<p>We had to cosign our son’s lease. He is in a studio apartment so no other persons on the lease. We debated between putting money into his account monthly or by the semester. I decided on monthly. My reasoning was that if he was working at a job he wouldn’t be paid by the semester and most of us adults don’t budget our money by the semester.<br>
I put the money into his account at the end of each month. He knows that the amount has to cover everything: utilities, rent, food, etc. and that any shortfall has to be made up by him.</p>
<p>CALmom - you are right that my CPA is conservative… but given the requirement on us is writing and mailing one check a month to the landlord vs writing and mailing a check to him, I’m opting for the better safe than sorry - especially since she just lost a case with the IRS in this area. </p>
<p>Record keeping is the key in any dealings with the IRS - and I agree that in most cases, the act of sending him a check once a month would probably suffice. Basically, I’m just being paranoid. :)</p>
<p>DS paycheck is spending money only - he will make less than 5K this year - so not really a factor in this.</p>
<p>We are in the camp of giving them a monthly amount for their use. </p>
<p>We dispense the equivalent of a single on campus room and the highest meal plan board divided monthly. Only one had a 12 month lease thus far, but did live there during the summers for internship purpose; in that case, our monthly amount extended for the summer.</p>
<p>We had one interesting landlord issue. Senior son was sharing a 2 bedroom condo with the owner’s son. Roommate’s mom wanted us to send her the check each month to cover rent and his share of the utilities. We were also required to cosign the lease.</p>
<p>I held firm to the position that I needed my son to continue to develop the skill of anticipating expenses. She relented only after my assurance that if son was late or short she could call us to correct the situation. I facilitated his compliance by creating automatic transfers for one week before rent was due. When son saw the large balance in his account he wrote and sent the appropriate payment.</p>
<p>We never received that call.</p>
<p>S2 is a soph. living off campus this year. We transfer $$ into his acct. monthly. He shares the house with 3 others.
The rent is due this week. I deposited it into his acct. I asked if they had stamps/envelopes for bills. S2 say “no”. So I ask what the plan is. S2 says “we’ll just drive over to landlords house and drop it off”!</p>
<p>College boy logic…easier to drive the rent check over than to have to go to make a trip to buy stamps and envelopes…go figure.</p>