AIBU to ask how much your child has in savings and what age they are

[Hmmmmminteresting]

I'm being nosey for comparison reasons I guess.
4yo has £2,300. I feel like in the grand scheme of things it's rubbish. Once we have paid bills, extra off mortgage, paid into our pensions etc he gets what's left which isn't a lot. That figure includes bday and Xmas money too but we don't have a big family.

DS is 3 and has just shy of £2k. Mixture of money from birth, naming day, birthdays etc plus we save half his CB in there. Not too sure what it is for, whether we will let him withdraw from it as he gets older etc.

I think I might need to open a 'current account' type thing for him in a few years where he can access some money for large items he wants to save for, and keep the savings for help towards a house deposit. I expect we will pay for driving lessons ourselves as thats what our parents did.

Also hoping to increase the amount but due #2 soon so still have years of nursery fees to go and want to make sure they have the same eventually.

I worry about one dc having access to thousands but more the people around them really.... It's OK if everyone has that money.. In some circles it's chicken feed, in others people would do anything for it.

We pay monthly into our children’s Trust Fund accounts, but we know we are extremely fortunate to be able to do that. DS 13 has about £18k and DS 11 has about £15k. When they hit 18 and can access it, they will hopefully have about 25-30k. We will obviously have had a lot of time to talk to them about what to do with it. I’d prefer Uni fees, a car or a flat deposit or variation of those. But equally it will be theirs and if they fritter it, when it’s gone they won’t get any more!

DS is nearly three and has just under £6k.

We’ve been saving regularly for him since he was born though - his child benefit plus a bit extra.

Oh and it’s not in his name, nor will it be until we deem the time is right.
I had it sitting in our current account to begin with but then put them in some decent regular saver ‘get 5% in the first year’ type accounts. They’ll pay the interest next month and then I’m thinking of putting it all in a stocks & shares ISA

DD3 - £1300
DD1 - £250

People seem to give more for the first 😬😂

We’ll make it up.

Our son is 2.5 we opened a savings account when he was born that he can't access till he's18. We pay in a sball amount each month (£30 between us) and occasionally his grand parents give him something. He has about £1800 so far. Will do the same for his sister when she arrives.

I'm totally a saver and for the most part, have been able to save £100 pcm for each of my DC from birth. This has gone into originally CTF's transferred into JISAs. (I self select the funds/shares - all blue chip/popular ones so nothing particularly high risk imo).

I have just checked their accounts for this thread (haven't looked because I didn't want to know since the stock market has sank along with our own pensions/investments recently and it was just too depressing). DC1 (16) has £80K+ DC2 (13) has £68K to my surprise (gone up as opposed to down).

I don't view this with trepidation at the thought that they might spend it all on drugs and partying. In this aspect, I'm an optimist and I view the gain as great - that'll see them through to graduating without debt, a bit of travelling/see the world and even maybe a house deposit. There is no crystal ball in parenting. You just do your best in educating them financially and hope to instill a work ethic in them before they hit 18. DS(16) completely understands that the investments are intended to fund his way through university in the form of income derived from the capital as opposed to cashing in the whole lot!

I had access to £8K on my 18th and I used it to help fund my living costs through my masters in my mid 20's. A friend of mine inherited £30K at 17. She bought a house with it in her first year at uni (Midlands in 1991). Most people I knew didn't "blow" it, only the odd one did which is always the ones you hear about! Nothing scandalous about spending it sensibly.

MN is anonymous and I believe it's useful to post figures about salaries, investments and expenditure. It's too often taboo in RL. I would consider myself to be fairly frugal and financially cautious so this type of thread on MN always surprises me especially when there must be growing financial literacy with the popularity of MSE over the last decade.

Obviously I don’t know what’s going to happen but I would rather make use of the tax perks to help my child. Both DH and I need to be on top of it so she doesn’t go nuts but it’s not like the bank phones her and says don’t you want to spend x thousand’.

You can introduce children to all sorts of things like net worth, growth of assets, saving for specific things and deposits on houses.

I managed to not piss away a lot more than has been remotely indicated on this thread. Think house, no mortgage and the same in shares. As a pp said, some do piss it away but I have enough confidence in myself and my child at this stage to think I have a fighting chance.

Oh and a little story: my child was on FaceTime with a friend boasting about how much money she got for Christmas. My child’s reaction, without prompt was ‘oh x, don’t say that, people might try and be your friend because they think they can spend your money’.

We put £100 a month in savings for our boys and will do until their 18th birthday

@00100001 oh yes, I'm just confused by the PP who is saving theirs!
If our DC get gift money we spend it on them (days out, put it towards a holiday, bike, swimming lessons).
They haven't got any inheritance but I don't think my DPs would leave them money when under 18. If anyone else did we'd look into a trust if over about £10K or spend it on a large family purchase if a few £K - more likely a holiday e.g. to see their birth family abroad, rather than a car/house which the adults own.

My daughter will be 2 at the end of this month and has just over 2k in her savings account.

Primary school and they should have enough for driving lessons or a RTW trip - that sort of level of savings. They are in my name though - I would rather take a hit on the interest (relatively low savings so it's hardly anything anyway) than let them access it at 18 and give it to a girlfriend or spend it on drugs

Driving lessons is a good idea. Both of mine are keen to learn and if we said that's what it's for they might well keep away from it aged 14 etc.

All the posters who save Birthday/Christmas money, why do you do that? Why does your child not get to spend their own gifted money? When i give a child birthday money it really is with the intention that they can choose their own gift. I can see when they are very small why you would save but I can't imagine doing that to a 10 year old (for example) - 'oh here is your £20 from aunt Vera, let's go pop it into savings' - meanwhile 10 year old just wanted to buy some Pokemon cards!

@blacktop

All the posters who save Birthday/Christmas money, why do you do that? Why does your child not get to spend their own gifted money? When i give a child birthday money it really is with the intention that they can choose their own gift. I can see when they are very small why you would save but I can't imagine doing that to a 10 year old (for example) - 'oh here is your £20 from aunt Vera, let's go pop it into savings' - meanwhile 10 year old just wanted to buy some Pokemon cards!

Because DS got given LOADS of money when he was 1-6, I'm talking about £150. What else would I do with it? There's only so much money that can be spent. We used to use it for things like trips to the farm, water parks etc. But there was still some left. So it went into his bank account.

Now he's older he spends it if he wants, and saves for big items.

That's where we used the money for swimming lessons, season ticket to the farm etc.

[quote drspouse]@00100001 oh yes, I'm just confused by the PP who is saving theirs!
If our DC get gift money we spend it on them (days out, put it towards a holiday, bike, swimming lessons).
They haven't got any inheritance but I don't think my DPs would leave them money when under 18. If anyone else did we'd look into a trust if over about £10K or spend it on a large family purchase if a few £K - more likely a holiday e.g. to see their birth family abroad, rather than a car/house which the adults own.[/quote]
See, if my DS inherited £10k, I couldn't spend that money on a large family purchase. Especially something like a holiday. It's HIS money. So if he's 28 and says "Mum, Dad, I'm taking you to Australia for 6 weeks, that's how I want to spend my inheritance" then fine.

But to decide to spend his money on something that isn't mostly for him, seems a bit off. We did use his money when younger to do things like Lego Land or whatever that he was desperate to do, which we couldn't afford ordinarily, or put towards a decent bike for him etc

I think about 5K ( the eldest). Now putting money for the other two and have stopped with him apart from birthday and Christmas money. Plan to bring them all up to a similar lever then start a separate account intended for all of them to help them out as and when I see fit. There is little interest anyway to benefit from putting it in there name at the moment. I don’t want a situation like their father had where he blew all his small savings and an big insurance payout on stuff for cars at 18.

blacktop - I Dont let them spend it as they are little and they would only spend it on tat. We have plenty of tat with three kids. I can afford to take them for days out myself so I am happy to put it in their bank accounts. But if you can’t afford days out etc then I think that’s fine but to let them blow it on plastic tat/ Pokémon cards that ends up cluttering up your house and then in bin is silly and terrible for the environment. They get so many toys at birthday parties anyway they don’t need to buy more.
This might change as they get older and ask for the money but for now it’s fine.

Because DS got given LOADS of money when he was 1-6, I'm talking about £150.
What else would I do with it? There's only so much money that can be spent. We used to use it for things like trips to the farm, water parks etc. But there was still some left. So it went into his bank account.

Now he's older he spends it if he wants, and saves for big items.

I'm not really sure why you answered my question, i was asking people who didn't let their older children spend their money, not those who do. I was even specific enough to say I understand saving it when they are very little, but not as they get older, which is exactly what you have done.

I really do want to know why people don't allow their children to spend their gifted money, ever.

@Carycy

blacktop - I Dont let them spend it as they are little and they would only spend it on tat. We have plenty of tat with three kids. I can afford to take them for days out myself so I am happy to put it in their bank accounts. But if you can’t afford days out etc then I think that’s fine but to let them blow it on plastic tat/ Pokémon cards that ends up cluttering up your house and then in bin is silly and terrible for the environment. They get so many toys at birthday parties anyway they don’t need to buy more. This might change as they get older and ask for the money but for now it’s fine.

Again; I was specifically asking people who don't let their older children spend their money.

No need for the dig about the environmental issues of bloody Pokemon cards either, do you suck all the joy out of everything or just the choice of a 10 year old

I got given £5k when I left uni from my grandmother. I spent it on a round the world trip. My grandmother disapproved but it was absolutely the best thing I could have done with it. I had already paid for driving lessons myself and had only a few thousand in student loans from uni. Not all kids waste their money. I'm saving a bit for my kids and I envisage it will get spent on driving lessons and travel. Maybe uni or a flat deposit. If either of them are total wasters (drugs, gambling etc) they won't get it.

Sorry blacktop missed that. But yes it’s hard to take the money off older kids obviously but if it was a lot I make try and press them into saving some of it.

My kids spend any cash gifts (£10 in a card from great grandma) but my mum and dad both pay into their bank accounts each birthday and xmas. It's never been discussed but they know that is for saving and not spending.