What rules govern your giving money to your children? When do you stop?
What age do you start giving them an allowance?
How much?
Do you pay for their devices?
Do you pay for their vacations?
Do they live rent free?
Do you give them free university?
Buy them a car?
Downpayment on a house?
Allowance - I recall we gave them from the age of 10 to 18. It was not much, maybe $10-$20 a week, I can't remember (so it must not have been much ). However, chores were expected to be completed to earn the allowance. Neither DW or I received an allowance from our parents.
Devices - Basic talk/text mobile phones we paid for, smart phones were on them. They could stay on our family plan, but once they realized mom and dad could track their activities and control calling/text is needed, they paid for their own separate plan
. We paid for computers for high school (actually I built them from spare parts as I upgraded mine) and both them their initial laptops for college.
Vacations - as adults we pay for their vacations if we want them with us, or want them to visit us. If we go somewhere and they choose to come along, we might pay for a portion (e.g. they pay transportation, we help with some of the lodging, we cover meals).
Rent free - only if they are enrolled in college. If they are working they pay a small amount (which we have "rebated" once they got their own place).
College/university - We paid undergraduate tuition for up to 5 years. If they lived on campus, we paid for housing and a meal plan (but if they used up the meal plan money they were on their own). If they lived off campus we paid up to a certain limit for rent based on the area.After 5 years, if they did not get their degree they were on their own, but we made some exceptions based on unique situations. For graduate school they are on their own. Our parents paid for our undergraduate education so we tried to do the same.
Car - We promised them either a car (a new used one up to a certain limit) or the equivalent in cash upon their undergraduate degree.
Down payment - none have bought houses yet, but we do plan to help them out with some of the down payment (they do not know this).
At this point, with all of them adults, we provide random assistance, based on situations, so that it would reduce the chance of them taking it for granted. For example, a car accident that was not their fault we would help with any deductible. When we received monies from my parents estate we passed along some of it to them. We give them small gifts for birthdays and Christmas, but have given large gifts for "milestone" birthdays.
The children all have different personalities, some have more of an "entitlement" mindset than others, but at least they all tell us they appreciate what we do and have rarely asked us directly for money. The few times they did, based on the circumstances we gave them loans (which they did pay back). At times they have asked us to help their friends in place of us helping them. We never discuss with one what we have given the others - if they want to share with each other than is up to them.