How to Talk to Your Aging Parents About Money
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What is the episode about and who is the guest on the money talk?
Here's your money briefing for Tuesday, September 21st. I'm J.R. Whalen for The Wall Street Journal. Talking about money with family members can always be awkward. For people with aging parents, having the money talk with them may be especially uncomfortable, but it's a way to ensure they'll have enough to live on comfortably in their later years.
A lot of parents are actually afraid to start the conversation for any number of reasons. Sometimes there's a fear of being a burden to their children if they're not in a good situation. But the other feeling is that the children will feel that they are due the money.
Why is talking about money with aging parents especially awkward or important?
So how should you approach the conversation with your parents? And where can you find help in managing your parents' finances? Wall Street Journal and Barron's contributor Cheryl Winokur-Munk has been talking to financial experts about this. She'll join us to talk about it after the break.
After decades of supporting their children financially, there comes a time when aging parents may need assistance themselves in getting their finances in order, either for retirement or to leave it for future generations. But those conversations don't always happen when they should, and that can put financial strain on a family. Our contributor Cheryl Winokur-Monk wrote about this for the WSJ's sister publication, Barron's, and she's with us to discuss how to jumpstart what are usually difficult conversations. Cheryl, thank you for being with us.
Thanks for having me.
So, you know, Cheryl, in a lot of cases, people have been seeing their parents manage money and the household finances their entire lives, but rarely talk about it. What do experts say about what the biggest obstacles are that get in the way of these conversations happening?
Well, they're not necessarily natural questions, even if you have a really close relationship with your parents. And starting to talk about money, it can be uncomfortable. The parents may feel, for example, that you're asking because you have an ulterior motive, when really you might not, and you just want to make sure the parents are okay.
What common obstacles stop families from starting conversations about parents' finances?
So it's those kind of dynamics. In general, people have a hard time talking about money, and these very pointed conversations can be even harder.
Now, you've spoken to several financial planners about this topic. What do they say about sons and daughters needing to recognize the signs that it's time to have these conversations?
Well, you really want to have these conversations before you get to a point where you're desperate to have them. So if you have a health crisis, for example, or a death or something like that. So just the fact that your parents are maybe getting a little older and maybe they're heading towards retirement, those can be some trigger points that to say, you know, we really should think about these things. And especially, you know, when you're doing your own planning for your children, maybe you have children who are going to be in college shortly, or you're thinking about buying a house. There's lots of things in your own financial life that could influence you to talk to your parents and to know basically what your parents' plans are.
And when you actually sit down to have one of these talks, how do experts say is the best way to begin and to frame this kind of conversation?
It's best, the experts say, to start really informally. So you don't want to sit down and say, hi, mom, dad, good to see you today. How much money are you leaving me when you die? Like, that's really not the kind of question you want to start with. Sometimes there are natural ways into it. Like, for example, if you're doing estate planning, you can say, hey, mom and dad, I was doing some estate planning and I was meeting with an attorney. Do you have an attorney? Or I met with my accountant today. Who is your accountant? Or things like, you know, we were starting to think about retirement planning. Are you comfortable in your retirement planning? Do you feel you're going to have enough money so that you'll be comfortable in retirement?
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