Irving Boy Has Recipe For Teaching Money Habits
IRVING (CBS 11 NEWS) - Derik Gutierrez is known as the 'Little Cake Boss'
"I was like, hey, I want to start my own cake business, but I was, like, five so I was like, okay, I'm going to wait until I was a little older," Derik said.
A few years later -- at the age of ten -- the Irving boy finally took a crack at cooking. He wanted to buy his sister a birthday present and turned to the kitchen to make some cash.
"One night he was just thinking about how can I make money, what do I know how to do. So he came into our room, it was about midnight, and he was like, Mom, I know what I'm going to do. I'm going to make cakes," said Derik's mom Diana Gutierrez.
Derik made business cards and started handing them out to family and friends at church, offering his cakes for 10 dollars each. Pretty soon, he had all kinds of bites. People found his cakes too sweet to pass up. He not only made enough money to buy his sister an iPod Touch, he earned enough to buy himself an iPad, and an Xbox Kinect.
"You know that you worked toward that goal and it's just an awesome feeling," Derik said.
That is an important lesson for kids to learn says financial expert, Vickie Mauldin.
"The more, as parents, we can teach our kids to be savvy with their money, they can keep more of what they earn and do more with what they spend."
Mauldin suggests parents talk to their kids about money early and often. Use everyday activities to teach them financial lessons like how to budget and save. Mauldin also recommends parents encourage kids to work for their money and set goals.
"To me, it's one of the most critical life skills we can teach our children," Mauldin said.
There are also some things experts say you should not do. Do not immediately be a lifeline for your children if they make a bad purchase. And don't set their goals for them; instead teach them basics and the discipline of good money habits.
"For them to know now the value of money and how to save, it's critical. It's going to help them the rest of their lives," Diana Gutierrez said.
He is not even a teenager yet, but Derik already knows the recipe to financial success.
"You can get anything if you are willing to save up for it," Derik said.
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