'I Want My Inheritance Now': Older People are Losing Their Life Savings to Family Members

[Zorro]

As housing stress and cost-of-living pressures mount, adult children are asking parents to unlock their wealth early — or to stop spending it.

After years of renting, retired Australian nurse Joan thought she was finally securing a permanent home. She handed over her pension savings of A$70,000 ($46,700) to a family member to build a small guest apartment in their backyard.

The plan was to live there for the rest of her life, free from the stresses of an unaffordable rental market, and then leave the apartment to her family. Instead, the arrangement collapsed within a year. The unit was unfinished — with no kitchen or functioning laundry — forcing her to rely on the house. Relations soured with her relative, who had since remarried, and the agreement fell apart.

“I was told to get up and pack up and get out of there,” said Joan, who spoke through a lawyer and asked to use an alias and withhold further family details to protect their privacy. Stripped of her savings and barred from collecting her belongings, she was left with nothing — no home, no pension, no safety net.

Her experience fits into a pattern of elder financial abuse that’s increasingly common in Australia and other developed nations. Experts warn such cases will rise as aging populations and cost-of-living pressures converge. Those aged 75 to 85 are most at risk, says Robert Fitzgerald, Australia’s age discrimination commissioner.

One of the most frequent forms of abuse is “inheritance impatience,” Fitzgerald says, when adult children pressure parents to hand over savings early. Its equally insidious twin is “inheritance preservation,” when children block parents from spending on aged care or medical treatment.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-09-18/elder-financial-abuse-is-on-the-rise-as-cost-of-living-crisis-grows?accessToken=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJzb3VyY2UiOiJTdWJzY3JpYmVyR2lmdGVkQXJ0aWNsZSIsImlhdCI6MTc1ODM4NDgwOSwiZXhwIjoxNzU4OTg5NjA5LCJhcnRpY2xlSWQiOiJUMlNWS1RHUFdDSkMwMCIsImJjb25uZWN0SWQiOiJDNjgyQTUwQzJCRDM0MTFCQTgwQjEwQjZEQjczQzM1MSJ9.UXdcoMDFF5VEPoGbSb86Yf6q0gtscNzeD_cgfs1I9JU