Yes. It's yet another survey on how generous our generation is to our children. This one comes from Better Homes and Gardens Real Estate and keys in on the ways in which we help our children buy a home.
According to its December survey, nearly one in five self-identified baby boomer couples had assisted at least one adult child in a home purchase. This help came in the form of down payment assistance, outright purchasing or mortgage co-signing.
How do we do it? The survey found that many of us are digging into our savings or we're dipping into emergency funds or retirement funds in order to come up with the average $10,000 to $30,000 down payment for an American home.
Do we expect to be repaid? The survey doesn't say. For some of us, it's repayment enough to see our children living in a nice, solid home that someday--should the housing downturn ever turn around--will appreciate and bring them a modicum of good fortune. If they eventually flip the house and make a killing (those days may never return but....), they might share the pot of wealth with the ones who made it possible.
Few of us can count on that one.
