Hi All,

I have a son who will turn 21 shortly and is committed to saving for his own house. He is an apprentice so savings are pretty small and the scope to do anything other than bank deposits is limited through lack of knowledge and costs associated with direct investments like shares. Plus the obvious emotional impact of a small investment losing value and that value taking a long time to be regained. He is not completely financially illiterate in that he actually did accounting & economics through to first year at university and as a family we have always been open about our financial situation and the choices that mum & dad make.

I see him saving diligently and budgeting whilst still enjoying himself but understand his frustration at how far away it seems before he could ever hope to get his own home. We have discussed direct share investments but he doesn't have the capital to support doing this yet. So what are you advising/helping your kids to do. My suggestions to date have been:
- Look to low cost fund investments like Sharesies as a way of getting some higher risk/higher return exposure
- Do the research and pick a single investment in the $2-3,000 range (that then obviously opens the debate as to which one)
- Consider peer-to-peer lending platforms as investments options
- Talk very nicely to the bank of mum & dad to help fund enough capital to make direct investment worthwhile/practical

One interesting observation is that his knowledge of the family financial situation is sometimes counter productive in that we are in the last phase of our working lives, he is in the first and so we are poles apart in financial status and that is sometimes hard to comprehend.

Really interested in what others are doing.