Do you think teens are expensive?

[Thystle]

Do you think teens are expensive? And why?


Also add if your are homeschooling or public schooling and if your teen works or not. And do you live in a small town or big city?





Here are the arguements I have seen so far...


Teens cost more because:

Their clothes cost more.

I can't find their size at the thrift store.

Their shoes are bigger and cost more.

They like more expensive toys.

Their school supplies cost more.

Their extra-curriculars/activities cost more.

Their make-up and/or toiletries cost more.

They want more spending money to go out with friends.

They eat more.

They need more dental work/braces.

I have to drive them more places (using more gas).







Honestly I see most of these as things we allow to happen... not things that are automatic and to be taken as "law".

Some may be true and many are just taken at face value as being true.


Yes we may always LIKE to do and give all or even some... but many things are not actually neccesary.


Many times we choose to pay more or say yes to more things. Yes that feels good but no kid burst into flame by not having _________ (fill in blank).





Half the kids in public middle school/high school do not participate in "extras" at school, or do they take classes after school.

Many homeschoolers do not sign their kids up for every $$$ class they see.

Many do not buy into "Back to School" and stock up after or year round for supplies.

Many find adult clothing at thrift stores instead of teen clothing.

Many shop the consignment stores and clearance times for new marked down clothing.

Many older teens actually work for their own spending money.

Many teens NEVER get an allowance, let alone spending money.

Some are not allowed to wear make-up or have to buy it themselves.

Some are made to shop for themselves.

Some are not allowed to dictate to parents that they be driven everwhere.

Some never get braces or needed dental work.

Many do not get fancy "toys", electronics, etc...




Ofcourse if you are in a very small area... it can be harder to get many deals, but not always impossible.







I think babies can be WAY overpriced if you buy alot.

I think kids can be way overpriced if you buy alot.

I think teens can be way overpriced if you buy alot.

I think adults can be way over priced if you buy alot.



I think it is in how you view needs -vs- wants, how you were brought up, any emotional baggage you have from childhood, how frugal you may be, what your finances are like, how you feel about teens working, how "indulgant" your personailty is, how much time you actually have or "feel" you have or have not, etc...





I have a teen, and basically he is no more expensive that the other two.

The ONLY things that are more expensive are his art classes and some of his art supplies.... but ONLY because I choose to buy them when I have money. Not because he "had" to have them, he has made do many times with plain paper and pencils.




One consession.... many do eat more, but it does not have to be pricey foods!




**I am NOT saying do NOTHING for your teens or that they deserve nothing or that is a waste of time!!!!!!!!****


Just saying there are choices to be made at ALL ages! I see alot of people that seem t feel hopeless when it comes to teens or just take it for granted they will be so much more expensive than little kids.


There is hope! If an adult can be frugal... so can a parent of a teen!







.

[Dar]

My daughter costs a lot more as a teen than she did as a younger child. She's homeschooled, she works, and we live in a "college town" of about 80K.

She mostly buys her own non-thrift store clothes, and her own entertainment, and some of her own dance stuff. Her biggest expenses are her dance classes (about 12 hours a week) and her college classes at the university (because she's enrolling as a high school student we're not eligible for financial aid, and it's nearly $200 a credit, plus fees). She gets some financial aid for dance, but I still pay $100 a month.

These are our expenses, but I definitely don't think they're expenses every teen will have. Rain's at a level of ballet that requires many hours a week, and she's serious about it. I could tell her no, of course, but I can pay it, and she works hard at it and enjoys it a lot, and I think it's a good thing to have a skill like that. She's already taught some dance classes for young children 9also acting classes) and that's a potential job for her later on... or she may want to join a dance company.

The college classes are also not necessary... if we lived in California, she could take CC classes for free, but we don't... but if she wants to take college classes and is capable of succeeding at them, part of my philosophy as an unschooling parent is to do my best to provide them for her. If she wants to apply to selective college later on, having a transcript showing A's at the state university at age 14 will help her with that...

When Rain was little, she didn't want many expensive things - as she became a teen, she specialized more and was ready to take on more. I don't think every kid will be like this, but I think it is a fairly common path. I want to provide my kid with all of the opportunities that are fulfilling and useful to her at that time in her life, and I think that often costs more for teens.

We are both pretty frugal, but for me, being frugal is about spending our money on the things that really improve our lives, and not on stuff that doesn't really matter. For Rain, the stuff that matters is expensive...

My daughter didn't need braces, but she did need to have her wisdom teeth removed. Luckily insurance covered it all... but I think not providing braces or other needed dental work for a teen is neglectful parenting.

Dar

[Thystle]

That is cool about your dd!






My kids are homeschooled too and my son is following art.


As an aside many of the places he has taken classes at, also offer classes for kids as young as 2, and some parents pay hundreds of dollars for their toddlers to take them. :

[lmonter]

Originally Posted by Thystle

As an aside many of the places he has taken classes at, also offer classes for kids as young as 2, and some parents pay hundreds of dollars for their toddlers to take them. :

I know, it's just something I can't wrap my mind around. I can hardly get my 4yo to keep his clothes on 5 minutes after walk in the door, let alone have him stay focused on one thing alone in a new/non home place.

I doubt I'm scarring our kids for life by not forking over the money for preschool... right now it'd be more hassle than a help for me right now (I can't guarantee I'll get a shower every day, let alone show up someplace on time on a regular basis!). But to each their own...

I am afraid of how much feeding 3 teenage boys and a husband is going to cost though, which is why I'm strategizing now with gardening/canning and working on getting a slightly bigger freezer. If I can get ahead of the game now while they're still pretty little, I figure it'll be a good thing.

[superstella]

Well, my teenage son does eat more. He used to be one of those "pick at your plate like a bird" kind of eaters, no more! And yes, he is probably more expensive, but not to me!

My mom spoils him to no end... so when he wants something, he calls up grandma, and she usually delivers it to him. For example, he doesn't want turkey sandwiches for lunch, so he calls her and has her deliver taco bell. He knows I won't do it, but he also knows she will. Wal-mart... he knows I won't go there, so he'll call her to take him to pick up some new "toy." I pay for his karate classes but I pay that with my 4yo as well, so that's not something teenage related. Clothes - my 12yodd has them all beat on how much we spend on clothes. Every spare $ she gets pretty much goes to clothes. Ds1 not so much.

He is in public school. His shoes are HUGE and yes I do spend more on his shoes. My dd also has big feet and shoes cost a fortune. I hope the younger 3 will have more normal sized feet!

I no longer give him spending money, and he does not have a job. Yet. He's not quite 16 though, and i know he plans to get one when his birthday rolls around.

[KariM]

For me, hands down my teen is more expensive than he was as an infant and more expensive than his sister is!

Some of our teen costs:

-orthodontics soon to come
-homeschooling costs
-hobbies that we can't fulfill by buying used items
-eats more!!
-costs related to OCD (psychologist bills, increased water use, increased soap use, etc)

Some of these are unique to our family and some I can see as being sort of universal.

He does not work and likely will not for a while until he's able to better control his OCD symptoms.

We also hit a period of time in the late elementary/pre-teen years where we couldn't find clothes in his size at garage sales and thrift stores and had to return to buying all new clothing. That was certainly pricier!

[gargirl]

My 14 year old is in men's small for coats and the same coat in the largest boy size was $15 less which was a bit of a shock. Depending on how much they grow, our kids generally get 2-3 years out of a winter coat and then it gets passed down to the next one or freecycled. I do tend to buy new winter coats because kids are hard on them. I do think teen clothes are more expensive even at the thrift store, but not alarmingly so.

Yep, my teen eats more for sure and they do tend to want money to go out to the movies or to buy video games or music but it is not a big jump from all the toys they wanted as a younger kid. We give our kids an allowance and they budget and save up and then ask for more money. LOL.

[UUMom]

College tuition is costly.

Braces.

More food needed. Tots eat like cats, teens eat like adults.

Specialty lessons at a more advanced level-- no more group rates. (art & music here)

I wouldn't say their 'toys' are more costly, or their entertainment, as they mostly pay for these things themselves. They have money of their own, which small children do not.

Car insurance. (we pay that, as it's our car. Our dc does not have his own vehicle).

My kids don't have, never had, The Gimmes. They barely had christmas lists. My 15 yr old wears a size 14 slim in teen pants and xs in tops. She is easy to buy clthing for, plus she's not a shopper. The 14 yr old is also easy to dress- standard everything, GAP jeans up the whazoo from Saver's. My 18 yr old has worked two summer jobs.

They still cost much, much, *much* more as teens than they ever did as small children. I haven't figured any way around braces for genetically -cursed facial jaw bone structure, or tuition. I know people say "I'm not paying for college, that's *their* responsibility!" I just don't see how a kid can do it alone these days.

[shayinme]

Well my son turns 16 in a few weeks and while he wants a job and is capable of working he may not be able to get a job for a while. My ex & I have joint custody and ds is currently finishing up his sophmore year at his dad's house which is 1100 miles from me. However he visits monthly and all school vacations which make a pt job hard for him to find working around his vistation schedule. Next school year when he moves in with me, if he has the same visitation schedule he might be in the same boat.

So I do make sure he has money for extras, granted he really does not ask for lots, his dad takes care of his computer needs. I handle clothes which he is in a size 12 man shoe and loves gym shoes, lets just say when we find a pair that he likes in his size for under $50 I am happy. I am happy he likes thrifting but with his quirky style thrifting can be hit or miss... admittedly the thrift shops in my area are not great and frankly are overpriced compared to what I am used to when I lived in a large city.

As for food, yes ds eats a ton but he likes to cook so that helps, he is wanting a car and we are discussing that, right now his Grandpa has offered him a truck so it would be a matter of gas & insurance costs...

For me I say its a general teens are older, gone are the $2 specials at the thrift store. I will also say that it is my intention to pay something on college. He knows I cannot foot the whole bill but I will contribute something.. my own folks had no money to pay for my education and I will be honest while I am now a college grad, it took years, I have tons of student loan debt and in my late teens and early 20's I made a lot of bad choices that I suspect I may not have made if I had felt that my folks gave a damn enough to help me through college. Interestingly enough with my younger brother (he is 8 years younger than me) my parents helped him (provided room & board while he went to state uni & a few bucks towards tuition) and I think it made a world of difference. He graduated in a timely fashion and is doing ok for himself.

As for dental, I think parents should pay for it, mine didn't and by the time I was 25 I ended up spending thousands to fix my teeth, work that if my folks had done just a little I would not have had to spend so much as an adult.

I am sure my Dad (my mom is dead) would say us kids didn't cost them much but both my brother & I would say no its because as adults we have born the cost. So while I agree we can and should teach teens to be frugal I don't want to do it at the expense of being negligent in my care of my teen.

Shay

[mum4boys]

shoes and clothing are a lot more expensive then when they were little. Not because they are picky but because men clothes cost more then boy clothes. Also schooling is a lot more now. My older boys were/are in public school and there are fees for everything or we have to buy the material.

[Om Girl]

Piping in here...I don't have a teen, but I was one not so long ago...
Here's what my family did and what I wished they would have done differently! I grew up in a small town, worked part time as long as I can remember and paid for my own auto gas, entertainment, make-up and any items that my parents wouldn't pay for. I took college classes as a HS student through our state PSEO program, which paid for them and stayed home for two years completing community college.
What they did:

• pay for extra-curricular sports
• paid 1/2 for my car, I paid 1/2
• paid car insurance
• paid for all clothing

What I wish they would've did:

• made me pay for car insurance and put that money away toward my additional expenses, clothing, entertainment, etc.
• given me a clothing budget, as I had to learn the hard way in college how much things "really cost"
• Prepared me for the real world with a little more financial knowledge

ITA that teens are more expensive than little ones, but I think it's perspective...what are their "real" needs vs. "wants". I think extra-curriculars are great, they keep kids busy learning new skills and discipline and keep them out of trouble, for the most part. But, I also think that it should become more focused than their activites as a child. Overall I feel that as my LO gets older it becomes spending more money on less stuff as her developmental level increases.

[choli]

Originally Posted by Dar

My daughter didn't need braces, but she did need to have her wisdom teeth removed. Luckily insurance covered it all... but I think not providing braces or other needed dental work for a teen is neglectful parenting.

Dar

There is no country apart from the USA where you could call not providing braces neglectful parenting. Crooked teeth are rarely anything more than a cosmetic problem.

[shayinme]

Originally Posted by mamalotusyoga

it becomes spending more money on less stuff as her developmental level increases.

I agree with this.. compared to the 2 yo, ds gets less stuff but the stuff he gets costs more.

At the moment ds recently stopped playing violin which while not super costly we did have the costs of the violins as he grew older and costs related to concerts (concert outfits). Right now he is not doing anything extra cirriciular other than drama so no costs there at the moment. Before he moved to WI with his dad he was thinking of joining crew and that definitely was gonna be costly though as I told him if he really wanted to do it we would figure a way to make it happen.

Shay

[JessicaTX]

I'm finding the teen far more expensive than the younger ones. The "toys" he has are more expensive, though he has fewer. He's harder on his shoes and clothes and he eats more. I buy most of our clothes at goodwill, but he's in men's extra small or boys xxlarge..and those aren't easy to find sizes. He prefers to use manly scented products rather than the cheap stuff the otehr kids use, he is only 13, so his jobs are more of a neighborhood mowing and the like- though he does use his money for the stuff I won't pay for, like the 200 dollar bike or going to the arcade.

[savithny]

The biggest thing I can anticipate as my kids turn into teens (it'll be awhile yet) is food.

My kids eat like birds, and yet manage to grow. Like weeds. Like 90th percentile for height weeds.

But y'know, when DS was 2, his idea of dinner was 3 olives and 2 chickpeas, some days. I remember being a teenager in the process of growing 6 inches in a year. I could eat a whole pizza and still be hungry for dessert.

We don't eat expensive prepared food. I cook from scratch, we have reasonable portion sizes of inexpensive foods (For the most part). But there is no way that you can feed a teenager for what it costs to feed a toddler, preschooler, or even younger school-aged child.

Our biggest line item in our budget, after housing, is food. We odn't spend a lot on clothes, vacations, toys, etc. So to go from having two small children with small appetites to haveing two teenagers, each eating as much as 1.5 or 2 adults -- that will be a major increase in our bills.

Around here, at least, teens can't legally work for-pay jobs until they're 16. And a lot of people aren't hiring people to babysit or mow lawns if they're less than 14. So that leaves younger teens - who may have adult-sized bodies, greater than adult-size appetetites, and desires for more adult extracurriculars and hobbies - with very little way to pay for them theirselves.

I'd never argue that teens *need* lessons, sports, brand new designer clothes, or the rest. But going without *all* of them in order to make your teen cost the same as your younger child is not as simple as you make it sound.

[asianyoushi]

apparently teens are expensive

http://www.newsdaily.com/Quirks/UPI-...ildsupport.xml

spoiled i think

[UUMom]

Originally Posted by asianyoushi

apparently teens are expensive

http://www.newsdaily.com/Quirks/UPI-...ildsupport.xml

spoiled i think

And that has what to do with this thread?

[UUMom]

Originally Posted by savithny

,
I'd never argue that teens *need* lessons, sports, brand new designer clothes, or the rest. But going without *all* of them in order to make your teen cost the same as your younger child is not as simple as you make it sound.

[asianyoushi]

Originally Posted by UUMom

And that has what to do with this thread?

teens wanted2.2 million a month from their dad for child support....

[UUMom]

Originally Posted by asianyoushi

teens wanted2.2 million a month from their dad for child support....

And that has *what* do to with this thread?