Parents ‘sapped’ by adult children

Published on Tuesday 26 February 2008 20:39

ADULT children are becoming more financially dependent on their parents, according to savings experts.

Research by Scottish Widows Savings and Investment, published today shows that older children’s dependence on parents has increased at a “rate of knots” over the past year.

Some 53 per cent of Scottish parents have given or loaned their children or grandchildren thousands of pounds, compared with 33 per cent last year, the research shows.

And the average amount given by parents to offspring in Scotland is 13,384, higher than the UK average of 12,610.

The main reasons for this are increasing levels of debt among young people, along with increasing housing prices, according to Scottish Widows.

Parents have felt the pinch as a result of being “sapped”, the research shows.

A quarter said they had planned to use the money in retirement and this could adversely affect them in their later years.

Anne Young, savings expert at Scottish Widows, said: “It seems that, although people could well be tightening the purse strings at a time when the credit crunch could affect finances, adult children are still managing to extract what they can from mum and dad.”

The main reason that children needed money from their parents was to pay off debt (31 per cent) or for a house purchase (29 per cent).