what do you do with monetary gifts?

so, Luce's baptism is this coming Sunday. I am assuming that if he does receive gifts, most of them will be monetary.

thus far he's received some monetary gifts and they have gone right into his college fund.

dh and I fund his college account quarterly with a set amount. (dh is an acct we work in quarters) so while I like putting money away for him, I am torn about his "gift" money.

do you use the money to fund FUN now or put it away for serious business later?

do you split it up somehow (50/50, 60/40..anything below "x' amount college fund, the rest fun...)?

when you GIVE money as a gift, do you have an expectation as to how the parents will use it?

TIA

I want to say that as a child, all of my gift money was used by my parents to buy necessities...food/clothes...sometimes to pay bills...so I kind of feel guilty "using" it immediately, even if its' for him...but at the same time, he already gets a nice chunk put away for the future...so something in the present seems nice too...

TIA.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

We have a mutual fund account that monetary gifts go in for DD. We have a separate college fund account that DH is in charge of handling (he's the money guru/actuary)

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

We have a savings account set up for each of the boys and we put some in there and have other money in cd's. I think the money should be used by them in the future for something they may want.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

For my children's christening, that money went into their 529 plans and any money they receive for their birthdays or holidays is put in to a bank account earmarked for them to be used for anything they might like in the future...whether that be a car, house, wedding, etc.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

when we had DS's Bris, we used the gifts to pay back what we spent for the Bris and the rest we put into an account for DS. Normally I would have put all the money away for DS but money is really tight now and I really wanted him to have a nice Bris.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

All of the money we got we put away for DS future. We would use it for college and I'd also like a separate acct for him when he gets married or is buying a home or something. This is what happened for DH and he used the money with the down payment. In the future DC will be so thankful you did. For now, he has sooo many gifts too that we didn't need any extra to buy something else.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

Every penny goes in their savings and I move around into CDS as I see fit.

I don't care what others do with my gift $$.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

Eddies goes into his 529, until he is old enough to know he is getting money for his birthday that he can use. Then he will get it and can do what he pleases with it.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

I cash the checks and get mani/pedis while he is at daycare.



I kid, I kid. We put them in our savings account, because we never got our azzes in gear to start the college fund. Now, I am actually sort of glad we didn't, since the market dropped from the time he was born. We are still planning on starting the college fund soon and will put all cash gifts in there for him from that point on.

For us, we are only having one DS and we spend plenty on him already for "fun stuff" so I would rather put that $$ away for him for his future.

When I give cash, I leave it up to the parents to do what they want with it. I don't think it's my place to judge if they feel they need it for diapers, formula, whatever. If I was that concerned about them spending the $$ irresponsibly, I wouldn't give cash in the first place.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

I opened an acct for her ad the money can only come out if it is being used for something for her. All of her money from the christening went in there.

My grandmothers give her like $20 for Easter or Valentine's day so I will either buy her something she needs or put it in her little piggy bank and she can use that $ for whatever when she gets older (since it will be a minimal amt.)

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

We put the money into our acct and then transfer to his 529. As far as when I give cash, I ASSUME parents will (hopefully) do the same. At this age he/we bank it all. He has no idea about money. When he is older we may split but some (most) will always go tot he 529.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

For now, I plan on putting all monetary gifts in DS' college account (once I finally get around to setting it up LOL!)

When DS gets older, if he gets money for as presents, we will save a portion of it in his college fund and the other portion can go towards something that he wants to buy (to help teach him the value of money).

ETA - It's none of my business what parents do with the money but, I would hope they would use it towards their DC that the money was intended for (unless there are extenuating circumstances and they need to).

Message edited 4/15/2010 12:43:16 PM.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

We put it into savings accounts for them and plan on that being the money that in the future they can use toward the things they really want but don't need. Like say they already have a Nintendo DS (or whatever it is then) and they want a competitor's version, use your own money.

Now that DD is 5 years old we're going to start having her put part into savings and donate part to a charity. DS will start next year when he's 5.

ETA: My parents had to use my communion gifts to pay bills and for food and my mom still feels guilty about it. I know what you mean about not wanting to use his money for that kind of stuff.

Message edited 4/15/2010 12:16:07 PM.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

All money that my children receive go into a money market or CD for their use when they are older. We would hope that they would use it for college but ultimately it is up to them. That's what was done for both DH and I when we were kids.

We put all money...including the $20 their nonni slip them here and there into the account and if it's closed we keep it in our until we can move it (and usually we round up and pad it a little).

ETA: When I give money as a gift I don't really think twice about what will be done with it. I don't know why but I never have...probably just assumed it was handled the same way.

Message edited 4/15/2010 12:17:44 PM.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

ooH I didn't think of the savings acct like a car/house/yacht fund!! that is a great idea.

I do throw small amounts of money ($20's and under/change) into a piggy bank for him....

so hmm...I think unless specified I will just put the christening money into his regular savings and fund the college acct the way we have been doing thus far...if anyone wants it to go directly (a few people have asked for his 529 info) of course we will respect that wish.

thanks.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

All money they get whether it is $5 in an Easter card or more in a Christening/Birthday card goes into their own indiv savings acct which I will give them in high school or college..they don't need any of it now! =)

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

It's how I build my own seasonal wardrobes.







Seriously though - right now it all goes into a money market account and we'll probably be moving that into some kind of investment account soon.

We put money in her 529 each month and we keep all gift money separate.

My parents put away all of my gift money when I was growing up - I was never allowed to touch any of it. When we bought our house my parents gave it to us and it was over 20K!

I hope to do the same for my kids.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

We put the money in their 529 plans (that we contribute to monthly). I also have savings accts set up, and as they get older, I'll split the gift money to build up their savings.

When I give $$ as a gift, my only expectation is that it be used for the child - put away in a savings or 529 acct or used to buy clothing/toys/necessities for the child. I prefer it not be used to fund their parties, but once I give the gift, its not up to me anymore. If they need that money to pay bills, then I'm happy its being put to good use to care for the child.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

Posted by CathyB

ETA: My parents had to use my communion gifts to pay bills and for food and my mom still feels guilty about it. I know what you mean about not wanting to use his money for that kind of stuff.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

We are setting up 529's for them with their baptism money, and savings accounts.

The 529's we will be puting money into ourselves.

The monetary gifts during the years for holidays/b-days etc, will go into the savings account and probably move into CD's .

Eta- When I give a monetary gift, I dont care what the parents do with it.

Message edited 4/15/2010 12:29:41 PM.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

it depends... she got a lot of money when she was born and we put that all in an acct. my grandma gave her a $100 for xmas and i bought her a doll house but then my inlaws also gave her a $100 check along with some gifts so we put that 100 in her acct. come to think about it, if the gift is in the form of a check we usually put it in her acct but cash we will buy something for her with it.

also any extra money we get back on our taxes because of her goes straight in her acct. the kids got more saved up then i ever have in my life

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

So far I have just put it all in his savings account. I intend to invest it in something high yielding but I havent gotten a chance to focus on it yet.

We fund his 529 seperately from our accounts. I've thought of putting some of his "savings" in there but for some reason, I feel weird locking it up and choosing for him that it will go towards college. I guess I figure if he wants to use his savings for college later he can or he can use it towards something else. But I'm still kind of on the fence about that...

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

we take everything and put it into a reg. savings account. we are not sure what DS will do with it, college , housefund? . but his name will never be on it, he won't know about it until we hand it over.

we took all money, baby shower cash, all bday cash, christening and random holiday money, and keep it all together. for ex. we pay for his christening but give him every penny he receives.

we don't specifically save any $ for our DC's. we have a cash account (DH and I are savers) that any college payments, car, wedding whatever, will come out of that

no fun money, everything goes away.

My parents spent all of my money growing up so I started off with nothing

Message edited 4/15/2010 12:40:03 PM.

Re: what do you do with monetary gifts?

We used her christening money to fund her 529, we put in a set amt every month so future money gifts will be put into stocks for her