How Do You Make the Saving "Fun"?

[shellynn24]

Some things we did with our kids when they were little:

We only spend change during vacations. If our total is $1.01 I'm still paying with $2. They would empty my wallet at the end of the week and sort the different coins into different banks.

I had them help me make grocery lists and cut coupons. The amount saved with coupons went into a bank (We had/have Coke Bottle, Donald Duck, 2 different Lion Kings, Fred Flintstone, and a few Coke Cans). Couponing can be time consuming but it can be a family project.

Instead of going to XYZ we stayed home and had a movie night or game night. Saved money went into the banks.

Saved money in ING accounts since then it took 3 days to transfer money to our Credit Union. Both boys had and still have their own accounts.

For birthdays they would ask for Disney Money as their gifts.

Back then we had Works on our computers and printed up a cool vacation budget plan. One page had what we needed for passes, room, gasoline, hotel on way down & back, meals, snacks and souvies. The other page showed when we met each goal. We used a Disney font and various colors to make it look cool. I printed mousekeeping envelopes for each day we would be there too. We used the menus & trip reports on the DIS to get the exact amount needed for each in park meal.

In the summer we would handwash the cars to save $$ at the carwash too.

When they'd get bored with it all we would do something like have Mickey pancakes for breakfast to get them motivated again. Kids need the long term goal broken down into short term goals to help keep them interested.

These are all good ideas, I especially like the idea of showing them how a budget is broken down and how it pays off.

Did you want a way for the kids to see your progress? How about one of those thermometer drawings that fund raising projects use- as you save more, fill it in with red marker. They might really get into closing the gap.

We did this one year when they were really small, I completely forgot about this.

There is no big secret to the ebay thing, it is ALL about timing. Very rarely does anyone list Disney gift cards on ebay for less than they're worth. Usually Disney GCs are bid up to over face value (don't ask me why!). So, I check ebay daily...obsessively...to grab the GCs that are put on with a buy it now option of less than face value. I also go through Mr. Rebates to get an additional 3% cashback. I then use the gift cards to pay for our trip, and if I end up with enough I use them to pay for our food/souveniers while we're there too - unless we have free dining of course. I've done this for 3 trips now and it does take some diligent ebay searching but I can do that relatively easily at work...and it has saved us hundreds of dollars.

I'll have to check this out. Why oh why would anyone pay more for money then the money is worth. That would be like buying a $5 bill for $7...makes no sense to me . Is there info about the rebate thing on ebay?


I used the idea of saving change in a jar and the kids had a great time decorating it with stickers and then combing the house for every bit of spare change. I think saving can be fun, I personally always enjoy saving for something I really want. My kids unfortunately have been very spoiled by their other parent and I have a hard time re-teaching them about not spending every dime on pointless stuff. I appreciate all the ideas and teaching methods, thanks!

 

[carebee21]

I'll have to check this out. Why oh why would anyone pay more for money then the money is worth. That would be like buying a $5 bill for $7...makes no sense to me .

This is how it works. I'm going to use even numbers because I'm not that great at math! You purchase a $97 disney gift certificate for $100. (they all seem to only go a few dollars above the amount their worth)

You get 3% back with mr bates. So that brings the cost to $97.
You get 1-2% (sometimes higher, depending on your card) for paying for the auction with a reward credit card. That brings your cost to $95.
You also get 2% back with ebay bucks. That brings your cost to $93.

So you saved a couple backs on the gift card. Obviously, you can save a bit more by using a rewards card with a higher percentage.

Plus, some people may do this to get a gift card of their choice. Not everyone has Disney stores by them, and the grocery store by me that carries disney gift cards only has princess ones, which obviously don't appeal to my son.

Personally, I'd rather buy them from disney store, than save a few bucks buying them on ebay and having to deal the potential hassle of the gift card never being shipped or "lost in the mail" or the gift card being empty. But that's just me

 

[Jill in Chicago]

I think the first thing is to set very specific goals.

Let's say you want to do a character breakfast. Everyone agrees you want to do a character breakfast. You look up how much it will cost. You decide which things you currently spend money on that will become optional. For instance they can choose if we go to McDonald's tonight, or we make up a bowl of pasta for dinner instead. Then the money saved goes into the savings jar towards the breakfast.

Or they could choose to make something for an upcoming birthday, with things at home, instead of going shopping for a gift.

The key is something specific. If it is just "we are saving for Disney," it is hard to get motivated. It could be "we are saving for one extra night at Disney. The cost for one extra night at the hotel is "$$$." Then you save up until you have "x."

Also everyone has to be on board with the goal. Otherwise set up 3 separate goals, one for each child. These can be things that the whole family will enjoy such as, Child A is saving for us ALL to go to a character breakfast. Child B is saving for ALL of us to go to the water park for the day....

Again, these are just examples. You may want to do much smaller things like Child A is saving for all of us to have ice cream one day....

Or, if we save up to "$$$$" then we get to do "this."

Long term goals like, "you are saving now for the money you can spend at Disney later are VERY hard for most children."

Also you may find that one child will decide that everything is "optional," and they want to put all the money towards Disney, and another child does not agree. Then it will be time to switch to separate things for them to save up for.

Also while doing this, it helps to still have "money they can spend right now," versus all of their money going into long term savings. That way they will learn to budget, and not feel like a failure for wanting something now, versus putting it all away for later.

 

[angierae]

This is how we're making it "fun" - every $50 we add a Mickey Head! (I'm behind, there should be one more up there.)


Disney chart by angierae75, on Flickr

 

[shellynn24]

This is how it works. I'm going to use even numbers because I'm not that great at math! You purchase a $97 disney gift certificate for $100. (they all seem to only go a few dollars above the amount their worth)

You get 3% back with mr bates. So that brings the cost to $97.
You get 1-2% (sometimes higher, depending on your card) for paying for the auction with a reward credit card. That brings your cost to $95.
You also get 2% back with ebay bucks. That brings your cost to $93.

So you saved a couple backs on the gift card. Obviously, you can save a bit more by using a rewards card with a higher percentage.

Plus, some people may do this to get a gift card of their choice. Not everyone has Disney stores by them, and the grocery store by me that carries disney gift cards only has princess ones, which obviously don't appeal to my son.

Personally, I'd rather buy them from disney store, than save a few bucks buying them on ebay and having to deal the potential hassle of the gift card never being shipped or "lost in the mail" or the gift card being empty. But that's just me

Thank you for the explanation. I understand a little better now. I too would be worried that I had bought an empty card.

This is how we're making it "fun" - every $50 we add a Mickey Head! (I'm behind, there should be one more up there.)


Disney chart by angierae75, on Flickr

What a great idea! My kids loved the poster and think we should do something like this too...thanks for the idea.

 

[angierae]

What a great idea! My kids loved the poster and think we should do something like this too...thanks for the idea.

Thanks! It's hanging in our kitchen and anytime we feel deprived about something that isn't "in the budget" we just remind each other about the poster.

Those are the Mickey heads from Home Depot, btw. I found that the lighter colors work better if you want to write where the money came from, too. (We track all of our coupon and bottle return money as Disney savings. I also wrote on the one that was my birthday money from my MIL. I think seeing where it all came from is fun, too.