Comments on: Starting a Lifetime Savings Journey

By: Laura

Laura — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 23:59:00 +0000

That is pretty cool. Wish my parents had given me one! Maybe once he gets a little bit older, you should open a lifetime savings account for him?
http://www.gobankingrates.com/savings-account/what-is-a-lifetime-savings-account/
Then he can put his investments on the far right into that!

By: carmen

carmen — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 22:46:36 +0000

… not that they drink coke :)

20 weeks is too long, IMO, to save for a $10 Batman toy at the age of 4. But maybe it’s right for him. My 6 year old saved enough for a Wii in about 9 months, with a similar allowance plus gift/extra earned money.

By: carmen

carmen — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 22:41:37 +0000

@ Sara, I don’t believe the purpose of parenting is to teach our children what to do and how to do it. We are all our own best teachers, but in need of guidance, acceptance and love by our parents and other key people in our lives.

As far as the allowance goes, good start Trent! I intensely dislike the split of money, but agree that all aspects of the budget have value and having not implemented the formal controlling approach, it is hard to keep momentum with donations for example.

I would be keen to hear what options you will consider for investing. Some traditional vehicles require transactions of at least £50 (c$80), some monthly. Company stock? I think my kids would love to own shares in Coke, Disney etc.

By: aevans

aevans — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 12:21:50 +0000

Trent! This is just great. Good for you. I wish my parent’s had done this. They might have tried to but we probably would have pitched a fit about the saving or donating parts. I wish my parents HAD been a bit more controlling at that young age. We would have learned a lot. Instead we had a lot of Power given to us (THey were afraid of being too controlling) and now we can see a lot of the results that aren’t great as adults.

The comments made about parenting and being the one in charge at that young age are really right on.
The other approach, giving the kids ALL that power also feels kind of empty as a kid. You WANT your parents attention and input. THEN when you get older your foundation is strong when you really start to rebel.

I am going to buy that bank for the grandkids!

By: Courtney

Courtney — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 02:47:25 +0000

Cute kids!

My son just donated his allowance to feed an elephant for a day at the Elephant Sanctuary in Hohenwald, TN. He got to choose the elephant he wanted to feed and got a picture of her in the mail – it was really neat.

The Humane Society is a favorite with our kids, too, as well as the USO.

By: SoCalGal

SoCalGal — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 17:13:32 +0000

I love Kim’s idea of the animal shelter for giving. What a great way to see where the $ goes. Trent, those are some seriously cute ninos!

By: Karen

Karen — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 15:52:59 +0000

Very cute kids!!

By: Shevy

Shevy — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 15:49:40 +0000

@Adriana
Do you allow your children (if you have kids) to decide whether or not they will brush their teeth, or to pick every meal they eat, or to choose to go to school or not?

The issue here is not “controlling” the child; it is education. The smaller the child, the more you limit choices and provide specific opportunities to learn about choices and consequences. As they grow, they have more and more input. The goal is to raise a self-disciplined, mature adult who is ready to go out into the world in 18 or 20 years time.

By: danielle

danielle — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 13:41:53 +0000

Can you post a link to where you got that bank? It is great!

By: Kristen@TheFrugalGirl

Kristen@TheFrugalGirl — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 10:47:09 +0000

I forgot to add that, Trent, I can hardly believe how big your kids are! You post pictures so infrequently, your daughter is still a baby in my mind! lol

By: Kristen@TheFrugalGirl

Kristen@TheFrugalGirl — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 10:46:06 +0000

Adriana, as someone else mentioned, when a kid is four, a parent has to do a LOT of controlling/deciding because the kid is, well, four! I see nothing wrong with this. Trent knows more about managing money than his 4 year old does, and so he’s working to ingrain good habits in his kids. And honestly, four year olds don’t do very well if they don’t have a parent kindly controlling a lot of their lives.

The only difficulty here would be if Trent continued to exercise this much control until his kid is 18.

My plan is to gradually reduce the amount of control I have over my kids until they are mostly functioning on their own by the time they leave home. For example, I exercise a lot more control over my three-year old’s money than I do over my 10-year old’s money.

By: Rachel

Rachel — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 08:37:35 +0000

First off, Trent – your kiddos are adorable!

I love the idea, and I also like the adjustment of what to do with gift money – split it how he wants, rather than 25% each way.

The research psychologist in me wants to be sure that you are noting exactly how each windfall is split up, and how everything is spent, and that we will be seeing graphs as soon as enough data has been collected!

About changing the goal – as long as it’s a reasonable goal – saving $10 for a batman figure should take 5 months, not counting any gift money that might go to that, and if he changes his goal, it’s likely to cost roughly the same (or more) – so it might be enough to recheck the goal when counting how much is saved up. If Trent notices that gift money isn’t being put in the saving slot as much as before, he might ask then as well.

Another question of how this works: other than basic needs – food, shelter, medical, clothing – is there anything else that you will buy for him, or does everything else have to come out of his spending section?

By: bethh

bethh — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:40:34 +0000

I was volunteering on the phones taking pledges for my local NPR station, and a kid called in to donate seven dollars/month for a year. It sounded like his parents let him pick an organization each year, and they contributed a dollar amount equal to his age. It was a very cute phone call! Good luck with this Trent – no matter how it goes, it’ll be a learning experience.

By: Patty

Patty — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 22:29:56 +0000

Gotta love this! Thanks – I think a niece or nephew may need this very soon.

Your kids are beautiful!

By: SMG

SMG — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 21:12:37 +0000

btw, both of your children are very cute!

By: Carey

Carey — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 21:01:39 +0000

I’m sort of with Johanna here with the “Save” compartment. In 20 weeks, when the little lad has saved up $10 for Batman, will he have moved on from the Batman phase? At this point, 20 weeks represents 10% of his lifespan up to that point (I know, crazy to think about it that way), so I doubt he’s going to be into the same things.

But, that’s what being a parent is all about: adjusting :)

By: friend

friend — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 20:05:37 +0000

I really like everything about this idea. I’ve been teaching my preteen about those four money categories for years, and he has his jars and his bank account, but the pig is such a wonderful way to visualize the categories. And kudos to the way you’re bringing little sis into the picture at her own speed.

By: Jessie

Jessie — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 20:03:12 +0000

Question: What do you do when he’s 5 years old and getting 2.50? That doesn’t divide into 4 slots in quarter form! Would you just do $2 one week and $3 the other week so it would work out? I only ask because I would love to do this for my children when they are old enough.

By: BJD

BJD — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 19:21:59 +0000

Sounds like Joe had a much better bday this year. If I remember right most of his friends got sick the day of his birthday party and no one was able to go to the party. His grin looks like he had a much better 4th birthday than 3rd!!!

By: John DeFlumeri Jr

John DeFlumeri Jr — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 19:20:54 +0000

That is a wonderful way to instill the habit of saving money for something.