Educating youngsters about cash requires much more than giving them an allowance.
Dad and mom who need their youngsters to develop as much as be financially accountable adults know that children who be taught the fundamentals of saving, spending, and curiosity are those who’ll be arrange for a financially steady future.
It’d shock you to be taught that analysis reveals that solely 23% of youngsters say they speak to their mother and father about cash, and youngsters who don’t obtain monetary training usually tend to find yourself in debt and to default on scholar loans.
No mother or father desires that for his or her youngsters!
Greenlight is a monetary literacy app for youths that makes it a snap for fogeys to pay their youngsters an allowance, tie the allowance to chores and financial savings targets, and extra.
Children additionally get a Greenlight-branded debit card. Dad and mom who wish to prioritize monetary literacy might wonder if Greenlight is the correct app to make use of. Right here’s our take.
What’s Greenlight?
Greenlight is a household banking app whose mission is to show youngsters tips on how to handle their cash.
Dad and mom can arrange a household account and benefit from an array of options to show their youngsters to be financially educated and accountable.
Greenlight is out there for each Apple and Android cellular units. It has a user-friendly interface (extra on that under) and a ton of helpful options that each educate and defend youngsters.
You possibly can select a pay as you go card and should you do, your cash will likely be deposited and held at Group Federal Financial savings Financial institution, an FDIC-insured monetary establishment.
Greenlight has some terrific sources on their web site, together with monetary training video games, a weblog, and their podcast.
You possibly can handle your child’s account your self or add one other mother or father or grownup to assist out.
Professional Tip:
Greenlight is a household finance app that gives instruments like chore administration, financial institution accounts and playing cards, investing, and even security options for teenagers. While you join Greenlight and refer your mates, you’ll be able to earn as much as $600 a yr in referral bonuses!
What Options Does Greenlight Supply?
Greenlight affords options for each mother and father and youngsters. Right here’s an summary of crucial bells and whistles.
Chores & Allowance
One of many issues that oldsters love about Greenlight is that it permits them to schedule youngsters’ chores and tie their allowance to chores and monetary targets.
It’s simple to arrange chores for a number of youngsters.
You possibly can set the frequency of every chore, specifying whether or not it must be carried out day by day, weekly, or month-to-month. There are preset chores so that you can select from.
One other cool factor about Greenlight is that if mother and father wish to permit youngsters to earn cash for doing additional jobs round the home, there’s an choice to set that up and pay youngsters as you approve their work.
Money Again & Saving
Children with a Greenlight debit or bank card can earn bonuses on financial savings and money again on spending.
Financial savings rewards rely upon which tier you select, as follows:
1% for the Greenlight Core Plan
2% for the Greenlight Max Plan
5% for the Greenlight Infinity Plan
Children may earn 1% money again on purchases with the Max and Infinity Plans.
Investing
Greenlight affords funding choices for fogeys and youngsters with the highest two subscription tiers.
The mother or father funding choice can also be included within the Core plan, however with “Lite” options.
With Greenlight Max and Greenlight Infinity, mother and father can ship their youngsters cash to take a position.
Greenlight has tons of monetary training round investing, too, so mother and father can evaluation primary funding ideas with their youngsters.
As you’ll be able to see, you and your youngsters can try detailed inventory and ETF evaluation and you can begin your youngsters off with as little as $1.
Security
Greenlight takes youngsters’ security severely and offers mother and father with a number of choices to guard their youngsters.
First, there’s the choice to set spending limits for youths and prohibit sure transactions or require parental approval.
That’s one thing that may be extraordinarily helpful should you don’t need your little one to rack up a whole bunch of {dollars} of spending on video games like Roblox.
For older youngsters, the highest tier of Greenlight affords extra security options together with Crash Detection, SOS, and drive monitoring.
Dad and mom can have the peace of thoughts of understanding the place their youngsters are after they’re on the street and that they will attain emergency providers rapidly if they should.
For Children & Teenagers
Probably the greatest issues about Greenlight is that with any plan, you and your youngsters will get entry to a ton of monetary training sources overlaying all the pieces from saving to investing to charitable donations.
The sooner youngsters begin studying about cash administration and core monetary ideas, the extra doubtless they’re to develop into financially steady adults who received’t find yourself residing in your sofa!
Professional Tip:
Greenlight is a household finance app that gives instruments like chore administration, financial institution accounts and playing cards, investing, and even security options for teenagers. While you join Greenlight and refer your mates, you’ll be able to earn as much as $600 a yr in referral bonuses!
How A lot Does Greenlight Price?
Greenlight is a subscription service with three completely different tiers.
The bottom tier comes with primary options, and the 2 larger tiers provide elevated performance and banking options. Right here’s how the associated fee breaks down.
Greenlight Core
Greenlight Core is the fundamental plan, which prices $4.99 per thirty days. The fundamental plan comes with these options:
Debit playing cards for as much as 5 youngsters
Core monetary instruments for youths
Parental controls
Monetary training app
Greenlight Financial savings Reward of 1%
Greenlight Stage Up (monetary video games)
Investing for Dad and mom (Lite model)
This plan is right if you wish to do a trial run of Greenlight to see if it’s the correct choice for your loved ones.
Greenlight Max
The center tier of Greenlight known as Greenlight Max, and the price of a subscription is $9.98 per thirty days. It comes with all of the options of the Core plan, plus:
Investing for Dad and mom (full model)
Investing for Children
Greenlight Financial savings Reward of two%
1% money again on purchases
Id theft, cellphone, and buy safety
Precedence buyer help
If you’d like to have the ability to make investments on behalf of your youngsters and educate your youngsters how investing works, this plan may be proper for your loved ones.
Greenlight Infinity
The highest tier known as Greenlight Infinity, and the subscription value is $14.99 per thirty days. You’ll get all the pieces that comes with Greenlight Max, plus:
Greenlight Financial savings Reward of 5%
Household location sharing
Crash detection (the app will contact 911 in case your teen will get in an accident)
SOS alerts
Driving reviews
Actual-time journey alerts
Households with youngsters might wish to go for Greenlight Infinity due to its enhanced security options to guard teen drivers.
How Does Greenlight Evaluate to Different Banking Apps for Children?
Along with Greenlight, there are various different monetary apps for youths. Listed here are a few comparisons that could be useful.
Greenlight vs BusyKid
BusyKid has lots of the similar options as Greenlight, together with debit playing cards, financial savings incentives, and funding choices, plus instructional content material.
One characteristic that BusyKid has that Greenlight doesn’t is a bonus choice, which permits mother and father to reward their youngsters primarily based on no matter standards they select.
The most important distinction between Greenlight and BusyKid is the associated fee.
Greenlight’s costs begin at $4.99 and prime out at $14.99 for the very best tier. BusyKid fees $4 per thirty days or $48 per yr for as much as 5 youngsters, making it considerably cheaper than Greenlight.
It’s value noting that there are not any tiers for BusyKid options, which means all subscribers get entry to all options.
One other key distinction is that BusyKid makes it simple to cancel your subscription the place some customers have complained concerning the problem of canceling Greenlight.
Lastly, grandparents and different kin can contribute to youngsters’ accounts utilizing a QR code.
Greenlight vs GoHenry
GoHenry is one other widespread monetary app for youths. It has two pricing tiers at $4.99 and $9.98, each of that are good for households with as much as 4 youngsters.
Each apps embody instructional content material to assist youngsters study cash. Each provide parental controls to present mother and father peace of thoughts round their youngsters’ spending.
Like BusyKid, GoHenry makes it potential for kin and household associates to deposit cash into youngsters’ accounts. Not like the opposite apps we’ve reviewed, it additionally permits for cash transfers from contained in the app.
Professional Tip:
Greenlight is a household finance app that gives instruments like chore administration, financial institution accounts and playing cards, investing, and even security options for teenagers. While you join Greenlight and refer your mates, you’ll be able to earn as much as $600 a yr in referral bonuses!
Execs and Cons of Greenlight
Earlier than you select Greenlight to show your youngsters about finance, listed below are some professionals and cons to think about.
Execs
Children get a debit card to assist them discover ways to spend responsibly
Dad and mom can set spending limits for youths and observe their spending historical past
Cash transfers could also be linked to chores and targets
Children earn money again and financial savings rewards after they use their card
Entry to monetary training and cash instruments
Sure transactions could also be blocked to guard youngsters
Cons
Money deposits usually are not an choice
The fundamental account has restricted options
Greenlight doesn’t work with P2P cost apps like PayPal and Venmo
Children’ accounts should be linked to a mother or father account, so it might be troublesome for fogeys with out a joint account to share monitoring tasks
Greenlight isn’t free; month-to-month charges vary from $4.99 to $14.98
What Do Reviewers Say About Greenlight?
On-line reviewers have loads of optimistic suggestions and feedback about Greenlight.
Dad and mom admire the parental management options, together with spending limits and automated spending notifications that permit them to observe youngsters’ monetary habits.
Dad and mom love the placement monitoring and different security options that present peace of thoughts for teen drivers.
Greenlight earns excessive marks for its monetary sources, which folks and youngsters can evaluation collectively to instill wholesome monetary habits.
Greenlight’s 24/7 customer support earns a whole lot of reward from customers.
There’s no such factor as a product with out damaging critiques. Listed here are a couple of not-so-complimentary issues customers have stated about Greenlight.
There’s no free model, so that you’ll need to pay to attempt Greenlight out.
Canceling Greenlight isn’t simple from contained in the app; you’ll in all probability need to name the corporate if you wish to terminate your subscription.
For Greenlight to assist youngsters, mother and father should be ready to observe the app.
On the entire, we predict the positives far outweigh the negatives. Each mother and father and youngsters can profit from utilizing Greenlight.
Closing Ideas
Our takeaway is that Greenlight is an excellent app for households the place mother and father need their youngsters to study cash from an early age.
Its instructional content material and sensible options make it simple for youths to save cash, spend responsibly, and discover ways to make investments.
The most important potential draw back is Greenlight’s value, which is excessive in comparison with different apps—notably for the highest tier, which is the one choice the place you may get entry to all of Greenlight’s options.
To study one other platform with monetary training instruments, try our Searching for Alpha evaluation.
