Money Moral Dilemma: Is it fair to redistribute my kids' cash equally?

pigpen

duchy wrote: »

I inherited several thousand pounds from an aunt- my younger brother inherited tens of thousands from her mainly because he was closer to her and partly because she believed a man should have control of the money. (other bequests reflected her differing attitude between the sexes)

Could I have used a bigger inheritance- Too right I could as I was pregnant -did I resent my brother's better fortune - no. I was grateful for what she left me.

Had my parents suggested to my brother he equalized the situation I'd have told them to butt out !

Just for interest.. if your brother had suggested it was unfair and offered to split 50/50 would you have accepted or would you have told him not to be so daft and to keep what he was given?

Ebenezer_Screwj

Why are you considering giving children money, it is hardly aspirational is it? My parents were wealthy but gave me nothing. I worked my way up and am comfortably retired, holidaying three times a year and reaping the fruits of my labour. If you give your children money, they will spend it.

beaker141

I have pondered this - I have 4 kids and the eldest has £700 and the youngest doesnt even have a bank account ! I have thought about pooling the money into 1 account or investment for simplicity - its a right pain to switch accounts when you need to do 3 or 4 of them at a time - and the only decent savings rates are regular savers.

I'm not sure when/How they get it back, maybe a quarter share of the pot when they reach 16 or 18.

janelise

Absolutely not! It's not your money, it belongs to your children. It is down to the donor how much they give to each child, and as the children would do well to learn, Life is not fair! It's not a very good idea for you to top the amounts up: that's really not honest: how do the children thank the donors??? "Dear Auntie X, thank you for the money?" or "Thank you for the £20"? I would be extremely displeased to learn that money I gave to one child had been divided up between others, or that a child thought I'd given them more than I had because a parent had topped the sum up.

missbiggles1

Hemera wrote: »

I am an adult and I find no problem with this. Think of circumstances in which the parent who has received the gift on behalf of the child can't afford to just keep the cash, but finds him/herself in need of using it - would you say it should only be used to buy food, clothes or whatever else for the child it was gifted to, and not for the other? My parents did exactly this - used cash gifts towards household expenses.
In a similar situation, one of my family members was gifted a sum of money by her grandparents, meant for her university fund. A few years after, the grandparents meant to do the same for her younger brother, but found themselves in no position to gift him the same amount, so they just split the previous gift and everyone was happy.

I'd call that theft in either case.

If someone gives money to a child then the parents have no right to use that money to provide things like clothes and food that it's their responsibility to pay for, regardless of whether or not there were siblings involved.

In the second example, if the grandchild who received the original gift chose to share that with his/her sibling, all well and good. If the parents/grandparents chose to take half that child's money away from him to give to a sibling then I'd consider that to be theft as well.

Once you've given somebody money as a gift then it belongs to them, so to take it away, for whatever reason, is stealing their money, pure and simple.

duchy

pigpen wrote: »

Just for interest.. if your brother had suggested it was unfair and offered to split 50/50 would you have accepted or would you have told him not to be so daft and to keep what he was given?

If he had I'd have said no - If he insisted I'll have told him to invest something of it for his soon to be born only nephew.

duchy

I'm actually a bit taken aback how many people would steal gifts given to a child for their future and redistribute them

pigpen

duchy wrote: »

If he had I'd have said no - If he insisted I'll have told him to invest something of it for his soon to be born only nephew.

I would too.. but i would have offered to divide it equally amng siblings.. but I'm sometimes a bit odd

duchy wrote: »

I'm actually a bit taken aback how many people would steal gifts given to a child for their future and redistribute them

Mine all have different amounts.. my oldest had £470 at 16... that was it.. my younger ones will have £2000-3000 at least because OHs family are quite simply better off and the middles ones varying amounts in between.. I spent £30 of DS1's 1st birthday money on a snowsuit for him and felt bad even though it was gifted with the instruction to get something he needed... but yes the number advocating theft is a bit shocking!

Bobz

A relative gave a fair bit of money to my son in his first few years, but then died before my daughter was born. I felt that she'd missed out at the time. However, I used what the relative left me to buy my kids equal amounts of Premium Bonds. Strangely, my daughter was much luckier than my son on the winnings, and therefore accrued far more in her savings by the time she was 16 than my son had (we had a rule that premium bonds wins were for savings not for spending). You can never try to balance these things out - their pot of money is theirs and not yours to take from and re-distribute.

Oh, and when the kids were old enough, we had a discussion about what would happen if one of them won big on the Premium Bonds. They decided between themselves that, if either won over £10,000 before they were 18 then they would share it equally. Neither liked the idea of the other having a large lump sum without them being in the same situation. That gave me peace of mind, too.

missbiggles1

I would've thought it quite normal for siblings to have different amounts of savings given that they might well receive money presents from godparents (or their secular equivalents), some of whom will be better off/more generous than others and some of whom will choose to buy presents rather than to give money.