Gifts of money to children.

[Astrid]

Just wondering who has the say in what happens with gifts of money to children?

If they say it must go into the child's bank account do you follow it?
What if they say, it must be spent on a present, clothes etc??

Who really has the say? The giver or the parents?
If the giver is totally insistent that money is always for the bank account, should they then just set-up their own account and handle it themselves??

[Calluna]

I think the giver should have a say but ultimately it is up to the parents and child to make the decision.

[Astrolady]

Nobody has forced a must have onto me before, but I'd probably follow through with the giver's request. Once Kameron got $70 for his birthday. He was only 5. So I put $50 into his bank account and let him spend $20 on whatever he wanted.

[onthefly]

Personally, I wouldn't attach strings to gifts like that. Think it should be up to the parents. But putting money in a bank is pretty sensible, so maybe I'd just go with that

[Rowellen]

I usually take the giver's wishes into account. But I think once a child is old enough to know what presents/money are, it is a bit cruel to say - "hey here's some money but you can't have it because you must put it into a bank account." A gift is a gift and the child should be able to spend it if they want. It is a bit different if they are doing little jobs to earn money say, rather than a pure gift. Essentially, the parents have the say. As a gift giver, I have given money to my nephew and I don't really care what he does with it. I expect he will spend it on some crap but at least it is crap he wants rather than crap he doesn't want lol. I think it would be a bit rude to tell him he must bank it instead.

And to your final question - yes or at least, request bank account details so they can transfer the money over themselves without making you go bank it.

[wysiwyg]

As all our relatives are overseas I have this situation frequently. Overall I think the sway is with the parents. I know if I give money to anyone with or without kids I really don't care how they spend it - if they want to put it on a horse that is up to them.

My granddads wife (not my grandma) gives money but always wants it spent not going into an account and not "frittered" away on everyday things. I struggle with this as am not a big believer in "things" and we don't have much room so I do things like buy zoo membership, museum membership etc etc and always send her thankyou letters explaining what we get. However it doesn't all go on gifts it has to be said. Or I am a little creative in that this year her money has bought a dolls house but the dolls house is actually an IKEA storage unit that we needed with the bottom half dolls house and when dolls house has no interest then it will all be storage. Her money in the past has also bought other storage furniture for the kids room - not strictly what she intended perhaps but they were not in need of anything else.

We don't have accounts ourselves for the children because I believe the money is better sat in our redraw account offsetting our mortgage - but IL's have set up some accounts for them in the UK. I have no idea what is in them or when they put any money in them to be honest - I have left that all up to them. My parents are very practically minded so if they give us money for children they are happy to trust me with it to do whatever we feel is best. I do have rough idea of what is in our account that is really the childrens.

It is made somewhat easier for us in that anyone who gives us money really is in the UK so we are never actually 'given' money for them - either is given to IL's who seem to randomly deposit in either DH's UK account or in these children's accounts they have set up - or they give it to my parents for my parents to sort out the currency exchange so we just work it out between us.

When the children are a couple of years older I will set up accounts for them so they can learn about banking money etc and that may change the way we do things a bit. However any significant sums will always go in the offset account while we have the mortgage.

If the giver doesn't like how we do it then they don't have to give us anything.

[Mildez]

For me it depends on the amount. Our parents in law give us some wool to sell from there sheep and insist we put it in the kids bank which is great as if they wanted to spend it it's to much money to be wasted on crap they would want.

[Astrid]

Thanks Ladies.

My dad is pretty good about whatever I choose to do with money he sends the girls, but MIL, well she is very insistent it goes to the bank account and we are NOT to touch it. This also applies to money sent by her parents.
It makes it hard when they might get say $100 from both side of the family, then we say they can spend $20 and we bank the rest, who's gift are they kids spending??

To clarify, I once talked about a hypothetical situation with MIL about childrens' money and what other families do. She took it that I pocket the kids money and use it to pay the mortgage. She has been paranoid ever since then. I am tempted to tell her to start a bank account for the girls herself and leave us out of it. There will be a point where we will need to take the kids money and put it in our mortgage, otherwise they will be taxed on the interest. I am not looking forward to that day and having to explain that one to her

[Trillian]

The IL's have given the kids money for birthdays' etc with the wish that they save it, but usually only if they know the kids are saving money for a particular thing and they always have something else as well - the money is never the main present kwim? Any other time they get money it's because it was easier/cheaper for the giver to send money instead of a parcel and pay postage etc so in that case they spend it.

[wysiwyg]

Thanks Ladies.

My dad is pretty good about whatever I choose to do with money he sends the girls, but MIL, well she is very insistent it goes to the bank account and we are NOT to touch it. This also applies to money sent by her parents.
It makes it hard when they might get say $100 from both side of the family, then we say they can spend $20 and we bank the rest, who's gift are they kids spending??

To clarify, I once talked about a hypothetical situation with MIL about childrens' money and what other families do. She took it that I pocket the kids money and use it to pay the mortgage. She has been paranoid ever since then. I am tempted to tell her to start a bank account for the girls herself and leave us out of it. There will be a point where we will need to take the kids money and put it in our mortgage, otherwise they will be taxed on the interest. I am not looking forward to that day and having to explain that one to her

So in that situation if you and the children are never to touch it then actually yes I think she should manage it - I suppose that is what my IL's are doing. I know I would find it very difficult to not be able to make decisions about how best to use the money to the children's benefit but then also have to deal with making sure it isn't taxed etc.

Oh and yes the same gift frequently comes from more than one person - they don't meet they will never know, quite a few people have given zoo memberships to the children.

[Astrid]

We do live in a different state from the rest of the family, so that is the main reason for sending money, plus they always say they just don't know what to buy the girls. So I do find it odd that they are then insistent that the money goes into the bank account. At the end of the day, even with compounding interest, $20 twice a year is not going to make a huge difference to the girls when they are 18.

I think we will just do what we think is best for the girls at the time and not tell them.

[Beatrix]

My children don't even have bank accounts. I feel really horrible about this but its not like it used to be for me as a kid. We banked at school and saw the balance going up.
They don't do banking at my kids school and they don't receive money very often at all for bdays so if they do we normally go on a trip somewhere like the zoo etc.

I personally think its up to the person recieving the gift as what they do.

[Jewel]

When my kids receive money as a gift from family it's never come with any instructions on how it's to be used (spent, banked) so I'm not sure how I'd feel if someone insisted. Anyways, my eldest gets the choice to bank his or spend it. My youngest doesn't really get the choice yet. It gets put into his account. He likes to take the bank book into the bank and give it to the lady at the counter.

[AnyDream]

We tend to do the spend a little but bank the most ... Mostly because no-one gives our kids very much money and $10 doesn't go very far, but when it's been added to a couple of times the kids can afford something they want.

Interesting thread. I suspect some of the pressure to bank the money comes from the older folks. Back in the day, it was fairly common for people to start these longterm accounts for children, they weren't actually bank accounts but some kind of insurance or bonds or benevolent society scheme. What typically happened with these was that you made fairly small deposits, but the interest compounded massively over time, so by the time they turned 18 or 21 or whatever it was actually a tidy little sum. Bank accounts sooooo don't work that way these days plus your fighting inflation all the way.

[feeb]

We have usually spent money on things kids need generaly clothes as they get so many presents of toys from everyone else. We have never been told to buy something specific thought always been what ever we feel they need. I did set up bank accounts just need to get round to putting money into them!!

[Astrid]

Interesting thread. I suspect some of the pressure to bank the money comes from the older folks. Back in the day, it was fairly common for people to start these longterm accounts for children, they weren't actually bank accounts but some kind of insurance or bonds or benevolent society scheme. What typically happened with these was that you made fairly small deposits, but the interest compounded massively over time, so by the time they turned 18 or 21 or whatever it was actually a tidy little sum. Bank accounts sooooo don't work that way these days plus your fighting inflation all the way.

True. My dad has put a small amount into trust for the girls. It will have increased only 2 thirds by the time DD2 gets it, much less for DD1 as it will be away for a shorter time. His reasoning for putting the amount into trust, was to protect it for the girls, he has had concerns about people contesting his will, if it is in trust then it can't be contested once he is gone.

[*Efjay*]

No one has ever given my kids money & said Bank it. Its always just be money as a gift. My Mum will give me a sum of money at christmas or easter to use how I see fit. Like this xmas just gone she gave us $150. I could divide that up between the kids & let them spend it but it would go on crap. It did get caught up on everyday things which Mum is also fine with. If it helped us out at the time then she is fine with that. If I spent it to take the kids out to something special then that would be fine too. I actually intend on taking the kids out either on the Sky rail & scenic train up here in Cairns/Kuranda or possibly to the water park that is here. To go as a family to the skyrail thing will cost close to $280 so its not something we would generally do. But they do ask to go on it.

If people want to contribute to the kids accounts I will give them the account details but I doubt anyone would think too for us.

We opened accounts for the kids about 6 or so months ago & $5 a F/N goes in to each one. We are going to increase that to $10 once this years budget is flowing nicely.

[~ Mylitta ~]

There will be a point where we will need to take the kids money and put it in our mortgage, otherwise they will be taxed on the interest. I am not looking forward to that day and having to explain that one to her

I'm going slightly off topic, but the kids accounts would have to have enough money in them that they are generating over $18,200 a year (each) before they even start to pay tax (as it's treated the same as normal income). In a pretty standard savings account that means they would have to have around $400,000 before they pay anything in tax. If you are worried about paying a significant amount of tax they would have to have a lot more than that in their accounts. If they are lucky enough to have that much then that's fantastic and I'd be giving MIL a pat on the back hehehe.