Would you live with one of your Children and their Spouse? (physically, vacations)

[TheShadow]

That ^^^^ sounds like a perfectly nice arrangement. If OP wants to be more "in their grandkids' life" then that is one possible route to pursue, but not being under the same roof 24/7, and being financially obligated to stay if it doesn't work out.

What would happen if the OP needed to sell the house and recoup their down payment/equity to pay for nursing home care? Would their daughter and SIL be willing, or able, to buy them out?

[TheOldPuss]

God, No! I suspect they wouldn't want either me or Mr. Puss living with them, either. We're comfortable and set in our ways.

[EllieKay56]

Our son, daughter in law and 17 yr old grandson have shared our home for the past 2 years. We get along fine. My son and his wife use the lower level for sleeping and watching tv. Our grandson's bedroom is on the 2nd floor near ours. They buy all their own food and cook their own meals since we don't eat the same way. Our son cuts the grass (we live on over 2 acres) and takes care of snow removal.
I imagine they will be with us for another 2 years until the grandson graduates high school. He is involved in sports and when he is home he is in his room gaming. My son does have a job interview for a different job. If he gets it he would move 3 hours away but daughter in law and grandson would continue to live with us for a few more years. I will actually miss them when they move.
Our daughter lived with us for 9 months before she moved to Alaska. Our 18 month old grandson and 3 yr old granddaughter lived with us then. The older 2 stayed by their other grandparents so they would not have to switch schools and her husband split time between the 2 homes. I miss them and wish it could have been a longer stay.

[rfomd129]

Who remembers "living within one's means?" When hubby and I married almost 40 years ago, we lived in a 560 sf apt until we saved up enough for our first house. We live substantially better now ; ) and have been fortunate to have traveled the world with our now adult, and financially successful kids. My point is, it didn't happen overnight and no one gave us any monetary gifts or free childcare to achieve this. Someone upthread mentioned depriving the adult kids of the satisfaction of achieving on their own (or something similar to that) and I agree with that sentiment. Since I've never been given large monetary gifts I can't speak to how that feels but I do know how it feels to work, save and make smart decisions (delay gratification) to achieve our goals and it feels fabulous.

[AZgarden]

Well thanks to everyone of you who gave me "reps" for what I said. All 12 of you !!! I totally continue to agree with rfomd129 above that you may be doing a disservice to those kids by offering them too much at this stage of life. It IS so important to establish yourself as "grown-up" early on in life and stand on your own two feet. It may be necessary to rescue later on, should adversity happen. But for now, let them make their way in the world on their own. JMHO

[johngolf]

Originally Posted by kbrkr

My Daughter and son-in-law to be are asking us to move from Florida to Georgia with them so that they can get better paying teaching jobs in Atlanta area. They want to live 40min outside of Atlanta. They want to find a house with either a Mother/Daughter setup or one large enough for both families. They would like us to be the primary on the mortgage, but they will pay the mortgage payments, but will need our large down payment. I see a lot of issues with this, but I also see a lot of upside. Although we would help take care of the future grandkids, the downside is we would probably become their primary care givers with both parents working; I'm NOT a fan of that.

Would you do it? Have any of you done it and has it worked out?

Under those "demands", no.

[Roselvr]

Originally Posted by kbrkr

Wow, so much great advice and insight on this forum that I am extremely grateful for.

The "Upside" for us would enable us to be in our daughters, son in law, and Grand Children's lives. We would also not have the pressure on our retirement savings for monthly expenses as they would cover that. We wouldn't need a car. I do have another son who is stationed in Savannah Georgia who we would be a bit closer to. Both my daughter and future son-in-law are very responsible and hard working. They are both teachers and working on their masters degrees. My future son-in-law is already like a son to me always helping me and visa versa. Their wedding is in March 2021.

My concerns, which many of you have also listed are as follows:

1. How to protect our down payment. Our will specifies an equal distribution to all 3 of our children.
2. What if we don't get along?
3. Don't really want to be a baby sitter, pet sitter, repair man, in our retirement. Patience and nerves are not what they used to be.
4. Don't really want to leave our lovely home and lifestyle here in Florida. We hate the cold weather. We are both unified on this.
5. I am slightly disabled and cannot climb stairs nor walk hills and Georgia primarily has 2 level homes and mountains.
6. I'm positive we would have differences of opinions on child rearing techniques, home styles, decorating, my wife's hearing requiring LOUD TV, etc.

You're putting the cart before the horse. Right now you don't need anything from them. It's a different story if you and your wife needed their help. If at some point you do, then discuss moving. Why should you not only uproot but be on the hook for the mortgage? It's very risky for you for reasons already mentioned.

I'm 55 and have a bad back so am disabled. I've gotten worst due to mostly being the one to raise my 7 year old grandson. I wish I could have a grandmother experience but since I do most everything for him, I'm more like his mother. I even do his showers. He can't wash his own hair yet because it's very curly and long like Slash from Guns & Roses.

Someone made the point about doctors. That's a huge one for me. I'm in pain management and on narcotics. It's not easy finding a pharmacy that will fill my prescriptions if mine are out. My hub wants to move South at some point, I'm ill just thinking about it.

As far as your will. Who's to even say there will be any money left by the time you and your wife pass away? It very well could be eaten by nursing care which is a whole other issue with being the main people on the mortgage. You may want to think about making a thread about that specific situation to get input from the posters that know Medicare and Medicaid rules, how houses have to be sold and things need to be paid down. It's not black and white. Also what if God forbid you or your wife get cancer? My hub who's 63 had cancer 11 years ago. It devastated our savings. We're still in bad shape because then his job closed. Now he can't make the same money delivering cars as he did back then.

My hub is hard of hearing, what we've found that works best is he uses a blue tooth headset to hear the TV so that he doesn't have to use his hearing aids. Maybe that will work for your wife.

Formerly Known As Twenty asked Would your future son-in-law ask any of this of his own parents? I want to know the answer too.

While you do get along with your future son in law, living in the same house is a whole other ball game. My step son lived with us back in 2005 for 6 months. It did not work out. He would do laundry without even asking me if I had laundry. He would also jump in the shower without asking my kids if they needed to shower. My son was working at the time, stepson wasn't. My dad had cancer when my stepson lived with us. Hub and I helped my dad, he lived 7 blocks away. My stepson who loved to cook, never offered to even cook dinner but he sure did eat when we did. Our lives just did not mesh. He never adjusted to live like the rest of us did. He was asked to leave in the end. Thankfully hubs sister took him in.

Originally Posted by kbrkr

I should have added more information; Daughter and SIL have been living together past two years and purchased a house together 6 months ago. They don't have as much equity as I do, but they do have skin the game so to speak.

So they sell their house and buy what they can afford there to get established on their own. There's nothing wrong with that. It's how it should work out.

Originally Posted by TheShadow

Changes the equation NOT ONE BIT.

They want a bigger house and free child care. You've carefully chosen your retirement location and are enjoying a good lifestyle, good friends, weather you like, and the style of home that accommodates your disabilities. Big moves are also big hassles. You'll have to change doctors, dentists, etc, also. You will have to downsize all your possessions too if they expect you to live in the MIL quarters. Is that the plan, or will you occupy the big house while they live in the basement apartment until they have kids? A friend of ours lives with his son and DIL (no grandkids) in retirement. He lives in the basement apartment with a kitchen, and he's not even allowed upstairs! They keep their cars in the garage and he has to leave his in the driveway. He's paying rent to them, and he gets treated like the "help".

Spending most of your day obligated to babysitting presently non-existent grandchildren is the only "upside" of this. Oh I forgot, selling your only transportation and becoming dependent on your kids to drive you everywhere too! Neither of those would be on my wish list, but that's just me.

You make a lot of great points, especially changing doctors. If either are in pain management or on narcotics, that's a whole different ball game of trying to find a pharmacy that will dispense those narcotics to them.

Originally Posted by TheShadow

That ^^^^ sounds like a perfectly nice arrangement. If OP wants to be more "in their grandkids' life" then that is one possible route to pursue, but not being under the same roof 24/7, and being financially obligated to stay if it doesn't work out.

What would happen if the OP needed to sell the house and recoup their down payment/equity to pay for nursing home care? Would their daughter and SIL be willing, or able, to buy them out?

That's a huge consideration too. Too bad mathjack or any of the other medicare posters aren't giving input about what could happen when that house needs to be sold to pay for nursing care.

Originally Posted by kbrkr

My Daughter and son-in-law to be are asking us to move from Florida to Georgia with them so that they can get better paying teaching jobs in Atlanta area. They want to live 40min outside of Atlanta. They want to find a house with either a Mother/Daughter setup or one large enough for both families. They would like us to be the primary on the mortgage, but they will pay the mortgage payments, but will need our large down payment. I see a lot of issues with this, but I also see a lot of upside. Although we would help take care of the future grandkids, the downside is we would probably become their primary care givers with both parents working; I'm NOT a fan of that.

Would you do it? Have any of you done it and has it worked out?

What if they end up not marrying after moving? You just never know these days!

Way too much risk for OP and his wife and not much for daughter and her fiance.

I like the idea of buying a house close to them after they have kids. If I was disabled and needed to move with them it would be a different story

Originally Posted by AZgarden

Well thanks to everyone of you who gave me "reps" for what I said. All 12 of you !!! I totally continue to agree with rfomd129 above that you may be doing a disservice to those kids by offering them too much at this stage of life. It IS so important to establish yourself as "grown-up" early on in life and stand on your own two feet. It may be necessary to rescue later on, should adversity happen. But for now, let them make their way in the world on their own. JMHO

You're welcome and you make more good points

[jamary1]

Oh, HELL to the no!

[Avalon08]

Florida has a homestead exemption law that protects the home from asset recovery by Medicaid. I don't know about Georgia, so check that out.

I was just reading an update on the case of an elderly couple in FL who were murdered two years ago (case is still not solved). But what struck me was that there's also a lawsuit going on about their $500K estate. This was a second marriage and the wife's daughter is claiming the husband was supposed to be making payments to her mother for something or other but didn't, and it has therefore damaged the estate. It reminded me of how complicated things could get with OP's situation and the three kids.

[skimbro000]

Originally Posted by WellShoneMoon

OP, I'll give you a brief description of my situation, which is working out extremely well for everyone involved.

I have three kids, only one of whom lives here in central Florida (married and the mother of my only grandchild, who is about to turn 6 years old).

I live in a condominium three blocks away from my daughter, son-in-law, and granddaughter. They bought their own home with no financial involvement from me. Daughter and SIL both work full time in demanding jobs; I've been retired for about 11 years.

When daughter went back to work from maternity leave, I started taking care of granddaughter two days a week; she went to daycare the other three work days. It was my daughter's request, but I was thrilled to be asked, and I loved taking care of the baby/toddler/young child. Now my granddaughter is in kindergarten, and the school is three blocks in the other direction from my condo. SIL drops the granddaughter off at my place on his way to work, and I give her a second breakfast and walk her to school every day. The daily walks are great exercise for me, and we have a wonderful time together, sometimes singing, sometimes telling jokes, sometimes talking about kindergarten matters.

I have never considered it "babysitting"; rather my relationship with my granddaughter is closer than that. We are closely bonded, and quite frankly this relationship is the most important thing in my life. I do it for free, but my daughter and son-in-law have always been extremely appreciative, including buying me groceries and taking me out for frequent restaurant meals (pre-Covid, of course, although now we do takeout instead of dining inside restaurants).

My schedule is very flexible. Sometimes I travel, and daughter and SIL arrange other care for my granddaughter when I'm out of town.

I think our whole situation is successful because there's no financial involvement of any kind, we're all flexible and reasonable (IMHO) people, we don't live together in the same house (they would drive me crazy and I'm sure I would do the same to them), and it's a win-win for all involved.

We have a similar situation. I live.7 miles from my daughter and her family. We see our 2 grandchildren all the time. I supervise their remote learning one day a week (I offered); we have them to sleep over about twice a month, and they just come over to do crafts, ride bikes in my huge long driveway and play at least once a week. They love us with all their hearts. There is no way I’d live in the same house as them. Neither of us “drop” in on the other. If my daughter needs someone to watch the girls, she asks us first. We say no if it doesn’t work and she’s totally okay with that.