Young Brits ‘Bleed Parents Dry’
Young adults throughout the UK are more dependent on their parents than any other generation – financially that is. Over 10 million young adults in the UK have been taking large sums of mum and dads money at an age they should be financially stable, either as a loan or a very generous gift.
In the past ten years parents in the UK have lent £2.1 billion to their grown up children. Four out of ten parents in the study admitted to giving out an average of £12,300 to their adult children, directly taken from their personal finance.
The main reason parents are giving out the money is to help their children on the property ladder, with 29% of the borrowed and given money going toward home purchase and deposit. Coming in second was car with 23% and other notable reasons included furniture and household items, paying off debt, living expenses, education fees and travelling.
Merlin Stone, leading economist, commented on the findings, “The same generation of children who came home to their parents to roost after university before departing to set up their own household are coming back with their hands out for help with the housing and furniture, car purchase and even holidays.”
“The paradox is that while our society is getting richer, it is increasingly dependent on intergenerational gifts. And worryingly half of these gifts are associated with the investments needed just to get started in life.”
Savings News posted on 15/10/2007 11:06:55
|
