Exactly…gifting for all or part of the down payment is an option many find more financially doable.
The title should be “how to buy your child a home”. 
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True!
I hesitated where to put this - whether to give it its own thread or pop it in this one or the “saving for a downpayment” one - this thread is more active so it wins!!!
Would your adult child ever consider buying your home? I guess your current home or a home you owned in the past if you still owned it (like maybe your first home).
I know a couple my age who sold their home where they raised their 2 boys in and were at for about 30 years about 2-3 years ago. The house recently went back up for sale - one of those two boys bought it - their first home will be their childhood home (with one other owner inbetween!)
Take away that your adult child doesn’t live in your town…but the house itself - can you ever imagine your child purchasing one of their childhood homes???
Gifted article:
We sold our kids main childhood home in fall 2023. My son and his wife live in town and have their own home but I think if looking for a home they would have seriously considered it.
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During our son’s recent visit, he took his new wife to see the old 'hood where he grew up and has mentioned several times that he’d like to end up back in AZ someday, but I don’t think he’d consider buying the house he grew up in, though he loved it while we lived there (he had a killer bedroom with a large private bath). The style of the house (not referring to decor) is not current and does not reflect his and DIL’s tastes. I think they would prefer to build or buy new or inherit the house we currently live in. They absolutely love our cabin and will inherit that someday, too. They don’t need our help to buy a house, though.
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I think all my kids would love to buy our home. It’s not happening as they we aren’t selling and they won’t be able to afford it.
My daughter has a neighbor who is living in her childhood home and raising her kids. The parents still own it but the daughter has lived in it for over 20 years.
Not the house I grew up in but had it been in different circumstances, would have liked to buy the house my mom and dad bought in retirement.
No ties to the house but the community and the set up of the house is great.
But it wasn’t the right time for us and so it was sold to new owners.
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Ds2 would love to live in our house.+
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I don’t think our kids could afford to live in any of their childhood homes. House prices are SO EXPENSIVE in our area.
The exception might be the condo we lived in when D was born and they house we moved to when she was toddler and lived in when S was born. The condo is very nice and has a neighborhood pool and playground. D has little to no memory of living there though. The house we moved into when she was 3 had a huge yard, but the neighborhood didn’t have an HOA and while most of the houes and yards were well-kept, there were a few houes and yards that didn’t look so great. Also, the house was built on a lot with poor drainage. During an El Nino year our patio flooded and it was a mess.
This may definitely be the case for some! I wasn’t sure how to phrase it…I think the point of the article was would they, if they could - find it desirable to live in the house that they grew up in - as an adult.
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Our son would never have been interested in buying the house he grew up in, and I wouldn’t have wanted him to do so. It was poorly constructed, in bad shape, and high maintenance. But excellent location, which is why we successfully sold it as a tear down when we moved. So the house doesn’t exist anymore anyway. Or, as I used to say, I pushed the birdie out of the nest for the second time then tore down the nest.
He is delighted that we own our current home in San Diego and I think would like to live here someday. He just has to outlive us and it’s his!
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I would have loved to buy my childhood home, and my parents knew that. Unfortunately, by the time they were ready to sell it, my kids were well entrenched in their schools and with their friend groups. There was no advantage to the home I grew up on versus the one we were living in - equally good schools, equally good commutes to work, different types of neighborhoods but each good in their own way. So at that point, I didn’t want to buy the house I grew up in.
I don’t think my guys will want the house we own now, mostly because I don’t see either living in this area. And even if they did, I don’t think my husband and I will hold onto the house that long. If DH and I died tomorrow, the cash from the sale of the house would be equally split between my two boys. So theoretically, if I just gave the house to one boy, I’d want to give the other boy the cash value of half. If I let one boy buy the house for a discounted rate, I’d want to give the other boy the cash equivalent of the discount, because that’s money from his inheritance that he wouldn’t be getting.
Of course, all of that is moot because I don’t have that kind of money. Assuming I’m alive, I would need the value from the sale of the house to help purchase wherever I’m living.
In terms of helping my adult kids buy a house, I’d like to be able to do that. I don’t expect to be able to do a whole lot, but if I can gift them enough to be able to make a downpayment more reasonable, I’d like to be able to do that. But who knows what the world will look like at that point in terms of cash in the bank for me or my kids. I was very lucky, my DH and I bought a townhouse about a year after we got married, and my parents were able to give us some money towards the downpayment, which certainly made it less painful. I’d like to be able to do that for my guys, if I can.
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D keeps telling us we can’t sell our house - that she wants to live here. I don’t really see that happening, although I don’t see us selling this house either !
Great house, right-sized as H calls it. Not too big, not too small, great neighborhood for kids. And as H grumbles, we’ve updated every room in the house 
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Actually we know people where this has happened. And it worked out very well.
- Parents sold the family home to their oldest child. It’s worked out great.
- Parent sold their house, and used part of the profit to buy the kid’s condo. The money the kid made was used to purchase the grandparent’s home. Everyone was happy.
If our DD stays in this area, we would most definitely ask her if she wants to buy our house. But right now they are living in her husband’s grandma’s house, and would consider buying that. Our neighborhood is terrific and we have a private beach with our neighbors on a gorgeous lake. We also have a little ski area in town. But a lot depends on job locations for DD and her husband. They will be able to afford our house!
In all the above cases, there were fair market sales with a little reduction. But everyone was so happy the houses were staying in the family.
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S really has no idea where he wants to live next or wants to live long term. It’s hard to help him buy any place under such circumstances.
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Our son is closing on his first house on Thursday in Denver . He did not ask for any help but we have given him a few thousand dollars to get some things he needs. Older son and his wife bought in 2022 in DC and they did not ask for help either. We had given them some money for their wedding earlier that year though. We did buy them a couple things for their new home.
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That’s great! I’m under the impression that it is still a pretty hot seller’s market in Denver… true? We live about an hour away - still a seller’s market but seems not a crazy as a few years ago.
I’m really not sure. He told us he was looking the beginning of February , looked at 8 places and decided to make an offer on one of them. I guess you’d call it a duplex
3 bedroom 3 bath with rooftop. It’s new and he got some incentives thrown in by the developer so he seems happy. I’m happy for him . He was renting a small house in Denver for a few years and I think he was just ready to finally buy. We are going out there in May to check it out.
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H’s sister bought his parents house. They built (literally my FIL and MIL’s father did much of the work) it over 60 years ago and it had always been the family homestead. SIL is making needed changes/updates but I think the entire family is happy the house is staying in the family.
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H’s brother bought MIL’s house after she passed. That was nice because he wanted all the crappy stuff inside just the way it was 
. They had an independent appraisal done and he paid FMV (already spelled out in her trust). BIL is one to drag his feet on everything. Luckily there was a change in inheritance rules happening soon so feet dragging was not an option here. I forget the details but he was to deduct the FMV of the house from his proceeds of the trust to purchase the house.
Neither of our adult kids will want our house. While it’s in a nice highly desirable area (and no mortgage), S doesn’t live in the area and D doesn’t want to deal with the traffic in and out.
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