I decided to start a weekly allowance for both of my kids after they had their 5th birthday. I basically decided to keep it simple. I just give them $1 for each year of age ($5 for my 5-year-old, $9 for my 9-year-old).
Depending on how well I’m doing financially on down the road, I might increase the amounts for both kids once they reach a certain age. Maybe something like this:
| Age | Allowance |
| 1 thru 9 | $1 for every age year |
| 10 thru 16 | $1 per age + $5 |
| 16 thru 18/21 | $1 per age + $10 |
So: if my son were 12, then he would get $17 weekly.
if he were 17, then he would get $27 weekly.
I marked “18/21” in the table above, because I haven’t decided yet when to stop providing an allowance to my kids. I might also increase it to $50 once they start college. I’m not sure, It’s still up in the air on that one too.
Update: My son is now 11 years old as of 2012, but I forgot about the extra five dollars I was going to give him. Quite honestly though, money has been tight for me lately, so I might delay that increase until he is 13, 14 or 15. At Age 16, I will make sure he gets the extra $5 plus his age.
Hope you enjoyed my model,
-MR
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Interesting. Do you require the kids to do certain things for them to get the allowance such as cleaning up their room or taking out the trash?
After much thinking, I decided not to. They do get exta money for “out of the ordinary” work that they do (washing the car, shoveling the drive, etc…)
I have my kids split their allowance money 2 ways, 1st way goes to savings, 2nd way for spending. In addtion to their allowance, they each have a piggy bank that change goes into. Of that piggy bank money, half goes to charities around the holidays.
Surprisingly, they enjoy giving half their money from the piggy bank to charity…
I’ve got great kids
I never got an allowance as a kid, it may have helped me learn how to manage my money if I did
Still, it’s a good idea, but I’d probably get them to do chores for the cash rather than just for free.
It’s great idea to split it into savings and spending so they learn early on to save it