WWYD?Sibs saving for toys, oldest convinces youngest to put money together to get what he wants

[kindacrunchy]

My boys are 8 and 5. They both have rather expensive items they want to buy and have been selling old toys, doing extra chores, selling lemonade, etc. to raise money for them. The oldest wants a robotics kit which is $250 and the youngest wants the $400 lego death star. The oldest comes up with the idea to put their money together so they can buy the things together. The youngest is so giving and I feel the oldest takes advantage of that. So the youngest agrees and guess what they are getting first? the robotics kit. hubby and i are very uncomfortable with this but we just don't know how to manage it. i told the oldest we would draw up a contract if they did this. hubby said he would be more comfortable if they were getting the legos first.

how would you handle it?

we could use some ideas.

thanks!

[ElleTwo]

Moving past the obvious choice of just making each one save for their own toy, forbidding the coop purchase.  What about a variation on the old cake trick (one piece of cake shared between two people, one cuts the other gets first choice) The choice for which toy to buy first gets made when they have saved up enough money to buy either of the toys, then maybe the younger one chooses or they flip a coin. SOmething like that.

[CarrieMF]

Moving past the obvious choice of just making each one save for their own toy, forbidding the coop purchase.  

Do you think the 8yo is going to be willing to pool his money with the younger one still once he has his toy?

I would do the above & veto this.  Let them save up their own money to purchase what they want.  If thier wants were in the $40-50 range then I'd maybe let it go, but $250 & $400 is alot of money

[kindacrunchy]

i talked with my youngest and asked him a series of questions. the number one question was would you give your brother all of your money if he asked and he said no. so then i asked if he felt the robotics kit would be his as well as his brother and he said no. so i told him that he is basically giving his money to his brother. he said he didn't think he wanted to do it anymore:)

[nextcommercial]

I would either intervene and say "save for your own toy", or say "we buy the youngest kid's toy first, then the oldest kid's toy".  

My brother was like your oldest child.  He could talk me into anything, and I'd let him.  I never learned, and he always got his way.  But, he's very successful, and has worked hard for everything he has.  He was never lazy in his whole life.  He's very motivated.

So, that little selfish streak your son is showing is pretty clever actually.  

[AllisonR]

I see you have already dealt with the issue, but as we just had the exact same thing happen here, I thought I would share. DS is 6 and DD is 4. DS convinced DD to pool their money for football cards. I let them do it, without interfering at all. Because the cards cost about 4 dollars a pack, it only took a week or two of them saving up. I figured it would teach DD the lesson by itself. And it did. The next time it happened, she got to the store, said no, she wanted her money back, and she saved up another week on her own for something she wanted. I think kids learn more if they really learn the lesson themselves, instead of us interfering and it being explained to them. However, it is less painful to learn the lesson on 4 dollars than on 400!