It’s a very generous gesture, but let’s slow down a bit

Dear Dave,

My fiancé and I are getting married in March. I’m in grad school, and he has a good job. His mom and dad have found a home online they think we’ll like, and they want to give us money for a down payment. I’m not sure how I feel about this, or the house. Do you think we should go ahead and accept their offer when I’ll still be in school and we’ll still have debt to pay off?

Allyson

Dear Allyson,

I always recommend that newly married couples rent for a year and concentrate on each other, the new marriage, cleaning up any debts you have and building an emergency fund. In short, you should get to know each other – and put yourselves on solid financial ground – before you buy a house. After another year or so, when you’ve had time to actually take control of your finances, the idea of looking for a home can come into the picture.

Obviously, your future in-laws are kind and generous people. I mean, that’s a pretty big offer, right? They want to do something nice for the two of you, but I think they got a little ahead of themselves with this idea. In the process, they accidentally violated some boundaries in your relationship with your fiancé.

My advice is to have a heart-to-heart conversation with your fiancé about all this. Get on the same page together about what’s the smart thing to do. After that, I’d recommend the two of you have a polite discussion with his parents. Let him do most of the talking. Both of you should say “thank you” a lot. But gently tell them you both feel it would be best to start out by renting something for a little while first, and explain why you feel this way. Then, say you’d both be very grateful if they still want to help with a down payment when the time is right.

I’m pretty sure this kind of approach would be good for your finances. And it would probably help head off any other boundary issues in the future.

God bless you both!

Dave