Keehn’s Place

Recently, I read an article about teens spending and saving money.  (Maranjian, S. Ways to Save and Make Money. The Motley Fool. 1995-2008. Teens & Their Money.) Before you can save money, you have to be making money!  How do you make money?  Most teens make money because they receive some sort of an allowance from their parent(s).  Do you fall into that category?  In fact, on average, teens that do receive an allowance are making anywhere from $20-50 a week.  Are you within that range or higher?  Lucky you!  If not, maybe some negotiating is in order.  If you don’t receive an allowance or are looking for ways to increase your earning potential what can you do?  The article suggests a few things:  sell your stuff!  Get an account on e-bay or other online auction site and sell away!  Or more realistically, get a job!

Around here, this is the time of year when students that do work during the summer months, they begin to think about what type of job they will be doing before school starts next year.  As a tourist town with a large number of jobs in the service sector, you’ll always be guaranteed to find something in housekeeping, waiting tables, or dishwashing categories.  But, don’t limit yourself.  If none of those appeal to you, jump on the entreprenurial band-wagon and do something different.  Create a job instead of look for a job.  If you are not motivated to do that, think beyond Main Street and try something different.  Some ideas could include: 

• Pet-sitting/care — is someone you know going on extended vacation?  Take care of their pets so they don’t have to be boarded.  In fact, you could do house maintenance at the same time: water plants, mow lawn, walk/exercise pets.  Make it a package deal.  Maybe you could just exercise someone’s pets for them a few times a week while they are at work. 
• Lawn Care/maintenance — as I stated before, lawn mowing, watering, gardening, raking, trimming hedges.  Get out and meet the senior citizens of our area.  Sometimes they are unable to do these things and would love to pay an able-bodied teen such as yourself!
• Summer Camps — does the YMCA/Rec Center offer some types of summer camps for kids?  Maybe you could be a camp worker.  There are lots of things to do at camp!
• Tutoring — Are you a good student?  Maybe you could help tutor students during the summer months that might need extra help to give them the extra push for next year. 
• Babysitting — there is always a need in our area for good, reliable sitters.  Don’t be afraid to ask the local day-care centers if you can advertise your name in their business.  They are over-flowing with children. They may be willing to share your information with parents.
• Serve the elderly — Some don’t always drive; some don’t cook; some don’t maintain their lawn/house.  You can!  Offer to run errands, go grocery shopping, take care of the things you know you can do.  When you charge a minimal fee for this and do a good job, you’ll certainly be recommended to their friends.  You could stay busy all summer long and make money at the same time!
• Talk and Share information — Many areas in town are tourist related, so why not share your knowledge of the rich history here and sign up to work at one of the many tourist attractions.  Give tours, answer questions in an info booth, etc. 

So now that you may have an idea on how to increase your income, what are you going to do to save it?  Typically, one should try to save 20% of your income and invest 10% because you’ll spend 70%.  As someone that still lives at home with virtually no expenses (except maybe your vehicle or phone) you should be able to save almost all of it.  How do you save?  In class, we talked about what you should do to save, but never how to actually get that money to start accumulating.  Here are a few tips from other teens:

• Limit yourself — only give yourself a $10 or $20 bill to spend for the day.  Once you are out of that, no more spending. 
• At the end of the day, put $1 and all your change in a jar.  Not only will you save $365 for the year, but your change will really add up!
• Get rid of your ATM card.  If you are always short on cash and constantly withdraw money that you know you’ll just waste, get rid of your ATM card.  That way, you’ll be forced to manage your money you do have and won’t have that instant access to your account for “AnyTime Money”.

To see the article in full and for more jobs/savings ideas, go to the following site:  http://www.fool.com/teens/teens02.htm

In closing, what do you do to earn money?  What are you doing to save money?  Do you have any tips/advice for other teens?