18:12 great post

We give our college-age DC (at an expensive, urban school, has a meal plan but quality of campus food is very poor) $450/mo.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:UMD kid living on campus with meal plan. We don’t give any allowance, credit card is for books, school fees, medical copays and emergencies only. Had a summer job and still has most of the money in own accounts. You’re giving way too much, OP.

+1

We have the same deal for our 2 kids. One is in an apartment so we give her $50 a week for groceries and will do the same for our son next year when he moves to an apartment. They’re expected to work summers and make that money last all year. If they aren’t careful, they need to get a job during the year. They have room, food, tuition and healthcare which is plenty.

Have you accounted for inflation at all? $50 doesn't seem like much to me, so I went to the Walmart web site and started adding things to the basket. Here's what I got for $46.23 before tax (FWIW, I didn't worry about organic or avoiding prepared foods, I just got what seemed like the cheapest).

white sliced sandwich bread
1/2 lb cheese
dozen eggs
16 oz. sliced ham
10 oz. bag of salad
bananas
carrots
5 apples
5 lbs potatoes
hot dogs
1 lb. of chicken breasts

I guess maybe a young person who doesn't eat a lot could theoretically live on this for a week? Two eggs for breakfast for five days and one each for the other two, ham sandwich with cheese for lunch (you'd have one thin slice of ham and cheese per day) with one piece of fruit or a carrot, a salad with a chicken breast a couple of nights, hot dogs (use the sliced bread for buns) for dinner a couple of nights, or a roast chicken breast with potatoes and carrots. This sounds like what someone who is trying to lose weight would eat. My teenage boy would starve to death.

FWIW, I had almost no money when I was in college, and I lived on Kraft Mac n Cheese and Ramen noodles. I know it can be done. But I'm not going to make my kid do that (or work just so they can have an adequate amount of food).

Two kids in college. One in a very small town and one in an urban area. Their spending is very different. For the kid in the small town it would be hard to find ways to spend $100 a month. Kid lives in a dorm and has a full meal plan. Town has maybe 3-4 cheap places to eat that kids don’t really go to and 1 cheap place kids like. The other kid lives off campus with no meal plan. Kid grocery shops and cooks but the social life for that DC is totally different. Friends are in apartments across a big area. Weekends involve eating out and socializing that costs money. Kid in the urban area spends more.

Rural SLAC with required full meal plan. I send $150/mo and will do a once/month Walmart order and some extras if they ask. I pay car insurance, kid pays for gas. They have learned some hard but useful lessons in budgeting and now doordash to make extra cash.

Who’s funding these kids I see at Starbucks. Every. Single. Day. Buying $7 drinks and snacks ??

A visit to chipotle is easily $25-30 these days. Do that just a few times a month and it adds up. Plus gas for the car. A few Ubers on the weekend and maybe a movie or two. You are spending several hundred dollars.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow that's so low, our high schooler gets $55/week and when I was in college 20y years a go I got $2k/months which also included 5-700 for rent.

What would they spend $55 in high school. We give per going out but no way they spend that a week.

$55 is one hoodie. Life has gotten so expensive. My kids work but I do give them money here and there on top of it because even a fast foodish meal is $15.

We pay generally under $15 for a hoodie. Not that expensive. And fast food can be had for less.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow that's so low, our high schooler gets $55/week and when I was in college 20y years a go I got $2k/months which also included 5-700 for rent.

What would they spend $55 in high school. We give per going out but no way they spend that a week.

$55 is one hoodie. Life has gotten so expensive. My kids work but I do give them money here and there on top of it because even a fast foodish meal is $15.

On clearance. Lol

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:UMD kid living on campus with meal plan. We don’t give any allowance, credit card is for books, school fees, medical copays and emergencies only. Had a summer job and still has most of the money in own accounts. You’re giving way too much, OP.

+1

We have the same deal for our 2 kids. One is in an apartment so we give her $50 a week for groceries and will do the same for our son next year when he moves to an apartment. They’re expected to work summers and make that money last all year. If they aren’t careful, they need to get a job during the year. They have room, food, tuition and healthcare which is plenty.

My terp lives off campus and has no meal plan and we give them$300 per month for groceries. They learned to cook and love shopping at Trader Joe’s.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wow that's so low, our high schooler gets $55/week and when I was in college 20y years a go I got $2k/months which also included 5-700 for rent.

What would they spend $55 in high school. We give per going out but no way they spend that a week.

$55 is one hoodie. Life has gotten so expensive. My kids work but I do give them money here and there on top of it because even a fast foodish meal is $15.

Very interesting topic, we’ve been dealing with our freshman who loves spending like it’s a sport. We only give him $40 every other week, and he calls / texts if he needs something from Amazon we get it delivered to him.
Otherwise he’s on the meal plan (apparently the food is bad at his school like most) it’s $3k per semester. .
We pay full tuition, room: board, haircuts, books, prescriptions, transportation home, and whatever pops up he asks for within reason and we don’t question it much, like new cleats, etc we buy it and have it delivered. We’ve also sent Chipotle gift cards and he gets cash from aunts, uncles, grandparents - he tears through that fun money so fast it would make your head spin. He did the same with summer job money. Poof.

With our son, the solution isn’t to give him more cash. The solution is to make sure he has some *skin in the game*. He started working part time a few weeks ago, and he treats his *own money* with more care.l! Fun money will be on him going forward - we will stop the cash allowance all together. If he works 10-15 hours per week at school, it’s more than enough to cover his entertainment during the school year, plus summer job he can contribute to gas and expenses for our car he drives. . Im tired of getting the car back with an empty tank! They have to have skin in the game which I think is fair considering we pay for everything else and he will graduate debt free.

Anonymous wrote:Wow that's so low, our high schooler gets $55/week and when I was in college 20y years a go I got $2k/months which also included 5-700 for rent.

What would they spend $55 in high school. We give per going out but no way they spend that a week.

Anonymous wrote:It really depends on the kid, depends on the family, depends on your HHI.

Nope we have a very very high HHI 1%ers.

What OP is describing would never ever happen in my house.

My children all understand finances.

No way would they have had $300 a month plus Uber plus not using meal plan. By the way plenty of schools have crappy meal plans.

They all had summer jobs for cash at college for the year. They also worked breaks. Sophmore year they all had part time jobs and classes. Mine were given credit cards in their names to start to establish credit. Not once did they over do it.

Her kid needs a job. He is spoiled and entitled.

Anonymous wrote:UMD kid living on campus with meal plan. We don’t give any allowance, credit card is for books, school fees, medical copays and emergencies only. Had a summer job and still has most of the money in own accounts. You’re giving way too much, OP.

+1

We have the same deal for our 2 kids. One is in an apartment so we give her $50 a week for groceries and will do the same for our son next year when he moves to an apartment. They’re expected to work summers and make that money last all year. If they aren’t careful, they need to get a job during the year. They have room, food, tuition and healthcare which is plenty.