7 ways to help aging parents with finances

Here's a great article from Stephanie Morrow with LegalZoom, which lists seven things you can do to helphttp://www.legalzoom.com/money-matters/personal-finance/7-ways-help-aging.  These seven things include:

your aging parents financially:

1) Be respectful.

2) Organize essential financial documents.

3) Make lists of financial activities.

4) Organize estate planning documents.

5) Create durable and health care powers of attorney.

6) Involve a financial expert.

7) Look out for red flags.

Talk to your kids about money

Not sure how to talk to your kids about money?  Here are some helpful tips from Chuck Bentley's article, "How to talk with your kids about the 'M' word -- Money":

1)  Practice Delayed Gratification

2)  Teach Your Kids About Simple Allocation

3)  Teach Personal Responsibility

4)  Talk About Earning and Spending Money

Click here to read the full article.

Empower Your Teen!

KPVI News 6 (Pocatello, Idaho) recently wrote a story about the importance of discussing money with teenagers. They interviewed Dr. Brad Klontz, a financial psychologist who works with H&R Block Dollars & Sense, who suggested that parents start with five tactics:

1) Fight the urge to give advice; just listen.

2) If at first they don't succeed... let them try, try again.

3) Tell your teen to think before buying.

4) Model healthy financial behaviors your teen can follow.

5) Talk to your teen's school about efforts to reinforce financial lessons.


Click here to read the full story.

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What are you teaching your children about money?

Never tell children that their parents are wealthy. Kids who grow up thinking their parents are wealthy often learn to live like they are.

Teach your children discipline and frugality. These are values held by most financially successful adults. Yet, kids can’t learn them on their own. Who will teach them if you don’t?

Children shouldn’t realize you are affluent until after they have established a mature, disciplined, and adult lifestyle and profession. It’s better that they learn some things on their own.

Minimize discussions about inheritances or gifts. Parents sometimes forget these talks, but children don’t. Many years later, these seeds can grow into large family conflicts.

Never give gifts to adult children as part of a negotiation strategy. Bribes usually backfire with toddlers – and adults too. No one likes gifts with strings attached.

Stay out of your adult children’s family matters. Adults make their own choices, and you should let them. All children resent interference.

Don’t compete with your children. Adult children sometimes hold different financial values than parents. Money may be less important to them than other things – education, status, happiness. Let them be.

Remember that children are individuals. Don’t try to equalize nature’s inequality with money. It rarely works, and siblings resent it. Respect each child separately.

Emphasize achievements, no matter how small. One parent taught his son, “I’m not impressed by what people own. But I’m impressed with what they achieve.” Guess what? The son achieved a lot, including financial success!

Tell children that there are a lot of things more valuable than money. Most of us know this, but few emphasize it. Yet, it’s one of life’s most important lessons. How can anyone be happy without this knowledge?

I grapple with these issues regularly. All of us learn early financial values from our parents (even by default). Most of my clients learned both good and bad at the “family school.” Sadly, some never overcome bad lessons.

What are you teaching your children about money?