PenPenWrites

OK. It’s official. Every recent survey I’ve seen says our generation is generous to our grown children: nine out of 10 of us give them a needed financial boost from time to time. (The latest version of that stat is in a survey by Ameriprise Financial; you can find it at ameriprise.com/presscenter ). The Bank of Ma and Pa opens up when the kids are in their 20s (helping mostly with college loans, buying a car and free rent at the old homestead) and keeps on giving even when the kids are well into their 40s.

Here’s something else the surveys find: It’s not the kids who are demanding the help. Financial planners and real estate agents who see multigenerational accounting in action say it’s more about generous parents than spoiled children. We are responding to financial challenges our kids face that we may not have had to deal with: staggering student loans and high-priced real estate are the two big ones. But I see a lot of other little things, like the creep of monthly bills just to maintain technological currency–the cell phone and texting; high-speed and WiFi Internet connections; a cable connection; iPods and iTunes. And that’s before they need BlackBerries.

Now that we know they need our help and we give it, the survey I’d like to see is whether we give with or without strings attached. And even when we don’t, do we inadvertently put a tit for tat on the money?

String-attaching is a form of custodial financing. It implies an on-going say in your grown child’s life. And, according to Carolyn Hax, an advice columnist who appears in the Washington Post, when a parent remains in the parent role too firmly and too long, kids still see themselves as kids; they develop a sense of entitlement to money and life shortcuts. Worse, resentments develop. and that’s what the problem is with custodial finance.

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She no longer has a land line. Alpha daughter, who is not particularly a techie, is all cell phone, all the time. I feel unmoored.
She doesn’t have a TV. Not that she doesn’t watch television programs. Her little family gets all its feeds from the computer. Movies too. Books on tape , music, photos–you name it: In her household, it’s on the computer or the iPod. I feel lost. What if I want to see the 7:00 news on NBC when I visit? I couldn’t figure how to manage it.
It’s not easy keeping up with the new technologies, even when your children aren’t latest-tech-tool crazy. [At least they’re not text messaging–make that, OMG, no txting!]
That said, I try to keep up. It helps that paterfamilies and I are still working, so we’re exposed to the jabber and chatter about Facebook and Wiki and even–have you heard of this one?–Twitter. I used to think my mother, who was born in 1912, lived through enormous changes–electricity, radio, telephones, television, computers.  But those changes took place over the course of her lifetime. The changes today are by the minute, and if we don’t keep up, we get left behind–not just by society but our own children.
I suggested to Uber son that we all get Skype. You know, of course, what that is. Telephone through the computer with a little digital eye that lets you see the persons you’re calling. I could see the Grands while I talk to them. [But what if I could also see them say Noooooo when they’re asked if they want to talk to me or Paterfamilias? ]
Am i crazy to be pioneering within my family for this form of communication? So far, I’ve only suggested it. Makes me feel with-it. Uber son even gave me a figurative pat on the back for knowing about Skype, no less suggesting it.

They’re close friends so they feel free to ask: Are you still paying your daughter’s airfare? Like me, one of their grown children was living on the other coast. Their son moved there for graduate school, married a fellow student. Money was tight; kids were being born. My friends could afford the air fare, and they wanted to see their son and his children. They picked up the tab for trips across the country–for holidays and for summer vacations at their home on Cape Cod. Now, ten years later, both son and daughter-in-law have good jobs, their kids are in school so day care costs are down. My friends figure grown children should be able to pay their own way.

They mentioned it to their son, and he said "No." Well, not in those words. He’s a very nice and thoughtful young man. But he said that money was short–he and his wife are renovating their house and had some other big bills to pay. Trips across the country for two adults and two children were too much for his budget.

OK. But my friends are on the verge of retirement and not feeling quite as financially easy as they had been about forking over $1,200+ each time their son and his family comes home–which is two to three times a year.

It’s a predicament. We all want our kids to come home for visits and to enjoy vacations with them, but when a long and expensive flight is involved, what’s fair?

Unwashed hair. Unkempt clothes. A beer belly and then some. When our grown children don’t look their best–not even close to it–it’s upsetting. Embarrassing. Annoying. Is it a blow to the pride?–you want to show them off but here they are looking down at the heels. Is it plain old materialism?–they should be showcasing the best and most expensive.

I got an insight into what it could be from a friend who just went through a bout of the unkempts.
She had rented a seaside house for the summer and invited her son and his latest girlfriend to come visit–make it their vacation. But it was a strangely uncomfortable visit–they kept to themselves and were quite distant. And all of this was made worse by the son’s appearance. He was badly in need of a haircut and the clothes he wore were frayed–buttons missing, tee shirts ripped. For my friend, it became the focus of everything that was going wrong.  "He looked like a loser," she says, and she is close to tears when she says it.

And there’s where I think she put her finger on the issue: It’s deeply disturbing when our kids look lousy. The fear is, they may not be doing well. They may be failing in life. We don’t want this for them. We want life to go well for them.

In my friend’s case, her son had been eased out of a business he had started with friends. He had been out of work for several months and had just come from some unpromising job interviews. His appearance spoke volumes about how he felt about himself. And that’s why it was so depressing.  We are, as the old adage goes, only as happy as our unhappiest child.

Do we give till it hurts? Between my friends, their friends, friends of theirs and people who’ve clicked onto this blog, there’s a recurrent theme: How much, how often, for what and until when do we help our kids out financially.

It’s all very personal, of course. But here’s a little statistical oversight from a recent survey of some 400 parents of adult children:
90 %  of us continue to support our children after they turn 18.
83 % of us support our children through higher education.
11 % of us help them to buy their first home.

It’s a change from our generation. When we were young adults, the survey found, only 39 % of us who went on to college or beyond got help from their parents.

Why the change? Our kids need more help, survey researchers say. They’re faced with high overall living costs, high levels of student debt and low starting salaries. Besides, we’re better able to finance that support than were parents in the 1970s and 1980s.  Well, that’s what they say.

Are our grown children our friends? Can they be our best friends? Not likely–there is an emotional component that bars the way. If a friend–best or otherwise–loses a job, gains too much weight, becomes ill, we’d worry about them and talk to them directly. "Are you OK?" we might ask. "Is there anything I can do to help?"

But such questions and concerns come freighted with other meanings when they’re addressed to a grown child. That’s a point Deborah Tannen makes in ter book, "You’re Wearing That? Understanding Mothers and Daughters in Conversation." While Tannen addresses herself to mother-daughter issues, much of what she has to say is true for any parent-child discourse–at least it is in our family.

Here’s the point Tannen makes about the fundamental tension built into the conversation between parent and adult child, particularly when it comes ot advice or suggestions and the fine line between those and criticism:

"From the daughter’s point of view, the person you most want to think you’re perfect is the one most likely to see your faults–and tell you about them. From the mother’s point of view, your job has always been to help and protect your daughter, give her guidance based on your greater experience, and ensure that all goes as well as it can for her. But any advice or suggestion you offer implies criticism, because someone who is doing nothing wrong does not need suggestions or advice."

My dentist has two sons: One lives nearby; the other half way across the country in Michigan. Every Christmas, the sons and their families come to her house for the holidays. This year, when she was discussing the holidays with her Michigan son, he brought up the question of travel. He didn’t know what to do. He had a 3 year old and newborn. He didn’t want to fly the crowded skies with two little ones. He was planning to drive–he usually did–but the newborn hated the infant car seat–he cried and cried whenever he was in it. The son didn’t know how his family would get through the eight hour trip.

This is the dialogue that ensued [according to my dentist]. SHE: Son, don’t come.  HE: But I don’t want to disappoint you. SHE: We’ll come to you the day after Christmas . HE: Oh Mom, that would be so wonderful.

Truth be told, my dentist told me [what could I say with all that dental gear in my mouth?], she didn’t really want to make a big Christmas dinner for the family at her house. It’s a lot of work. She hinted as much to her son who lives nearby. This son has five children. "We see them all the time," she said. "I suggested we just stop by their house on Christmas day. But he was so disappointed. The kids look forward to Christmas at grandma’s house."

This time she did not say "dont’ come."

It’s November and all thoughts turn to summer vacation. Should we be making plans for a multi-family love-in with all offspring and theirs?

The first year we tried that, we bundled into one 4-bedroom condo: alpha daughter, her hub and a one year old; uber son, his wife and a 5-month and 2 year old. Luxury place. Protected lawns for running; swimming pool and tennis courts across the way. The vacation was, well, here’s what it was: Neither alpha’s family nor uber’s came with the attitude that pater familias and I would be babysitters in residence. Nor did they expect all their meals to magically appear at the table. Everyone pitched in. There was no dumping. What there was, tho, was a lot of need. From the moment I hauled myself out of bed in the morning, someone small needed something that wasn’t being provided: a quiet cuddle, a romp outside, a belly rub, an apple sliced, a clean sock found, a milk run made.

What with different bedtime rituals for babies and toddlers [plus the complication of different time zones–alpha daughter lived a coast away] and the plain old exhaustion of having three children under 2 in the house, not once during our week of togetherness were all the adults in our little family able to sit down to a dinner at the same time–which was part of the point of vacationing together: the chance to visit with eachother as adults.

Almost every afternoon, pater familias would raise his head from his book and call out to an ever-more frazzled me: what time do you want to play tennis? Or, when are we going for a bike ride?

What universe was he living in?

Actually, he was in the real one. This was, afterall, supposed to be our vacation, even though a week of rest is what I needed once this one was over. Yet, as we all packed up to drive off to various cities and airports, both alpha and uber asked the same thing: Can we do this again next year?

Reader, we did. it does not get easier.