Aarti Darooka Tibrewala,
Entrepreneur, Financial Literacy Advocate
A chartered accountant and MBA, Aarti is an entrepreneur and financial literacy advocate. She has over 15 years of combined experience in the consulting, advisory and travel industries. A national ranker in CA, Aarti is a published author, who has written a plethora of books for children’s financial education and is currently helping build awareness for financial literacy for women through her platform, Sthreedhan.
Shreya works for a social media marketing agency. She has now been earning for nearly 4 years. Her father is a manager with an MNC bank and her mother is a housewife. She also has a younger brother who’s still finishing his graduation. Her father has been the sole breadwinner for their family and now she wants to help out.
Starting a conversation around this matter is a little complicated for her. She’s not been sure how to raise the topic with her father because she doesn’t know how he will take it. She finally speaks to her aunt, her father’s younger sister, to whom he is very close and who will be able to guide her on this matter.
Shreya’s aunt is also a working woman who has always been a partner in financial matters with her husband. She starts by asking Shreya the following questions:
How much is your family’s monthly expenditure?
What kind of savings do your parents have?
What portion of the family expenditure would you like to contribute?
How long does she intend to contribute? Would her father be willing to let her pitch in after marriage? Would her future partner be happy if she did that?
What are her financial goals? How does she intend to plan for those while also doing her bit for her family?
Shreya had to think through these questions carefully. The question of the family’s total monthly budget and her parents’ savings can only be answered by her parents. She finally found the right time to speak to her parents on a Sunday afternoon and told them about her intentions. Her father was quite happy that his daughter had become mature enough to take on so much responsibility. They figured that she could help out with about 25% of the household expenses based on their respective salaries. This way she would be helping out without taking on too much burden. 25% of their current household expense budget would be about 15% of her salary. So, after contributing, she would still have enough to plan for her further education.
Shreya’s parents’ savings would be augmented by the amount that her father had to contribute lesser due to Shreya’s involvement. This way she would be helping them also become more financially secure in the future. Her father was also very keen that she start her own savings through SIPs and liquid instruments that would be easily accessible to pay for her masters. Her father was also clear that he did not expect her to contribute after her marriage, as would be the case in most conventional households. This eliminated any complexity going forward.
While circumstances would be different for every individual, it is important for each capable member of the household to contribute to running of the home. If you are young and your parents are still capable, you can do so without taking up the entire burden. Another way of doing it is to pick up certain elements that are in particular fixed so that you have clarity of what your monthly outgo would be. For example, if your family has a fixed amount paid towards household help, internet charges, OTT subscriptions, etc. you could select some of those items to pay.
Whether you are doing this burden-sharing with your parents or your spouse, it is important that there is honest communication and information-sharing. If you are all on the same page, as a family, you will all benefit and be able to not only manage expenses better but also plan your finances more constructively. After all, as finance guru Robert Kiyosaki says, financial freedom is available to those who learn about it and work for it!