Mom loses all her money to bad investments, takes daughter's college fund. AITA?
Being able to provide for your child now or in the future is a choice no parent should have to make.
One mom was out of her depths financially after her husband died. He left her with more than enough money to provide for their daughter, including a large college fund. However, this mom decided to ignore the advice of her husband's lawyer and made some very risky financial choices that left them with basically nothing to live on. The only money they really had left was her daughter's college fund.
AITA for liquidating my daughter's college fund to keep our dream house?
I (50F) lost my husband 4 years ago. I also have a 16yo daughter.
My late husband left me everything and told me to trust his lawyer. My husband had worked for 20 years as a doctor and did some minor investing so I inherited over 7 figures.
A year later, I decided to list our home of 12 years and received an offer too good to refuse. With the inheritance as well as the influx of cash from selling the house, I decided to move my daughter and I to Malibu because we always dreamed of a home next to the beach but my husband was exceptionally tight fisted and called homes there money pits.
We found a beautiful home by the sea. I never personally handled anything regarding buying a home before so I did not anticipate all the extra costs beyond the sticker price.
But my daughter was so excited so I decided to go for it. My late husband's lawyer was furious at my decision so I decided to stop taking his calls. I ended up signing with a money manager who said that we'd be passively earning 90 percent of what surgeons earned per year.
But the money manager ended up tanking a lot of our investments. I took the dwindling money out and made my own investments which made it worse and long story short, because of all that I only have around $35k available to me now, not to mention our debts.
With the amount available to me, I am looking at only being able to pay 1 month of a mortgage/ upkeep and then I'm basically out of luck until my business gets clients.
However, the place where we do have a significant amount of money is the fund my husband started for our daughter. With the money there, I could prevent our credit cards from being shut down, and not have to worry about the mortgage for many more months.
So I ended up liquidating my daughter's college fund. I told her about it today and she was furious and said she cannot believe all her dad's work is gone. She also said she won't be supporting me for retirement. AITA for trying to fix my mistakes and trying to keep our house?
Here were the top responses from readers:
YTA. You decided not to listen to the lawyer, you decided to move to an extremely expensive place, and you decided to trust someone's shady advice. Now you're taking away your daughter's chances of being able to go to college loan-free. That money is not yours. You should be ashamed of yourself.
So let me get this straight, your husband left you a 7 figure inheritance PLUS a house, and in 4 years you managed to do the following:
1. Sell your marital home and move to a Malibu beach house that you can't afford to maintain against your late husband's advice.
2. Your late husband's lawyer whom he trusted also told you that's a bad idea and you didn't like hearing that so you started ignoring his calls
3. You cashed out what was remaining of your husband's investments and gave your money to a random money manager you didn't know who made too good to be true claims (FYI, surgeons can make 300-500k per year, there is absolutely no way you are getting anywhere close to that with a $1M investment).
4. Money manager tanks your investments so you try to do it yourself and make it worse.
5. To go even further, you empty your daughter's college fund to continue living your lavish lifestyle that you can't afford.
YTA in the worst way possible. You've stolen from your daughter and potentially limited her future prospects. There is a reason why your late husband said trust his lawyer, as you obviously can't handle that kind of money! There is a reason why many people who win the lottery end up going broke a few years later - they don't manage their money and live way beyond their means.
Sell your house and move into something you can afford. Replenish your daughter's college fund and try to repair your damaged relationship with her.
YTA. You made an extremely poor financial decision and disregarded those around you who were offering you more sound financial advice. Having a home near the beach doesn't mean you need to move to Malibu but I digress.
You are absolutely the AH here. You robbed your daughter of a chance to start her life off comfortably and took money that was never intended for you. Sell this god forsaken money pit of a home, get somewhere you can actually afford and take a class in personal finance management.
Hopefully the daughter gets a hold of dad's lawyer and works to sue you.