Ever wonder what the best gift kids can give to their parents? A hint, it’s not money or things. It’s your financial freedom. Parents worry about their children even when they are grown up. The best thing kids can give to their parents is the knowledge that they are self-supporting and on the right track.
Conversely, the best gift parents can give to their kids is to teach them to be self-reliant. Learn skills that will support them and their families into the future. Parents should not be concerned about the financial well-being of their children because the children learned early how to become financially independent of their parents.
Self-reliance is critical to emotional well being
The worst thing you can do for your parents (not sure it’s the worst but close to it), is ask them to support you as an adult. When parents should be saving for their retirement and setting things up for their later years, don’t ask for financial help. Do not ask them to sign for your art degree.
My mother and father would have as they used to say, sell the shirt off their back for any of their kids. This never changed for them, they were offering to pay for meals when the kids were in their 50s. Of course in my family, our parents stopped paying our bills early in life. After a time, we started doing financial things for them even though they were doing well with their pensions.
People are having children later in life
Having children later in life may have some benefits but there may be some serious issues to confront. Planning and saving for retirement is a very important thing for parents to do. Most people no longer have defined benefit plans for retirement so 401k is the key. This means pouring money into savings at a time when some children are actually in school.
Considering the children are young when parents are “over the hill”, parents must instill a sense of responsibility. This means that they teach their children to learn to support themselves as early as possible. In an ideal situation, children should be out of the house after high school into the military, college, or trade school.
Perhaps they live at home for a few years while they are working on their new careers. By their mid 20’s they should be out of the house and supporting themselves. This means parents are not buying cars, paying for auto insurance, loaning money, etc. If you think this is harsh on the kids, consider how you will support yourself and those kids in retirement if they do not learn early.
Love does not mean money
Constantly giving money and other material support to your adult children does not show your love. If this prevents them from being self-sufficient, it may be the wrong thing to do if you love them. Many parents who have raised children after the parents are well into their careers tend to provide all manner of material things to their children.
Raising your kids is your business, no one should tell you how to do that. This is why parents should instill in their children the fact that they must learn to support themselves. Many kids wait well into adulthood to stop taking from their parents. Parents love their kids so they continue to give long after that giving will affect their retirement.
Social Security will not support you in retirement without other sources of income. This usually comes from savings over decades. You should prepare for eventual retirement by creating a plan and sharing that plan with your adult children. They must know you are saving for retirement and you cant loan them your retirement funds for any reason.
Kids can wreck retirement plans
There are many horror stories out there about parents who have saved for years just to have their children make off with their retirement savings. Kids borrowed and could not afford to pay it back, some stole the money and others asked their parents to sign for student loans.
Some of the faults lie at the feet of the parents who have enabled their children to treat them badly. Parents who gave their children everything and expected nothing in return e.g chores, only enable this behavior. The question you need to pose to your children is if you can not support yourself because you gave them everything, who will?
The best gift kids can give to their parents is the sense that the parents will not have to worry about the kid’s financial welfare. Money is the source of so many tragic issues. The last thing parents need is to spend emotional capital worrying about how their kids can not support themselves as adults.
Parents can give the gift of independence
Parents should instill in their children at an early age that they must earn what they receive. Even if parents give things to their children the children should be taught the price of those things. The price is not in money purse but the price they have paid e.g. working long hours away from the family.
Both parents and children must give each other the gift of financial independence. Parents teach children values and children recognize how important it is that their parents remain self-sufficient. Others agree with the premise of this article. If you teach your children to become self-sufficient at an early age, you are likely to see that they will start offering to pay for your lunch.
My parents were in their 20s when the kids were born
My parents had their children in their 20s well before they reached their peak earning age. As kids, we learned that if we wanted money, we had to work for it. As soon as we were old enough, we started doing chores around the house. Later as we got older we picked up part-time jobs mowing lawns etc.
All of us were out of the house in our early 20s. Yes, our parents would occasionally loan some money, small amounts. We all paid them back even when they told us not to. We paid them back because it was the right thing to do. We raised our families and our parents improved their financial situation as they earned more and were not supporting kids.
Understanding that with people having children later in life, the concept of saving for retirement has taken a turn. It’s difficult to buy sports equipment and pay for youth organizations at the same time as you are saving for retirement. Many will have children in high school into their early 60s.
The best gift kids can give to their parents
It’s even more important that older people with school-age children teach their children the value of independence. Independence when it comes to how to manage their finances. They need to learn how to do things for themselves. It’s a very hard thing for some parents but necessary. Frankly, it’s an expression of love to push them in the right direction.
A note of explanation. This article is not intended to discourage parents who have special needs children from doing what they believe is necessary to take care of them. Even in this case, what happens when you are gone. If your children need help as an adult because of some medical condition, your work to plan for retirement has become even more critical.
There are only two ways to prepare for retirement. Earn more and save it or spend less. We encourage you to read our blog article on creating a budget for retirement, click here. There are many more articles on this site that you may want to read to help you prepare for retirement.
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