Ask Property: How do we help the kids without putting ourselves in a worse financial position?
Welcome to Ask Property, our new weekly column where we answer your real estate dilemmas. Our Ask Property columnist Nina Hendy is here to hunt down the answers from leading experts on your property finance questions. To ask your question send an email to media@ninahendy.com.au.
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Questions: My wife and I are in our 60s and we are in a comfortable financial position, drawing down a regular income from our super. However, the relentless interest rate rises have impacted our kids, who are in their 30s with young children of their own. Both live close by and are struggling to cover the mortgage and bills. Should we offer to help them and risk putting ourselves in a worse financial position? If so, how can we do that without impacting our income?
Answer: A growing number of older Australians who should be focused on enjoying their retirement are navigating how to help adult children as the cost-of-living pressures take their toll.
While many are deciding how to pass down $3.5 trillion to the next generation over the next 20 years in the biggest intergenerational wealth transfer on record, feeling pressure to offer money early to help adult children can be stressful.
Research shows that 36 per cent of Australian homeowners with an offset or redraw facility have withdrawn funds from these accounts in the past 12 months due to financial pressures, pulling out an average of $14,000.
Just 7 per cent of homeowners have tipped money into their offset or redraw account during the same period, the research from Homeloanrates.com.au shows.
"Three interest rate hikes this year have piled hundreds of dollars onto our monthly mortgage repayments, and many households have run out of room to manoeuvre," Homeloanrates.com.au CEO Shaun........
