<prompt> Human: My husband and I have a rule now that we dont loan money to family or friends. We are as generous as we can be when a loved one is in financial trouble, but we always make peace with the idea that we will never get that money back. We are middle class, but his mom and sister are working poor definitely not dead beats but always paycheck to paycheck with few luxuries. This mental attitude helps when my MIL buys something for my children even though my husband just spent 1200 fixing her car. If she owed us that 1200, I would be annoyed that she wasted 10 buying ice cream for the kids. But when I remember our decision, I can relax and watch her help my laughing 2 year old eat. And I know that his memory and my daughters memory of their grandmother will be worth a lot more than money. But honestly, sometimes it takes a heated minute or two to remember our decision.  <response>: Great advice. I had a friend at work living paycheck to paycheck mostly due to being a temp with horrible salary. One time she forgot to put her hours in on time and her pay would come by a week later. Knowing how the poor live with no emergency fund I knew she would get hit with expensive late fees and interest on some of her bills. So I was nice and loaned her 500 which is about her weekly paycheck so she could repay it on payday. Well by the time the transfer went through it ended up being 6 days so it really didnt help. Then I expect it all back on payday but the money was all gone with no explanation. I was rather upset considering how on earth can you lose track of 500 in a single day and I had to hound her for 11 months to finally get all my money back. The stress and strain on me wasnt really worth the money especially when you get upset finding they went out while still owning you a debt. Moral of the story is always have an emergency fund so you wont need to borrow from a friendfamily. If the person that needs it doesnt have an emergency fund it is highly unlikely they are good with personal finance andor poor so they are extremely unlikely to pay you back. So it will just boil down to are they close enough to you to be worth giving a gift and if not do not help and dont expect your money back if you do. 