Episode 1165: Giving to Family and Friends Without Hurting Them

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 1,165 of the inspired stewardship podcast.

[00:00:07] Roy Heintz: I'm Roy Heintz. I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, your talent and your treasures to live out your calling. Having the ability to lead like a coach is key.

[00:00:25] And one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to. The inspired stewardship podcast with my friend, Scott

[00:00:33] Maderer,

[00:00:34] Scott Maderer: don't want to help, or you're not financially able to help. That's also something that you need to communicate very clearly and you need to communicate the boundaries or the limits on that. That we've helped people before sometimes, and then had them turn it into an expectation where they expected it every single month, because we weren't clear upfront about the boundaries.

[00:00:59] [00:01:00] Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent and your treasures for your true call. In the inspired stewardship podcast, you will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world.

[00:01:25] In today's episode about investing in others through stewarding your treasures. I talk with you about how we often give to family and friends, and yet it makes things weird. I share some tips on how you can actually give without creating that tension. And I also talk about what to do when you can't, or don't want to give.

[00:01:47] As we talk about stewarding your treasures. Wouldn't it be great. If you could support this podcast and do it without costing yourself, an extra dime turns out you can't. All you have to do is use [00:02:00] inspired stewardship.com/amazon. When you're ready to make a purchase via Amazon and a small commission will come back to support the show.

[00:02:09] If you enjoy the show, when you're ready to buy from Amazon, just use inspired stewardship.com/amazon. One of those things that comes up from time to time is should I help out this friend or this family member by giving them some money? This could be helping out an aging parent. Who's maybe having some financial problems.

[00:02:29] This could be helping out. Your son or daughter who's perhaps transitioned outta the house, but needs some help. This could be a family member or a friend, even somebody close to you who for some reason is maybe behind or having some struggles has a broken car or something else that's created a financial emergency.

[00:02:50] And maybe it's something that's could have been somewhat in their control, or maybe it's something that's completely outside of their control, like a medical emergency or [00:03:00] something like that. but the idea is whether or not you should help them by giving them money. Is that even something that can at all be helpful at any time?

[00:03:14] And the truth is that one of the first questions you have to ask is are you in a position that you can afford to help family members without putting yourself. A damaged situation without getting yourself behind or now making it where you are going to need financial help pretty quickly. So you need to actually have a budget and have either money set aside for this sort of purpose or money that you could repurpose for this.

[00:03:41] But it needs to be a deliberate decision if you're married or have a significant other or a partner of some sort, it's something you need to talk to them about as well, because the truth is. Whenever you want to give someone some money. If you're doing it out of a place of weakness, [00:04:00] there's always going to be more guilt, more fear, more anger, more angst, and other things as well.

[00:04:06] But let's assume for a minute that you're financially able to do it. You've got the positioning in terms of your own finances. You've gotten yourself in good shape and you've got some money set aside that you can use for this purpose of helping a family. Or a friend, the question that then comes up is how do I do it without making it weird?

[00:04:29] How do I do it without creating stress or strain in the relationship? The first step is you actually need to communicate clearly make it clear. Is this a gift or is this a loan? Is this something that you're expecting to be paid? Make a, make it clear whether this is something that's a one time event or something that you can afford to do periodically, make it clear what your expectations around the money are.

[00:04:57] And we'll talk more about expectations around [00:05:00] money later. You have to have some sort of. conversation about it, and then you need to set up a system to do it. Are you actually just gonna hand them money or are you gonna set up a shared account and maybe deposit money in it? And they can pull it from there if they need it, but not if they don't, there's lots of different ways you can do it by the way.

[00:05:20] You can also use this as an opportunity to have a conversation about maybe helping in some other ways, by helping them get in a position where this never happens again. Maybe sponsoring them, working with a financial coach or someone else to help them really look at their finances and their behavior and figure out what's going on.

[00:05:42] And maybe there's a way to lay the foundation where this never happens. Again. That may be something that you financially help with as well, or even say we'll financially help you with the emergency. The requirement the condition that you communicate is [00:06:00] around them actually stepping up and following through on coaching or something like that.

[00:06:07] There's another option too. One way I've seen people give to family or friends to not make it weird is give completely anonymously. and that's also an option if you're really worried about the communication or worried about the awkwardness of that conversation is to just set it up in a way where you give them their groceries or money or whatever it is in a way that isn't tracked back to you.

[00:06:33] And that's always an option as well. If you haven't done that, though, as part of that conversation, you need to be very clear about the financial expectations, for instance, If you've given 'em the money to fix their car and after fixing their car, they then go out and spend some money in another way, perhaps having fun or going on vacation.

[00:06:57] Are you going to be upset by that? And [00:07:00] if you are, you need to have that conversation proactively. It's important too, to recognize that you probably wanna do the giving situation in a way that's as casual as possible. Don't make a big deal out of it. Maybe you even can find a way to give them the dignity of providing some services or something else for you that you need and make it more of a situation where you're paying them or bartering with them, for their services in some way if you have.

[00:07:31] Done it as a loan, you need to be really clear about that. I generally try not to ever give money to family or friend as a loan, but instead do it as a gift and do it with absolutely no strings attached, do it without those expectations, it's just their money. But if you're gonna do that, you have to have your mindset set up and you have to be in a financial position where you can do that.

[00:07:56] And. Have this unconscious deep down [00:08:00] feeling of, Ugh, I can't believe they did that the week after you gave them the money. The truth is too. If you don't want to help or you're not financially able to help, that's also something that you need to communicate very clearly and you need to communicate the boundaries or the limits on.

[00:08:18] that we've helped people before sometimes, and then had them turn it into an expectation where they expected it every single month, because we weren't clear up front about the boundaries. And as that happens, it damages the relationship. It makes everyone feel bitter and hurt. Everyone feels confused.

[00:08:38] Everyone feels angry. When in reality, none of that needed to happen. If there had been a clear communication and expectation up front. Thanks for listening.

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