How much board should I be paying?

silvercar

Dunroamin wrote: »

That seems quite fair to me, why do you think it isn't?

Because the offspring remaining at home then bears a higher cost for events outside their control eg if someone decided that £40 was a fair contribution to costs of say £200, then one person leaves and the costs only drop to £180, you are then asking for £45. When a lot of those costs will be because of the property chosen as the family home by the parent(s).

thorsoak wrote: »

Of course, as each one moved out of the family home, the costs went down.

But not by the same proportion.

Dunroamin wrote: »

Why would anyone budget to support adult children who happen to return after university?

Maybe that is the difference between you and me. I know that getting started on your career takes time, that first jobs may be lower paid, I also know that it takes a while to settle down into a spending routine and there are extra expenses when you initially start work (eg work clothes) the need to network. It is also well known that lots of students end up with an overdraft or loan.
You also know your own children, you know what the chances are that they will return home after university - you may even encourage them to do so.
So as a parent you have had years notice (almost a decade really!) to budget for the extra costs you may incur by your offspring returning to the family nest.

My eldest has now left home, but in the knowledge that if at any time he wants to return to the nest, his bedroom is waiting for him.

silvercar

thorsoak wrote: »

So, the parents should chose a hovel in which to live with their children, in order not to share the costs with adult children who CHOOSE to live en famille ?

Skewed thinking!

As for us, we moved AS A FAMILY into two farm-labourers' cottages which we converted into a family home which was large enough for us and our four children - with a 10 year difference in age from oldest to youngest.

If we subscribed to your arguments, you would have us move every time one of them went to uni! As it is, we moved and downsized once they had all left home and we retired.

You've turned my argument upside down. I was saying that parents make the choice on where to live and so it is unfair on them to burden the children with the extra costs incurred by their choices.

I wasn't saying move to reduce the costs of contributing children, I was saying budget for the property you are living in and don't charge your children for the choices you made.

FatVonD

Soleil_lune wrote: »

Some people here are COMPLETELY missing the point! Regardless of the fact that your young adult child 'may' or may not cost an extra £40 a week, the fact is that a LOT of people lose a minimum of £200 to £300 a month in tax credits and child benefit, when a child comes out of full time education, and simply HAVE to and NEED to ask their adult child for a contribution.

Soleil_lune wrote: »

As I said, many many people lose a lot of income when their child leaves full time education, and have no CHOICE but to ask for help from their offspring.

So, playing devil's advocate, you could say that, if the parents have been living a lifestyle that could only be maintained with the benefit of child benefit/child tax credits then they have been living beyond their means and need to rethink their finances. After all, if the adult child were to move out the parents would still be overstretched (unless of course they rented out the room or downsized.)

silvercar

FatVonD wrote: »

So, playing devil's advocate, you could say that, if the parents have been living a lifestyle that could only be maintained with the benefit of child benefit/child tax credits then they have been living beyond their means and need to rethink their finances. After all, if the adult child were to move out the parents would still be overstretched (unless of course they rented out the room or downsized.)

Agreed. None of this is a surprise, you know when they are born that child benefit/ tax credits stop at the latest when they reach 18/19 if not sooner.

thorsoak

silvercar wrote: »

Because the offspring remaining at home then bears a higher cost for events outside their control eg if someone decided that £40 was a fair contribution to costs of say £200, then one person leaves and the costs only drop to £180, you are then asking for £45. When a lot of those costs will be because of the property chosen as the family home by the parent(s).



But not by the same proportion.



Maybe that is the difference between you and me. I know that getting started on your career takes time, that first jobs may be lower paid, I also know that it takes a while to settle down into a spending routine and there are extra expenses when you initially start work (eg work clothes) the need to network. It is also well known that lots of students end up with an overdraft or loan.
You also know your own children, you know what the chances are that they will return home after university - you may even encourage them to do so.
So as a parent you have had years notice (almost a decade really!) to budget for the extra costs you may incur by your offspring returning to the family nest.

My eldest has now left home, but in the knowledge that if at any time he wants to return to the nest, his bedroom is waiting for him.

So at what stage will you be downsizing into a smaller home? Or do you plan to keep your children's bedrooms ready and waiting for ever?

silvercar

thorsoak wrote: »

So at what stage will you be downsizing into a smaller home? Or do you plan to keep your children's bedrooms ready and waiting for ever?

When the house gets too much for us to look after.

I don't see a problem with keeping a house bigger than my needs, I will have paid for it, property in the long term is a good investment.

The children are free to come and stay if they wish (and my youngest is at university now, so home in the holidays and could well move home after university). The rooms are not ready and waiting in the sense that there is any pressure on them to move home, they are available should they wish to stay - for overnight, for a week, a month or longer. In all likelihood he will also come home for a time after university, before fleeing the nest.

We also have nieces and nephews and parents who may want to visit, possibly even stay for longer.

thorsoak

Which is precisely what we did! We also helped our children to get on the property ladder by using our savings so to do.

I still have (just!) enough room to welcome them to stay - and in fact when OH was ill, it was comforting for all of us to have all four of them staying at the same time.

jellyhead

Soleil_lune wrote: »

£200 a month on a family of three for ALL regular shopping? - like £47 a week on EVERYthing? Food, nappies, detergents, alcohol, baby food (unless you breast-feed) cleaning stuff, all groceries? Where do you shop? 1989?

Why include alcohol? It's surely not a regular weekly expense for families who are short of money? I can't remember the last time we bought alcohol :eek:

jellyhead

Dunroamin wrote: »

We went to bed at around 11.00pm and our teenager was routinely up until 2 in the morning. When we banned the use of the central heating to this time (we were far too hot to sleep) we found he snuck in a fan heater and frequently fell asleep and had it on all night.

Fan heaters cost an arm and a leg My brother got a sudden huge heating bill and discovered that his lodgers were heating the shed with a fan heater because he didn't allow them to smoke indoors.

It isn't costing an extra £40 a week to keep my extra teenager - good job really, because he only pays £44 per week in board and that includes food, toiletries, washing, transport, clothes etc.

My sister had an extra teenager a few years ago and she cost a fortune in utilities - it's things like leaving hair straighteners on all day, 2 showers a day, etc. and frequent clothes washing whereas mine isn't so meticulous about his appearance. I have persuaded him to wear jeans for 2 days instead of wearing clean everything every day.

He's sharing a room, so that would be heated anyhow. The radiators have thermostats on them so their bedroom can be warmer than mine if needs be, but the heating goes off when I set it to, and if they are cold they can wear a onesie or have a blanket around them while sat at the computer, wear slippers etc.

They can't stay up til 2am anyhow because of school 5 days a week and he works weekends too, he never gets a lie-in except for today while the teachers are striking.

Dunroamin

jellyhead wrote: »

Why include alcohol? It's surely not a regular weekly expense for families who are short of money? I can't remember the last time we bought alcohol :eek:

I can't remember the last time we didn't.:o