Recently, I’ve coached a few different moms about allowance and chores. These concepts often go together, but I think about them as two separate pieces. Today, I’ll teach you how to use giving allowance to teach financial literacy to your kids.
You’ll Learn:
Giving allowance gives your kid the ability to have some money in their pocket so they can learn how to spend, how to save, how to have regret, and how to feel proud. Listen to learn how.
----------------------------------
Managing money is a skill - and an important one. When you want to teach your kids how to read, you give them books. When you want to teach your kids about their feelings, you emotionally coach them about their feelings. When you want to teach them how to count or do math, you give them small items that they can count and manipulate.
So if you want to teach your kids about money, you have to give them some money.
There are a lot of things I want my kids to learn and understand about money. In order to do that, they have to make decisions and have a lot of different experiences with money.
I want them to experience the feeling of having some money and then spending it. I want them to spend money and be thrilled by the purchase. And I also want them to have the feeling of spending money on something that’s not good quality that breaks right away or that they regret.
I want them to have the feeling of saving their money in order to get something. But I also want them to have the feeling of wanting something and not having enough because they didn't save.
I even want them to have the experience of paying for fines. Sometimes, in life, we make a mistake and we have to pay money to fix it.
Ultimately, I want them to experience both success and failure when it comes to making decisions and spending money. This is how we learn.
My take on allowance and chores might be a little different than you’re used to. While the two are connected, I don’t actually believe that you should pay your kids to do chores.
Allowance is meant to teach financial literacy. Chores teach kids how to be in community. As a part of your family community, they should participate and help out…just because they live there. Both help teach responsibility.
So if you’re not paying your kid to do chores, how do they fit together?
As a member of the family, your child will have jobs to do around the house. There will be expectations for them to meet.
If they don’t do their jobs, what happens? Often, you end up doing the job for them, and they’ll need to pay you back for the time and energy it took you to do that.
Not doing their chore is a mistake. When you make mistakes, you have to pay for them in some way. You have to make it right. One way is for them to pay you back in time. If you did one of their chores, they can do one of yours. Another way is to pay you back in money.
For example, you might give your kid $5 a week for allowance. One night, you realize they didn’t take out the trash, so you do it before bed. The next day (or the next time you pay allowance), you say, “This chore that I did cost $1,” so they owe you that or you take it out of their allowance for the next week.
The shift is that the amount of their allowance is set, but you are docking their pay for things they didn’t do.
These are some tips and things to think about to use an allowance as a financial literacy tool.
Decide how much allowance you’ll give. This is a personal decision that depends on your financial situation, how many kids you have, etc. The cool thing is that when you start giving your kid allowance and stop buying extra stuff (if you have been), you’ll have a better handle on your own money.
In my opinion, $1 a week is great up until age 5-7. Then, you can raise it a little bit. We did $5 a week for a really long time with our boys.
Once they hit high school, it was more like $20 a week, because they were paying for food, movies, bowling, etc. when they were out with their friends. Now, in college, we give them slightly more than is necessary for the week or month, and they use that to pay for any extras.
Decide what you’re willing to pay for and what your kid has to pay for themselves. For example, if you’re going to a carnival, what will you provide? What extras does your kid have to buy for themselves? Maybe you pay for their admission or a ride wrist band or one sweet treat. Anything beyond that, they’ll need to pay for on their own. Decide in advance and communicate it clearly.
The idea is that you are still providing for them, but your child has some money for extras.
Have a safe place to keep money. For kids 12 and under, you want a piggy bank or a place where they can physically see their money. We want to make it concrete. A bank account is a little too vague for kids this age. It’s hard for them to understand how much is there and available.
Around age 12 or 13 is a good time to open a bank account. I really like the Greenlight debit cards for this. Monthly paper statements are also a great way to review their finances with them and get them into the habit of looking at their money - how much they have, how much they spent and how they feel about those choices. This can also lead to discussions about their financial and savings goals.
Give them some freedom. You might want to tell your kid they can’t buy something if you think it’s junk, too expensive, etc. But this is where they start to have those valuable experiences. When they feel that excitement or buyer’s remorse, it opens up a conversation about budgeting, saving, and lots of other good topics.
I’d rather see your kids buy stupid stuff at age 7 than get to college and waste a ton of money because they haven’t learned those lessons. This is how they practice.
Optional: Set limits around what they can buy. A big one here is sweets. Your kid might be happy to spend $20 on candy. It’s okay for you to say, “You’re welcome to spend your money as long as you don’t spend it on sweets.” Or maybe they can buy sweets on the weekend, but not during the week.
⚠️Caution: Don’t set these kinds of limits right away. Let the situation play out a bit. Let them do their own thinking, and see if they come to their own conclusion. If something doesn’t play out the way you want (in my case, my kids were buying ice cream every Wednesday with zero regrets), you can always pull back and create a new limit.
Optional: Offer opportunities to earn more. If your kid is saving for something, you can create extra chores or jobs outside their normal responsibilities that they can earn money for. Quality control it, and make sure they do the job right. This gives them the feeling of working hard to earn something they want.
Giving allowance gives your kid the ability to have some money in their pocket so they can learn how to spend, how to save, how to have regret, and how to feel proud. It also gives them a new way to repair their mistakes.
Let them try, fail, succeed and learn so that they’re taking steps toward financial responsibility.
Get your copy of the Stop Yelling Cheat Sheet!
In this free guide you’ll discover:
✨ A simple tool to stop yelling once you’ve started (This one thing will get you calm.)
✨ 40 things to do instead of yelling. (You only need to pick one!)
✨ Exactly why you yell. (And how to stop yourself from starting.)
✨A script to say to your kids when you yell. (So they don't follow you around!)
Download the Stop Yelling Cheat Sheet here
Welcome back to become a calm mama. I'm your host. I'm Darlyn Childress. I'm
Speaker:a life and parenting coach. And today on the podcast, I wanna
Speaker:talk about allowance and financial
Speaker:literacy and how I teach the concept of
Speaker:allowance to my clients. And I brought this up
Speaker:today because the last few weeks in the Calm Mama Club, I have
Speaker:coached a few different moms about allowance and how they
Speaker:connect to chores and whether you should connect them to chores, whether you should
Speaker:pay kids for doing their chores and how it all works.
Speaker:So I wanted to break it all down on the podcast because I realized I
Speaker:had not done a podcast episode on allowance
Speaker:and chores. Today's podcast episode is not
Speaker:really going to be about chores. Because as you'll see, the way
Speaker:that I teach allowance is really
Speaker:around the concept of financial literacy. And then I teach
Speaker:chores around being in a community. I will
Speaker:connect chores and allowance in this podcast, but not in the
Speaker:way that you think that you typically think about them because we're not
Speaker:gonna pay kids to do chores. Because as a part of your
Speaker:community, in your family, they should participate in that
Speaker:community because they live there. Right? Because they participate in that
Speaker:community. So we want our kids to have chores so that they learn about
Speaker:being in a community and being responsible, and we want them to have money
Speaker:so they learn about being responsible with money.
Speaker:Okay. No joke. I just got interrupted while recording this podcast from
Speaker:my 18 year old son, who's a freshman in college, asking me
Speaker:if I could send him his weekly allowance for college. Isn't that so
Speaker:funny? It it's just made me chuckle. Okay.
Speaker:Now I wanna talk to you about financial literacy, not so much
Speaker:what it means, but just how important it is to give your
Speaker:kids the skills around managing their money.
Speaker:And I want to remind you that when you wanna teach your kids how
Speaker:to read, you give them books. When you wanna
Speaker:teach your kids about their feelings, you emotionally coach them
Speaker:about their feelings. When you wanna teach them how to count
Speaker:or to do math, you give them things that they can count, little
Speaker:manipulatives, little math games. So if you wanna teach
Speaker:your kids about money, you have to give them some. That's
Speaker:my frame of reference when it comes to allowance is I
Speaker:want to give my kids some money so that they
Speaker:learn all sorts of things about money. So
Speaker:one thing I want them to learn when it comes to money is I want
Speaker:them to learn the feeling of having some
Speaker:money and then spending that money, making
Speaker:that decision to spend the money. I want them to
Speaker:have the feeling of spending it and being thrilled by the purchase
Speaker:and being really proud of themselves. And I also want them to have the
Speaker:feeling of spending money on something that's
Speaker:not quality or that breaks really fast or that they
Speaker:regret and have a little buyer's remorse.
Speaker:I want them to have a lot of different experiences with money,
Speaker:which means I need to give them some and then let them make a lot
Speaker:of decisions about it. I also want them to have
Speaker:the feeling of saving their money in order
Speaker:to get something. But I want them
Speaker:also to have the feeling of wanting something and not having
Speaker:enough because they didn't save. So in all these
Speaker:examples, I'm giving them experiences with
Speaker:being successful as well as failing. I want
Speaker:them to have money and to use it in ways that
Speaker:are great and not use it and use it in ways that aren't great. I
Speaker:want them to have money and save and feel that really great feeling of
Speaker:having a lot of money and then buying something if they wanna buy something or
Speaker:whatever. And I want them to feel that sad feeling of, oh, I wish I
Speaker:would have saved my money so I could afford blankety
Speaker:blank. I also want them to experience
Speaker:that the experience of paying
Speaker:for fines, for lack of better term.
Speaker:Like, sometimes in life, I might make a mistake. I
Speaker:might not pay my credit card bill on time, or I might
Speaker:accidentally leave my clothes in the washing machine, and they get
Speaker:mildew or something like that. I might make a mistake in
Speaker:life, speeding ticket, or don't turn off the,
Speaker:the heater, and I get a big gas bill. Right? I
Speaker:sometimes do things in life that make then I make a
Speaker:mistake, then I have to pay money to fix it.
Speaker:It costs me money when I make mistakes. So I want my kids to have
Speaker:a little bit of money, so that they can also pay
Speaker:actual money for the mistakes that they make. Now,
Speaker:primarily, what I'm talking about here is chores.
Speaker:So I'm gonna start there with the way that I think about
Speaker:allowance with chores. Imagine you have a little, you know, 7 year
Speaker:old and their job is to empty the dishwasher when they get
Speaker:home from school or make their bed or wipe
Speaker:down the sink, you know, in the after brushing their
Speaker:teeth or putting their socks and shoes away, some kind
Speaker:of task like that. And it's just a standard routine.
Speaker:I'll teach you in another podcast episode how to create chores,
Speaker:but like, how to create the rhythm of chores in your
Speaker:family. But just thinking about the fact that you have expectations,
Speaker:your kids kinda know what they're supposed to do. Right? They have jobs.
Speaker:And I love that. I want your kids to have lots of jobs. Now, what
Speaker:happens if they don't do their job? That's one of the biggest questions
Speaker:we get about, you know, when you have a kid and they don't do their
Speaker:chores, what are you supposed to do about it? So here's how I do
Speaker:it, is they have their chores.
Speaker:And if I have to do their chore for them,
Speaker:then they need to pay me for my time
Speaker:or my energy or the attention.
Speaker:They, they need to pay me back because I did their chore for them.
Speaker:So it needs to cost them something. Not doing their chore is a
Speaker:mistake. And when you make mistakes, you have to
Speaker:pay for them, right? You have to make them right. You have
Speaker:to do restitution and fix things.
Speaker:And so that's how I handled
Speaker:chores for the most part throughout the kids' elementary school
Speaker:and even into high school. I would give them allowance.
Speaker:Right? They would have some money that, you know, they could also earn more money
Speaker:by doing extra chores that weren't their regular chores. So they'd have a little
Speaker:bit of spending money. And then if they didn't do something,
Speaker:like bring the trash cans in, that was one of their big jobs, empty the
Speaker:dishwasher, obviously clean up after themselves. They didn't
Speaker:do one of their chores, and I had to do it because I went to
Speaker:bed and realized they went to bed and I realized they hadn't done it. Or
Speaker:I go into the bathroom when I see the sink, something like that, and I
Speaker:wipe it down. I would make a little note and I'd say, oh, this chore
Speaker:cost $1. And then I would either
Speaker:go the next day and say, hey, you owe me a dollar because I did
Speaker:your chore. Or when it was time for allowance and I went
Speaker:to give them the $5 I would hold back some of the money and I'd
Speaker:say, oh, this is to pay me for the chores that I did for you.
Speaker:You don't have as much because I'm docking your allowance
Speaker:to pay for the chores that you didn't do. So I
Speaker:love that concept. I'm not paying you
Speaker:for doing your chores. The the allowance
Speaker:is set. But if I have to do your chores
Speaker:for you, then you're paying me.
Speaker:Isn't that great? So
Speaker:we wanna give our kids, an allowance. Right? So that they can
Speaker:learn how to manage money, make mistakes,
Speaker:how that to use money to pay for mistakes that they've made,
Speaker:to spend money, to save money, to have all of
Speaker:those feelings. So one of the things that I've
Speaker:noticed has to come alongside when you start
Speaker:with allowance is that you start
Speaker:to eliminate or dramatically reduce
Speaker:the things that you buy for your kids. So let
Speaker:me break this down. Imagine that I'm going to, like,
Speaker:a carnival, like, a state fair or like a local
Speaker:carnival or or your school might have kind of a
Speaker:festival or something like that. So as a parent, I decide
Speaker:what I'm willing to buy and I decide that in advance.
Speaker:I'm not impulsively getting there and just being like, oh my god. My kids keep
Speaker:asking me for money and I'm so overwhelmed and you don't wanna say no. I
Speaker:want you to think about how much you wanna spend, what you're willing to pay
Speaker:for. So I'm like, I'm gonna give you each, you
Speaker:know, $20 wristband or $20 in
Speaker:coins or whatever the little thing is, and I'm willing to buy one
Speaker:sweet treat. Right? Then anything
Speaker:extra that you want, you can pay for it.
Speaker:So that kind of idea is So that your kids have to have
Speaker:some money if they want to pay for
Speaker:something extra. So imagine you go to
Speaker:Target or you go to, you know, a a drugstore or something like that.
Speaker:And they're like, mom, I want to buy this, you know, little army men
Speaker:or this little doll or these, you know, these stickers or these, you know,
Speaker:stick on tattoos or something like that. One of those
Speaker:impulse buys, you know. And then they say: mom, mom, mom, can you buy
Speaker:this for me? And you can say: oh, no, no, no. I'm not spending my
Speaker:money. Did you bring your money? They'll probably say: no, no. I
Speaker:don't have any money with me. I have money. My money is at the house.
Speaker:Can you Can I pay you back? And then you can decide whether
Speaker:you want to lend money that day or not. So you can say no, the
Speaker:bank's closed. I'm not open for lending money. Or if it's something
Speaker:that you don't mind them having, you can say: sure. Go ahead. I'll happy to
Speaker:lend you money. And then when they get home, you give they hand you the
Speaker:money back. Now, what form is this money in?
Speaker:It's really important for kids under 12,
Speaker:even a little bit older, but for sure under 12 to have some sort
Speaker:of piggy bank or a place to hold their money
Speaker:so that they can see it and touch it and notice if it's
Speaker:growing, if it's little bit of a lot. We wanna make
Speaker:it concrete. So having a bank account and having a
Speaker:money in the bank is a little bit vague for them. It's hard
Speaker:for them to understand how much it is, how much is
Speaker:available, those kinds of things. So we want our kids to have
Speaker:a piggy bank of some kind. It doesn't have to be, like, an
Speaker:actual piggy bank. We just want them to have something that they can put their
Speaker:money in. I think my kids had, like,
Speaker:well, some of them they had sometimes they had wallets, which was fun, but they'd
Speaker:always lose them. But they'd have a little basket in their room, and they'd have
Speaker:money in these little baskets. So when you think about
Speaker:having your kids, when you are out and about,
Speaker:start to buy them less stuff. Or when you're going to buy
Speaker:them something, tell them in advance. And then let them decide if
Speaker:they wanna buy something extra that it would be their money.
Speaker:Now, what people often ask me is should they be able
Speaker:to buy whatever they want? What if it's a piece of junk?
Speaker:What if it's candy? Right? What if it's,
Speaker:you know, something they wanna buy for their friend or they wanna spend too much
Speaker:money on something? Then this is where we want
Speaker:to begin to separate ourselves a little
Speaker:bit and let them have that experience. Let them figure out for
Speaker:themselves what they wanna spend money on. Let them buy
Speaker:something and regret it. Let them buy something and be happy about
Speaker:it. Let them find the feeling of giving a gift to a friend
Speaker:and spending a lot of money. But then the next time when you go to
Speaker:the carnival or you go to to the drugstore or wherever, and
Speaker:they realize, oh, I spent all my money on that one thing.
Speaker:So, yeah, that's tough. It's gonna take you a while.
Speaker:How how many weeks did it take you to get that much
Speaker:money? Do you know? And you start doing the budgeting, you start
Speaker:doing the math, you start having conversations with them. If you give
Speaker:them $5 a week and they want to buy something that costs
Speaker:$60 that's 3 months of savings.
Speaker:That's a lot of savings. That's a lot of time to not buy something
Speaker:that they would want, something smaller,
Speaker:something less expensive. So we want to stop buying
Speaker:toys on demand, snacks on demand, extras on
Speaker:demand. We want to help our kids look forward to
Speaker:birthdays and holidays for the special items, but also having
Speaker:that desire of saving your money to get something.
Speaker:Now, obviously, with someone with ADHD or, I mean, most kids in
Speaker:general, they're gonna have a lot of regret. They're
Speaker:gonna buy things that are dumb. I
Speaker:would rather your kids buy stupid stuff at age 7
Speaker:than to waste tons of money when they're in college.
Speaker:I want them to learn the feeling of not having enough money to
Speaker:get something or to have something that they want. I want
Speaker:them to have that experience. So we have to give them these small
Speaker:examples and moments where they get to practice spending
Speaker:money and things like that. So you have to start buying
Speaker:less. Now, if your kid was trying to save something,
Speaker:you know, save $60 and they only have, you know,
Speaker:$20, you are welcome to create
Speaker:chores or extra jobs that you can pay them
Speaker:for. And you can be really generous. You can be stingy. I don't doesn't matter.
Speaker:You can say, okay, you know, if you wanna do my chores for me, these
Speaker:are things that I am responsible for. You're welcome to do those
Speaker:and here's the going rate. So you could just make it up. If you
Speaker:want them to, you know, do the laundry or mop
Speaker:the floors or, I don't know, small chores
Speaker:that you do in the house that you think that they're capable of doing properly,
Speaker:you go ahead and give them that that responsibility. And then you
Speaker:can quality control it and just say, nope. This is not you do
Speaker:not do a $5 job. This is only a $4 job. If you want
Speaker:the full $5, you're gonna need to do this and that. Right? Go
Speaker:back and have them do that. That is really that feeling of,
Speaker:like, you know, working hard to earn something
Speaker:and to keep at it and to, you
Speaker:know, do the right do it do it properly and to get
Speaker:paid appropriately. That's a good feeling. So you can teach
Speaker:your kids the value of working to get money,
Speaker:working to earn, and then also how
Speaker:important it is to do good work in order to
Speaker:get your full pay. So you can teach a little bit of work ethic
Speaker:and work habits in there when it comes to earning money.
Speaker:So we have, like, a baseline for allowance and then we
Speaker:have a, extra
Speaker:opportunities if you want to. You don't have to. You actually don't have to do
Speaker:any of this at all. You don't have to give your kids money if you
Speaker:don't want to. You don't have to buy them extra stuff ever. There's no
Speaker:requirement that you add anything to your life whatsoever.
Speaker:I just know that some people are interested in teaching their kids about
Speaker:money, and this is a good strategy to do it.
Speaker:Now, how much money is is one of the
Speaker:questions I get. And, obviously, that's very personal depending
Speaker:on your financial situation, where you live, what your
Speaker:kids have access to. You know, if
Speaker:you had 4 kids and you give each one $5 a
Speaker:week, then that's $20. That's $80 a month. Like, it can
Speaker:add up quite a bit. The cool thing though is when you start
Speaker:giving your kids allowance and you stop buying extra stuff,
Speaker:you'll actually have a better handle on your own,
Speaker:income, you know, your own money because you won't be just kind of throwing
Speaker:money over here and there and buying everybody a Starbucks or everybody an ice
Speaker:cream when you weren't planning on it because those are the kinds of things that
Speaker:we're gonna pull back. We're gonna say, no. I'm not gonna buy those today. I'm
Speaker:not willing to spend my money. You can spend yours.
Speaker:So you'll probably actually spend less on your kids if you give them a
Speaker:decent size allowance. What's a decent size allowance?
Speaker:You can start this around 3. And I feel like $1
Speaker:a week is great, up until
Speaker:they're, like, 5 or 6, something like that. 7, you can keep
Speaker:it to $1. And then you wanna kinda go up to a little bit more,
Speaker:$2, $3, $5. Our thing was
Speaker:$1 until you were 6. And then but I always did the
Speaker:boys at the same. So, like, sore it was 4. He got a little bit
Speaker:extra. And then we did $5 for a really long time. It was
Speaker:$20 a month. That was seemed to be about right for them
Speaker:in terms of stuff that they would probably wanna get. And then when they were
Speaker:in high school, I started to change. I gave them
Speaker:much more, but they had to buy their food when they were
Speaker:out with their friends. They had to pay for their movies. They had to pay
Speaker:for their bowling nights and whatever that kind of thing
Speaker:was. They'd have to pay for those things. So it's more like
Speaker:$20 a week. But if they saved it, they could have
Speaker:$80 in a month and they would be able to do something really fun like
Speaker:go to a concert. That's the same concept I have now
Speaker:with how much money I give to my kids in college
Speaker:is I give them slightly more than is necessary for the
Speaker:week or for the month. 1 kid wants it weekly, 1 kid wants it
Speaker:monthly cause they're trying to figure out how to budget. And I
Speaker:give them a little bit extra because I've told them many times I'm
Speaker:not willing to pay for spring break trips. I'm not willing
Speaker:to pay for concerts. I'm not willing to pay for extra stuff
Speaker:that comes up. You have to save your money
Speaker:for those things. And they consistently don't have any
Speaker:money. They blow it. So they're learning. They're figuring it out.
Speaker:Okay. So the last thing I wanted to talk about was sweets and candy
Speaker:because we I've given that as an example. So it's like, you
Speaker:know, I'm gonna I'm willing to buy one sweet treat at the school
Speaker:carnival. And that's only if you wanted to. You could also say
Speaker:0. Now what if your kids like, I wanna spend $20. I
Speaker:brought all my money and I wanna buy all of the sweets. Right? Some
Speaker:of kids are gonna want that. You are, as
Speaker:a parent, I've talked about this on the podcast, you are
Speaker:responsible for what your kids eat,
Speaker:when they eat and where they eat. Now, even
Speaker:if it's their money, you always have that
Speaker:right of refusal. So you can
Speaker:say no, I'm not having you
Speaker:buy extra sweets today. You can spend your money
Speaker:on other things. You're welcome to spend your money as long as you don't spend
Speaker:it on sweets. That's like, you know, when my kids
Speaker:were in elementary school, we would go to this park every day. Every Wednesday after
Speaker:school and there would be a ice cream truck. And that
Speaker:ice cream truck would come and the boys knew and they would bring their dollar
Speaker:and they would bring their, you know, like, very excited about it. And
Speaker:they would buy, like, Spongebob Squarepants ice cream. It was, like, just such
Speaker:junk that I and then finally, I said to them, you are welcome to
Speaker:spend your money on non sweet things during
Speaker:the school week. So I just kinda made this new rule where it's like,
Speaker:you can maybe buy things on the weekends for sweets, but not during Monday
Speaker:through Friday. I just made it up. And then they were like,
Speaker:oh, okay. That's the rule. I can't buy anything. They're sad. And
Speaker:that's fine. It's okay. So you get to say, no. You have
Speaker:the veto. I would caution you.
Speaker:Like, the first few times the boys bought ice cream on the ice cream truck,
Speaker:I was like, fine. Whatever. But then I didn't, like,
Speaker:make it a thing. But then it became kind of a habit and they I
Speaker:was, like, essentially giving them money every week so they could buy stuff from the
Speaker:ice cream truck that I didn't really want them to do. I realized that didn't
Speaker:feel aligned. Then I pulled back, made a new rule.
Speaker:So sometimes you kinda need to let let the failure happen or find out
Speaker:what you're truly uncomfortable with. Maybe it's a one off. I actually want
Speaker:them to buy some ice cream and then go, well, that was stupid. I'm done
Speaker:with it, and I wasted my money. Like, I wanted them to have that
Speaker:regret. But this in this case, it wasn't happening. They were, like,
Speaker:excited every Wednesday. And I was, like, okay. No. I'm gonna fix this.
Speaker:So I wanna caution you to not say no right away, but
Speaker:let the situation play out a little bit.
Speaker:See if they're gonna come to their own conclusion. Let them do
Speaker:their own thinking. You can talk about it. You can say, oh,
Speaker:remember, okay, you have $5. If you buy this thing for
Speaker:$2.50, you're gonna have $2.50. But remember, this
Speaker:weekend, we're going to whatever you're going to.
Speaker:Do you want to only have $2 or do you wanna
Speaker:have $5? So you can start talking about
Speaker:how do you wanna spend your money thinking about the future, giving
Speaker:them perspective. But if they don't have any money, they're
Speaker:just asking you for money, then that's a very different conversation. You're not
Speaker:asking them to think about their money. You're just telling them no,
Speaker:and they don't understand why you're saying no. You
Speaker:probably don't even really understand why you're saying no half the time. Right?
Speaker:So we to recap, we wanna give our kids
Speaker:some money. We wanna give them some allowance. And that
Speaker:just gives them the ability to have some money in their pocket
Speaker:that you can teach them how to spend, how to save,
Speaker:how to have regret, how to feel proud. And,
Speaker:also, they have some money to pay you back for when you do
Speaker:things for them, like their chores. And that
Speaker:way, you have a little bit of, you know, another
Speaker:way to have them re make repair back to you using
Speaker:money. You don't have to. You can also just use time. Hey. You didn't do
Speaker:your chores. The, I did your chores today, so you
Speaker:can do mine. I'm happy to take you to soccer once you have done these
Speaker:three things, like vacuumed the floor, tidied up the pillows,
Speaker:you know, wipe down the doorknobs, you know, small little things like
Speaker:that. You you can just have them repair back to you in
Speaker:time. But, also, if they have some money, you can have them repair back to
Speaker:you in money, which is pretty cool.
Speaker:Alright. I think that is all I had to say about it.
Speaker:Oh, I guess I was gonna say when to open in a bank account.
Speaker:I would recommend more a little bit older, to be honest, like, when they're
Speaker:12 or 13. And the green light cards
Speaker:are really helpful because they can see that
Speaker:they have you know, they can see their you give them a certain amount
Speaker:of money, and then they can, like, practice with the debit card thing. But it's
Speaker:it's very interesting how, like, my kids have a credit
Speaker:card and they have a debit card, and they really like
Speaker:using their debit card more than credit because they can see the money
Speaker:going down. With the credit card, they don't
Speaker:see it. They just kind of they're, like, waiting to just get to their max
Speaker:or something. It's not real as much as, like, oh, I only have,
Speaker:you know, $22 left in the bank. So they're constantly checking
Speaker:their debit accounts. Now they're older. So how did they
Speaker:learn how to do that is through having allowance and then
Speaker:eventually having jobs, like actual jobs where they,
Speaker:you know, made money and then learning how to manage that money
Speaker:completely. Paying for gas and, you know, buying their own
Speaker:clothing and paying for their food out and their drinks out,
Speaker:like their Starbucks and their Red Bulls and whatever.
Speaker:That's later. So when they're in middle school, you
Speaker:kinda wanna establish, like, okay, we're gonna have a a bank account.
Speaker:Now, if your kid has a ton of money from grandparents and you have to
Speaker:make a bank account, like, of course, but realize that they don't know anything about
Speaker:it. They're not connected to the bank account. You are you're the
Speaker:one who's managing that. The only money that they really manage is the stuff that's
Speaker:in their hands until around 12. Now, when you open
Speaker:up a bank account for them, whatever age, I
Speaker:suggest you opt for monthly statements, paper statements.
Speaker:And I hopefully, banks still offer that where you can get something in the
Speaker:mail because then it's addressed to them. They open it.
Speaker:They start to review it. You can review it with them, and you get into
Speaker:the habit of looking at how much you have and how much you spent
Speaker:and, like, are you happy about your things you bought? What are
Speaker:your goals? What do you wanna save money for? Are there anything
Speaker:extras? Do you wanna spend money on doing paying me for your chores? Do you
Speaker:wanna keep doing that? Or would you rather just do them? So you're having a
Speaker:conversation with that monthly statement, which is really
Speaker:cool. Okay. I
Speaker:think that is it. If you have any questions,
Speaker:of course, you are always welcome to join the Come Mama Club. We talk
Speaker:about this kind of stuff in our weekly group sessions. That is
Speaker:on Tuesdays at 9:30 Pacific. We meet every Tuesday for
Speaker:about an hour. Lots of you know, the people come. The moms come. They ask
Speaker:questions. And the moms ask me questions and I coach
Speaker:them. And then there's some chat happening with, like, in the chat. There's lots of
Speaker:really good ideas going on in there all the time, which I love. So the
Speaker:Calm Mama Club is always available to you to join. It's $30 a
Speaker:month. You get the online course, that Calm Mama handbook, weekly
Speaker:group coaching, as well as a bunch of other online
Speaker:resources. So that's pretty cool. Or you could reach out to
Speaker:me and DM me on Instagram at darlin childress
Speaker:or reply to an email if you're on my email list. And just let
Speaker:me know, like, oh, hey. I have a question about this. And I'm happy to
Speaker:answer. Alright, mamas. I hope you are having
Speaker:a great week and that you've learned something today about
Speaker:money. And I will talk to you next time.