The Barefoot Investor has urged one couple to focus on saving for retirement instead of giving in to their “monster” daughter and paying for her education.
Scott Pape, 46, shared the advice after Patty, a mother, wrote that she and her partner had already spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on their child.
“Have We Bred a Monster?” was the title of the letter in a column for the Daily Telegraph.
“My teenage daughter received a private school education, which cost my husband and I (average working class) over $40,000 per year,” Patty wrote.
The mother went on to say that the couple had saved “hard” to remain mortgage-free on their “modest” home and were happy to be able to provide their only child with a private education.
The couple were looking forward to their daughter finishing grade 12 this year, so they would no longer have to pay “unrelenting tuition fees” if she attended the local university.
But the couple’s daughter throws a spanner in the works for their retirement plans.
“She wants to go to college in another city, where she pays $40,000 a year for a live-in college, to get the ‘full city experience,’” she wrote.
Patty said she travels to the city every day for work, but her daughter thinks the university in the same city is “too far” to travel to.
A mother asked Scott if it was fair not to want to support her daughter in college after she and her husband paid $40,000 a year in private school tuition (stock photo of a classroom below)
Scott Pape (pictured) didn’t mince his words and said their 18-year-old daughter should go to college in the city if she insists – but at her own expense
“She says she is desperate to leave home and move to the city, with or without our help,” she wrote.
“She has no idea how to be financially independent! Is this ‘normal’ privileged teenage behavior or have we bred a monster?”
Mr. Pape didn’t mince his words and responded, “You’ve bred a monster.”
The financial guru explained that the couple had already spent a large amount of money on their daughter’s education and now it was their time.
“Explain that you have already spent over $500,000 (pre-tax) on her education…and now you need to focus on saving for retirement,” he wrote.
The Barefoot Investor felt that their daughter should leave home and experience life, as it would be a great learning experience.
“Part of that experience should include working for minimum wage, occasionally drinking from a gang, and sometimes eating two-minute noodles to make some money,” he wrote.
According to The Barefoot Investor, it was time to start saving for retirement after they spent $500,000 (before taxes) on their daughter’s education (above, stock photo of a middle-aged couple looking at their finances)
The financial guru said it’s a chance for their daughter to become financially independent, which also has the added benefit of keeping her more down to earth (photo from a stock photo of university students on campus)
He urged the parents to give their daughter a chance to become financially independent – and a better person.
“Not only would I encourage her to move to the city, I would also help her pack her bags,” he joked.
“The education she gets will make her a much more down-to-earth person. (And if she doesn’t succeed, she can always go to the local college!)”
Patty’s question comes at a time when private school costs have skyrocketed, leaving many parents empty-handed.
In New South Wales, school fees have risen faster than inflation, with Sydney’s top schools now charging three times the fees they have in the past 25 years.
In 1999, tuition for girls at Kambala School cost less than $10,400 a year. By 2024, however, that figure had risen by a whopping 352 percent to $46,950.