Cashed-up Aussie boomers branded ‘evil’

Victorian parents Leanne and Leon Ryland have two adult sons who apparently won’t see a cent of inheritance, with the couple having spent about $170,000 on holidays since they retired.

Their goal of seeing the “wonders of the world” has so far led them to Machu Picchu in Peru, India, Sri Lanka and the Maldives, with the US being next on their agenda, they told SBS Insight on Tuesday night.

The couple joked the only thing their two sons would inherit would be their “shelf of s***”, a pile of cheap trinkets from their travels.

Their jet setting comes after they saw a financial planner before they retired about four years ago after saving their whole lives.

“We’ve done all the right things by investing in property, boosting up our super, making sure that was healthy, going without a lot of things,” Ms Ryland said.

“And he said, ‘You’re crazy if you don’t retire when you can because you’ll spend most of your wealth on travel or whatever in the first 10 years and then after that it slows down’.

“It’s changing your mindset. You get into a phase now where you actually spend instead of save.”

The cashed-up boomers run a Facebook group called “SKIclub”, which stands for “spending kids inheritance”, where retirees can share travel tips.

Ms Ryland said she’s trying to convince her husband they have to “spend now, because if we don’t spend it, you know he gets it”, pointing to her son.

“We’re not going be able to spend all this money so let’s do it because in another 10 years we won’t be climbing the Great Wall of China. We won’t be going up Machu Picchu,” she said.

“We won’t be doing those things. So we’ve gotta do it now because what else is there?”

They’re not the only ones with this mindset, with Ms Ryland sharing the more they travel, the more they meet people who are “thinking the same way”.

Viewers have been quick to brand the pair as “entitled”, with one taking to social media to share their thoughts.

“SBS Insight tonight is hilarious — boomer privilege at its best & still not conscious of it. So entitled,” one person wrote on X.

“Boomers are evil … bragging about overseas holidays with no regard for the environment, spending all their money so their kids have no inheritance,” another wrote.

“Clogging healthcare due to their perceived entitlement for health and refusal to die. Selfish and privileged.”

Despite this, the couple’s son Alex appeared to support his parents decision.

“It’s their money,” he told the program.

“They’ve worked hard their entire life and invested well in order to get that money so I think they should be able to do whatever they’d like with it.”

The program also heard from other boomers, with Lorna Shuker sharing she bought a $62,000 home with her husband without help from her parents, who had never owned a home or car themselves.

“My family were very poor,” she said.

Ms Shuker described how she got into nursing and saved as much as she could, with her life now “comfortable”, having been able to buy and sell multiple million dollar properties.

She also expressed her thoughts on younger generations, who she said were not “brilliant at budgeting”.

“I think they’re the generation that sees something and they want it right now,” she said.

“And that’s why they will use services like Afterpay and live beyond their means.”