Is there a kipper in your house?
If you have adult children living at home, you’ve got “kippers”.
The acronym, created by a UK insurance company, stands for:
Kids
In
Parents’
Pockets
Eroding
Retirement
Savings
Sounds a bit more serious than what North Americans tend to call adult children living at home: boomerang kids.
So what can you do to get your kids out of your pockets and make sure your retirement savings is still there when you want to retire?
It can be tough: The simple truth is that more people in your house = more dollars. With an adult child at home, you’ll be using more heat, hot water, and electricity. You’ll need to buy more groceries. You’ll need more gas for the car.
You need to work out a budget for your household and ensure it’s something everyone can live with. If you don’t know where the money to make the situation work will come from, you need to think long and hard about whether you can help your adult child by having them live at your home. Otherwise, as the acronym says, it can be easy to let your retirement savings be eroded away.
With some simple budgeting strategies you can get a good overview of the situation before your child moves home – and keep those kippers out of your pockets!
The Danger of Helping Adult Children with Living Costs
The Money Across Generations SM study conducted for Ameriprise Financial by GfK Roper Public Affairs, makes clear that a large percentage of boomer parents have a difficult time cutting the financial strings.
The study shows that two-thirds of boomer parents are helping adult children pay off college loans or tuition, more than half are contributing to the purchase of a new car and one-third help their adult children deal with living costs ranging from a home mortgage to utility payments.
There is no doubt that financially supporting children is commonplace for boomer parents.
After all, some of the most notable expenses in life such as housing, cars and education, have become extremely expensive, and parents often want what’s best for their kids.
How much of a favor are you doing by providing a constant source of supplemental income to your children?
Adult children living at home too long may be less likely to own their own homes — ever
A warning to parents with adult kids still living at home: If your kids are older than 25, you might want to start pushing them out the door.
A new survey indicates the percentage of people who purchase their own homes while in their 30s increases with age of departure from the parental home until about age 25 – then it drops. After age 28, their chances of becoming homeowners are no better than children who fly the coop at 16.
Half of 20-to-24-year-old Australians live at home with their parents.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, almost 50 per cent of 20-to-24-year-olds live at home with their parents, in what one author dubs the “Crowded Nest Syndrome.”