<p>When my daughter went to college, we gave her access to her $$ that had been saved for her from baptism/gifts/etc. We told her “this is your spending money. We will not be giving you spending money. You are responsible for earning money during the summers to replace what you spend.” Then we let her at it. It is her money.
We do pay all her tuition/room and board/travel home expenses.</p>
<p>Wow, ok, I do see how I am not letting him grow up. I’m also afraid that he’ll be out of money months before graduation, and I too am recently out of work. He knows, but being in a college atmosphere, I really think he’s lost sense of the real world.
Can I insist that he get a job first, then I will hand over the money?</p>
<p>or you talk to him and say what it feels like for you right now…you have no source of income and what it feels to have bills but no income. You have been doling out his money so he is not in the situation where he has no money, but still has fees.
Tell him that you do not have any money to bail him out.
Have him make a budget per month…so if he has, say, $1600 in his account but 8months to go, then he can only spend $200 per month, much like what you have been giving him. But if he spends more than $200, then he is borrowing from another month. What will he do without in that month? No food? No fun? Or perhaps a better way would be to bring in his own money and get a part time job.
But you cannot and will not give him anymore spending/living money than what is in that account.</p>
<p>Or better yet, tell him before you turn over the reins to his bank account, he has to make you a budget per month and show you how he can get through the rest of the year with that money. At least that will make him think it through.</p>
<p>And for my daughter at least, she is much more stingy with her money than she is with mine. :-)</p>
<p>I’m not critical of how you have handled the situation in college ~ I’m sure you wanted him to graduate and whatever decisions you made had that as the main goal. But with one semester to go, I wouldn’t worry so much about the decision you make for “now”, I would concentrate and face having a game plan for after graduation: How much to help (or not) What are you willing to put up with (him living back home). It’s a tough job market out there -and I know the financial reality has me second guessing what would otherwise be a tough love approach.</p>
<p>At this point he should be spending his time looking for a “real” job for after he graduates. I’m not sure that getting a temp job right now is the right move. I’d have him prepay like the others have suggested. However since you are out of work are you concerned you won’t be able to pay for what you have been paying for and so he may need to cover costs you would have paid for if you were employed?</p>
<p>I would hand over HIS money…and let him know that getting a job is how this money will be replenished if he runs out. The “Bank of Parent” needs to close, especially of you are not working yourself.</p>
<p>If he runs out of HIS money, that is HIS problem, not yours. </p>
<p>If you run short on cash, will HE give you money? Betcha not.</p>
<p>He needs to do this himself…now. Actually, he should have been doing his own money manage,ent since freshman year…in my opinion.</p>
<p>My kids earned their discretionary spending money…and spent it. Honestly, I have NO IDEA how much they earned or spent in college. It was THEIR money. We did not supplement discretionary spending money. PERIOD. And in our family, that included books.</p>
<p>You can’t hold his money hostage to make him get a job. It’s HIS money. You have absolutely no right to it for any reason, to teach a lesson or otherwise (unless he owes you the money for something).</p>
<p>However you work out the current financial situation, you and your son need to give some thought to the upcoming costs associated with his transition from college to whatever comes next.</p>
<p>He may have considerable expenses during that transition, and he almost certainly will have cash flow issues. </p>
<p>For example, if he is going out of town for a job interview, the company may pay for it, but they may not be able to reimburse him until afterward. He might have to pay for a plane ticket, rental car, hotel room, etc., and get the money back later. That’s what I mean by a cash flow problem.</p>
<p>In terms of expenses during the transition, he may need to pay the first and last months’ rent on a new apartment, get suitable clothing for job interviews (and later for the job), buy at least minimal furniture if this is the first time he will be living in an unfurnished place, pay deposits on utilities and Internet, and maybe even buy a car, if he doesn’t already have one. Different young people have different expenses, and he probably won’t face all of the ones I’ve listed. But it’s important to remember that he may have to pay for quite a few things before he has any income from a permanent job.</p>
<p>If there isn’t any money available for these sorts of things, you may want to talk with him about getting a part-time job now so he can save money for these purposes. But this would be separate from any discussions with him about managing his finances right now.</p>
<p>This is the strangest thread. I’ve never heard of a parent doing such a thing. You have a really compliant kid to just hand over his paychecks as a 21 yr old. He needs to learn to manage his own funds. College is a nice time to practice this while they are being housed and fed and no real harm will come to them if they mess up. The real world is a lot colder.</p>
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<p>Interesting regarding different perceptions on what’s essential vs discretionary spending. </p>
<p>From my perspective, college textbooks are categorized alongside essentials like college tuition or food. However, that doesn’t mean one doesn’t do their utmost to look around for bargains by buying used/discounted books.</p>
<p>Cobrat…of course books are not discretionary. However, since WE were paying tuition, fees, room, board, transportation home and cell phone, we asked that our kids buy their OWN books. You know…it was a good lesson as part of money management. They were very careful consumers, looked for the best price or textbook option (one kid rented books for one course. Both ordered their texts used online).</p>
<p>They learned that paying full price for a brand new book at the school bookstore was unnecessary.</p>
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<p>Interesting perspective. </p>
<p>Most college classmates I knew and I myself regarded phone bills as our responsibility while transportation to/from home varied by family. Granted, this did mean in practice, many students…especially young men like myself preferred using email and writing infrequent long letters to using the phone to make long-distance calls.</p>
<p>Cobrat…our kids were on our family plan. We asked only that they call us once a week…and we would pay the bill.</p>
<p>But back to the OP.</p>
<p>This kid EARNED the money and should be managing how it is spent himself. If he runs out of money…that then will be his problem, not his parent’s. </p>
<p>As noted above, I would not let my kid starve so would provide grocery store gift cards. BUT if he begged me for money, I would insist on seeing exactly what his every cent was being spent on…because I would not want to be funding ski vacations, concert tickets, expensive clothing, dinners out, etc. I’m not saying my kids shouldn’t spend THEIR money on those things, I’m saying they should not run out of money for things they need because they did.</p>
<p>Unless he is seriously underweight, he can finish his senior year without eating or going out. Give him his money, with stern warnings about how he will run out because he is not budgeting, and that you WILL NOT give in. Get your spouse on board with this. And then hand his money over. And then stand by it. Better he learn this now than in 5 yrs when he maybe has a wife and children.</p>
<p>I will say, when I married my husband, his parents had always controlled his money. He had NO CLUE how to manage his own money. It took years, because he was already 24 yrs old, for him to understand anything. This was a man with a degree in math from U of Chicago and another degree in computer science from a state U. </p>
<p>Tell him you can help him with budgeting, but not money. It will take a little bit of him struggling before he finally gets it. Perhaps if he goes the spring not being able to go out at all with friends, he will learn to not spend so quickly later.</p>
<p>OP, I know what you mean. It’s one thing to say, “let him sell the car/borrow books/eat sparingly” and quite another to watch it happen, or have the money come from your own savings. So I see how you arrived at this. </p>
<p>Doling out the money in installments seemed an equitable compromise between letting him have it all (and he will overspend and borrow from you) and micromanaging. BUT you have to stop with the advances. That’s your end of things. You just say “I’m sorry, that’s not the deal”. If he continues to press to have it all, give it to him. And then when he comes begging, you have to be resolute. (I have been there, done this, and it is awful, let me tell you) Help him problem-solve without your money. </p>
<p>Money management does not come naturally to many people. You cannot model it, advise it, or otherwise externally create the pressure to care about it. Only simple economics will help, and even then, we all know plenty of adults who are up to their eyeballs in debt and financial ruin because they never do get it.</p>
<p>Bottom line: Controlling his money is really about control.</p>
<p>We have a joint account with our son, so we can see if he runs through his money. (He doesn’t, in fact I wish he’d spend a little more on fun!) He could empty up the account and set up his own account any time if he wanted to, but it’s easier for us to reimburse him for textbooks and the like this way. Anyway I think college is high time for a young adult to learn to budget on their own. Just make it clear what you will pay for - we cover textbooks and other university related expense, and we also pay for travel to see us and the phone bill. He’s on his own for the rest. I’ve encouraged him to use Excel to track expenses, though I’m not convinced he does. At this point he doesn’t need to, so I haven’t pushed it.</p>
<p>I’m getting ready to give it to him. FYI, he worked all summer receiving mostly cash for his restaurant job, sometimes double shifts, and loved spending time counting his money! We are only talking about expenses, like beer and gas and excessive restaurant $ and weekend excursions.
I pay for food, rent and utilities. He couldn’t possibly be able to pay for that.
Getting a job would be the answer, I just hope he doesn’t find credit cards as his answer.</p>
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<p>If he has no credit established already and no real source of income, that is unlikely to be a problem as he’s almost certainly not going to get approved let alone for a decent line of credit.</p>
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<p>When I got my first job I didn’t have a bank account and the place did direct deposit so I would have it deposited into my parent’s bank account and they’d withdraw it and give me cash. It usually wasn’t too much money, less than $800 a month. Could be that he did the same thing of depositing it in his parent’s bank account but they’re controlling it.</p>
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<p>He’d have to have quite a bit of extra fat to live 2 months without eating. I know you see the stories of people living a year off of body fat and not eating anything, but it’s not typical.</p>
<p>Now, obviously we’re in America and he’ll find a way to feed himself without money before starving to death, but that’s not a particularly good situation to put him in either. Especially if it’s his money.</p>