Financial Freedom and Autistic Adults
At the Strategic Planning Retreat for COSAC yesterday, an autistic man noted that one thing his mother used to do for him, and that his brother now did for him as she has passed on, is to balance his checkbook. Today’s Newsday describes the financial difficulties that autistic adults face: 25-year-old Sean Beaudoin works 20 hours a week as a kennel assistant and has his own car, credit card, and good credit rating:
Last month, Sean walked into Hustedt Chevrolet in Centereach and traded in his fully paid 1997 Ford Explorer for a $2,500 credit toward a 2002 Chevy Malibu with 50,000 miles. He owed an additional $11,400 on the Malibu.
After Beaudoin’s mother discovered the purchase and complained to the dealership, the manager agreed to lower the total price to $8,550. That’s more than the car’s $6,940 retail value in excellent condition, according to Kelley Blue Book.
Paula Beaudoin said she agreed to the purchase because the dealership refused to reverse the deal. Hustedt Chevrolet has an unsatisfactory record with the Better Business Bureau of Metropolitan New York for failure to respond to complaints.
Edward Reyer, general manager of Hustedt, said Beaudoin seemed more intent on getting the price lowered than on reversing the deal. And he said the price had nothing to do with Sean’s condition.
“Anybody can be overcharged,” Reyer said. “Forget about autism. If you come in here and you like a car and you’re given a price — no matter how much it’s marked up — and you accept a price, you’re accepting the price, no matter who you are.”
Reyer needs to learn about autism, far from just saying “forget it.” Linda Fulton, whose 23-year-son Dunlap also is on the autism spectrum, notes that he has ordered a Lamborghini from a Chicago car dealer and $10,000 worth of model planes (she was able to cancel both orders; Dunlap has a strong memory for numbers and has her credit card numbers memorized). He also has been interested in buying the Quiet Supersonic Transport (QSST) airplane, which is the $80-million replacement for the Concorde to be launched in the next decade (he’s settling for a ride—$225,000 for the first flight).
Charlie has been trying to learn the values of pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters, but has bee struggling with the concept and I’m thinking this is a skill more readily learned in the “natural environment,” by giving him money to pay for a soda or snack so he can see that one thing gets exchanged for another. A consultant for our school district has also noted that they have started to teach older autistic kids to ATM cards or cards with a set amount of money on them (the latter sounds like a good idea, to me).
Once a child turns 18—whatever his or her disability—the parent is no longer the child’s legal guardian. The Newsday article also mentions guardianship, which is a legal means of protecting those who cannot take care of themselves, by making decisions that are in their own best interest, or managing their assets: It involves having a child legally declared unable to handle their finances and other affairs, and I anticipate Jim and I will be doing this for Charlie in the next few years.
Not an easy thing to think about, but getting a bill for a QSST wouldn’t be either. Money sure doesn’t grow on trees, or get magically deposited into one’s banck account.
Tags: asd, asperger, autism, car dealers, finance, guardianship, Money, Parenting, pdd-nos
8 opinions for Financial Freedom and Autistic Adults
AnneC
Mar 2, 2008 at 6:21 pm
Helping me learn to deal with money was one of the things my parents did really, really well. Some of what they did seemed “overbearing” to me at the time, but I can certainly appreciate it in retrospect given how things have turned out for me financially as an adult. When I started my first job (cash register at an amusement park) at age 18, I was given instructions for “tracking” all expenditures right down to the cent. I had some difficulties dealing with this at first and saw it as “unnecessary”, but over time I realized that I was in effect coming to appreciate that every single penny does make a difference in one’s financial security.
I got into a routine of tracking my income and purchases in a spreadsheet and this served me very well once I started living away from home at university. Everyone who saw me doing this (peers, etc.) thought it was really weird, but for me I absolutely had to do it so I would get a sense of how much it actually cost to live. I was able to see how easily “little things” (like coffee drinks) could add up, and I sort of made a game for myself out of attempting to spend as little as possible and still get everything I needed to go to school, pay whatever bills I had, etc.
The net result of all this (coupled with the fact that I attended junior college for the first 2 years of my post-secondary education, in order to get my general-education classes completed cheaply, and the fact that I attended a public university — California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo when I transferred) was that I was able to pay my own way through school without any loans or financial aid or parental aid. I graduated in 2002 with zero debt.
And the funny thing is, I had no idea this was really that unusual when I was doing it — in my mind, I was just doing whatever it took to get through school. I did look at the financial aid forms a few times, thinking it would be nice to have some “backup” funds, but I couldn’t understand the forms and so never filled them out (I survived without the “backup” funds so it didn’t end up mattering, but still). And I’m sure that things like “not getting out much” (not being a fan of crowds, drunken parties, etc.) led to savings, as did not having a car (I’ve never had a license). I was pretty shocked to find out that many people saw paying one’s own way through school and graduating without debt as “impossible”…it seems that sometimes (and this might actually be related to being autistic in my case), I end up doing things that I’m not “supposed” to be able to do, not even knowing that there’s some kind of big social structure around those things supposedly restricting who can do them, and how they might be accomplished.
Kristina Chew, PhD
Mar 2, 2008 at 6:43 pm
I’m thinking some of my students could use a spreadsheet such as you keep—-so many of them have huge loans hanging over their heads (and more to look forward to, if they go to grad school).
feebee
Mar 2, 2008 at 7:37 pm
This makes me think of that book, Autism and the Myth of the Personal Loan.
*tries to keep a straight face and fails*
AnneC
Mar 2, 2008 at 10:15 pm
Yes…I think tracking one’s purchases is a good exercise for pretty much everyone, autistic or not! It is very easy to justify spending “small” amounts of money often and not realizing how much it adds up if you never track it.
And I actually haven’t used the spreadsheet “religiously” in a while now, but having used it continuously and rigorously for several years definitely have me a clear, concrete sense of how much things cost. I can not spend money at all now without “feeling” it, and I always ask myself, “do I really need this? And if not, can I actually afford it?”
Marla
Mar 3, 2008 at 12:02 am
AnneC-I would love to hear what your parents did to help you learn money skills at a young age. Our daughter really struggles with learning money and remembering the worth of coins, etc.
K-When can parents have their child declared unable to care for themselves? I thought it was not until the child was 18 that you can seek guardianship? Do you know what the rules are? Do they vary according to state? It is tough to think that we will more than likely have to do that too. We need to reapply for services too. I just get so tired when I think about starting that process.
Kristina Chew, PhD
Mar 3, 2008 at 1:01 am
@Anne C,
I signed up for online banking on my checking account—very revealing!
@Marla,
I thought you had to wait till a child was 18 years old, though Bono of the NAA is quoted in the article as saying otherwise. This is the ASA’s on Planning for the Future—am looking for other resources, too. A lot more to think about—-
Norah
Mar 3, 2008 at 9:08 am
I legally manage my own money and accounts (ie no guardian), but I don’t really. I would never want to have a guardian for that, but I’m quite relieved to have someone who wants to manage my accounts for me (my boyfriend) without taking away my control over a significant part of life. Even if no direct family members or friends were willing to do this, though, I wouldn’t have to give away control to have this managed: I would be able to receive funds from the government to hire someone to handle my financial situation (although I’d need help hiring them with the funds :P).
I am pretty much unable to handle money well on my own, beyond just paying for everyday stuff with my atm card. I’m not irresponsible with money as such, but I just can’t get a grasp on the amount in my account, and my expenses, due to dyscalculia. I have a creditcard, but I easily get confused with outstanding amounts, even though I try not to spend money with it that I don’t have (I have it because I want to be able to order my clothing and such online, notto actualy buy things that I don’t really have money for). It’s hard to explain the confusion, but I have the same problems with trying to work out a travel schedule by train on my own, for instance.
If I were left to do all this on my own, I’d quickly get into trouble, I already almost was in serious trouble paying off my insurance a while back.
Jen
Mar 3, 2008 at 11:41 pm
I’ve never balanced my checkbook, but, I only once overdrew the account when I scheduled an automatic credit card payment to go through in anticipation of a check that didn’t come when it was supposed to.
On another note, We’ve just started doing some purchases with one of my students. He selects an item from a bag labeled with a price, and “pays” me for it before I give it to him. Right now, there are only two at a time in the “store” and they cost 1 cent or 2 cents, but hey, we’ve gotta have a place to start.
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