“Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.” – Chinese proverb
The same principle applies to your kids and money.
By teaching your children how to manage their money, you’re preparing them to be self-sufficient in their finances (which means they won’t be running to the bank of mom and dad whenever they’re strapped for cash).
As a parent, you want the best for your child—which can be expensive. It all adds up: food, clothes, books, toys, camp, sports, and lessons. In fact, 36% of Canadian parents have borrowed or know someone who has borrowed to pay for a child’s extracurricular activities.
With so many expenses, it’s hard to start saving for your child’s future, but it’s essential. The cost of post-secondary education is high and increasing. Housing prices are also on the rise in many parts of the country—and it’s worth noting that 18% of first-time homebuyers down payments are loans or gifts from parents and other family members.
Whether your child is just a toddler, a teenager, or a young adult in college, it’s not easy to teach your kids about personal finance, especially when you’re not even sure yourself! But the best way to learn is by teaching. So here are some essential things you must convey to your kids to instil the idea of becoming financially independent. You might learn a thing or two yourself!
1. Discuss wants vs needs
The first step in teaching kids the value of saving is to help them distinguish between wants and needs. Explain that needs include the basics, such as food, shelter, regular clothing, healthcare, and education. Wants are all the extras—from movie tickets and candy to designer sneakers, a bicycle, or the latest smartphone.
You can even quiz them on items in your home to drive home the concept. For example, point out items in their bedroom or the kitchen and ask them whether the object is a need or a want. This allows you to explain the idea that you must prioritize what you spend money on, leaving some funds for future necessities.
2. Get them used to a budget
It's a good idea to help your kids learn to track what’s coming in and going out of their bank accounts, but not everyone is detail-oriented enough to keep tabs on every transaction. It might be easier to teach them a few good rules of thumb to follow instead.
For instance, one easy way to think about budgeting is to spend no more than 60 percent of your paycheque on committed expenses. These are things that you can expect to pay each month like rent, utilities, food, and other necessary costs. Then, commit about 20 percent of what you have for savings. The final 20 percent is for whatever you want. While these are just guidelines, knowing them can help your kids instil good financial habits with their money.
3. Start early—and focus on contentment
Whereas giving younger children piggy banks to help them focus on savings might work, showing your older children takes a bit more effort. Along the way, parents can help their children find contentment in their financial circumstances. With teens, for example, helping them budget and save for a car or a big event like prom is potentially their first chance at planning for big purchases. And it’s important to reiterate that no, that car may not be the newest on the block, but it gets from Point A to Point B just fine.
4. Young Children: Start with Play Money
The best place to start with young children is still with something tactile, engaging, and concrete. Play it safe by using play money. When handling play money, you can talk to your child about what they're worth, teach them how to make a change, and make pretend transactions with them.
Use teachable moments to build a money lesson into your daily life. For example, when paying with your debit or credit card, you can explain to your pre-teen how they work and how they're different.
5. Help them create a safety net
Hopefully, your kids know they should start saving something for retirement. But it’s also good to talk about some simple things they can do to ensure they’re in a good financial position. Talk through:
- Emergency Savings. It’s a good idea to set aside three to six months' worth of expenses. This is money they can use for an unexpected big bill or if they lose their job. They don’t need to set it all aside at once (no one can). But they should devote some of their savings each month to building an emergency fund.
- Retirement. When you’re young and starting out, retirement seems so far away. But the sooner your kids start saving, the more time they’ll have for their money to grow. If they get an RRSP through work, it’s a good idea to contribute at least enough to get any company match. Then as they make more money over time, they can slowly increase their contributions.
- Insurance. They probably know to sign up for their employer’s health insurance if it’s offered. But things like renters’ insurance and disability income insurance probably aren’t top of mind. These are typically relatively inexpensive when your kids are young, and they could make a huge difference in protecting their finances from the unexpected.
6. Teach them not all debt is created equal
If your kids are like most young adults today, there’s a good chance they have some (or a lot of) student and credit card debt. So, it’s important to help them understand the difference between good and bad debt and how to use debt to their advantage, not their detriment.
Bad debt is typically high-interest debt that provides little long-term value. This would include things like credit card balances. Good debt tends to have lower rates and usually helps pay for something that will provide enduring value. A mortgage, for instance, can help you buy a home that’s likely to grow in value over time. Student loans help you get an education, increasing your lifetime earning potential.
7. Instil the importance of good credit
Remind them of the importance and perks of having good credit and show them how to do this correctly. The most important way to maintain good credit is to stop making only the minimum monthly payment. Instead, pay your balance back in full at the end of the month. If you can’t do this, you are living above your means. You can’t get financially independent by spending so much. Teach your kids how to use a credit card correctly and tell them to think about paying it back in full at the end of the month whenever they want to pull out their credit cards to buy something. Credit cards, if used correctly, offer a tremendous amount of perks such as free flight, insurance, and even fee reductions, but only if your credit is in tip-top shape.
8. Plan to wean them off your support
Your job is to protect your children and take care of them, so it can be tempting to support them financially when they ask for help or to offer cash for things like buying new furniture, paying off their student loans faster, or renting an apartment in a better part of town.
If you’re able to help your kids and you want to, that’s great. But make sure you have a plan to transition them to be responsible for their bills. And if helping your children will put your financial future at risk, you may want to think twice before offering to help. Remember, the less they ask you for $100 here or $200 there, the better they’ll learn to manage their finances.
9. Help them set up high yield savings accounts, and a no-fee chequing account
Set up an online, free chequing account for your kids (when it is the right time) and help them set up a high yield savings account online as well, so they can have fun watching their money grow. Contrary to popular belief, money does grow–if you let it.
Show them how to invest in the stock market with diversified mutual funds or GICs as they’re able to.
If you’re not comfortable investing or feel like you lack the knowledge to pass along to your children, there is such a thing as automatic investing. It’s all about automatic diversification of stocks. There are some very easy ways to invest in the stock market. Life-cycle funds automatically diversify your investments between stocks and bonds based on your age, while index funds offer a bit more customization.
You can also reach out to our Credential Asset Management Inc. Digital Wealth Specialists who could introduce you to robo-investing through the VirtualWealth platform. Visit our Innovation Wealth site to learn more.
10. Stop teaching your kid how to survive–teach them how to accumulate wealth
Wealth can be used to do good in the world. We need more philanthropists and innovators. There are so many important problems to solve and places to go. Give your children permission to accumulate wealth for the good of themselves, their future family, and their community.
The Path to Financial Literacy
Of course, there's more to teaching the next generation about money than the ten strategies above. Passing down your financial know-how is an essential job for parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles, but it's easier said than done. The use of cash is disappearing, spending is frictionless, and fraud and scams are constant threats. Preparing your kids to be good money managers will be an ongoing process. Don’t give up! You and your children will truly benefit from your efforts.
Mutual funds are offered through Credential Asset Management Inc. VirtualWealth is a trade name of Credential Qtrade Securities Inc.