Helping Your Child Develop Financial Independence

With early lessons, children can develop
financial independence and strong
credit scores.

This time of year can be an emotional one for parents with high school and college graduates. Graduation ceremonies make for proud moments, but for many parents, it is a time of reflection on their job as parents. As our young adult children walk across that stage to get their diploma, we can’t help but hope that we did the very best we could to prepare them for the real world and owning their own homes in North Georgia, and one of the most important things we can teach our children is to be financially independent. Many parents wait until after high school to worry about teaching their children about financial independence, but lessons in financial independence and saving should start sooner than that.

The Equifax finance blog recently published an article titled “Preparing Your Children for Financial Independence”, which provides some helpful tips for setting your child on the right financial path.

1.    Talk to your children about their financial goals and help them develop a plan for success. Share with your children how to earn, appreciate and manage money and set a budget for them to live within their means. Talk about how much they should save to reach the lifestyle they hope to one day have. 

2.    Make use of money management tools to gradually increase your child’s responsibility level. Young children can learn how to save/manage money with an allowance tied to chore completion. Older children can learn how to budget their money for the things that they want to buy (the article suggests coming up with a monthly budget for lunch/snack money, fun money, clothing, etc.). Teenagers can work a part-time job and open a checking account to learn how to appreciate and manage their money.  

3.    Be a good role model. Children watch to see how their parents spend money and will model their behavior.

Get more tips in the full article on the Equifax finance blog, as well as tips on credit ratings, credit monitoring, identity theft protection, taxes, insurance and more.