Elderly people paying rent when they move in with their children is “actually a very good idea”, a novelist and broadcaster has said. 

Anne Atkins made the remarks in the context of family finances. 

Speaking on Newstalk Breakfast, she said when she looks after her grandchildren, money does not change hands - but she feels very well remunerated. 

“We've got two small boys here for the week and at eight o'clock I've got to jump on an e-bike and bicycle them three miles to their activity,” she said. 

“The last time we looked after them at their parents’ house because they were in the States for a week we got paid very lavishly. 

“The cupboards were full of gin, wine, they cooked loads of lovely meals for us, there was beef in the freezer for us to have ourselves. 

“I don't think I've been so well paid in my life.” 

A grandparent with her two grandchildren sitting on beach. Picture by: parkerphotography / Alamy Stock Photo

Ms Atkins continued that most grandparents “wouldn’t dream of” asking for money to look after their grandchildren, but for some it might be appropriate. 

“I was commenting on a grandmother - or rather the mother of the mother - actually being asked to do something that would have required her to be available all day every, through the year,” she recalled. 

“And she felt that for that kind of commitment she wanted remuneration.” 

Sometimes, Ms Atkins, some family members have enough that it is appropriate for money to change hands in exchange for a service. 

“My parents came to live with us for the last 10 or 12 years of their lives and my father insisted, absolutely insisted, on them paying rent,” she recalled. 

“That hadn't occurred to us, we would never have thought to ask for it.

“It was actually a very good idea because it gave him a sort of stake in the household and he was contributing; we had higher household heating bills because we had a very old person living with us.” 

Ms Atkins added that her father lived to 102, something she credits to him being so well looked after by the family. 

He continued to pay rent until the day he died “because he wanted to”. 

Main image: An elderly parent with his grandchild. Picture by: Emailme3 from Pixabay.