what to tell your kids and what not to....

okey dokey do....
I was just thinking about this this morning, and I wanted to see what you guys did or plan on doing.
My main question is about finances....do you tell you kids or not? I have always planned on explaining them to Leane, showing her bills and pay stubs, and stuff. My mom never told me about anything to do with money, how much her bills were, how much she made, what a good wage is, how much houses cost, and so on.
Now she expects me to know it all and gets mad when I ask her something.....
Sometimes I wonder if this is why I used to be so bad with money. (we're horribly in debt right now) I still have a spending problem, but I'm quite sure that was self-induced.
When I was younger and my parents were getting divorced, we had basically no money, but my mom made a sure point to never let us know. When we asked for something, she would just say, "no." when we would ask why, she would say, "money doesn't grow on trees." We had no idea what it took to live, so we just thought "why not?" I didn't understand why she was saying no....we assumed that since she was buying groceries and cigarettes...why not get us a toy or something? Maybe we were just bad at hearing "no," but I was also interested in the 'why' part of things.
Now, my family is always going on about how spoiled I am and how I stretched my mom to the limit...and not to mention going on and on and on by saying, "times are tough little girl. You need to learn that. Fixed incomes are hard to live on today." In fact, I just got into this huge fight with my oma about this yesterday for saying that. I'm married and my family is living on a VERY fixed income! I don't get it......
I got a little off topic there...guess I had to blow off some steam....
So back to the main question.....what do you guys do when it comes to expaining finances to your kiddies?

 

hmmm, I may not show them actual bills and such but I do think I'm going to instill my children/child with good work ethics.. I want them to know it takes work to get what you want.. they'll have allowances and I'll tell them what I think is appropriate to help them understand why they need to work for what they have...

 

Not when they are young. My dh is kinda secretive about just how much he makes, as kids TALK, and what he makes may seem like a lot to some kids in our area. We don't want our kids to be taken advantage of by those who think they should buy things for them. (Hell no, we aren't rich, but Bear has been at his job for 22 years now, and he finally makes a decent income. The early years were difficult with money, and we STILL go into debt when we have an unexpected purchase.)

I don't like the idea of showing kids the bills. Kids have different coping skills than adults do, and I wouldn't want my children worrying about the bills when they should be outside playing. I think an allowance, with a little budget to spend and save is a MUCH better idea than to show the kids really scary adult things like paychecks and bills.

We show the kids (ages 20 down to 6) the cell phone bill (well, actually, Sage doesn't see it, as she does't have a cell phone, but the other three kids do) so they can see how many minutes they used, and if they go over their minutes, THEY have to pay for them. Sunshine once went $100.00 over her minutes! She learned very quickly not to do that again. But, we don't show them the mortgage, or the heating bill, or the electricity, or the credit card bills, ect. They scare the hell out of ME, I can't imagine what seeing those would do to a child.

 

That was kinda what I was debating here......i never thought of the part where kids may be stressed out about family bills. But at the same time, when you're asking that they turn a light off when they leave a room to save power, and they ask why, what do you say? 'because it's expencive?" then they ask, "how expensive?"
I'm stuck. I want her to have a healthy attitude about money.
I think that I like the allowance idea....but in another way, i don't want to reward her for doing things around the house that everyone should help out with......it's a vicous circle.........so what DO i give the allowance for ?

 

My kids start getting allowance at about 6 or 7. They have a basic rate, which they always get, no matter what. (my dh calls it the "Sugar Family Welfare State." LOL!) Then some based on some chores. Let me tell you, when they "forget" to take out the garbage or do the dishes for the 1000th time, taking a couple of bucks off of their allowance is a potent motivator! But we never take away the entire thing. My dh never had allowance (his lovely parents didn't belive in "giving" money to children.) And, even as 46 year old man, he is TERRIBLE with money.

The kids, after a few years, need to use part of their allowance to buy lunch, so if they want to save more money, they can bring lunch. (We don't charge for lunch food brought from home.) In the summer, they have more money for fun things. They get raises based on age, duties and inflation. (As school lunch goes up, as well as other costs.) All my older kids are pretty good with money. They all have jobs, and Bear decided they can still have allowance, although, Sunshine, at 20, and a good waitressing job, gets less than the two teens. (IMO, she no longer needs an allowance, but Bear thinks it is still a motivator for her, so we keep it. Sunshine loves clothes and make up, so it is motivating for her. She is expected to do certain things, but I think kids need to have their own money. All the kids I know whose parents didn't give them allowance are either terreible with money, or they are real cheapskates. They just never learned how to spend properly, IMO. I remember a freind whose parents "didn't belive" in allowance, who were always "borrowing" money from me and not paying it back. The same thing happened to my kid's freinds who didn't get it. They seemed to have a "you have money and I don't, so you should give some to me" attitude. Moon learned the hard way to NEVER lend money to freinds who didn't get allowance. She was at one point, out more than $20.00 in Jr High. She finally had to put her foot down. It always seemed like the people who had the most money never gave allowance, the kids just had to wait until their parents were "in the mood" to give them money. That is not a really dependable way to have an income. You don't wait until you boss is "in a good mood" to pay you. You get it for doing your job, as welll as just showing up.

I got allowance, but it was not much (Between $3.00 and $5.00 a week when I was in HS, and I had to buy lunch with it, I did not get any reduced price lunch, so I was spending about a dollar a day in the 70s.) my parents stopped my allowance when I got second job. My first job (not including babysitting, which I had been doing since I was about 10) was an advice column for teen in our town newpaper. When I got a job in a record store, at the age of 16, they cut my allowance completely. Our kids still get allowance,if they get a job. Bear is a pretty generous dude.

 

I remember when I was ten or so, my family had a big reorganizing of our finances at one point, and my parents used it as an opportunity to instill some sense of responsibility in us. We got our allowance on the same day as my dad got paid, which was every other week. I think this really helped, because it meant we had to be more careful with our budgeting than when it had been every week. We had to buy all our "extras" ourselves - sweets and other junk-food, music, movies, books, toys, etc. We opened saving accounts so we could see what real banking was like, and to help us save up for larger wish-list items.

One thing they really stressed, though, was that allowance was NOT linked in any way to chores. Allowance was our own tool for learning how to handle money, and it came with membership to the family.

Chores also came with membership to the family - we all had to do our own laundry, and we each had our own parts of the house that needed our attention (dishes, bathroom, kitchen floor, etc.) When we didn't do the chores, it was it's own punishment. No clean clothes. A disgusting house. It didn't take long to realize that it was really worth an hour or so a week to keep the place liveable. And when a cleaning job was really bad or something, my mom was always willing to help - but this way it was not always HER responsibility - it was ours.

It might not work for every family. Mine was always pretty weird, even in childhood.

 

I level with our kids. Even though my husband works 72+ hours each week, most of it goes to paying bills & things like school supplies.

We made a pie-chart showing how much each one of our bills & things like groceries take up. We didn't use numbers as we didn't think it was important for them to know exactly what DH makes, but it showed them simply exactly how much was left for extra things. We allow them to sit in & voice opinions on what that money will go towards as well. Right now, they know it is being saved towards a trip to Chicago this fall, to see King Tut. I think it helps to let them see things like how we budget the extras... not to go on & on about it, but we will point out things like having to skip eating out & buying quite as many special snacks right before & after a trip.

Both of my kids started getting an allowance on their 6th birthday. They get $1 per month for every year they are old, so my son is now getting $10 per month, while my daughter gets $6. This is their money to do what they wish with. The only stipulation we put on it is that they must make or buy their sibling a birthday & Christmas gift. If they make something, we will foot the bill. But if they choose to buy something, it comes out of their funds. And like hummblebee mentioned, we too give them an allowance simply because they are a part of the family - as we also explain their chores.

So far the kids have both saved most of their money towards large purchases. My son has bought several of the larger Lego sets that we could not afford to get for him, and many X-box games that I refuse to buy. (They're not violent, I just don't want to financially contribute to that addiction) Just last month they decided to put their money together, to get one of those waterslide toys to play with. And come the end of the month, they will have saved enough to get it.

So yeah, I think that talking to your kids about money is important. They don't need to see you pulling your hair out at the end of the month, but I do feel that if they know where your paycheck goes it helps with the gimmies.
love,
mom

 

Sounds like some good financial works for your kids, mamas. Good job.

I find the thing that stumps people is whether to tie allowance to chores or not. The way Bear and I see it, not only is this a potent motivator (my kids are not motivated by a dirty house, and they do their own laundry, which is not tied to allowance, just so they won't have filthy clothes) but, with four kids the house can get gross, and they also want animals, and sometimes, with so many kids, there is always "Let her do it, I did it last time. Let Lennon do it, he's stronger." ect. So, like I said, they have a base, which is rarely taken away (they have to REALLY mess up for that to happen) but there is a % that IS tied to chores, or nothing would get done, without yelling and I really hate to have to yell, and I also HATE to do it all myself.

This is just what works for us. If kids are willing to do the chores with not a lot of cash motivation, I think that is fantastic. My kids are slobs......

 

In our family we don't pay an allowance. We expect each older child (14 to 18) to participate in the daily running of the home by splitting firewood, doing dishes, feeding the animals, assisting with the care of the 6 month old, or cleaning of the common spaces or yard. They are responsible for their own laundry and rooms. If they have been consistant with these daily tasks they can have movie money or whatever.
They can earn their own money based on an hourly rate for tasks other than the daily chores such as large scale firewood cutting, baby sitting, land cultivating, etc. We may rethink this with the younger ones. I like Maggies method of giving an allowance and requiring the school lunches be bought from this to teach budgeting.

We have never shared the details of of my salary with our kids, but have found that each of them have assumed in their early teens that we are poor because we have no grid power, heat with wood, drive the same thirty year old pick-up and try and grow as much of our food as possible. Explaining to them that we have no morgage, no car payments, etc. has taken some time to sink in. Our oldest, though he will probably choose a more normal way to go about things, finally said he got it. It took realizing that his girlfriends parents paid the bank payments for everything for him to understand why we do things the way we do.

Another thing we do to help them realize the cost of things is to take an expediature and ask them how many hours they would have to work at their job (or their brothers job) to pay for a certain thing. Knowing that they would have to work all day washing dishes to pay for the pizzas we are all eating, or work and save for one whole year to pay for the materials for our roof puts perspective on things.

 

My parents and grandparents would give us some pocket money (an allowance of sorts) that was just for treats, and we've always our own bank accounts. Otherwise we were pretty sheltered, as our parents would always pay for things we needed (clothes, school stuff etc) and as they could always provide it was never really relevant to mention money. If we did ask for an expensive toy or whatever then we'd have to contribute our own money towards it. Even so my brother and I have never been materalistic. Think we learnt from example there as our parents live comfortably without great extravagance, my father in particular is very sensible with money [he buys good quality stuff ... then gets suprised 15 years later when it wears out, lol].

They never told us how much they make, I'm 20 and have only the vaugest inkling of my fathers salary. Am aware how much my mother makes (it's come up in conversation), but my brother probably doesn't.

I get an allowance now I'm in university and living away from home, £120 a month (sterling). That covers food, clothes, bills etc; and my rent is covered by the student loan. I don't budget to any precise degree [one of my roomates has a spreadsheet and everything], but have enough of an idea to get by. Probably spend more on food than some students because I like to eat well, but it evens out because I don't go to bars or care about the latest fashions.

As for doing chores, we weren't really rewarded unless it was a fairly large and/or kinda one off task (e.g weeding the garden). Guess our parents figured that after everything they needed to do for us the least we could do was partake too. We are each 25% of the household and need to pull our weight accordingly, no bribery involved.

 

my philosophy is to always answer my kids' questions, openly and honestly, as they arise, but not give too much information when a short explanation will do. If my short answer is not enough, they will keep asking more questions.


My older DD has been getting an allowance for about a year now (she's five now). I got so tired of the "I want that" everytime we went shopping, so as soon as she was able to do simple addition and subtraction, she got $1/week and has to save it up to buy more My Little Ponies (that's what she always wants, more ponies). But DH was adamant that her allowance not be a reward for doing chores and helping around the house, and that it not be withheld if she does not help as much as usual. I agree with him, and it works great for us, but I do give her a little extra if she's been particularly extra helpful that week. Now my two year old is starting to want money of her own, but so far she's still happy with some loose change jangling in her pockets (big sis is good about spending some of her money on toys for the little one, too).

The kids see me paying bills, they know what that's about, but haven't asked about how much Daddy makes or anything like that. It's not like they go to public school where kids brag about things like that, so they don't know to make a big deal of it.

 

wow, there's lots of good stuff here!
I really agree with not giving allowance for chores.
So how do you guys handle it when your kids refuse to clean/do thei share around the house?
I'm going to make sure Leane knows that it's everyone's job to help around the house. Although, I want to do it in a subtle way so it doesn't seem like a huge thing and when she does clean, that it's something to totally be fussed over. I just want her to see it as it's something we all do. Still having a fun time getting that concept across to Cody lol, but he's coming around quite a lot.

 

I've only had one kid out of five actually refuse to do his share, and as stubborn as he was it did not take him long to realise that his life could be pretty shitty when he didn't cooperate. Basically if they don't participate in the daily chores they lose privileges. These privileges can be anything from internet access to the freedom to go to a friends house. As lazy as teenagers can be they all pretty much realise that by pulling their load everbody's life is much better.

 

My kids don't have a choice. We have a daily schedule... pretty necessary when schooling 2 kids. Part of every day is chore-time, and we all have different chores that we are responsible. Even Daddy has chores. I spread them out, so family chores are in three 15-minute segments throughout the day.

Since the bulk of the kids' chores include caring for our pets & helping with things like dishes & laundry, whenever they say they don't want to help (which does happen, but not very often) I just point out that the piggies & frogs would die if we didn't care for them, and that we will all have to run around wearing dirty clothes & not eating until the dishes & laundry get done. Fortunately that hasn't appealed to them yet, so they help.
love,
mom

 

my kids generally like to help, and we make it a fun game to do chores. yeah, the house is usually a wreck, but so what? I make absolutely certain to never act like I hate cleaning and picking up, so my kids won't learn to hate doing housework like I learned to hate it because of how my mom always dreaded doing any cleaning and such.
We also work on explaining the natural consequences of their actions (or rather, inactions, as the case may be). Like, if you don't pick up your dirty clothes and put them in the laundry, it won't get washed and you won't have anything to wear. If you don't pick up your toys and put them where they belong, you won't be able to find what you want and will spend all day looking for it instead of playing. If you leave the markers out with the lids off them, they will dry up and Mommy will throw them away. If daddy steps on your favorite car/pony/doll and breaks it, Mommy will throw it away, so don't leave it on the floor.

 

lol... I do a lot of that too.

One that comes up all the time in this house, is "If you leave your legos on the floor & Mummy steps on one & it hurts her foot, she will throw it away!:
love,
mom

 

what if they decided they didn't care if their clothes were dirty?
I'm just trying to think like a kid would here, lol.