Another question on teen driving & paying for their own expenses

[Kimm in WA]

My son will be turning 16 soon, so all this discussion has been of interest to me.

 

My first question is: what do you make your kiddos pay for?

 

We are, off hand, thinking that we'll pay for the additional $45 in ins. to add him on our car and the gas to go to his CC classes since that's part of his education and our responsibility.

 

A family friend is offering to give him a car that they no longer use. It will require some work that he will need to pay for. We are thinking that the ADDITONAL $45 to add another car to our policy should be his responsibility, as well as the gas for any non-essential driving like non-school, running brothers to karate, youth group, errands for mom kind of stuff that we'd be doing any way. He has a PT job and should pay for the gas for this as well.

 

So another question is HOW can I keep track of how much gas we pay for and how much he should? We have a gas credit card - would you suggest getting a 3rd card (if possible) so he has practice using a credit card while at home and paying it off each month (we don't carry a balance on the gas card).

 

At what age do kids out there get their own checking/debit card?

 

Can ya tell all these age 16 changes are throwing me for a bit of a loop!?

 

Thanks for any advice,

Kimm in WA

[homeschool_mom]

I would come up with a per mile expense. When I was a teenager, my sister and I shared a car. We each kept track of our mileage in a notebook. I believe my dad made us pay 10 cents per mile, but keep in mind that was about 30 years ago.

[TravelingChris]

My oldest couldn't get a license until he was 18 since we had lived in Europe until he was 17 and he had to have a learner's permit for a year or until he turned 18 to get a license. Then he was away at college without a car and housesit on a small farm where they let him use their car so he only drove ours when he came to visit. SInce he has moved back home, he hardly uses the car since we only have two and parking at his college is too expensive anyway. He wants to buy a car but needs to have a good paying summer and part time in school year job first.

With dd who will turn 16 in Aug., she won't drive the car to the cc because we live about a mile away and she can bike, walk or get a ride from me. I need to keep my car for other purposes. I expect her to use the car alone when she will travel to adult choir practices at our church. SHe also will use the car to transport her and her younger sister to youth group and sometimes to do errands, including her own like going to the library. I won't expect her to pay anything since she is not employed. ALso, she will be helping me out by reducing the amount of back and forth driving I have to do.

[Leanna Tomlinson]

We have two driving teenagers. My husband wanted them to learn how to manage money before they left our home, but at the same time he was leary of many of the employment opportunities available for teenagers.

 

We had both dd's get checking accounts and debit cards when they turned 16. At that time we also required them to start paying for all of their entertainment, clothing,car insurance, and gas. We gave them an allowance of $100/month. We felt like this amount would allow them to meet some of their expenses, but also teach them to budget. Our daughters babysit and run errands for us, but we don't pay them for these favors, they are included in the $100/month. They also make outside

money babysitting, tutoring, cleaning, and teaching violin.

 

My husband got tired of the "nickel & diming" that was happening all the time with trying to keep track of mileage when they drove somewhere for us. If they drive a long distance for us, we will give them enough $ to fill the tank; we now keep more cash in the house for this purpose. If the errand for us is short, they eat the cost and it will be made up the next time we give them a whole tank full and they only needed half.

 

We bought an old car for them to use, but made it clear that it is OUR car for them to use and it is monitored and controlled by us. The insurance they pay is only the additional $ that they add to the insurance premium. We don't believe in handing over a car to teenagers, but we needed them to have a car for our convenience and sanity. DH does require them to maintain the car (oil changes, taking it for a tune-up) so they can have this experience before they buy their own vehicle. He pays for this, but requires them to take the car in to have the work done.

Edited May 26, 2009 by Leanna

[Pamela H in Texas]

Kimm,

 

Well, I can't help with most of your question because we're doing differently than most but for particular reasons that aren't applicable to most people's situations.

 

However, I can tell you that there are several banks (Wells Fargo for one) that offer teen checking accounts with visa debit cards. Kid just needs to be 13-17yrs old. Mom is a second on the account. Mom can even set limits for different kinds of purchases

[Gwen in VA]

We paid for all their driving expenses. This sounds like we are the nicest parents in the world, but the REASON we pay is --

 

Before they had their licenses I drove them to here, there, and everywhere. 99% of their driving post-license is to places I want them to go to -- and if they didn't have their licenses I would drive them there anyway! So we didn't want to "punish" the kids financially for saving me a lot of driving! (Does this make any sense?)

 

If anything, their having their license saves us money -- I am more likely to be home in the late afternoon now so we have take-out pizza less often! :-)

 

If they had used the car more to "gad about," we would have asked for a certain fee per mile, but a once-per-month random trip doesn't justify the headache of keeping track of miles.

[hsmamainva]

We also pay for our oldest daughter's driving expenses.

 

Her car was a gift from her aunt, so we didn't have to pay for that. We have had to pay for several repairs to the car, as it's 10 years old and has needed various things fixed over the 2 years that we've owned it.

 

We also pay for the insurance costs. She just got her license in December; prior to that, we didn't have to pay extra for her when she had a learner's permit -- only once she became a licensed driver. We've had to pay for her car, however, since it was put on our policy.

 

As for a bank account, our bank allows children under age 21 to have an account with them that's placed under our account. She doesn't pay any monthly fees for it, no matter what her balance is. She doesn't have checks, but she has a debit card and that's what she uses when she's out and about.

 

We pay for her gas and other expenses during the school year. She drives herself to and from the community college twice a week. She earns her gas and spending money by watching her younger siblings for us. Our 7 year old has autism and needs almost constant supervision, when she's not in school.

 

Now that summer is here and she isn't taking any classes, she's been using the money she received from friends and relatives for her graduation from high school. We've told her that we expect that money to last all summer! We'll see if it does!

[Brenda in MA]

Since our son got his license this past year, we paid for the insurance and for gas to/from his cc classes. I just figured the miles of each trip, the MPG of the car, the number of trips, the cost of gas, and gave him a check every month. He is responsible to keep the car filled with gas and pay for oil changes. So if he wants to drive to places other than the cc, the gas is on him. Having him able to drive himself to the cc and to work is very much a convenience to us and very beneficial to him, so we don't mind paying for the insurance and the gas to the cc.

 

Last summer, with his cc ID in hand, ds was able to open his own checking/savings account with a debit card. Since the bank considered him a college student, he was able to qualify for their special low/no fee account. My name is also on the account because he's under 18, and I do keep an eye on what he is spending his money on. He's working this summer scooping ice cream, and he's doing a good job so far of saving most of his money, so I'm comfortable with him having control of his money.

 

Brenda

[AnitaMcC]

My son will be turning 16 soon, so all this discussion has been of interest to me.

 

My first question is: what do you make your kiddos pay for?

 

We are, off hand, thinking that we'll pay for the additional $45 in ins. to add him on our car and the gas to go to his CC classes since that's part of his education and our responsibility.

 

A family friend is offering to give him a car that they no longer use. It will require some work that he will need to pay for. We are thinking that the ADDITONAL $45 to add another car to our policy should be his responsibility, as well as the gas for any non-essential driving like non-school, running brothers to karate, youth group, errands for mom kind of stuff that we'd be doing any way. He has a PT job and should pay for the gas for this as well.

 

So another question is HOW can I keep track of how much gas we pay for and how much he should? We have a gas credit card - would you suggest getting a 3rd card (if possible) so he has practice using a credit card while at home and paying it off each month (we don't carry a balance on the gas card).

 

At what age do kids out there get their own checking/debit card?

 

Can ya tell all these age 16 changes are throwing me for a bit of a loop!?

 

Thanks for any advice,

Kimm in WA

 

For us, If we are lending our teens one of our cars for the teen to use, the teen pays their portion of the insurance and a portion for the gas/car maintenance. If the teen gets own car (which teen pays for) he/she pays the insurance and the gas/car maintenance totally. If teen does parental errands, we will give the teen a little money for the gas used for doing errands for us.

 

For keeping track of the gas expense... I don't see it being feasable myself. We just give teen some money to cover the expense if they are running errands, specifically out of their way, for us. We don't keep tabs on it.

I opened a joint checking account for each of our four kids about 6 months ago and each got a visa check card. Really only got it for them because at the time the bank had a deal for opening checking accounts get a gift card. I opened the accounts with $25 and got a $50 gift card for each account. Figure I made money there-LOL. The teens use their visa check card when they want to buy something, if they have money available-LOL.

Anita

[Amber in AUS]

My parents paid all my driving expenses until i was working full time however I paid all my social & outing expenses from my PT job. If i wanted to eat out, i paid. If i wanted clothes, i paid etc.

[74Heaven]

I can recommend what 'not to do' because we just did it for several months. We tried to keep track of the teen's mileage and then she paid the price of a gallon of gas per 20 miles she drove. So if she drove 40 miles that week, she owed 6 dollars or 3 a gallon/price of gas/maintenance. It was ridiculous because this teen is disorganized and it turned into a big chore when it wasn't becoming an argument. She started driving in the 4 per gallon summertime.

 

I KNOW I was a teen once but I had forgotten how much teens take for granted. Here you are giving them a car to drive, paying room, board, clothing - and everything else and then they balk because you accidentally charged them for an 'errand' gas charge. gee whiz

 

We had originally set this up so there would be 'real world' consequences/costs. but it was too much trouble by far... My second born would likely be a good recordkeeper and she would log the miles faithfully and keep track. But not firstborn...

 

Soooo, what we have found easiest - by far - is to just have that teen put gas in the car that they drive - and pay the 70 a month insurance for same 'beater' car - which is almost the same cost as just adding a teen to the regular policies. When the teen wasn't working - thru most of the school year - we just paid everything as I wanted the teen to save as much as possible for future college expenses...... The teen does have a debit card btw for her own checking/savings account.

 

We have also been quick to hand over the debit card when we use her car unexpectedly or when she wasn't working - which meant she wasn't driving much so there. We also had the car break down in Nov/Dec and we had - I think it was over 11 feet of snow over last winter so driving was minimal for the new teen driver.

 

lisaj, mom to 5