A Personal finance blog for saving money and earning more and thus having a better life
If there’s one huge gift we as parents can give our kids, it’s the knowledge they need to grow up to be financially stable adults.
As National Teach Your Child to Save Day rolls around this month (April 20), now is the perfect time to start teaching best practices for savings. And with the graduating class of 2018 about to walk the stage, it’s urgent that parents make sure their teens have the information they need to manage their money.
As far back as I can remember, my parents always stressed the importance of an education. My mother was an English teacher, and my father worked in finance. They came from a 3rd world country, worked hard, and put my brother and I through school.
I love them dearly for that. Many people in this world, including many of my friends, grew up in single parent homes or were not pushed to succeed by parents that stressed the importance of an education. To be sure, many of these same friends who did not have the benefit of encouraging parents still received excellent educations, great careers, and have gone on to start families of their own.
Now, I am a firm believer in education as instrumental to success. I have an undergrad degree and a graduate degree as well. However, I do not necessarily believe that one must get educated and acquire skills through expensive universities. Looking back on the past 15 years or so, I wondered what I would tell my former self with the benefit of hindsight.
It’s very rare for a school to offer financial courses, let alone require them. Although there are strong benefits from children having the opportunity to learn both at school and at home, the responsibility usually lies squarely on the shoulders of parents. Unfortunately, family financing is not commonly discussed in most households.
On money matters, parents may sometimes say they’re tight on cash, or that they’re saving, but if a family budget happens to exist, it’s not something kids are exposed to. As a whole, Canadians now owe $1.57 trillion, a figure that works out to more than $20,000 per person. Debts are climbing across the board, and the behaviors that have caused this are being installed as normal in today’s generation.
I love my children and I want the very best in life for them. I want them to avoid making the same mistakes as I made. I want their future to be brighter and fuller of opportunities than mine was. I want them to live healthy, happy and properly balanced lives.
And I am more than certain all parents out there are the same.
Maybe it is this generation’s record-breaking student debt, or maybe it’s the trend of getting married much later in life, but millennials are known for putting off adult responsibilities. The generation is pushing back the big financial decisions in life, like buying a home and establishing a viable retirement plan.
A new survey[1] from the Indexed Annuity Leadership Council (IALC) reveals that 37% of millennials say they have no money for retirement, and 24% say they owe more than they’ve saved. So, clearly millennials are unprepared for retirement!
Taking bad financial decisions in your 20’s and 30’s can have a huge impact on your long-term goals. And when you’re in a relationship, budgeting and saving money can go for a toss.
But you needn’t fret about getting into a relationship just because you have goals to meet. Saving money while being in a relationship isn’t difficult and if you go about it the right way, you and your partner are bound to succeed!
Imagine a 20 something just starting their work life after finishing college education. He/she would have loads of student loan to repay, a successful career to start, tons of financial decisions to make and lots of dreams to live for. Well, everything would become smooth and easy if they follow the below guidelines.
Remember how you achieved the academic success? I am sure it’ was due to your intellectualism and hard work. Guess what? Financial success can be achieved by exactly those two qualities you possess. Having success is a mind game, a game you play against yourself.
“Saving to Build Wealth”, as the saying goes. But when we are young and single temptation to waste the money prevails over saving them. Schools teach us to be wiser, intelligent and good human beings. I am not sure if anywhere in this world the school system teaches how to be wiser with money. I was never taught how to best manage my finances responsibly.
Glad to present you another article on basic of financial management. Long time back I wrote about managing your money like a shepherd, which gave me immense pleasure. They I did a series of posts to state the importance of teaching monetary skills to your children. It is so much important these days when we have decreasing savings rate and growing instability in the financial market.
