Here is an interesting fact. My kids have more money then me or my husband at any given time. Our son still has most of his birthday money too. We have actually had to borrow money from our kids. Recently I needed $4.00, which my daughter lent to me. She said she wanted it back – with interest! Funny, don’t we clothe them and feed them? Ha Ha.
My daughter makes, on average, $80.00 a month walking a neighbor’s dog three times a week. Sometimes my son will cover for her if she’s at a friends house or not available. Call me crazy but $80.00 a month for a 13 year old sounds like a lot. My daughter’s friend makes over $100.00+ a month as a ref for the local soccer association. And she is only 13 too!
My 15 year old nephew has more money then anyone I know. He literally has THOUSANDS of dollars! Not only does he save up all his birthday and holiday money (he’s been doing that since he was very little) but he also has TWO businesses. He mows lawns and shovels snow and he also has a DJ business and has been hired to DJ local dances. I’m really proud of my nephew. He’s a real “Go Getter”.
We do give our children an allowance from time to time. Usually its based more upon good behavior then actually helping out around the home. We feel that they SHOULD help out. But we do reward them when they go out of their way and do something special or unexpected. Grandpa also gives the kids money several times a year too.
Do your children get an allowance or earn money? If so, how do you manage it? Do you have a system set up to keep track of what a child has earned and what they have spent? Personally our system is very primitive. We put their money in an envelope and when they want money we give it to them from their envelope.
There is a new web site that is called Allowance Manager which allows parents and children to keep track of their funds quickly and easily. Best of all its FREE!
I played around with it a bit and I like the way it is set up.
The first thing you need to do is open a FREE account. It doesn’t ask for much information. Once you create an account you need to wait for an e-mail to be sent to you. In the e-mail is a confirmation link you need to click on. After that your account is set up and you can start adding your children.
The add a child to the account you will need to add their gender, name, and birth date. Since I am not keen on supplying personal information for my kids online I just used nicknames and made up a date of birth. After all, I know their birth dates so why would I need to input it on the computer? Since there was no personal information submitted I figured it was pretty safe to use.
Its easy to set up a regular allowance schedule. For example, if your child gets $10 every Friday the system will add $10 to the accoutn balance every Friday. If your child earns extra money throughout the week (extra chores, good behavior, great report card) you can manually update that amount into their account.
Whenever your child needs to use money from their allowance you can easily update their account to reflect the amount.
I like that you are able to add a brief description of the transactions. That way your child can see where all their money comes from and where they spend their money.
You would still need to house the actual cash some where (like in an envelope or piggy bank). You could even set up an actual bank account and use the Allowance Manager the way you would use a check register to keep track of debits and credits.
Your child can also easily view their account online. Each child gets their own log in and password unique to their own accounts. The only thing a child can do is view the account in detail. They are unable to make any additions or subtractions. Only a parent can do that when logged in to the parent account.
If your child is interested in donating money or ideas on how to spend their money (not that kids need ideas LOL!) there are suggestions found on the site too. For example, if your child is interested in donating money there are links to places like Toys for Tots and the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF).
Overall I like the idea of having a ‘visual” to see how much money both of my children have. I also think its great for the kids to see what they are spending their money on in hopes it will teach them how to budget their money better. I also like that it is FREE and my kids can easily check their allowance balance online.
The “cons” to the Allowance Manager is that you have to deal with some ads on the site. Thankfully they are not “obnoxious” and in your face. I just mentioned that just to let readers know that they will see ads. I’m assuming that is how the can offer this service for FREE.
The only other thing I didn’t like is that fact that it needed to know my children’s gender, name and birth date. I feel that is personal information and I don’t see why it would be necessary. You can always do what I did and use nicknames and faux birth dates if you feel uncomfortable about it.
To learn more about the Allowance Manager please visit www.AllowanceManager.com.
Kimberly
*This is a compensated post. I am receiving a gift card in exchange for the website review.