by Taylor J. Kovar – CEO/Founder, Kovar Wealth Management

 

–Hi Taylor – My 12-year-old son doesn’t seem interested in good spending habits, to the point where he kind of ignores my advice. Any tips for how I can break through to him?

 

–Hey Mindy – This is one of my favorite topics—not because I’ve got all the answers, but because I enjoy the challenge of it. Every mind works a little differently and everyone has their own Money Personality, so figuring out how to get through to a pre-teen is quite the riddle. There will be a lot of trial and error, but here are some good rules to follow.

 

  1. Don’t make it about money. As an adult who worries about bills and rent and groceries, you have a very different relationship to money than a kid with no financial responsibility. What looks like bad spending habits to you might feel completely reasonable to your son, so you won’t get anywhere by trying to explain how money should be spent. Instead, the conversation has to be about his interests. What big-ticket items does he want to buy? Where’s a place he’d like to go? What’s an activity he really wants to do? Get him excited about something in the future, then try to attach that objective to a savings goal. Make saving exciting instead of boring and he might do an about-face.
  2. Gamify. Everything is more fun when you get to play. If you give your son an allowance, start giving him the opportunity to earn extra dollars through playful chores or trivia night, something where it’s not too much work but not just free money. The money earned has to be saved for something specific like an outfit for a school dance or a family trip; this way you don’t give him the opportunity to blow the experiment on a video game or some other ordinary purchase. Without taking money away from your son, this will give you a chance to have some say in how he spends and make him aware of goal-oriented saving.
  3. Take the Money Personality test together. Depending on your son’s self-awareness, he might actually enjoy learning why he feels the way he does about money. We’ve got a free test at 5MoneyPersonalities.com where everyone in your family can learn about their primary and secondary Money Personalities. It will be really helpful for you, the parent, and it might be interesting for your kid. Lots of teenagers get excited about having a personality to identify with, and just getting this self-assessment can change their spending habits a little.

 

I expect you’ll still get a little resistance to whatever money conversations you try to have. As long as you start the discussion on your son’s terms, you can hopefully get a foot in the door and build off of that first talk. Good luck, Mindy!