In a recent Money For Couples podcast episode, I listened as a married couple in their early 60s spoke about financial issues. Initially, they said their financial problem was that they were spending too much money and didn’t have enough set aside for retirement.
After Ramit Sethi dug into their numbers with them, he uncovered the real problem – their deadbeat adult son.
The son had relied on his parents bailing him out financially repeatedly throughout his adult life. They helped cover his rent, debts, car payments, expenses, and other financial needs. They “lent” him money, which he agreed to repay, yet time and time again never paid back.
By the end of the episode it was clear that his father was still holding out hope that someday his son, who is now 35 years old, would someday became accountable and honorable and pay back his debts.
It’s never going to happen.
Without naming names, I know this from experience. I’ve had several deadbeats in my life. These were people I was very close to and cared for very much. I trusted them.
Whenever I lent them money they promised to pay me back. Sometimes we’d sit down together and work out a very generous long term repayment plan (like $50/month for several years with no interest and no contract). Other times, they’d provide me with specific dates for lump sum repayments like “over the next 3 paychecks” or “at the end of the month”.
I never received a dime from any of them.
In retrospect, I recognize that this is the normal behavior for a deadbeat. Each one I knew did the same with other friends, family members, coworkers, business partners, creditors and banks. Their behavior had little to do with me – I was just the available sucker at that specific time. Once they burned me and I cut them off, they moved on to find the next mark.
I learned a valuable valuable lesson after being burnt several times by people I trusted.
I don’t lend money anymore.
I will give it to people with no strings attached. I tell them not to pay me back. Instead they can pay it forward someday by helping someone else in their time of need.
Will they? Maybe. Maybe not. It makes no difference to me. I did what I felt was right. And my mind is free because I’m not thinking about them paying me back.
As for those people whom I now know are deadbeats…it’s probably no surprise that I’ve cut all of them out of my life.