Talking to your children about finances! [shock]

TBH I don’t remember ever talking much to DD’s about finances - except just once, when a recently graduated dd who really disliked her first graduate job, wanted to jack it in and ‘go travelling’, told me she ‘didn’t care about money’.

I absolutely blew up at her. Dh and I had both grown up in permanently pretty skint families of 4 children and had known all too well what it was like to be broke.
That was thankfully in the past and dds’ experience had been quite different - I told her never to dare to say such a thing again, she had absolutely no idea!

I’m glad to say she did very soon get real - she did eventually ‘go travelling’, was often hard up en route, but by happy chance ‘fell’ into her long-term career along the way.

My mother was always threatening us with the loss of our inheritance if we didn't toe the line but never told us exactly what she had. She was never an "investor" so rather sadly, her money has devalued and what she has will go in care home fees. I feel that as she was tight lipped about her finances, so should I be but it has caused all sorts of problems as my sister feels I should be completely transparent. I feel caught between the devil and the deep blue sea as my Mum didn't want my sister to know her finances as she thought of her as a "spend thrift" (she can be) but I can see how hurtful it is to my sister if I maintain that line. Not only that, it makes her think I am trying to hide something when I am not. POA's aren't always helpful to the POA! It's a double edged sword.

Why should people talk to family members about their money, if they do not need to?

I knew who my parents worked for and what they did. In retirement I knew who they had pensions from, but not in detail or how much, although their jobs and time in them gave me a pretty good idea and I knew they had savings as well.

What more did I need to know? When my father became ill nd we activated the POA, I knew which bank his personal account was held in.

Our finances are more complex and we will need to draw up a schedule of where it is held for DC, but again, they know where we hold our current accounts and who pays our pensions .

BlueBelle

I only heard the very tail end so can’t really report on it but there was something on the news this morning about the concerns of elderly parents being encouraged to set up joint accounts with children
Is this just a coincidence that we have a thread on it ??
MaybeI m just be ultra suspicious of this new thread/poster?

You are right to feel suspicious, Bluebelle

New poster, intrusive questions and the OP did not go through GNHQ as is usually required of journalists etc.

Could easily be a journalist and we have given our opinions for what they are worth, we've discussed the pros and cons of joint accounts and generally said no thanks.

Does GNHQ charge a fee for official surveys of opinion?

I told my kids all the way along, why wouldn't I?

I am 81 years of age and am computet literate and do everything online. I have made a will out and our family have copies and know exactly what is in the will. I have also taken out Power of Attorney in case I become unable to manage my financial business and anything else that comes along, they also have copies of that as they will be the ones who inherit everything.

I have included letters to them all telling them what kind of a funeral I want, what flowers and what kind of music I want. If I got knocked down by a double decker bus tomorrow all my finances and everything else will be straightforward.

I lost my husband 10 years ago and I now live a quiet but comfortable life in my lovely home and if I die tomorrow I will have no regrets at all. My husband and I had a fantastic courtship and marriage, it was love at first sight in 1964 when he asked me to dance at the Mecca Locarno .

I have also signed an official DNR (do not resuscitate) in case I have a terminal illness that will need ongoing care. There is no way on this earth I am going to be stuck in a hospital bed, hospice or anywhere else for that matter just give me painkillers and let me die peacefully.

As far as I am concerned, I have covered all bases.

Even though I have everything under control, wills and power of attorney etc. there is not a cat in hell's chance that I want our family to share my account as long as I am fit and healthy and my mind is 100%. I do not want them knowing what I am buying. Until I can no longer do online banking or cannot remember what day it is, my money is my money and it will be my account.

Letting the kids take over the finances? Has anyone seen/read 'King Lear'?

I think that many of us know what we are doing and have made provisions for if and when we become unable to manage our finances and day to day living. I have. After my husband died 10 years ago the first thing I did was get the family together, organise a solicitor and made out my will and power of attorney, they all know what is in my will and power of attorney and regarding my finances, state and private pensions that is my business until the day comes that I am no longer able to manage day to day living, that is when our family will take over, everything is paid by direct debit and I do online banking and online shopping.

Even though I am 81, I have all my faculties, am very healthy and know more about computers than our 50 odd year old family do in fact when they have problems, they and even our teenage grandchildren ring me to sort it out.

Me neither, until I am unable to do things for my self and I lose my marbles then the power of attorney will kick in.

I set up a joint bank account with my daughtr when I was working abroad so that she could deal with family birthday/Christmas presents for me, this was to avoid the cost of overseas post. This worked very well, until she lost her job and had to delare bankruptcy. At that point the account was seized and I nearly lost what cash was in there, It wasn't huge amount but I also used the account for ready cash when I had trips to the UK it caused a great deal of inconvenience. I did manage to sort it out but was extremely difficult from another country. We always need to be aware of pitfalls in joint acccounts not matter how trustworthy the joint holder may be.

I would imagine the joint bank accounts refers mostly in cases of Dementia, where a loved one lose capacity. Often this is set up after diagnoses, so it is in place when required when the donor no longer has capacity to do their own banking.. The son/daughter or whoever can then use the bank account for caring relating items as necessary. This is usually the person who. has POA. It is a perfectly good arrangement which the bank keeps an eye on so it is not misused. It is not a "joint" account but an account with a named person authorised to act on behalf of the donor. The money does not become the property of the shared party once the donor has died but stays as part of the donors estate. I think it is vital to set up POA and letting your children know your wishes, even living will is now recommended to save much unnecessary argument amongst children.

Lilyflower😄

In my family, both the one I grew up in, and now, we have never made any secret of money matters.

But that does not mean I would ever have a joint account with one of my children. Joint accounts are after all frozen on the death of the one holder, and I am better at money matters than my son is!

Heck. I’m far more tech savvy than two of my kids. They ask me for advice.
My very elderly dad decided last year that he just wasn’t doing anything finance wise any more and assumed I would do it. Which was my prompt to get him to agree to activate his POA. Otherwise I’d have been acting illegally. My parents never ever discussed money with me, neither mine nor theirs, and I was utterly astounded as to how much he has and did feel a bit mmph that I’d scripmed and saved for years to give myself and the kids a decent standard of living and put a tiny bit away in a pension.

If I shared an online account with my daughter, it wouldn’t be very long before it became empty.

Besides, my finances are personal.
Even my partner doesn’t get a look in.

I’m perfectly capable of doing online banking, also.

Madgran77

*Personally I work in tech so I wandered whether there were any interesting solutions people use to collaborate with their grown up adult kids before it gets to needing a POA*

Do a POA earlier rather than later! Too many people leave it too late

DH has all our investments on spreadsheets and DC know how to access them should the need arise. We have LPAs set up for the future with each other and both DC as attorneys.

The patronising assumption that all old people are clueless idiots annoys me. DH is a computer and financial whizz who was worked in tech all his life and he is 74. Even my late mother did everything online at 86.

fancythat

My first reaction to this thread was similar to others.

Second reaction, in light of the more recent post, and
I've heard some people recently using shared accounts (with their kids) to get help with online banking and thought it was a cool idea.
Okay? Maybe a good idea?

But going by some family situations on GN, that would certainly not be a suitable arrangement for all.
And some or many GNetters are more than capable of doing online banking themselves.

If you have a joint account with your child and you die then they get all the money in the account , would you like that to happen ?

The patronising assumption that all old people are clueless idiots annoys me. DH is a computer and financial whizz who was worked in tech all his life and he is 74. Even my late mother did everything online at 86.

I quite agree with you, and the same could have been said about my Dad. Indeed he was still driving and towing his caravan at 84.
However, at 92 vascular dementia is gradually reducing what he is capable of doing and it is a case of introducing measures to support him as and when a new need arises.

I'm 55, have discussed and set up both finance and health POAs with my son.
He knows who I bank with, along with my utility company, tv service, council tax, etc,etc, and where to find all my passwords if/when they're needed.
Everyone should arrange to have these types of talks with their adult children, and get POAs set up, because no-one knows what's going to happen tomorrow.
I don't really want to be negative, but we could be run over by the proverbial bus, and left unable to look after our own finances or be able to make our own health decisions, but if you've had the conversations and arranged POAs, the people you've assigned to take on these responsibilities will be able to do so straight away, but without them, they would be facing an expensive, lengthy, legal fight through the courts to try to get permission to look after these things for you.
Setting up POAs is fairly straightforward and inexpensive (people in receipt of certain DWP benefits can do them for free). You can find forms on the gov.uk website to fill in yourself, you don't need solicitors to do them for you.

There is no “ one sister fits all” some of us keep our wits into our 90s some need help sooner, we should be honest with ourselves how much we can do ourselves and take notice of others when they ask if you’re OK.

One size fits all

Of course not all people of a greater age aren't all idiots but one of the blights of dementia is that if you are suffering from it, you don't always realise it so insist you are ok long after the need for help. 80% of Alzheimers sufferers believe they can still do everything they could before this vile disease took hold even when the physical evidence contradicts this. That is why you need to put things into place before you reach this point because by the time you do, it's too late and nobody knows if they are going to be affected.

Our adult children know everything about my husband's business, they'll have to run the business alone someday without being 'managed' . They know where we bank, what we have, what we intend for care, and what charity we support, who is our attorney and accountant, where my books are located.

To use an annoying phrase 'they've got this.'

We'd never consider not telling them, they do have eyes and ears.