10 Best Pieces of Money Advice People Received From Their Parents

Did your parents install good money practices with solid financial advice growing up, or are you searching for tips now? After someone asked the internet for the best advice they received from their parents about money, here are the top recommendations.

1. Budgeting to Spend for Christmas Gifts

One Redditor shared, “When I was between the ages of ten and twelve, for Christmas, our parents gave us a budget and a Toys’R’us catalog instead of asking us what we wanted.

We then picked out our presents. My first memories of budgeting and the idea of not being able to have it all and having to compromise to stay within budget stuck with me.”

2. Work Hard and Do Your Best In School

“Do your best at school so you can go to a new place and live a comfortable life,” answered another. “We are poor and have nothing to give you if we pass on, and your education is the only thing we can offer to help you in the future, teary-eyed, and sobbing. I miss my family. I haven’t been home for a year now.”

3. Pad Your Pension

One suggested, “Pay as much as you can into your pension. It’s good advice I ignored for a while because I was young and stupid, then adopted it.”

“I was foolish and made no pension payments due to earning such a small wage. At 30, though I started working in a school, I put 5% of my salary in, and my employer puts in 22%,” another volunteered.

4. Choose a Career Because You Love it, Not Because of the Pay

“Choose a career you love that covers your bills over a job that pays loads but makes you miserable. It is generally good advice in terms of net life satisfaction,” one confessed.

A second noted, “I agree. I have several friends who have incredibly high-paying jobs but are overworked, stressed out, and unhappy. As a result, they barely have free time to see their loved ones or enjoy their money.”

5. If You Want Something, Save For It

“Some good advice I received, save up for things you want. As a child, that made me plan how long it would take to get something and made me consider the trade-offs like sweets now vs. extra week saving,” answered another.

6. Watching Your Parents Struggle Growing Up

“Accidental advice was seeing them go into debt for unnecessary luxuries that later took years to pay off (crushing my mum to the point where she was going without necessities at times because of lack of cash). So I learned to avoid consumer debt like the plague, thankfully,” explained one.

7. Invest Early and Often, If You Can

One suggested, “Best advice my parents taught me was how to invest money that I didn’t need that day, week, or month. I didn’t care about investing as a kid, but it was advantageous once I grew up and understood it.”

8. Don’t Spend Money You Don’t Have

Another noted, “Never borrow money from anyone. And never lend money out to anyone. It taught me never to spend money I don’t have and not to condone the act. But, if it’s life-saving, and it’s someone I trust and know well, then I would lend them money.”

9. Balance Spending with Saving

“My parents saved every penny they could,” shared one. “If we went out for a meal or out for a day, there was always a voucher involved. They had the money to do things but chose to save instead. My dad died at age 54, and I have always thought what a shame he didn’t spend and enjoy more of the money he worked so hard to save and earn.”

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10. If You Can’t Afford to Buy it Twice

“Not my parents, but my grandparents told me if you can’t afford to buy it twice, you can’t afford it,” one explained. Another stated, “What I was told, which is a variant of this, is that there’s a difference between having enough money to buy something and being able to afford it.”

We hope you enjoyed this best money advice Redditors received from their parents. This article is inspired by the internet and does not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of The Cents of Money.

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2 thoughts on “10 Best Pieces of Money Advice People Received From Their Parents”

  1. My opinion is you should only accept a job that offers you the chance to achieve great mastery of your craft. You don’t have to worry about job satisfaction. If you learn to be world class at what you do you will always find great satisfaction in it. You don’t pick a job that you enjoy, you pick a job you can do better than most anyone else and enjoyment follows. And if you can do that in a high paying field, so much the better. Certainly worked for me.

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