Money manners: 90th birthday blowout

LITTLE ROCK — DEAR JEANNE AND LEONARD:

My brother “Sam” and I have always said we’d give our mother a blowout party for her 90th birthday. But now that the big day is approaching, Mom’s mind has failed to the point that she’ll have no idea that the party is for her or even that it’s her birthday. Sam, who can be a bit of a tightwad, says giving her a party she won’t appreciate is a waste of money. But I think we should go ahead with it, even if Mom won’t really understand what’s going on, because she’ll still have a good time. What’s the right thing to do?

• Uncertain

DEAR UNCERTAIN:

Remind Sam that he won’t know what’s going on at his funeral or memorial service, and ask him if that means there shouldn’t be one.

The fact that your mother won’t appreciate the expression of love and respect that the party represents is no reason to call off the festivities. It’s still appropriate to honor her on her milestone birthday.

While your mother may not understand what’s happening, her friends and family who attend will, startingwith you.

So tell your cheapskate brother to get out his credit card. Your mother deserves the recognition you’ve always planned to give her.

DEAR JEANNE AND LEONARD:

At the urging of our daughter and son-in-law, my husband and I bought a foreclosed house intheir subdivision and moved halfway across the continent to be near them. Since the cost of the house was beyond our retirement budget, they contributed half of the purchase price (there’s no mortgage; everyone put up cash). The deal we’ve all shaken hands on is that my husband and I can live in the house until he and I decide we’re no longer up to it. Then we’ll sell it, with half of the proceeds to go to my daughter and son-in-law. In the meantime, my husband and I pay the homeowners association fees, along with the utilities, insurance and maintenance expenses. His name and mine are on the title, and our wills state that, should we own the house when we die, it goes to our daughter (our only child) or her son (our only grandchild), with our son-in-law getting it if neither of them is alive. Is there anything else we need to do to protect my daughter’s andson-in-law’s interests?

• Ruth

DEAR RUTH:

You’re kidding, right? Because the four of you absolutely need to prepare and sign a document that memorializes the terms of your agreement.

Here’s why: Suppose, say, that either you or your husband dies while you still own the house. If the survivor remarries, there’s nothing to prevent the new spouse from ending up on the title or ahead of your daughter in the survivor’s will. Or suppose, say, your daughter and son-in-law divorce. What protects him from being removed from your will and being unable to get his money back? ... Sorry, but these sorts of things happen.

Also, no one’s memory improves with age. So when the time comes that you and your husband feel you can no longer manage the house and you decide to sell it, it’s not inconceivable that, having paid all the bills for so many years, you’ll have come to believe that the home belongs only to you. After all, that’s what it says on the title.

Don’t think this could happen? OK, but write down the agreement anyhow. Because we can tell you from experience that yours would not be the first honorable family to discover that 10 or 15 years after they all shook hands on a deal, some folks recalled the terms of the deal one way and some recalled them another.

P.S.

You also need to talk to an accountant about the tax consequences of your daughter “inheriting” a house that she and her husband have already paid for half of.

Jeanne Fleming and Leonard Schwarz are the authors of Isn’t It Their Turn to Pick Up the Check? Dealing With All of the Trickiest Money Problems Between Family and Friends (Free Press, 2008) E-mail them at

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