I want to pay my late 60s parents $1,000 monthly for babysitting.
They refuse the money: should I invest it for them instead?
A listener named Carrie Anne wrote into the Rich Habits Podcast with a problem most adult children would recognize. She wants to pay her late 60s parents $1,000 a month for watching her kids. The parents refuse the cash and, in her words, would likely spend any of it on toys and clothes for the grandkids anyway.
Host Robert Croak’s answer: open a joint brokerage account, invest the money in their name, and build them a nest egg whether they engage with it or not. “I love this idea. It’s super simple. You could sit down with her, do it in a few minutes, maybe 10 or 15 minutes, get it up and running, and then really set them up,” Croak said.