Young adults can turn to their parents for a financial lifeline
A great majority of parents would bail out their young adult children who are drowning in debt, with mortgage debt among the most likely to garner their sympathy, according to a new CreditCards.com survey.
When asked how they would respond if their child asked for money to pay off a debt, only one parent in 10 (10.5%) said they would refuse to help financially. Meanwhile, more than half (52%) said they would give $1,000 or more. On average, parents would offer $5,705 as a gift or $7,936 as a loan.
The survey also found that mortgage debt was among the debts most likely to garner sympathy from mom and dad, with only 4.1% saying they would never help with mortgage or rent. This followed medical bills (2.1%) and utilities debt (3.9%). Meanwhile, 57.3% of parents said they would never help with gambling debt.
“In most cases where I see a parent helping a child with mortgage, rent, or utility debt, it’s because the child has fallen on hard times – they lost a job or some other circumstance has affected the child’s ability to pay this bill,” said Kelley Long, a certified financial planner at Financial Finesse. Long added that this help is usually temporary.
The CreditCards.com poll was conducted from Oct. 26 to 28 through a national online service of Ipsos Public Affairs. The respondents who said they have children (61.5%) were asked what they would do in various situations if their child asked for help with debt.
