WIBU to allow my son to manage his own budget?

[Purplejay]

Hi, long discussion with DS 12 last night about budgeting. He would like to manage his own budget. I said we will discuss it further when he is 13 but I make no promises. In the meantime he has to show he can be more responsible, not expect to be waited on hand and foot etc etc. I am a single mum and DS is my only child. Currently he gets £10 per month pocket money and I buy his clothes, pay for his activities, toiletries, phone, Xbox live/game pass etc and £15-20 per week lunch money.

We tried to add up what I do/expect to spend on him on clothes each year and was a bit shocked at how much. He is just going into men’s sizes and still growing. For example: per year...
4 hoodies £160
6 t shirts £20
2 long sleeved tops £20
1 smart shirt £20
4 jeans £80. (kids ones were more like £10-15 but men’s cost more)
2 joggers £30
Pants/socks £30
Shorts £30
Swimwear £20
Footwear x 3 £120 (he bought some £80 ones himself in the past year with Xmas money and I bought 2 pairs of £40 trainers, sliders and slippers)
Nightwear £20.
Coat(s) £50
Total £600. Does that sound a lot?
I should add that does not include PE kit which would be another £100 or so (I was thinking of not including this as pe kit is non negotiable) and the school has a no uniform policy so he wears jeans, t shirt and hoodie every day.

I was thinking that if I were to let him control clothes, activities with friends, toiletries and spending money, that would be about £20 per week. I would want him to get an app and record his spending.

I would continue to pay for his phone, Xbox stuff, pe kit and give him lunch money.

Does anyone else do this? Does it work? DS is pretty responsible but has been fairly disinterested in money up to now. It could be a good lesson. He won’t spend it all on games and buy no clothes as he loves buying clothes. More likely the other way around! I have parental settings on everything anyway so he has to ask to download anything on Xbox which costs money and all phone apps (even the free ones).

I would be interested in your thoughts/experiences on giving teens responsibility for their money and how much your kids cost in clothing!

My DSD manages her own entertainment budget and since that's happened she never spends her own money. It's proved to be very cheap.

Part of whether it is reasonable depends on whether you can afford it.

£15-20 per week for lunch is quite a lot for example. The hoodies also stand out as a big expense. If he is going through so many because he is still growing, might it be worth looking for them in charity shops - maybe try to encourage him to develop a charity shop habit for his clothes? Or take him to an outlet mall?

The other obvious point would be if he was a spender or a saver. Some people can't seem to stop themselves from spending money the second they get it, so you might find that he spends his money on xbox or little treats like sweets or crisps and it won't ever build up to enough to buy the clothes that he needs.

Hi, my son is only 11 but is very tall and wears men's size small in most shops sometimes extra small. With regards to your clothes budget, some things you seem to spend a lot on? Jeans? As they are still growing I tend to buy Primark jeans at £10-12 per pair (men's black skinny fit). Also most t-shirts etc are non branded so w bit cheaper. He does have two branded hoodies ( Jack wills and Hype ) but these were bought in the sale. I have also started to give him away amount each week that he controls what it is spent on. So if he does go into town with friends etc this is used. We also are quite strict on budget for trainers. His feet have grown 3 sizes in the last 18 months Annie wears a men's size 10. We have said once they slow down a bit he can have a bigger budget. They are still branded but I tend to buy them in the sale.

For ds I keep the clothes money budget separate but allocate £150 x3 instalments a year (but I buy all socks and pants plus winter coat on top of that). He gets to buy whatever he thinks he needs though.

Bus pass and haircuts are also paid directly by me.

Everything else comes out of pocket money.

DS isn’t great with budgeting. Hence the reason I’ve kept clothes allowance ring fenced. Have been doing it this way for a couple of years now and no real improvement. Tbh, he has no will power, although can save for a large purchase if he is really committed. He’s 15.

Mine got $50 a week once they started high school.
This covered everything from phones, lunches, outfits, outings, hair,makeup, shoes etc.
I still paid for sport stuff.
I had lunch stuff at home that they could make and take to school.
Both are now very good with budgeting and saving.
Both now in their 20’s and have bought their own, small second hand cars. DD2 spent 7 weeks touring USA last year.
DD1 just back from Egypt and looking to book Mongolia next.
Worked well for us.

We've just started doing this - late in the day- for our DSS aged 15 and 17, but they get less - £45 per calendar month. That's just what we can afford. They can get jobs if they want more! No restrictions on what they can spend it on. So if they want to spend all on non-clothes, they don't get any new clothes. We pay for their shoes, school stuff, termtime lunches, travel, phones, though, so they only need to budget for other clothes and entertainment, spotify accounts, etc. Working well so far, and they haven't spent much. Neither of them go out much, though!

Btw, OP, I think your annual clothes cost per kid is fine - pretty much the same as ours. As I say, we pay for shoes ourselves unless they want something ridiculous, in which case they pay on top of what we're prepared to (about £60 - big feet!)

Sounds like a good idea. My parents pretty much did this with us - they bought the essentials (uniform, toiletries, school stuff etc) and we got £5 a week for the rest. They bought us essential clothes, but basics only - if we wanted branded stuff, we had to pay the difference ourselves. We're both good with money now.

There were times when we messed up - my mum remembers a holiday where I'd been given £5 to last the week. I spent it all on day 1 (on books!) and then cried when my sister bought herself ice cream every day. My parents stood firm, and after a week of no ice cream, I learned the lesson.

If you're not sure, you could always start with one area and give him money for that. Then build up to more.

The jeans budget was a guesstimate. He had 4 pairs of jeans currently which are H&M cheapest at under a tenner a pair. I anticipated men’s would be more. Primark sounds good!

The hoodies are a big spend. He likes labels. Currently he wears 2 Nike and 1 Adidas (£40 each) 1 Under Armour (£30) and one plain oversized one (£20). One of the Nike ones was an Xmas gift.

He is happy to have cheaper jeans and tees in order to have branded trainers and hoodies. Most of his tees are H&M basics or men’s 2 for £5 or £6 from Tesco.

Trainers I have said I won’t spend more than £40 per pair while he is growing which is why he spent Xmas money on his Nike “Pegs”. He is a good sale shopper and looks on eBay. He isn’t so keen on pre owned clothes though now he is older.

The non uniform obviously means no buying uniform but does mean more jeans and hoodies. I want him to feel comfortable and confident in school so have been happy with his choices. Thinking on, he hardly wears the sketchers I bought but lives in his Nike.

Ringfencing clothes might be a good idea to start with. Thanks all.

I do that with my older teens (We call it the grooming budget and it's haircuts, clothes, toiletries) but my younger one (12) isn't ready for this yet. His toiletry bill is tiny - Lynx is literally all he uses. (Shower gel, toothpaste, mouthwash, hand wash and shampoo are communal here)

With my 12 year old (nearly 13) he chooses online, I approve budget then I order. Alternatively I buy a bunch of stuff I think he'd like and return stuff that he doesn't. He currently only notices when his shoes need replacing and is happy for me to pick underpants and socks.

Currently I tend to buy clothes every 3-6 months for him. Recently he got 3 new hoodies and this was the first time I bought hoodies in like 9-12 months. I've noticed that my older teens do the same. Every 3-4 months they do a bigger order on ASOS or similar.

I think that the amounts sound normal except for the footwear- did he outgrow them or does that include school shoes? My son is 5.5 which is just about kids sizes so I'm dreading the adult size jump where the next size up is much more pricey. I don't buy new swimwear and socks every year either. Socks tend to fit a range of sizes (eg size 3-6) so last years here. (All of his socks are plain black so no matching issues lol)

I think that's a good age to start but I would do it in a supported way at first. So you could plan to give him £50/month, with a clear list of what things he is now responsible for. And at the end of the month, go through with him what he's done with the money, so you can point out things like if he wants to spend £40 on shoes, he'd be better saving £20 and doing it next month rather than all in one hit, or whatever.

And definitely don't start giving advances on next month. If he runs out, he runs out. Like in real life. It'll be good for him to learn.

He outgrows footwear. He had white (bad idea) trainers in size 8 for prom in July. sketchers size 8 in August ready for school and sliders for hols. By January he needed size 9 sketchers and he bought size 9 Nike’s with Xmas money. While these still fit, I have just bought him some £30 Adidas ones in 9.5 from eBay for ‘best’/summer. He lived in the Nike’s. These are his school and evening and weekend shoes as there is no uniform. They are wearing really well.

I have to buy swimwear, shorts and pants every year as he grows so much. He is 5’7.

Start with the Xbox or entertainment budget say for a year. Then add other things and increase amounts.

No advances though.

I did this with mine at around 14. It's surprising how little new clothes matter when it's "their" money.

They ended up with ££ in the bank but wearing rags .

Having said that they had passed the huge growth spurt that boys have so were not outgrowing shoes every few weeks. For that reason alone I might suggest you wait a year or two.

I didn't make them keep any records but they did have basic current accounts. It stood them in good stead when they went to uni.

They are still pretty frugal in their 20s now.

YetIWill that sounds like a terrible lesson to be taught! Books are not worth as much as ice cream????

@C0untDucku1a That wasn't the lesson. The lesson was "if you spend all your money on one thing now, you won't be able to spend it on something else later".

My now 15 year old has been managing her own budget since she was 12. I pay for school uniform and school shoes, PE kit, transport to and from school and haircuts. She does the rest. Initially she would blow it every month, but cheap clothes in Primark etc. Now she tends to save it, buy better quality clothes that will last longer (helps that she’s not growing as quickly now) and if she wants brand names she keeps an eye on places like TK Maxx. I’ll start doing the same with younger daughter this year I think.

I think the idea of him managing his own budget is fine but ... he is getting to the age where boys typically have huge growth spurts. My DS, for example went from a size 4 shoe to a size 12 shoe in the space of not much over a year, and similarly he was growing out of clothes in a couple of months. You can't really give him a budget and then watch him grow 3 times during the year and have no money left and nothing to wear. Maybe saying you will cover basic clothing but he has a budget to buy extras/labels would work better at the moment.

I'd start by giving him an allowance for toiletries, phone, Xbox live/game pass etc and possibly lunches, and see how it goes. Give him advice on budgeting but don't insist on him doing it in a particular way. If he is to learn, he needs to have the ability to make mistakes and feel the consequences. So no bailing him out when he gets it wrong.

£2.50 a week isn't enough to allow him to make consequential mistakes, so isn't giving him the chance to learn.

I started this when mine were a similar age - I split the child benefit between them monthly (around £70ish each) but that’s for clothes, phone (I bought their phones both on sim only plans £6 per month) and any outings/coffees/cinema/Xbox games/extras they want.
Dd is really good at budgeting and saving, she also supplements hers with babysitting (she’s saving for a MacBook for starting college) and Ds is not quite as sensible and we’ve had a few months of spending it all in 2 days then going without for the rest of the month, but it’s how they learn.

The lunchtime budget is a good idea - just a small weekly amount.
If I handed over all his clothing budget I’d be worried my DS would blow it on an expensive item and not leave enough for his all requirements. My DS14 is growing very quickly and I recently spent:
£28 Nike Shorts
£28 puma joggers
£35 Adidas joggers
£65 North Face water proof
£55 trainers
£12 x4 short sleeved school shirts
Everything went too small seemingly overnight! All these items were reduced, not full price and he needs new underwear, jeans too. It’s all really expensive as he’s out of kids sizes now.

When mine turned 13, I started giving them £60 pcm. I paid for lunch (packed lunches), shoes, winter coat, transport, phone, essential toiletries, essential clothes (I.e. school uniform, so in your case I would have a budget for clothes as he'll need more - e.g when my older ones went into 6th form I took them out to buy 6th form clothes).

They paid for extra shoes and clothes, extra toiletries, entertainment, going out, birthday and Christmas presents for family.

It's worked well imo.

Phone is contact. A fixed monthly amount. He has plenty of minutes/texts and if he runs out of data he has to wait or top it up himself. He gets 5gb a month so is usually well within. If he runs out he usually waits until it renews.

Xbox live gold and the game pass are also fixed amounts so not really any point in giving him control of them either.

These all go out by DD currently.

Xbox games are extra and he has these as gifts, used birthday/Xmas money or uses pocket money.

I agree £2.50 pw isn’t teaching him anything. It usually gets spent on Xbox, although he bought some air dots recently from eBay.

I honk I would probably give him X amount say twice a year for clothes so he can do a big shop, rather than dribs and drabs.

DS started to have his lunch money and the choice of what to do with it. He quickly sussed that by tagging along to the supermarket he could buy three times as much crap food as he could afford at school, and still have some left over. (We still provided fruit, ordinary yoghurts, bread and sandwich fillings)

I think it's great for teenagers to start budgeting.

We pay necessary clothes, school uniform, phone, toiletries, activities.

Their allowance has to cover extra entertainment, such as cinema/lunch out with friends at weekend/any extra (branded) clothing they want on top of what we buy.

They save up if there's something special they want.

Working well so far.