A recent conversation with my six-year-old taught me how careful we need to be about our “money messages” to our children, and it also taught me that it is never too early to start talking to your kids about finances. Believe me, they understand far more than we realise.
We were playing a board game and my youngest had to create a story for different characters.
Soon a theme started to emerge where each character was a “poor person”. One had to live in his car and another collected cardboard to sell to buy a mirror (at least a recycling message in there). Once he started on this third character who was also a poor person, I asked him if he was worried about being poor — turns out he was very, very worried.
We are moving provinces and we will be renting a home. In my son’s mind that means we are homeless. He is desperately worried about the fact that we will have to move again one day and what if we can’t find another house? He thinks we are doing this because we are poor.
This is where the messaging comes in. Due to this move my husband was between jobs for a few months and we had to cut back, which included cutting back on the children’s extra murals. We explained to them that dad wasn’t earning money at the moment so we had to be careful with our money.
My youngest also added that whenever he wants a toy from the shops I say “‘we don’t have the money for that”. All of this meant to my six-year-old that we are poor.
So I sat down and explained how our family finances work. Even though dad did not bring in a salary for few months, we had a pile of money saved up and this pile of money means we will never be poor, it also means that mom and dad will be able to stop working one day when we are older — like Ouma.
“So why don’t we have money for toys?” I took some plastic chips from the board game which represented the money we get in each month and showed him how saving works. A few chips are used for day-to-day stuff like paying for the house, food, clothes, petrol and some nice things like treats and small gifts.
Some chips are used to add to our pile of money for when we are older or if we don’t have a job, and finally some chips are then used to save for family holidays and presents and Christmas (he was very interested in the size of this pile!).
“So when I say that we don’t have money for toys, I mean that this little pile for our everyday shopping has run out. I don’t want to take money away from the pile that we are saving for important things”.
So now I’m thinking that I’ve done a good job in explaining the basics and then he threw this at me. “But what if you get sick and you can’t work or you are in an accident?” — has he been reading my columns? Where do kids get this stuff?
So I explained about insurance and that it would pay us money every month if we couldn’t work.
He then asked to see the “piles of money”. So I went to my office and took out all my statements — my bank statements, money-market statements and investment statements and even our insurance policies.
Seeing the numbers, if not the actual cash, seemed to impress him — especially the bank statement that had lots and lots of numbers ( he doesn’t get credit and debit yet).
So what have I learned?
Firstly, play with your kids, that is when you find out what is really going on in their minds.
- Never tell your kids you don’t have money, rather say you don’t want to spend money on that (or encourage them to save up for the toy themselves).
- Don’t be afraid to discuss money, budgeting and saving and show your children that you are making a provision for the future — it will make them feel safer.
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