Deadbeat son Michael Rotondo is not the only one who’s been counting on his parents’ largesse.
That’s because many Americans — from their 20s into their 60s — are hoping that their parents’ assets will provide their financial salvation, according to a new Merrill Edge survey.
In fact, 1 in 3 Americans say their financial stability is now dependent on receiving an inheritance, the survey said.
“We’ve never seen such a strong reliance on receiving an inheritance,” said Aron Levine, head of Merrill Edge, a multichannel money manager.
The biannual Merrill Edge survey, which examines the concerns of affluent Americans, also found that the inheritance need was strong across a range of adults, from their 20s to their 60s.
For instance, 20 percent of baby boomers, 36 percent of Generation Xers and 32 percent of millennials said they were depending on their parents’ inheritance. The wait for the inheritance has even spread to the youngest generation, according to the survey.
It found that Generation Zers — those in their late adolescence and early 20s — were “the most likely” to depend on financial assistance from their parents.
“While it’s great to see investors thinking ahead, the key to financial freedom is outlining and following an action plan for short- and long-term goals beyond an inheritance, which may or may not ever come,” according to Levine.
Last month, the 30-year-old Rotondo became a poster child for grown offspring who remain dependent on the assets of their parents. His folks had to sue him to force him out of their upstate New York house. He moved out on May 31.
Rotondo is not alone in relying on a parental bailout. Over the next 30 to 40 years, $30 trillion in financial and non-financial assets are expected to pass from the baby boomers to their heirs, according to the National Bureau for Economic Research.
However, Levine emphasized that most young people aren’t “naively” depending on inheritances to solve all their money problems. They are looking at them, he says, as one possible way to help with huge student loans at the same time they are trying to establish households.
A veteran adviser agrees with this maybe-it-will-happen, maybe not philosophy of potential inheritance.
Ray Mignone, an adviser in Little Neck, Queens, says he constructs retirement plans with two options: One in which he projects an inheritance and a second in which he doesn’t.
But another adviser doesn’t agree with counting potential inheritance.
“Unless it is in writing that someone will get money, I will not include it in a retirement plan,” says Charles Hughes, an adviser based in Long Island.