Do you have questions on financial planning for your children’s future? £200 voucher to be won

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Created for OneFamily

Please note we are no longer taking questions on this Q&A. You can view Nici's answers here

It can be difficult knowing where to start when planning financially for your children’s future. We’ve invited Nici Audhlam-Gardiner, OneFamily Chief Commercial Officer and expert in child and family savings to answer your questions.

• Everyone who shares a question below by 1 March will be eligible for the prize draw.
• One lucky Mumsnet user will win a £200 voucher from a store of their choice
• Nici will be back online in a couple of weeks to answer a selection of your questions.

About Nici Audhlam-Gardiner

Nici is passionate about empowering families to make money work for them, from driving OneFamily’s volunteering efforts with local educational charities to improve life chances, to making sure OneFamily products are accessible and easily understood by all. As a mother of two teens, Nici has navigated (survived!) the early years of juggling work and child care, putting the right financial foundations in place for her children, and is now knee-deep in negotiating monthly allowances and post-exam incentive schemes!

Here’s what OneFamily has to say

'As a member-owned business, we are interested in helping create a better financial future for Britain’s young people. From providing accessible, easy to understand products to awarding education grants and giving extra support to customers who need it, we are focused on Inspiring Better Futures.'

So whether you’d like to know the best ways to invest for your children, how much they will need when they turn 18, or you’re after advice on how to support them to become financially savvy, post your question on the thread below.

Thanks and good luck with the prize draw!

MNHQ
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What would you recommend as the best savings vehicle for teenagers for their wages from part-time work? Both DDs are earning several hundred pounds a month from supermarket jobs and are keen to save for the longer-term (possibly car, university or a home). Where would you recommend they put their savings?

I save regularly into ISAs for my two children - originally started in order to pay for them to go to University.

However, I am not sure that this is the best way to invest as a) interest rates are low and b) it seems to make more sense for them to take out student loans to pay their fees and invest the cash elsewhere so they can get on the property ladder when they graduate.

Do you think it would be wiser to stop paying into the ISA and use the money I am saving to invest in something else such as property or stocks and shares? I have about £10k in each of their ISAs (which I don't think I can touch) and am paying in £300 per month.

I have 3k initial investment in each of my kids’ ISAs - they are under 5 years’ old and the money will sit there until they are 18 and hopefully grow substantially, even based on conservative inflation calcs.

I still save £100 per month per kid, saving approx. £1k per year for each kid and probably intend to do so until they are adults.

I’m not sure what to do with this ongoing savings endeavour or even if we should keep this up given that we have the ISA investments already.

Should I be topping up the ISAs with the £100 per month, or is there a smarter way I can invest/grow this additional savings?

Who should we open a child sipp with? Is there anything we should know?

What’s the early good habits I can instil? Children are 2 and 1

I would be interested in understanding more about paying into a pension for a child. I understand the government will top it up by 20%. What are the things that we should consider?

The child's savings accounts we have for our children reduce the interest once the money saved reaches £5000, can you advise what to do at that point with the money? We want something completely safe and secure with no risk to losing any of the money.

Is it best to help children save for a deposit for a flat or help with university costs?

My son 3 receives DLA which ice been saving for him as I've covered most costs until now. Whars the best way of saving it for him but still having access for large purchases such as mobility aids. It doesn't need to be instant access as I can cover in the short term.

What is the best way to save for children and get a good return, but retain flexibility to stop them accessing it at 18 if they are likely to waste the money then? Is it worth starting a pension fund for them while they are children?

What would be the best place to save around £5k pounds inheritance for around 10 years? It would help if I could withdraw half in around 10 years and leave the rest for another 5 as there is a large gap between the children.

Is there anything we can do to stipulate that money we save for them is used for something useful eg buying a house rather than spent on booze/etc

We have a children's savings account but the interest rates have dropped. If we can save £20 a month where's best to invest it?

What would you recommend to help children appreciate what they are spending when they spend money. The increased use of cards (and less cash) means I am less confident in teaching them how to save as it's all a bit theoretical. And are there any good bank cards for younger children?

Thanks to generous relatives my kids (both under 10) have £10-15k each in savings already, increasing each year. I'm very risk averse and don't want to put it in stock/shares - what's my best option?

My son still has a CTF account and is nearly 16. Is it better to keep the CTF or to transfer it to a JISA? Even though it's not got long to go before he can access it?

Thanks @CurtainTroubles I think you are probably right and I'm going to look into a Stocks & Shares ISA - the interest I'm currently getting is pathetic, I'm just a bit risk averse.

How much should I be saving for university and when should I start? To be honest I already know I’ve left it too late but we didn’t have anything spare previously. Please can you advise how families without significant savings can best prepare for further education.

Fab topic! We opened a high interest saver for my toddler from birth but after a year it changed to a normal account with very low interest. What would you recommend to put his savings into?

Also when would you start teaching children about money? I'm so frugal, my husband isn't, I'd like to instill some of both of us into how my son looks after/ spends his money.

With an income of around £1k a month, and a very small (if any!) disposable income at the end, I'm really struggling to try to save for my dc. I budget and meal plan, use food hubs for discounted food and use free food apps/groups and I sell on the outgrown toys, clothes etc to generate as much income as possible. Due to lack of family help with childcare there's very little else I can do to boost savings. What would you suggest I do with such a minimal amount? I have life insurance which is the only way I could hand anything down to dc, which feels really grim!

If after all your efforts, your child grows up showing evidence of being rubbish at being a sensible saver, is there any way to stop them blowing any savings just because they’ve turned 18 and are now going to be allowed access to withdraw from their account?

We've done quite well with saving for the DC who are 15 & 13 now. As yet they don't know they have this money which is a combination of regular savings by me and my late parents plus an inheritance. They have a total of around £30,000 each.
Due to their ages I'm thinking of how they might choose to use it. Are they best to use it to avoid student debt and leave education in better financial shape, or take student loans and keep the savings for future?
Also, will their savings affect their student loan entitlement?

Is there a similar scheme to the help to buy ISA that was running a few years ago?

I have a savings account for my dcs, I received a letter before December last year to say that the interest rate was going to be reduced on these accounts, As we've now had 2 interest rate increases in the last few months, what are the chances the interest on these accounts will increase, or would now be a good time to look for new accounts with a better interest rate (assuming there is one out there!).