Kids
- Financial literacy: What’s my motivation? (35 comments)
This post is from staff writer April Dykman. Were you required to take a personal finance class in high school? I wasn't. And I'm not in the minority. In fact, only 13 states require a personal fin...Read more »
- Saving for college when time is on your side (81 comments)
This post is by staff writer Holly Johnson. According to the Federal Reserve, the average amount of student loan debt carried by a student graduating in 2012 reached a staggering $24,301. And that...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: Would you give a child a credit card? (122 comments)
I’m personally a proponent of making teenagers authorized users on credit cards. My thinking is that it gives the parent the opportunity to teach their kids about managing credit while they’re at ...Read more »
- Minimalist parenting: The frugal choice (77 comments)
This post is by staff writer Sarah Gilbert. The woman on the radio sounded panicked. She lived in Los Angeles, and because of her neighborhood (weird homeless guy on the corner; busy streets a...Read more »
- A scholarship for small-business folks (12 comments)
With student debt now topping credit card debt (see page 3 of the PDF), every penny that you can find to put toward education is wanted. We hear a lot about student loans, but not so much about schola...Read more »
- Reader Story: Costs and savings of having a stay-at-home parent (77 comments)
This post comes from Lynn Svenson, who blogs at The Photographer's Wife. Some reader stories contain general advice; others are examples of how a GRS reader achieved financial success or failure. T...Read more »
- Reader Story: Teenagers and money (aka Debunking the Mom-Is-an-ATM myth) (44 comments)
This guest post is from Anna Weisend. Anna is a self- employed pastry chef and sugar artist with multiple streams of income, but her favorite job is the one that she doesn’t get paid for: being a mo...Read more »
- Party philosophy: When to spend big on fiestas (57 comments)
I grew up in a family not given to extravagance with regard to birthdays. Not that we could have been extravagant if we would have wanted to. With five children close together in age, a dad who'd pu...Read more »
- Battle of the toy bulge (101 comments)
By now, most families have taken down their trees and house lights. And if you're like me and live in the Midwest, you might be counting down the days until the first signs of spring. A new year of ...Read more »
- Reader story: 10 financial lessons I learned from my parents’ divorce (67 comments)
This guest post from Sydney is part of the “reader stories” feature at Get Rich Slowly. Sydney blogs about personal finance, entrepreneurship, self improvement, travel and lots of other fun stuff...Read more »
- Romanticizing poverty and learning financial independence (103 comments)
In high school, I babysat a kid whose parents were pretty well off. And by "well off," I mean they were crazy rich. One day I decided to take the kid out for ice cream -- my treat. When we got to...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: Why will you teach your children frugality? (45 comments)
This is a guest post from Suba. She believes in living life instead of existing and she shares her thoughts at Wealth Informatics, a personal finance blog focused on living a high quality of life by i...Read more »
- Resisting the holiday spending trap (73 comments)
Every year, I fail to really account for the cost of Christmas. "A few hundred dollars," I think, for gifts, and then by the first few days of December I've bought several pounds of butter, and lots...Read more »
- New life for old DVD movies: The answers to scratches and breaks (16 comments)
This is a guest post from freelance writer Jessica Ward. DVD games and movies For several years, we've fought the occasional skip, fingerprint or ding in our DVD movies, and have typically bee...Read more »
- Lowering expectations for Christmas (175 comments)
This post is from new GRS staff writer Holly Johnson. Holly is a 32-year-old wife, mother of two, and frugal lifestyle enthusiast. She blogs about saving money, frugal habits, and whatever is on her...Read more »
- Adopting strategies to pay for big expenses (82 comments)
I like the idea of financial independence, and if I'd had my way, we would have started our family once we had college fully funded for each child. Plus, a healthy emergency fund, a do-I-want-to-be-a-...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: How can you help children appreciate delayed gratification? (33 comments)
This post is from Ollie Geiger, a personal finance writer who contributes to MoneyRates.com. I had it pretty good as a kid. While I didn't get everything I wanted for birthdays or Christmas, my pa...Read more »
- Foster kids “age out” without a financial education (33 comments)
This post is by staff writer April Dykman. When Eddye was a senior in high school, her goal was to save money to buy a car. “I wanted to make sure I had reliable transportation for college,”...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: What is your hobby worth to you? (115 comments)
This guest post was written by Jenny Saikwa. Our friends' weeks and weekends are crammed full of various pursuits - soccer, baseball, gardening, scrapbooking, calligraphy, swimming, dressage, saili...Read more »
- Reader Story: Go online to raise money-savvy kids (12 comments)
This post from Doug Lebda is part of the reader stories series. Doug is a personal finance expert, father of three, founder and chairman of Lending Tree, the Lending Tree Foundation and co-founder of ...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: If parents are paying for college, are any majors off limits? (257 comments)
This is a guest post from Jacqueline Whiton, who self-financed her undergraduate education and MBA. She is interested in personal finance and is saving to fund her three teenagers’ anticipated colle...Read more »
- 15 Things You Need to Know About Financial Aid (62 comments)
Timothy M. Hayes, MBA, CFP®, is the founder and President of Landmark Financial Advisory Services, a member of the Garrett Planning Network of fee-only advisors, and an expert in navigating the finan...Read more »
- What Matters in Matters of Love and Finance (165 comments)
"You need to keep your skills fresh," said a commenter in a recent post about the finances of parenting, referring to the concept of a mother staying at home with the kids. "In case of death or divorc...Read more »
- Back-to-School: The Hidden Financial Bonus for Parents (143 comments)
I'm headed toward one of those parental milestones to which many of you with multiple children either remember fondly or look forward to with something like desperation: all of my boys will be in publ...Read more »
- Reader Story: A Pre-College Spending Frenzy (73 comments)
This guest post from Preserved Sanity is part of the "reader stories" feature at Get Rich Slowly. Some stories contain general advice; others are examples of how a GRS reader achieved financial succes...Read more »
- Nobody Has It All: Careers We Can Believe In (189 comments)
This post is by staff writer Sarah Gilbert. By now, lots and lots of people know that Anne-Marie Slaughter doesn't have it all. Even though she was extremely high-powered, as Director of Policy Pla...Read more »
- Reader Story: My Son Manages My Finances (111 comments)
This guest post from Rita is part of the "reader stories" feature at Get Rich Slowly. Some stories contain general advice; others are examples of how a GRS reader achieved financial success or failure...Read more »
- Reader Story: Financial Advice for a Five-Year-Old (45 comments)
This guest post from Neil Wyn-Jones is part of the "reader stories" feature at Get Rich Slowly, and a perfect post for Father's Day. Some stories contain general advice; others are examples of how a G...Read more »
- Financial Education for Fifth Graders (80 comments)
I've finally overcome my fear of speaking in public (though speaking in front of 1000 people at next month's World Domination Summit may bring that fear back) and have actually found that I enjoy talk...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: How Much Do You Spend on Kids? (271 comments)
The "Ask the Readers" feature has always been popular at Get Rich Slowly. It's a great way for people like you to ask questions about money, and, best of all, it's a chance to help others solve their ...Read more »
- 5 Unusual Ways to Raise Successful Children (104 comments)
This is a guest post from Natalie Peace of PeaceAndProfit.com. She is the author of 30 Keys to Building a Multi-Million Dollar Business: What They Didn’t Teach Me in Business School. Natalie is an e...Read more »
- Reader Story: Adding to Our Family Without Subtracting from Our Budget (98 comments)
This guest post from Mark is part of the "reader stories" feature at Get Rich Slowly. This seems like a natural follow-up to Friday's reader question about when to start a family. Some stories contain...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: How Much Money Do You Need Before You Have Kids? (268 comments)
For the most part, this site reflects my values and my experiences. That's natural. One of the first rules of writing is to "write what you know". This is one of the main reasons I've brought staff wr...Read more »
- Think Different: Teaching Kids to Be Entrepreneurs (61 comments)
This article is from new staff writer Tim Sullivan. I remember when my parents gave me a raise in my allowance. I was seven and I went from $2 a week to $5 a week because I started doing my own lau...Read more »
- Calibrating and Circumventing the Cost of College (116 comments)
This article is from new staff writer Tim Sullivan. It’s a common refrain that today's college graduates are entering into the worst job market and economy since Hoover was around. We’re told t...Read more »
- An Early Education in Financial Literacy (58 comments)
This post is from staff writer April Dykman. Last week J.D.'s wife, Kris, e-mailed me about an NPR story on a recent Girl Scout badge overhaul, specifically about merit badges for financial literac...Read more »
- Reader Story: The High Cost of Kids’ Sports (92 comments)
This guest post from Kay Lynn Akers is part of the "reader stories" feature at Get Rich Slowly. Some stories contain general advice; others are examples of how a GRS reader achieved financial success ...Read more »
- Frugal Back-to-School Shopping (115 comments)
This post is from GRS staff writer Donna Freedman. Donna writes a personal finance column for MSN Money. She also writes about frugality, intentional living, and life in general at her own blog, Survi...Read more »
- College Is a Big, Fat, Hairy Rip-Off! (But Save for It Anyway) (109 comments)
This is a guest post from Robert Brokamp of The Motley Fool. Robert is a Certified Financial Planner and the adviser for The Motley Fool’s Rule Your Retirement service. He also has a newly reinvigor...Read more »
- An 11-Year-Old’s First Budget (74 comments)
This is a guest post from Andrea Deckard, who publishes Savings Lifestyle, a website that helps people save on what they need so they can spend on what they want. Growing up, my parents taught me v...Read more »
- Reader Story: Money Lessons for Kids from Captain America (64 comments)
This guest post from Dustin Riechmann is part of the "reader stories" feature at Get Rich Slowly. Some stories contain general advice; others are examples of how a GRS reader achieved financial succes...Read more »
- The Tiger Mother and You: Are We Preparing Our Kids for a Better Financial Future? (120 comments)
This is a guest post from Robert Brokamp of The Motley Fool. Robert is a Certified Financial Planner and the adviser for The Motley Fool’s Rule Your Retirement service. He contributes one new articl...Read more »
- The Cost of Being a Better Parent (107 comments)
This is a guest post from Robert Brokamp of The Motley Fool. Robert is a Certified Financial Planner and the adviser for The Motley Fool’s Rule Your Retirement service. He contributes one new articl...Read more »
- The Kardashian Kard: A Credit Card Targeted at Teens (53 comments)
This is a guest post from Beverly Harzog, who is a spokeswoman and contributing editor at credit card comparison website CardRatings.com. When I first heard about Kim Kardashian’s new prepaid cre...Read more »
- Allowance: For Learning or Reward? (46 comments)
This is a guest post from Gail Vaz-Oxlade, the host of the popular Til Debt Do U$ Part on CNBC (Saturday nights at 10 and 10:30). Gail is a columnist for Yahoo Canada, Chatelaine, and Zoomer Magazine ...Read more »
- Capitalist Kids: Encouraging Young Entrepreneurs (71 comments)
Saturday, I posted what I thought was an amusing anecdote. I told how I'd bought some treats from a young girl's bake sale, but she'd been woefully unprepared to take my money and give me change. I me...Read more »
- Kids These Days (106 comments)
Kris and I took a stroll through the neighborhood today to visit the weekend garage sales. First we walked down to Lane's house to browse his books and knick-knacks. (Lane is a GRS reader, and when we...Read more »
- How to Help Your Kids Build $25,000 Stock Portfolios (61 comments)
Mary and her husband set out to build a stock portfolio worth $25,000 as a college graduation present for each of their children. That's a lofty goal. How did they do it? In her entry to the GRS video...Read more »
- Three Stories About Banking (19 comments)
As part of my downshifting project, I've spent the past couple of days replying to several hundred stale messages in my inbox. There were plenty of great reader stories, guest posts, and "ask the read...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: How to Talk About Money with Teenagers? (66 comments)
Most readers here at Get Rich Slowly have their own tale of a financial turnaround. Many of us were just plain dumb with money when we were younger, and it took us years (or decades!) to realize the e...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: How Do You Figure the Calculus of Kids? (163 comments)
I keep intending to retain "ask the readers" as a regular Friday feature — and I keep failing. You folks send me tons of great questions, and I'd love to share more of them. This week, for examp...Read more »
- What Did Your Parents Teach You About Money? (122 comments)
February was National Parent Leadership Month, which highlighted the role parents play in shaping the lives of their children. As a sort of tie-in, the most recent poll in the Get Rich Slowly sidebar ...Read more »
- How to Save While Shopping for Children’s Clothes (33 comments)
This is a guest post from Gina Lincicum, a long-time GRS reader who writes about frugality and family finance at MoneywiseMoms.com. Moving to the D.C. area after my twins were born, we transformed ...Read more »
- Munny Journey: A Journal for Your Child’s Financial Development (16 comments)
I have some financial blind spots. For one thing, Kris and I do not have children. It's difficult for me to write about the concerns of parents. So when the publisher sent me a copy of Munny Journey, ...Read more »
- Where to Find Free Activities and Events in Your Area (65 comments)
This is a guest post from Lynn, a long-time reader of personal-finance blogs. Lynn is a potential Staff Writer for Get Rich Slowly. She is the CFO (Chief Financial Officer) of her family, and is worki...Read more »
- The Great Piggy Bank Adventure (29 comments)
"If we're going to have a free-market capitalist society, we've got to give people the tools to not be victims" — John Cammack, T. Rowe Price I get a lot of e-mail from PR firms. I ignore mos...Read more »
- Mother Knows Best: 5 Ways to Teach Your Kids About Money (56 comments)
For Mother's Day, I invited blogger Amanda Steinberg of DailyWorth to write a guest post for moms. DailyWorth offers daily personal-finance tips for women. Recession talk is everywhere, even on Mot...Read more »
- In Pursuit of Financial Education for All (50 comments)
This is a guest post from Sharon Lechter, co-author of Rich Dad Poor Dad and a member of the President’s Advisory Council on Financial Literacy. She is the CEO of Pay Your Family First and founder o...Read more »
- What Fourth-Graders “Know” About Money (50 comments)
Financial Literacy Month begins today. What better way to kick things off than with a story from the trenches? This is a guest post from Chett Daniel, who writes about improving your life through pers...Read more »
- The High Cost of Having Children (158 comments)
Because my wife I do not have children, I feel that it's important to bring in outside voices to talk about money and kids. This is a guest post from Cathy, who writes about family finances, parenting...Read more »
- Ask the Readers: How Do Children Affect Financial Priorities? (90 comments)
When you're on your own (or even with a partner), money decisions are generally straight-forward. You set personal goals and you work toward them. But what happens when you add children to the mix? Ho...Read more »
- Kids Who Are Smart With Money (38 comments)
I sometimes like to highlight my favorite reader comments. That's difficult because there are so many great ones to choose from. But in a recent discussion about kids and cash, Mick left this absolute...Read more »
- The Last Word on Kids and Cash (48 comments)
This is a guest post from Lisa, a mother of two small children. Lisa's always on the lookout for practical suggestions for teaching kids about money. I figured a recent Kiplinger's article was right u...Read more »
- Saving for Baby: Making the Move from Two Salaries to One (41 comments)
This is a guest post from Corrinne Fisher, who is transitioning from career woman to stay-at-home mom. I stared down at the two pink stripes on the pregnancy test with the same feeling one has when...Read more »
- Using an Allowance to Teach Kids About Money (40 comments)
This is a guest post from Nickel, who writes about personal finance at Five Cent Nickel. Since that and his four kids don't keep him busy enough, he's launched another site more narrowly focused on cr...Read more »
- All I Really Need to Know About Stocks I Learned in the Sixth Grade (An Interview with David Gardner) (28 comments)
This is a guest post from Jericho Hill (a.k.a. Stephen), Get Rich Slowly forum administrator and resident economist. I recently attended a focus group at The Motley Fool, a website about financial ...Read more »
- Young Entrepreneurs: Encouraging Children With Kid-Sized Businesses (36 comments)
This is a guest post from my wife, and features a story I've come to look forward to updating every summer: the tale of two entrepreneurial girls. Last weekend I explored Portland's beautiful Eastm...Read more »
- Saving with Albert: Teaching a Four-Year-Old the Value of Money (33 comments)
My friend Albert — age four — loves electricity. Ever since he was young (ha!) he's been fascinated by the stuff. His parents have carefully nurtured his hobby. Now that Albert's older, th...Read more »
- One Hen: How One Small Loan Made a Big Difference (25 comments)
Don recently pointed me to an NPR piece about a new children's book that explores the concepts of microlending and entrepreneurship. Katie Smith Milway's One Hen: How One Small Loan Made a Big Dif...Read more »
- How to Inoculate Your Children Against Advertising (91 comments)
This is a guest post from Lisa Tiffin, a freelance writer who covers food, lifestyle, business, and green living. I have a confession to make: I like commercials. Even though they can be boring, in...Read more »
- How to Prepare for a Baby (Without Going Broke) (90 comments)
This is a guest post from Lynnae of beingfrugal.net, a blog about frugal living and getting out of debt. Preparing for a baby doesn't have to cost a lot of money. Magazines and TV ads will tell ...Read more »
- Growing Money: A Complete Investing Guide for Kids (14 comments)
During my family's Christmas celebration, I learned a little more about my oldest nephews. I don't see them often, so it's hard to know what interests them. This year, I learned that six-year-old Alex...Read more »
- Parents.com Stay-at-Home Calculator (44 comments)
When a new baby arrives, young couples face a decision. If both parents work, who should stay home with the child? The mother? The person with the smallest salary? Or should both parents continue to w...Read more »
- The Unbranded Kid: Thoughts on Marketing to Children (70 comments)
Kris and I are childless by choice. We love our friends' kids, but we've elected not to have any of our own. As a result, we've never had to face the financial challenges that come with parenting. One...Read more »
- Ads I Hate: Barbie Shopping Boutique (23 comments)
Russell Heimlich passed along the following ad that seeks to plant the seeds of consumerism in our children, making the task of financial literacy more difficult further down the road. "You never run ...Read more »
- Baby Boom: The Shockwaves of a Lifestyle Change (32 comments)
This is a guest post from Amanda, a Colorado tech writer and an activist for children with congenital heart disease. I’ve been following Get Rich Slowly and Wise Bread lately, and I find myself f...Read more »
- Sammy the Rabbit Teaches Kids to Save (3 comments)
Financial literacy is best taught at a young age. Some of us are just coming to terms with basic financial skills at 38 — what if we'd managed to start on these habits when we were eight? The...Read more »
- Marketing Affects How Children Perceive Food (16 comments)
How powerful is marketing? How young are we when we first feel its effects? Can marketing really change the way we perceive the things we buy? Earlier today I shared a passage from Malcolm Gladwell's ...Read more »
- How to Start a Family Without Breaking the Bank (87 comments)
This guest post is from Nickel, author of Raising4Boys.com and FiveCentNickel. I recently received an e-mail from a reader asking about the "real" cost of raising kids. In short, she's he...Read more »
- Personal Finance for Nine-Year-Olds: How to Save for a Backhoe (18 comments)
The youngest reader of Get Rich Slowly might just be C.J., who is nine-and-a-half ("almost a teenager"). C.J. recently started his own fiscal fitness journal in the Get Rich Slowly discussion forums. ...Read more »
- How To Escape the Gift Trap (60 comments)
This is a guest-post from my wife. Amanda recently sent J.D. an e-mail looking for advice about gift-giving: My husband and I have made huge lifestyle changes since our son was born with conge...Read more »
- Stock Tips from Ten-Year-Olds (31 comments)
We spent several hours last Saturday walking the streets of southeast Portland, looking for bargains. Portland's posh Eastmoreland neighborhood held its 22nd annual garage sale (which I wrote about la...Read more »
- PAYjr: A Web-Based Chores and Allowance Tool (13 comments)
Last week I highlighted the Money Savvy Pig, a savings bank "for the twenty-first century". But really, what 21st-cenury kid wants a plastic pig? Today's youth are all about web 2.0. PAYjr wants to be...Read more »
- The Money Savvy Pig: A Piggy Bank for the 21st Century (28 comments)
One of the best things parents can do to prepare their children for the Real World™ is to teach them basic financial skills. A kid who knows how to save is a kid who has a jump-start on life. Mo...Read more »
- The Problem with the Bank of Mom and Dad (39 comments)
An anonymous poster at AskMetafilter wonders should parents finance grad school? Should parents help their children pay for grad school if they can afford it? My parents are divorced, but both are ...Read more »
- How One Father Taught His Son About Money (27 comments)
An anonymous reader e-mailed a story about the financial education he received from his father. Something my dad did for me when I was a kid — after I got my first job (delivering papers) at ...Read more »
- Frugal Easter Egg Decorating Tips (19 comments)
Tina sent in a timely article from The Dollar Stretcher, one of the oldest and best money-saving sites on the web. (It's been around since 1996, and looks like its design hasn't changed since!) Jenny ...Read more »
- Mary Poppins on Compound Returns (7 comments)
After writing about Time is Money last night, I climbed into bed and began to read John Bogle's new The Little Book of Common Sense Investing. In the introduction, Bogle raves about the magic of compo...Read more »
- Allowances for Kids: Teaching Children the Value of Money (21 comments)
While browsing de.lico.us for stories about animal intelligence [blatant plug], I stumbled upon a financial anecdote at A Room of My Own: Sarah has been eager to earn some money; she has a Jones ...Read more »
- Financial Education: Are Schools Doing Enough? (63 comments)
I read a lot about the lack of financial education in the United States. It's a popular topic among personal finance bloggers and in media interviews. But I wonder how widespread the problem really is...Read more »
- Money Blueprints: What Our Parents Taught Us About Money (20 comments)
I had dinner with two friends from high school last night. We shared good wine, good food, and, especially, good conversation. Much of our discussion focused on our shared history: the things we did t...Read more »
- Throw Away your TV and Save a Bundle! (48 comments)
Guest-writer Paul Gonzalez believes that giving up television can save you big bucks. Paul and his wife run One Year Exit Plan, which provides coaching and personal project management services to peop...Read more »
- You’re Never Too Young to Save (18 comments)
I went to the credit union today to deposit my Christmas bonus. I waited my turn behind a boy who was about four years old. In one hand he held a wad of cash, and in the other he held his account info...Read more »
- Tax Tips for Tykes (6 comments)
Here's some end-of-the-year advice from new GRS-reader W.C. Varones, a finance professional from San Francisco. Varones writes that if you have investments for your children, now is the time to maximi...Read more »
- Five Gifts That Will Make Your Kids Rich (9 comments)
Lynn forwarded an article from CNN Money entitled "Five gifts that will make your kids rich". The five recommended gifts are: A Roth IRA — "Best way to make your kid a millionaire." Kids ar...Read more »
- How Do You Teach Kids the Value of Money? (35 comments)
At the grocery store yesterday, I passed a man and his daughter in the snack aisle. She was maybe ten or eleven, a little overweight, and begging for cookies. He was tall and muscular, a blue-collar t...Read more »
- Reader Comment: Teaching Children to Save (7 comments)
My wife and I don't have children, but many of our friends do. It's fun to watch them grow. Most of these children are in school now, and beginning to develop an understanding of money. For example...Read more »
