when he's not the one cooking. Any alcohol/junk food/snacks/cereal he has to buy for himself.

We put the money into a separate savings account but haven't yet decided what we'll do with it when he moves out.

I encourage my DC to save rather than me saving on their behalf.

With DS1, we started by going through what only-him bills were and getting them on his account: bus direct debit, subscriptions, so he could decide what he wanted to spend going forward. We also discussed how to track spending here.

Next, I showed up him how in the real world adults make choices on different types of accounts and financial products and looked through different options and tactics.

It's after that we discussed all being part of the household and arranged things to do around the house vs rent. It was easy for me because this is how it works for our lodger of 11 years: when he changed jobs, we arranged he'd pay lower rent in exchange for certain things for the household. Part of this was considering a bill he would pay so he'd have his name on it and could be used for ID and building up his credit score (so not mobile as lots of places don't take that as proof of address).

Really, to me, part of the real world is that people within a household can arrange how we do things together. Rent can be part of that, but I don't think it's required to see how the real world or balancing the needs to keep a household running works.

I got charged £200 a month some was used to pay bills food etc and they saved the rest. They weren’t well off and I didn’t mind I got given the money saved when I needed it to help buy things for uni etc

JFC every fucking time. I'll be charging rent when my children start working if they are living at home. I cannot afford to support adults. I'll downsize if they move out.
In this case the OP doesn't need it so saving it is a good idea but I'm sick to the back teeth of the pearl clutching at charging working adults a contribution. I pay for a roof over my head. By your logic I shouldn't because it's my home?

I would say £100 a month would be fair. You can either save the money for her or use it for food shopping, bills etc. I think it is fair to take some from DD - even if you give it her back at a later date- because it teaches her that there isn’t such a thing as a free ride. I’d encourage saving a good proportion too.

My DC contributes towards the coat of running our home. He earns £1,400 and contributes £250 a month. He saves £500 a month to.

He does half the housework and cooking. We work as a team (single mum).

I don't need the money, I save it for him (he doesn't know) but an adult working child should be contributing towards running a home.

As long as she's saving it for uni, not spending it all, I don't see why you'd charge her for rent if you don't need to. Just a contribution to bills and food (or she buys her own)?

If you're not happy with your own salary, you could look to change career?