Survey: Most parents teach their kids about saving money
Chosen Americans likely grew up not openly discussing finances at home According to a new NerdWallet survey conducted online by The Harris Poll of baby boomer parents ages - didn t teach their children about saving money Perhaps because talking about finances has become less taboo nowadays s parents of young kids are prioritizing this life lesson The survey unveiled that of parents of children under have taken action to teach their kids about saving money like encouraging them to set savings goals or opening up a savings account for their children to deposit money into function e n i s var d InfogramEmbeds var o e getElementsByTagName n if window d window d initialized window d process window d process else if e getElementById i var r e createElement n r async r id i r src s o parentNode insertBefore r o document script infogram-async https e infogram com js dist embed-loader-min js If you re a parent who wants to teach your kids about saving money here are a sparse options to consider Set kids up with an age-appropriate savings vehicleAccording to the survey of parents of children under opened a savings account for their kids to deposit money into as a way to teach them about saving Additionally a few parents of minor children used visual tools whether physical or digital like piggy banks or savings jars For young kids a piggy bank or savings jar is presumably a good place to start Sure they aren t yet earning interest but having tangible bills and coins allows them to begin learning the value of denominations and how to count cash before moving on to opening a savings account or using a banking app You can open a savings account for a child regardless of their age jointly owned by the parent and the kid In addition to your own personal information and photo ID you ll likely need to provide the child s name date of birth and Social Safeguard number when opening the account You could opt for an online-only bank or a local brick-and-mortar but keep in mind that several banks may require an account for a minor to be opened in person Look for a savings account option that doesn t charge monthly fees and has a decent interest rate Nowadays there are also banking apps for kids These may include educational sessions savings goal features allowance tools and parental controls The downside is that specific apps charge monthly fees and or don t pay interest So you ll need to decide if the interactive features are worth the added cost Consider giving your kids an allowanceThe survey revealed that in parents of minor children have given them an allowance to teach them about saving money For school-aged children this may be a good option Whether an allowance is tied to chores or not a small weekly allowance can be a starting point for learning how to manage competing financial priorities like saving spending and giving According to the survey nearly a third of parents of children under require their kids to save a certain amount of money they receive as a way to teach them about savings You could give your children guidelines on how much to save spend and donate or allow them to decide on the allocation themselves You can further this discussion by talking to your kids about how you make these decisions when it comes to the family finances Discuss your financial goals with your kids and ask about theirsLess than in parents of minor children have discussed family finances with their kids to teach them about money according to the survey While you naturally don t want to burden children with money stress there are age-appropriate approaches to use your own finances to teach kids about saving Consider your own savings goal for the year Maybe you want to fund an crisis savings account save up for a vacation or invest of your take-home pay for retirement Explain what your goal is why you set it and how you re working to achieve it Then ask your kid to do the same Depending on the age of the child an appropriate goal might be learning the value of different bills and coins saving up for a special toy or even a car or putting a certain amount of allowance aside for giving Once your kid has identified their goal discuss why they want to achieve it and what strategies they ll take to get there Say your child wants to save up to buy a new toy It costs and they receive an allowance of week The motivation for the purchase is that it s a fun thing to play with and they will save up their allowance for seven weeks in order to cover the cost of the toy plus the sales tax Bonus Depending on their age now may be a great time to teach them how to calculate sales tax if your state and or locality charges it The toy may turn out to be a great purchase cherished for years to come Or your kid might find they authentically don t like the toy as much as they thought Which brings us to a bonus tip for teaching kids about both saving and spending Bonus Let kids make bad spending decisions within reasonKids savings goals are likely short-term deferred spending rather than long-term savings And parents with their years of experience spending and saving ostensibly have opinions about what their children decide to buy with their limited funds But unless the item isn t age or otherwise appropriate it might be smart to allow kids to experience a few buyer s remorse The majority parents don t want to see their children disappointed But allowing kids to make mistakes on a small scale like buying a toy that isn t particularly well made or isn t fun to play with after an hour or so is a starting point for having discussions about how to mindfully evaluate purchases before we make them Depending on the item it may also be a good opportunity to teach them about return policies A bad buy now likely won t keep your kids from ever making uninformed purchases in adulthood But these early lessons may help them think more critically about how they spend and maybe spare them from too a large number of spending regrets in the future when the dollar amounts at stake are higher MethodologyThis survey was conducted online within the United States by The Harris Poll on behalf of NerdWallet from March - among adults ages and older among whom are parents of children under The sampling precision of Harris online polls is measured by using a Bayesian credible interval For this evaluation the sample information is accurate to within - percentage points using a confidence level For complete survey methodology including weighting variables and subgroup sample sizes please contact press nerdwallet com DisclaimerNerdWallet disclaims expressly and impliedly all warranties of any kind including those of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose or whether the article s information is accurate reliable or free of errors Use or reliance on this information is at your own liability and its completeness and accuracy are not guaranteed The contents in this article should not be relied upon or associated with the future performance of NerdWallet or any of its affiliates or subsidiaries Statements that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties as indicated by words such as believes expects estimates may will should or anticipates or similar expressions These forward-looking statements may materially differ from NerdWallet s presentation of information to analysts and its actual operational and financial results The post Survey Most of parents teach their kids about saving money appeared first on Rough Draft Atlanta
