Svetia Deshais is worried about the well-being of her children, and that of many other young people living in the UAE, who have an expensive lifestyle compared to children abroad with less money to spend.
"When we return to our home countries we are not going to have this," says Ms Deshais, 37, a mother of three who works as a wealth consultant in Abu Dhabi.
“We are not going to have a nanny and we are not going to have so much money, so they might actually suffer depression [because] we went from the top to the bottom.”
So she is preparing her children for life after the UAE while they are still here. They know now not to expect something every time they go to the supermarket. In fact, they only receive gifts on their birthdays and Christmas.
“They have to get that in their little heads, because they are growing up with a five-star lifestyle,” she says.
And now she wants to help other parents teach their children the value of money, too.
Ms Deshais, from Slovakia, is running a series of sessions to introduce children to money throughout February and March in Abu Dhabi for four age groups: three to four; five to seven; eight to 11; and 12 plus, each featuring age appropriate content.
She came up with the idea after speaking to a fellow mum. “We were just chatting about how kids need to know more about money,” she says.
"They have no clue about the value of money and then we thought it would be good to teach them and maybe create a little session. And then that was it – here we are."
The sessions are being run through Fun with the Kids, formerly Events with the Kids, a Facebook group which organises activities and events for all the family. It currently has over 9,000 members.
_______________
Read more:
Why saving for something fun is good for your financial health
How to budget for a surprise expense in the UAE
_______________
More than 200 families expressed an interest in signing their children up for the money sessions within 12 hours of the details being posted online.
“It has been a very popular event. It’s obviously something that the families are interested in,” says Marianne Pearson, 43, from the UK, who runs the website on a voluntary basis.
“But I do think money is an important area here. Some children are growing up not knowing the value of money.”
Each session will cost Dh15, Dh5 of which will be used to cover the cost of materials to make a money box to hold their savings. Ms Deshais will return the remaining Dh10 to the children to get them started.
Older children will be introduced to concepts like debt – and why they should not accrue it, as well as the value of investing and putting money aside. And the youngest ones will learn about why their parents go to work, as well as the importance of saving to buy things they like.
But is three years old too young to learn about money? The vast majority taking part in a discussion about the topic on the Abu Dhabi Q&A Facebook page thought not.
Kellie Kiernan, 39, from the UK, who is a mother to two children aged four and nine, was one of the many in favour of the initiative. She says she struggles to instil a sense of value of money and importance of saving in her children. The family has recently returned to Abu Dhabi after living in the UK for three years while her husband, an
Emirati, was on a work posting.
“We noticed our son struggled to comprehend that his UK cousins had a significantly different economic status to him or his UAE cousins. [He would say] ‘just tell your mum to get you an iPad like this one’ or ‘why do you only go on holiday in England?’ etc. My four year-old is creating a wish list based on toy adverts she has seen on YouTube and television. She thinks coins are real money and paper cash isn’t,” says Ms Kiernan.
"I think this is a fantastic initiative."
Dan Britton, a British personal finance author for children behind the Financial Fairy Tales series of books that teach young children about money, agrees. He says it is never too early to start teaching children about money.
"Even as toddlers they are absorbing information from all around them," he says. "It's a good idea to start consciously planting positive money messages as soon as they start taking an interest."
Eri Akbar, an early years education lecturer in Dubai with training centre Quest, who teaches courses certified by UK awarding body Cache, says young children are naturally curious to learn about their world – and part of the world involves transacting with money.
Many young children enjoy using money when they engage in role play activities at nursery, for example, pretending to buy vegetables at a supermarket set-up, she says. “Hence, an enrichment class teaching money sense to three to five year olds can be beneficial, as long as it allows children to learn through play.”
However, she adds that children will not be at any disadvantage if they miss it.
“Children will eventually learn to handle money through practical life experiences. Most importantly, how they perceive the value of money will depend on their parents, as children look up to their parents as role models.”
Ela Jayne, 32, from Australia, set an example from the start, by talking to her children about prices during the supermarket shopping while they were still babies.
At first she would tell them what they were, but by the age of two, her daughter was able to read the numbers herself. Ms Jayne started getting her daughter to work out which product was cheaper by the time she was three.
“When she was four, her brother was born and I would ask her to explain to her baby brother what she had worked out, and why she was choosing each product she was buying,” says Ms Jayne.
"By the time he was three he was working out price per 100 grams and my daughter had moved on to managing the shopping list and determining how much we needed for a week."
She opened a bank account for her children, who are now 12 and eight, when they were born, and they are each responsible for their own contributions. She does not pay them a weekly allowance or pocket money.
They earn their money instead by carrying out jobs and are paid a rate per task, such as Dh5 for emptying and loading the dishwasher and Dh15 for cooking dinner. They are always encouraged to bank at least 50 per cent of their earnings, or the first Dh15 per week if they have earned less than Dh30.
And they are still savvy when it comes to choosing what to buy.
"If I offer my daughter
Dh12 so she can buy a biscuit at a cafe, she will ask for the Dh12 and ask if she can instead go to the supermarket where she can buy an entire packet of biscuits for Dh12, and sell half of the packet to her brother for Dh6, so they each get more and save money," she says.
Our family matters legal consultant
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
The Greatest Royal Rumble card
50-man Royal Rumble - names entered so far include Braun Strowman, Daniel Bryan, Kurt Angle, Big Show, Kane, Chris Jericho, The New Day and Elias
Universal Championship Brock Lesnar (champion) v Roman Reigns in a steel cage match
WWE World Heavyweight ChampionshipAJ Styles (champion) v Shinsuke Nakamura
Intercontinental Championship Seth Rollins (champion) v The Miz v Finn Balor v Samoa Joe
United States Championship Jeff Hardy (champion) v Jinder Mahal
SmackDown Tag Team Championship The Bludgeon Brothers (champions) v The Usos
Raw Tag Team Championship (currently vacant) Cesaro and Sheamus v Matt Hardy and Bray Wyatt
Casket match The Undertaker v Rusev
Singles match John Cena v Triple H
Cruiserweight Championship Cedric Alexander v Kalisto
F1 2020 calendar
March 15 - Australia, Melbourne; March 22 - Bahrain, Sakhir; April 5 - Vietnam, Hanoi; April 19 - China, Shanghai; May 3 - Netherlands, Zandvoort; May 20 - Spain, Barcelona; May 24 - Monaco, Monaco; June 7 - Azerbaijan, Baku; June 14 - Canada, Montreal; June 28 - France, Le Castellet; July 5 - Austria, Spielberg; July 19 - Great Britain, Silverstone; August 2 - Hungary, Budapest; August 30 - Belgium, Spa; September 6 - Italy, Monza; September 20 - Singapore, Singapore; September 27 - Russia, Sochi; October 11 - Japan, Suzuka; October 25 - United States, Austin; November 1 - Mexico City, Mexico City; November 15 - Brazil, Sao Paulo; November 29 - Abu Dhabi, Abu Dhabi.
MATCH INFO
Al Jazira 3 (O Abdulrahman 43', Kenno 82', Mabkhout 90 4')
Al Ain 1 (Laba 39')
Red cards: Bandar Al Ahbabi (Al Ain)
MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League semi-finals, second leg:
Liverpool (0) v Barcelona (3), Tuesday, 11pm UAE
Game is on BeIN Sports
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
MATCH INFO
Barcelona 2
Suarez (10'), Messi (52')
Real Madrid 2
Ronaldo (14'), Bale (72')
The Brutalist
Director: Brady Corbet
Stars: Adrien Brody, Felicity Jones, Guy Pearce, Joe Alwyn
Rating: 3.5/5
Sleep Well Beast
The National
4AD
Multitasking pays off for money goals
Tackling money goals one at a time cost financial literacy expert Barbara O'Neill at least $1 million.
That's how much Ms O'Neill, a distinguished professor at Rutgers University in the US, figures she lost by starting saving for retirement only after she had created an emergency fund, bought a car with cash and purchased a home.
"I tell students that eventually, 30 years later, I hit the million-dollar mark, but I could've had $2 million," Ms O'Neill says.
Too often, financial experts say, people want to attack their money goals one at a time: "As soon as I pay off my credit card debt, then I'll start saving for a home," or, "As soon as I pay off my student loan debt, then I'll start saving for retirement"."
People do not realise how costly the words "as soon as" can be. Paying off debt is a worthy goal, but it should not come at the expense of other goals, particularly saving for retirement. The sooner money is contributed, the longer it can benefit from compounded returns. Compounded returns are when your investment gains earn their own gains, which can dramatically increase your balances over time.
"By putting off saving for the future, you are really inhibiting yourself from benefiting from that wonderful magic," says Kimberly Zimmerman Rand , an accredited financial counsellor and principal at Dragonfly Financial Solutions in Boston. "If you can start saving today ... you are going to have a lot more five years from now than if you decide to pay off debt for three years and start saving in year four."
Our legal columnist
Name: Yousef Al Bahar
Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994
Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers
The%20Boy%20and%20the%20Heron
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EDirector%3A%C2%A0%3C%2Fstrong%3EHayao%20Miyazaki%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarring%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%C2%A0Soma%20Santoki%2C%20Masaki%20Suda%2C%20Ko%20Shibasaki%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ERating%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E5%2F5%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Dirham Stretcher tips for having a baby in the UAE
Selma Abdelhamid, the group's moderator, offers her guide to guide the cost of having a young family:
• Buy second hand stuff
They grow so fast. Don't get a second hand car seat though, unless you 100 per cent know it's not expired and hasn't been in an accident.
• Get a health card and vaccinate your child for free at government health centres
Ms Ma says she discovered this after spending thousands on vaccinations at private clinics.
• Join mum and baby coffee mornings provided by clinics, babysitting companies or nurseries.
Before joining baby classes ask for a free trial session. This way you will know if it's for you or not. You'll be surprised how great some classes are and how bad others are.
• Once baby is ready for solids, cook at home
Take the food with you in reusable pouches or jars. You'll save a fortune and you'll know exactly what you're feeding your child.
Richard Jewell
Director: Clint Eastwood
Stars: Paul Walter Hauser, Sam Rockwell, Brandon Stanley
Two-and-a-half out of five stars
Arabian Gulf Cup FINAL
Al Nasr 2
(Negredo 1, Tozo 50)
Shabab Al Ahli 1
(Jaber 13)
World Cricket League Division 2
In Windhoek, Namibia - Top two teams qualify for the World Cup Qualifier in Zimbabwe, which starts on March 4.
UAE fixtures
Thursday February 8, v Kenya; Friday February 9, v Canada; Sunday February 11, v Nepal; Monday February 12, v Oman; Wednesday February 14, v Namibia; Thursday February 15, final
RESULTS
2pm: Maiden Dh 60,000 (Dirt) 1,400m. Winner: Masaali, Pat Dobbs (jockey), Doug Watson (trainer).
2.30pm: Handicap Dh 76,000 (D) 1,400m. Winner: Almoreb, Dane O’Neill, Ali Rashid Al Raihe.
3pm: Handicap Dh 64,000 (D) 1,200m. Winner: Imprison, Fabrice Veron, Rashed Bouresly.
3.30pm: Shadwell Farm Conditions Dh 100,000 (D) 1,000m. Winner: Raahy, Adrie de Vries, Jaber Ramadhan.
4pm: Maiden Dh 60,000 (D) 1,000m. Winner: Cross The Ocean, Richard Mullen, Satish Seemar.
4.30pm: Handicap 64,000 (D) 1,950m. Winner: Sa’Ada, Fernando Jara, Ahmad bin Harmash.
Starring: Jamie Foxx, Angela Bassett, Tina Fey
Directed by: Pete Doctor
Rating: 4 stars
What is the definition of an SME?
SMEs in the UAE are defined by the number of employees, annual turnover and sector. For example, a “small company” in the services industry has six to 50 employees with a turnover of more than Dh2 million up to Dh20m, while in the manufacturing industry the requirements are 10 to 100 employees with a turnover of more than Dh3m up to Dh50m, according to Dubai SME, an agency of the Department of Economic Development.
A “medium-sized company” can either have staff of 51 to 200 employees or 101 to 250 employees, and a turnover less than or equal to Dh200m or Dh250m, again depending on whether the business is in the trading, manufacturing or services sectors.
Take Me Apart
Kelela
(Warp)
Why are you, you?
Why are you, you?
From this question, a new beginning.
From this question, a new destiny.
For you are a world, and a meeting of worlds.
Our dream is to unite that which has been
separated by history.
To return the many to the one.
A great story unites us all,
beyond colour and creed and gender.
The lightning flash of art
And the music of the heart.
We reflect all cultures, all ways.
We are a twenty first century wonder.
Universal ideals, visions of art and truth.
Now is the turning point of cultures and hopes.
Come with questions, leave with visions.
We are the link between the past and the future.
Here, through art, new possibilities are born. And
new answers are given wings.
Why are you, you?
Because we are mirrors of each other.
Because together we create new worlds.
Together we are more powerful than we know.
We connect, we inspire, we multiply illuminations
with the unique light of art.
Ben Okri,
ARABIAN GULF LEAGUE FIXTURES
Thursday, September 21
Al Dahfra v Sharjah (kick-off 5.35pm)
Al Wasl v Emirates (8.30pm)
Friday, September 22
Dibba v Al Jazira (5.25pm)
Al Nasr v Al Wahda (8.30pm)
Saturday, September 23
Hatta v Al Ain (5.25pm)
Ajman v Shabab Al Ahli (8.30pm)
U19 WORLD CUP, WEST INDIES
UAE group fixtures (all in St Kitts)
- Saturday 15 January: UAE beat Canada by 49 runs
- Thursday 20 January: v England
- Saturday 22 January: v Bangladesh
UAE squad:
Alishan Sharafu (captain), Shival Bawa, Jash Giyanani, Sailles
Jaishankar, Nilansh Keswani, Aayan Khan, Punya Mehra, Ali Naseer, Ronak Panoly,
Dhruv Parashar, Vinayak Raghavan, Soorya Sathish, Aryansh Sharma, Adithya
Shetty, Kai Smith
Company%20Profile
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EName%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Raha%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarted%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%202022%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Kuwait%2FSaudi%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EIndustry%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Tech%20Logistics%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFunding%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20%2414%20million%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestors%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Soor%20Capital%2C%20eWTP%20Arabia%20Capital%2C%20Aujan%20Enterprises%2C%20Nox%20Management%2C%20Cedar%20Mundi%20Ventures%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ENumber%20of%20employees%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20166%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
UAE and Russia in numbers
UAE-Russia ties stretch back 48 years
Trade between the UAE and Russia reached Dh12.5 bn in 2018
More than 3,000 Russian companies are registered in the UAE
Around 40,000 Russians live in the UAE
The number of Russian tourists travelling to the UAE will increase to 12 percent to reach 1.6 million in 2023
MORE ON THE US DEMOCRATIC PRIMARIES
COMPANY PROFILE
Name: Grubtech
Founders: Mohamed Al Fayed and Mohammed Hammedi
Launched: October 2019
Employees: 50
Financing stage: Seed round (raised $2 million)
England squad
Joe Root (captain), Alastair Cook, Keaton Jennings, Gary Ballance, Jonny Bairstow (wicketkeeper), Ben Stokes (vice-captain), Moeen Ali, Liam Dawson, Toby Roland-Jones, Stuart Broad, Mark Wood, James Anderson.
Crime%20Wave
%3Cp%3EHeavyweight%20boxer%20Fury%20revealed%20on%20Sunday%20his%20cousin%20had%20been%20%E2%80%9Cstabbed%20in%20the%20neck%E2%80%9D%20and%20called%20on%20the%20courts%20to%20address%20the%20wave%20of%20more%20sentencing%20of%20offenders.%26nbsp%3B%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3ERico%20Burton%2C%2031%2C%20was%20found%20with%20stab%20wounds%20at%20around%203am%20on%20Sunday%20in%20Goose%20Green%2C%20Altrincham%20and%20subsequently%20died%20of%20his%20injuries.%3C%2Fp%3E%0A%3Cp%3E%26nbsp%3B%E2%80%9CMy%20cousin%20was%20murdered%20last%20night%2C%20stabbed%20in%20the%20neck%20this%20is%20becoming%20ridiculous%20%E2%80%A6%20idiots%20carry%20knives.%20This%20needs%20to%20stop%2C%E2%80%9D%0D%20Fury%20said.%20%E2%80%9CAsap%2C%20UK%20government%20needs%20to%20bring%20higher%20sentencing%20for%20knife%20crime%2C%20it%E2%80%99s%20a%20pandemic%20%26amp%3B%20you%20don%E2%80%99t%20know%20how%20bad%20it%20is%20until%20%5Bit%E2%80%99s%5D%201%20of%20your%20own!%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
ACC 2019: The winners in full
Best Actress Maha Alemi, Sofia
Best Actor Mohamed Dhrif, Weldi
Best Screenplay Meryem Benm’Barek, Sofia
Best Documentary Of Fathers and Sons by Talal Derki
Best Film Yomeddine by Abu Bakr Shawky
Best Director Nadine Labaki, Capernaum
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
Our family matters legal consultant
Name: Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
The advice provided in our columns does not constitute legal advice and is provided for information only. Readers are encouraged to seek independent legal advice.
