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Monday, December 1, 2008

Some Financial Mistakes You should Avoid As A Parent

It is easy to blame on other people's mistake. But this post is not about that. I love my parents and appreciate whatever sacrifices they have made to bring me up. And without any doubt, they love me too. Just that they loved me and my siblings too much that they unintentionally made some mistakes along the way.

For instance, they never allowed any one of us to work during the school holidays. Even until I was 17! The reason they had was if we earned our own income, we will be too comfortable with it that we would not concentrate on our studies anymore. The problem: we failed to understand the challenges of working life until very much later stages of our lives.

Another issue that I can clearly remember is that they never allowed us to spend our 'gift money' that we received during celebrations or birthdays from friends, relatives and even parents themselves as we like. We were told to put it into our savings. However, if we needed anything, we should ask our parents and if they were okay with it, they would get it for us. The problem: we failed to make our own choices and differentiate between the needs and wants.

They pampered us too much. They tried to provide us with all the comfort that they could. When my youngest brother got a job,my parents insisted that they should send and fetch him. Many times I've insisted that he should stand on his own feet and make use of public transport available, especially when he is 25!

Apart from that, my brother uses the car during the weekends just to go and meet friends and hang-out. I can see the problems arising:
  • he doesn't learn budgeting, because he still gets free rides
  • his time management skills are nil because he gets to tell parents when he is ready to leave and not the other way around
  • once he is very comfortable with driving (parents-sponsored), it is difficult to use public transport.
How is he going to get by when he can't afford all these comforts with his small salary later on?

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