Your adult child has a steady job, decent credit, and enough income to handle a mortgage, but there’s one obstacle standing between them and homeownership: the down payment. You have money saved, and another year or two at work could potentially replace whatever you give them, so helping may sound reasonable. In fact, parental housing assistance isn’t unusual. A Bankrate survey found that 17% of adults age 23 or older who had received ongoing parental financial assistance got help purchasing their first home. But delaying retirement to help adult children changes the equation because parents aren’t simply giving away extra cash; they may be giving away years of their own financial freedom. Before volunteering to work longer so your child can buy sooner, these are the questions worth asking.
