How much spending money for children?

[ANNFMUR]

How much do you budget for your children to spend at Disney. Our 9 and 5 year old have collected quite a few Disney dollars from friends and relatives.
I am hoping it will be enough. We have the dining plan and are of course paying for all their food.

Thanks

 

[pooh2001]

first we visited WDW with our kids they were 7 and 10 - so we gave them eat $100 - and the spent it on .... lots of trinkets

second time we visited WDW with our kids aged 8 and 11 - we gave them each $100 - did better spending. The 8 year old bought more practical useful items, the 11 year old bought an item in the Lego store in DTD and kept $30 cash.

third time - $100 each and their items were for better use - they had enough Disney trinkets at home.

fourth time will be in 2006 - $100 each - I assume they will pick a few 50th anniversary items - Yeti and Figment things.

The older the child and the more times they have been to WDW - the better spenders of cash are they.

 

[nliedel]

I gave them $100.00 each and told them that was it for a week (combo cruise and Disney). They were so careful they each had money left when they came home. I meant it too they got no souveniers from me but hats.

It was great because they talked about every single purchase and reall thought about what they wanted to carry (you bring it, you carry it) and how much it would take away from later in the trip. They are 6 and 8.

 

[maxsmom01]

My son is going to have about $200 BUT some of this is birthday money as he will be celebrating it at WDW. Also, he is cheap like his dad and will save as much as humanly possible.

 

[hollyb]

We just started saving today. The 2 children will have at least $100 each. They will be 9 and almost 7 when we go. Of course we will buy everything they need but they can buy what they want.

 

[jenndisney]

My DD saves all year for her Disney Spending Money. She gets birthday money and such. We also have extra jobs she can do to earn money (weed the garden, scrub trash cans, etc...). She has saved over $185 each year we have gone to Disney. She is now 9 and we have been going since she was 5.

When we get to Disney, we divide her money by the number of days we are there. For example, she has $150 and we are there for 10 days. She gets $15 each day. Now she can spend that 15 on day one, or...save it and have 30 the next day, and so on. DD likes to save it for a few big ticket items and so she usually saves most of it for the last day or so. We very seldom have lots of small stuff. She has picked a pin or two out after a special ride or something like that. But that is how we hope she spends it, on things that bring back a special memory.

I do want to explain how we keep track of her money and what is spent. Throughout the year as she saves, we put the money in a savings account (ours because we get more interest than one for her age). We got a check book register and keep track of all her deposits and withdrawls on it. When we get to Disney, we use another register for that trip only. She has her total on top and we subtract what she spends day by day. This way we do not have to try to keep money seperate.

We pay for all the food and snacks. If it has been a heavy snack day and she wants something else, we will ask if she wants to buy it herself. Just makes her think a bit more.

Now if I would only hand her my paychecks and have her save it up for me. She is so much better at it than I am.

 

[theflowerladee]

We do the same as jenndisney, our kids have whatever money they get for birthdays, what we save in a coin jug and they split it by how many days
we are there. We have realized over the last few years how much we really save, because they are much more frugal when spending there own money than ours. My kids usually end up with somewhere between 150-200 each
and it is usually enough. have a magical time.

 

[casey49781]

i gave my kids 7 dd and 4 ds ,, 20.00 a day for length of trip 8 days dec 04 ,,i dont care what they buy,, my ds 4 spent alot at lego store and loves his lego where my dd wanted all stuffed animals and tinker bell doll,,,,,i buy all food and drinks,,,,we are going again in nov and i ordered welcome baskets for them so i hope that helps on junk,,,,,i told them this is my christmas present to them so nothing from mom under the tree,,,

 

[MickeyMoose]

We went with $10/day for each. I initially thought that was maybe too much (we of course purchase all the necessities, food, drinks. . . this spending $ was just for 'blowin'. . .), but it all worked out fine. They were thrilled and actually were very prudent (?) with it all.

 

[catherines_mama]

I guess I'm in the minority. I'm not a big souvenir (cant spell) buyer. In our previous trips DD only got 1 big and 1 little, and that was it.

This trip is her 1st as a 'big girl' (she'll be 5)!! And I was planning to give her $40. She knows this already and knows she'll be able to buy only 2 or 3 things. I guess we just aren't shoppers.

 

[mareed]

We've done $5 per day for each of our DS's for several years. I think they were about 3 & 6 when we started this, and they're now 7 & 10. We go frequently, so the relatively low amount works well because there just isn't really all that much stuff that they want, but they do like picking up a few small things, and it also lets Mom and Dad have a chance to look in the shops. If we didn't go often, or it was a once in a lifetime trip, I'd do a larger amount.

 

[tmt martins]

DD12 is into the pin trading so she gets 1 small pin a day ( sometimes I pick one up and make her trade it everyother hour).Then she gets 1 anyother item for the entire trip.She also saves her money that she can do as she pleases with.

 

[ChloeChipper]

This is one part of the trip I had not thought about at all. My kids are teens, 14, 15, and 17 - how much do you think they'd need for souvenirs. Its our first trip to Disney World but have been to Disneyland TONS of times. Are there arcades around where my boys will want to blow money? I know we'll go to Disney Quest a couple times, but what about at the parks and hotels? I will need to budget money for that, and Im sure they'll want extra snacks & to buy a few things. My kids are all very involved in school and school activities so they dont have jobs yet. They do have some money of their own but they each have specific things they are saving for and I dont want them to have to use that money on the trip. So realistically how much do you think would be appropriate for them? Do you think $20-25 per day would be good?

 

[Haworthfamily]

Thanks for the great advice.
We leve Two weeks today! and I've been discussing the my DH how much money we should change into dollars for our DD 4 1/2.
She's just starting to understand money and we try and get her to purchase her sweets and comic once a week with her money at the counter.

She also loves pin trading - which I think is a great way to build confidence, by speaking to CM's or other holdiay makers to trade her pins.

Thanks again.

Sarah

2 weeks and 2 hours until we leave for WDW

 

[deedeetoo]

We don't give the kids spending money. But we are not big souvenier shoppers. Usually, the kids are allowed to buy one souvenier each trip. We limit them to about $20 and it must be small enough to fit in the luggage. DH and I rarely buy anything for ourselves.

 

[sweetpeakaris]

Our kids are 3, 5, and 7. We are giving them $100 each.

 

[tmt martins]

Are there arcades around where my boys will want to blow money? I know we'll go to Disney Quest a couple times, but what about at the parks and hotels? I will need to budget money for that, and Im sure they'll want extra snacks & to buy a few things. Do you think $20-25 per day would be good?

Yes in most resorts and some of the parks there are Arcades (Mk outside SM ).
That should be fine but drinks and snacks could eat up $25 quickly.

DD will spend what we give her and find other things to do (there's plenty) when we say no more and cut her off.

 

[digskat]

I have been depositing $20 every pay day for both kids. They know if they keep their rooms clean and help out around the house they get paid on Pay day. They will have about $450 in their accounts by our next trip so I will allow them to buy some american money with some of their earnings. I was thinking $50 each.

 

[mommyofthreeboys]

I feel cheap. My 3 kids are only getting $30 each. I plan on buying a t-shirt for them and of course all the snacks.

 

[Crazy4Disney72]

I am taking my DD in about two weeks for her 6th birthday. I will buy all food/snacks and probably a shirt or something, and then she will have about $25 to spend however she wants, maybe a bit more if she earns more doing little jobs around the house. I think usually the most my kids have ever had as 'their' money was maybe $20-$30. When my oldest DS was 11 and the two of us went to Disneyland, he had almost $100 because it was about a month after Christmas and he had asked the relatives for Disney Dollars for Christmas instead of gifts. I thought that was a huge amount of money for a kid to have. He added significantly to his pin collection so at least it wasn't a lot of junk taking up space! We've just never been huge on souvenirs....from the time they were little, whenever we went anywhere we would tell them they could pick one thing. For something like WDW where we were there for a week, we would tell them if they saw something they wanted to remember it and on the last day we would go back and get the one thing they wanted the most. We usually bought them shirts or sweatshirts and then the one thing they picked out themselves.