A MUM has revealed that she takes a portion of her kids’ birthday and Christmas money every year – but claimed that she’s not a “criminal parent”.
Janice Curnew revealed that she actually takes this money to help her kids in the future.
Taking to TikTok the mum said: “Every time our kids get money, we skim a little bit off the top.
“Birthdays, Christmases, money from their grandparents – we’re taking a little bit.
“And before you come at me in the comments for being a criminal parent, I’m going to tell you exactly why”.
Janice said that instead of letting them keep all of the money, she takes a portion of it and puts it into savings for the future.
She explained that if they were given £20 for their birthday, she takes £5 and puts it into a high interest savings account, so that they can use it when they need a deposit for a house.
Janice said that this way, her kids will never be in debt and will be set for the future.
She added that now her children are old enough to make money from jobs such as babysitting they do the same with this cash.
For example, if they earn £100 from babysitting, they will put £20 of it into their savings accounts.
The mum said that the rest of the money they have can be spent however they want to “because money is spent to be spent”.
She urged all parents to follow the same principles, adding that it’s “never too late to start”.
“If your kid is 15 you can still be doing this”, she said.
“Start today and make them set some money aside because they are going to need it”.
Janice’s video, which was posted under the username @janicecurnew, has gone viral, racking up over 1.3 million views on the video sharing platform.
TikTok users raced to the videos comments section to share their thoughts, with many people agreeing with the parenting hack.
One person said: “We actually take all of our kids’ money and put it straight into savings.
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“It adds up so fast”.
Another person said: “We do this too. We take 70% of each of their pay checks and it goes into savings.
“No one taught me to save. Uni is so expensive, this is how we help them save.”
A third added: “I wish my parents had done this”.
A fourth said: “Take all of it until they know what money is”.
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