Mom Empties Her Daughter's College Fund To Pay For Her Dream Beach House & Wonders If She Made The Right Choice
Her daughter had been left that money by her late father and was depending on it to be able to go to college. Now, that money is all gone.
Krakenimages.com / Shutterstock / sl-f / Getty Images / Billion Photos / vitaliikrasnoselskyi via CanvaPro A mom is being criticized after she dipped into the fund meant for her daughter so she'd be able to buy her dream house.
Posting to the subreddit "r/AmItheA--hole" (AITA) subreddit — a forum where users try to figure out if they were wrong or not in an argument that has been bothering them — she wrote that after her husband passed away four years ago, he had left behind a college fund for their 16-year-old daughter.
She emptied her daughter's college fund account so she'd be able to buy her dream house in Malibu.
In her Reddit post, she explained that after her husband passed away, she received all of the money he had left in the trust for both her and their daughter. After working 20 years as a doctor, along with some minor investments, she was left with seven figures from her husband.
A year after his death, she decided to list the home that they had all been living in for the last 12 years and ended up receiving an offer that was too good to pass up.
"With the inheritance as well as the influx of cash from selling the house, I decided to move my daughter and [me] to Malibu because we always dreamed of a home next to the beach but my husband was exceptionally tight-fisted and called homes money pits," she admitted.
She ended up finding a beautiful home by the ocean but pointed out that she had never handled buying a home before and did not anticipate any of the extra costs beyond the price that was listed for the house. However, her daughter was extremely excited about it and ended up purchasing the Malibu home.
"My late husband's lawyer was furious at my decision so I stopped taking his calls," she continued. "I ended up signing with a money manager who said that we'd be passively earning 90% of what surgeons earned per year," she added, referring to all of the money left behind by her late husband.
She ended up losing most of the money left by her late husband.
After leaving all of the money left by her late husband with her new money manager, she ended up losing most of it after the money manager made some questionable investments that didn't work out in their favor.
She immediately took the remainder of the money out and tried to make her own investments, which ended up making the entire situation worse. "Long story short, because of all that I only have around $35k available to me now, not to mention our debts."
With the amount left over, she realized that she wouldn't be able to pay more than one month of the mortgage on their new Malibu house, and has to wait until her business starts picking up more clients so she can make more money.
To fix her mistake, she realized that her late husband had left extra money for their daughter so she would be able to go to college.
"The place where we do have a significant amount of money is the fund my husband started for our daughter," she shared. If she removed the money from her daughter's account, she knew it would fix the credit card debts and she wouldn't have to worry about mortgage payments for a few 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." Her daughter also promised her mom that when the time came, she would not be helping out with her retirement.
Now, the mom is wondering if she made a mistake by trying to fix everything so they would be able to live in their new home.
Most Reddit users agreed that she was in the wrong for taking money that rightfully belonged to her daughter.
"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," one Reddit user pointed out.
"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."
Another user added that she should sell their new Malibu home to save the money that she has left. "You robbed your daughter of a chance to start her life off comfortably and took money that was never intended for you."
"Sell this money pit of a home, get somewhere you can actually afford, and take a class in personal finance management."
A third user chimed in, "Your poor money management is your fault, not your daughters. That money was for her. She is 16, and she would have gotten over not having a beach house."
"The blame is squarely on your shoulders. Those were your mistakes. Shame on you."
Nia Tipton is a writer living in Brooklyn. She covers pop culture, social justice issues, and trending topics.