What to Expect When Parents Move Into Your Home

Many families today are sharing homes to reduce costs and help raise children or manage a household. If you are thinking about inviting your parents to live with you, it is important to make plans to meet everyone's financial, social, and health needs.

Financial Agreements

Discuss with your loved ones how their living expenses will be managed. Will you all share their home or yours? Or would there be a monthly budget where your parents contribute a certain percentage? 

If they are assisting with childcare, you may decide to reduce their share of living expenses as a tradeoff. Often, it helps to prepare a budget that includes everyone's income and expenses so that everyone knows what to expect monthly except for unexpected bills that pop up. Those can be negotiated separately.

Household Duties

Housework can also be divided based on your parents' abilities and interests. One of them might like doing yard work while the other prefers cooking. 

They will probably want to pitch in and help in some way if they are able. Their duties might change over time based on health issues that may develop. It's important to make them feel appreciated without depending too much on their help or refusing their assistance. 

People with disabilities can sometimes help with simple tasks like folding laundered towels or setting the table for meals.

Monitoring and Supervision

If your parents help to care for your children, you will want to explain the house rules and boundaries. Grandparents love to spoil their grandchildren, so let them know what is acceptable or advisable. 

They may offer advice for raising kids that you don't agree with, and you can politely listen but explain your preferences. Similarly, if one or both parents require health care or supervision, you will need to figure out a schedule that works with everyone's needs and availability.

Health Support

Aging parents may experience health problems over time. You will need to decide how to help with their home care and medical appointments, possibly by hiring home health care providers. 

You may need to adjust your work schedule and other responsibilities to help care for their needs. Discuss reasonable options with family members to be prepared if and when that day comes.

Sharing your home with your parents is a wonderful way to enjoy a renewed relationship with them that could be beneficial to your children as they learn about life from their older relatives. 

Make practical plans in advance so that the transition will be smooth and clear with minimal tension or confusion.

Worth Saving? 3 Cost of Living Expenses You May Be Tempted to Cut Down

For many people, cost of living expenses chew through the lion’s share of their income. They get to the end of the month with almost the exact same amount of money. It can prove tempting to save money by cutting down on some cost of living expenses. There are, however, three of these expenses that aren’t worth the meager savings.

Food

There are good ways and bad ways for you to cut down on food costs. Good ways include coupons, buying store brands, and even the occasional bulk buy. Once you do these things, though, you might be tempted to simply start depriving yourself of more expensive food. Think fruits and vegetables during the winter months.

That’s the bad way to cut down on food costs because it will almost certainly affect your health. Your body needs the vitamins and nutrients found in fruits and vegetables. Depriving yourself of these increases the odds of getting sick, which will cost you in medical bills, prescriptions, and missed work.

Insurance

Sooner or later you’ll look at your insurance premiums and think they’re too high. You might say, “I don’t really need that much coverage, do I?” It’s easy to think that way when you’re in good health or haven’t had an accident recently. 

The problem is that it’s hard to predict health problems or accidents. Ditching better insurance coverage for cheaper premiums leaves you in a vulnerable position if anything goes wrong. 

You can find yourself on the hook for thousands of dollars in medical costs or replacing your vehicle out of pocket. You won’t save nearly enough on your premiums to make that a good trade. Plus, you can usually find better rates with another insurance provider.

Savings

Every budget should include money for savings. Ideally, it’s 10% of your take-home income. When things get tight, you can find yourself thinking that there are better uses for that money. “I’ll replace it later,” you think.

The problem is that money that’s not in savings can’t go into a retirement account like a Roth IRA. Even if you do replace those savings later, you can’t reclaim the growth that money experiences in a retirement account. 

No matter what you buy now, it’s rare that it can exceed the long-term investment value.
Many families live on tight budgets, even in a strong economy. 

When it comes to cutting your cost of living expenses, though, some cuts aren’t worth the savings. Food, insurance, and savings are three areas where you really are better off spending the money.