On the brink of retirement and....

[tbeltrans]

Originally Posted by PorkPieGuy

I didn't know it was per year - I just thought it was for the course. Sorry!

A lot of churches teach a class and only charge for the materials (and it's a one-time fee). Even still, it would be good for them to have a plan for leaving and some sort of timeline in place.

Be wary of who is teaching the class. My wife and I attended a Sunday morning Bible study years ago and the teacher also taught the financial class. The first day we showed up, the teacher was telling how his wife got into one of those accidents with their Ford Explorer in which she was rear ended, and in turn rear ended the car in front of her. Apparently multiple vehicles were involved and nobody was hurt. However, he was worried that the insurance company would "total" their car. He said that if that happened, he would be stuck with the payments on top of making payments on a new car, because he owed more than the car was worth.

Before I could catch myself, I asked how the heck somebody gets into THAT situation. He looked at me as if I were from another planet, and his response indicated that, to him, carrying debt like that is normal - everybody does it. The cause of my bewilderment was that I don't go into debt at all to buy a car, ever, so that kind of problem is foreign to me. I buy what I can afford, and prefer to save for it instead of borrow, and assumed (wrongly) that somebody teaching people how to handle their money would do likewise.

Would I want to learn from somebody who does carry that kind of debt? Probably not. I would seek out folks who live more responsibly than that to emulate, which is what I did and have been much better off as a result. You don't need to pay for a course on this stuff. Just find somebody who lived through the Depression of the 1930s (and learned from it) and listen to what they have to say.

Tony

[Jcamp]

I was going to mention FPU as well. It’s not $129 a year it’s $129 for the class and a year of access to the training materials and videos. I’m pretty sure that once that year is expired Dave’s team will probably set u up again with the online portions again for free. I’m a big fan of his and have heard him to many times to count that he’ll tell folks on the radio to just email them and they’ll unlock it again. If you and your family are needing to get on the same page I would recommend that you all take it. I agree with the poster above that you should be careful as u can on who is teaching it but for the most part it is about a hour long video followed by conversation and “home work” like making a budget, working on your insurance and stuff like that for 9 weeks (one class per week). Much of his material can be found online for free but in your situation it may b better to have the class atmosphere. Whatever the case I wish you the best of luck and prayers. Hope everyone learns many lessons through this and comes out the other side much wiser/smarter and ready to move out and become the person they should be. Lol
Keep in mind that Dave himself was a millionaire before he went broke (due to being in debt) and now he’s a multimillionaire doing things differently so who knows what the next 5-10-20 years can do for your family

[TBman]

Thanks for the encouragement everyone. We'll get through this.

[tbeltrans]

Originally Posted by Jcamp

Keep in mind that Dave himself was a millionaire before he went broke (due to being in debt) and now he’s a multimillionaire doing things differently so who knows what the next 5-10-20 years can do for your family

Now, if this is true (and I have no reason not to think so), then this is a guy one would listen to. He has been through a tough lesson and come out the other side. I would think he and I would have similar views about choosing debt over saving.

Anyway, TBman, I have often heard that having kids really helps the parents "grow up". I don't know that I could deal with a situation like you are going through (not having kids, I have not had to develop the type of strength it would take), but you seem to have a handle on it. I am sure you all will do fine.

Tony

[Mr. Jelly]

Be careful. You're in a tough position. It has become common in todays world for grown children to demolish their parents financial retirement. Because of situations just like yours. You must take care of yourself and not have your future taken away from you. Or that you give away your future. At 65 you don't have much to draw from and time is not on your side.

[JCave]

Originally Posted by Mr. Jelly

Be careful. You're in a tough position. It has become common in todays world for grown children to demolish their parents financial retirement. Because of situations just like yours. You must take care of yourself and not have your future taken away from you. Or that you give away your future. At 65 you don't have much to draw from and time is not on your side.

My oldest brother... We've not spoken in over six years.

[Pura Vida]

Originally Posted by Mr. Jelly

Be careful. You're in a tough position. It has become common in todays world for grown children to demolish their parents financial retirement. Because of situations just like yours. You must take care of yourself and not have your future taken away from you. Or that you give away your future. At 65 you don't have much to draw from and time is not on your side.

My co-worker is going through this right now. He has three adult kids (20s, 30s) and a handful of grandkids, and he also owns three homes (primary residence, plus two rental houses). The other two kids are tenants in each house. One makes rent and may eventually buy it from him, but the other has been shorting him on rent for years (b/c he knows he can get away with it). He puts up with all of it to provide stability for his grandkids, but it's obvious that two of his kids are taking advantage of him, as a result.

It's painful to watch him work so hard and have everyone bleed him along the way. He needs to make his kids develop an exit strategy, other than bleeding him dry.

[RP]

I was half on my own during college and completely on my own once I finished. My son is 32 and supports himself although he knows he can turn to his mother or myself in an emergency. My girlfriend's two adult children are in their thirties and are employed, but she still feels responsible for their financial well-being and gives them unsolicited large chunks of money at various times as well as regularly buys clothes for their children. Am I missing something or was I just born into the wrong family? I just don't get this concept of adult children being supported by their parents....

[Mr. Jelly]

I ran into an old musician I know the other day. He's a retired custodian. He had his two grand children with him and it looked nice with grandpa out with his grand children etc. We started catching up and then he says, you know my son's in prison? I didn't. He tells me he's taking care of the kids and his son is about to get out. I'm thinking wow that would suck. And where and how is his son going to live crossed my mind. Then he says my wife's on hospice. I told him my heart went out to him. Now I'm praying for the custodian.

[jnidoh]

Barry...love your smiling smiley......you have a sense of humor and will need it in the near future.

My wife and I have been through this with 4 nieces, their parents were either self centered morons or drug/alcohol dependent individuals. Partly raised them and found their parents lying/cheating lifestyle hard to over come.

They toed the line at our house but it hurt to see the type of people they became. One niece has a 2 yr old son and is pregnant again by her boyfriend who will not get a real job since the law will take out child support for two children from two different wives.

I don't know what the answer is but you seem like the kind of person that can deal with it. Good luck.

john

[Neil K Walk]

Originally Posted by Mr. Jelly

I ran into an old musician I know the other day. He's a retired custodian. He had his two grand children with him and it looked nice with grandpa out with his grand children etc. We started catching up and then he says, you know my son's in prison? I didn't. He tells me he's taking care of the kids and his son is about to get out. I'm thinking wow that would suck. And where and how is his son going to live crossed my mind. Then he says my wife's on hospice. I told him my heart went out to him. Now I'm praying for the custodian.

Millennials are a weird bunch. Maybe they're not all flakes though:

https://www.thecut.com/2019/05/25-si...=pocket-newtab

It makes me think that maybe putting all your eggs in one basket is not all that sane either.

Anyway, there's an old saying: "there's no such thing as a free lunch." Did you pay for your friend's?

[TBman]

Originally Posted by jnidoh

Barry...love your smiling smiley......you have a sense of humor and will need it in the near future.

My wife and I have been through this with 4 nieces, their parents were either self centered morons or drug/alcohol dependent individuals. Partly raised them and found their parents lying/cheating lifestyle hard to over come.

They toed the line at our house but it hurt to see the type of people they became. One niece has a 2 yr old son and is pregnant again by her boyfriend who will not get a real job since the law will take out child support for two children from two different wives.

I don't know what the answer is but you seem like the kind of person that can deal with it. Good luck.

john

Thanks. The whole thing is making me a bit cranky from time to time though. I'll try to limit my "get off my lawn" comments here to only 3 a week,

[MrDB]

Barry, your story is unfortunately all too familiar to me. My 45 y/o daughter has never been financially independent in her entire adult life. She has lurched from one catastrophe to the next for 25+ yrs. The amount of money that the First National Bank of Dad has spent bailing her out time after time is into six figures.

Now none of that would have ever been spent if there were no grandchildren. But it's hard to let your grandkids live in a house with no heat or no water or no food or a car that's not safe to drive.

I'm retiring next year, and there will be no more bailouts. If she can't handle life on her own then she'll need to figure it out. Dad is done.

[RP]

Originally Posted by MrDB

Barry, your story is unfortunately all too familiar to me. My 45 y/o daughter has never been financially independent in her entire adult life. She has lurched from one catastrophe to the next for 25+ yrs. The amount of money that the First National Bank of Dad has spent bailing her out time after time is into six figures.

Now none of that would have ever been spent if there were no grandchildren. But it's hard to let your grandkids live in a house with no heat or no water or no food or a car that's not safe to drive.

I'm retiring next year, and there will be no more bailouts. If she can't handle life on her own then she'll need to figure it out. Dad is done.

My girlfriend keeps saying that about giving money to her adult children, and I remind her about the extinction burst...

An extinction burst is a concept from behavioral psychology. It involves the concept of elimination of a behavior by refusing to reinforce it.

The best example of this is a child’s tantrum. Parents react to tantrums, which is why they often work, but the point of the tantrum is primarily attention. So when the parent reacts, it reinforces the tantrum and increases the frequency of it. What many parents fail to understand is that even a spank or yelling is still attention and still helps to reinforce the tantrum.

What is generally very effective about reducing tantrums is not attention, but a complete dearth of it. As difficult as it is to do so, the tantrum will generally go away once the attention is removed.

But first there is the extinction burst.

The extinction burst is basically what happens when the tantrum’s not working any longer– it actually gets worse for a time before it fades away. If you’ve ever seen kids throwing a tantrum, you’ve probably seen this — some more informed parents will let the tantrum go and they don’t actually look like good parents when doing it– they look kind of mean and uncaring, but it’s often the right thing to do despite appearances.

So what happens is that the kid just starts ramping up that tantrum– thinking “I just need to try harder.” And sometimes this works– the parent relents, gives the attention (which may be yelling or a slap, but it’s still attention) and the kid gets rewarded for the tantrum and gets rewarded for making the tantrum worse.

[Glennwillow]

Best of luck to you Barry! This is a tough turn of events for you. Sometimes the only answer is to work longer before retirement. Hopefully you have that option. I worked until I was 68 when blood pressure problems finally told me that I really had to get out of the pressure cooker. But for me, it did help my financial position to work later. In the scheme of things, a couple more years is not that long and it can provide a timeline for others to solve their financial problems.

- Glenn