General

"We interviewed youths from various ages, studying in different educational fields and of different family situations to get a better understanding of their financial behaviour."

Introduce yourself

Daron: My name is Daron, I am 20 years old and currently a marketing student in Temasek polytechnic.

Yucheng: Hi, I’m Yucheng. Right now I'm studying at Temasek Poly in Food Nutrition and Culinary Science and I am 20 years old.

Owen: Okay. Hi, my name is Owen and I'm 23 this year. Um, I'm currently working part-time and my degree of education is, um, I'm currently studying Banking and Finance in Singapore Poly.

Aiman: My name is Aiman, I'm 19 this year, uh, I'm currently studying in SP and doing my internship. And I'm pursuing a diploma in mechatronics and robotics. Yeah.

Jeslyn: Hi i am Jeslyn currently 21 , working in bible society as a full timer, Specializing as a communication officer.

Leticia: Hi i am leticia from Ngee ann poly, a year 2 student studying design

Kieron: My name is Kieron, right now I'm 18 turning 19 this year and i'm a student but currently interning externally, my degree of education right now is polytechnic level or diploma level, have not graduated yet.

Solihin: Hi, I am Muhammad Solihin, currently 23 years old. Currently working at PSA under royal greyhound as a prime mover driver. My highest qualification is Secondary 5. I have been in this line for 8 months. Previously I was walking at SATS for about 1 year plus, but I didn’t like it, so I changed to something of my interest.

Sabrina: I am Sabrina, 21 years old, currently not working and I am a student at NIEC. My hobbies are window shopping, scrolling through online shopping platforms.

Loh Chuan Ren: I am Loh Chuan Ren from Temasek Polytechnic, I am 19 at the moment and I am a student from the course of food nutrition and culinary science.

Ryan Goh: I am Ryan Goh. I am 20 this year and a student at Ngee Ann poly studying audio visual technology.

Clara: I am Clara. I am 19 this year and I am studying at Temasek Poly, food nutrition and culinary science.

What are your sources of income?

Daron: From part time work and from stocks.

Yucheng: Currently I am just working a part time job at a cafe, and the other sources would be from investments and allowance from parents at $80 a week

Owen: I’m working part-time for Food Panda. So, my source of income is working just by doing FoodPanda on Saturdays and sundays.

Aiman: Right now is my internship allowance, and sometimes for food, my parents will still give me money.

Jeslyn: Only sources of income are from working in bible society

Leticia: Currently I take allowance from my parents but I don't take much from them and ask when I need to , so it is not a fixed amount . I saved some from my part time job when I was working with my uncle during the school holiday, I earned around 2-3k a month. As well as bursary awards .

Kieron: Allowance, intern and part time work but I very long never do part time work very long, but I have plans to continue my part time work soon.

Solihin: My source of income is my salary and also from side hustles that I do from parcel deliveries or helping my mum with her deliveries.

Sabrina: As of now since I am schooling, I am not really working so I get an allowance of $200 every month.

Loh Chuan Ren: Usually my allowance and some money I earn from my part time job, that's about it.

Ryan Goh: My current sources of income are my savings and allowance from my parents and some other side hustles that I do ah. I recently set up this drop shipping store that sells camera products, so I made some money from that.

Clara: My sources of income right now is intern pay and my allowance is 800 per month and if I do OT, I would also get OT pay

What motivates you to be more financially aware?

Tell me about the “wisest” financial decision you felt that you’ve made?

Daron: I think it comes down to being responsible for your life ah, right now I can see that many of my peers are not being financially literate. I can see that some of them are suffering financially and I don't want that to happen to me in the future as well. They have a traditional way of just earning income through work. 9 -5 jobs, I personally don't wish for that to happen to me in the future.

Yucheng: I guess it would be when I look at other people struggling with how they manage their money, which worries me for my future. Since I was young, my mom didn’t really have the education since they were from

Malaysia so education in the past wasn’t really the priority. So they did not really have much choice but to work. In this world right now paper is quite important, especially to get a higher paying job and seeing them struggle to pay loans and taxes is quite frightening to me.

Owen: Seeing people around me doing well in their financial aspect of their life ah, basically like when I see my friend buying stuff that is branded or whatever, I will be motivated to try to save up more money, but I just try, but then it doesn't work.

Aiman: I think it's the fact that life in Singapore isn't exactly cheap? So, you know, you have to start saving early. So that when you grow up, you won't face any financial issues la. I think it's a good habit to practice when I'm still young. So that when I actually grow older, I will know what to do with my money. And the fact that I still have money la, instead of just spending all the way and saying, YOLO. You're still young. You know, you can do whatever you want with your money, but I think it's good to start early.

Jeslyn: News articles just show you successful young people and make me want to do something with my life, makes me insecure but also motivates me. From young I was always aware that my parents are older , so I need to be more aware of the money i spends

Leticia: I think being financially educated is very important , for example during covid where people cannot work. I also don't want to be like the people who get credit cards for the sake of getting them and then spend a lot and take loans like it's nothing. I think it's a skill everybody needs to have and be like financially aware.

Kieron: Because my mom is not that well-off and my dad used to be fine but now he is not so well-off also. So I think that made me value money more, even though I start spending a little more now, but I still feel like being consistent with my savings now is okay, because last time I really spent too little already when I wasn't doing much with my life. The main point is the consistency and discipline is driven from the fact that I am not from a wealthy family background.

Solihin: I am from an average family. I have been supporting myself since I was 14 years old. I understand the value of money, and it motivates me to be more financially awake about it.

Sabrina: Having a better, stable future and also being prepared for unexpected expenses or incidents like probably accidents or such things.

Loh Chuan Ren: What motivates me to be more financially aware is especially when I see people around me investing, like my friends. I just see all their money grow and it makes me extremely aware. I became more conscious of it.

Ryan Goh: I have goals, like a monthly goal that I try to hit. Like a quota of how much money I want to save and invest, which is about $400. A lot of them I invest maybe half in ETFs and 45% in large cap stocks and the rest in penny stocks ah. The reason I do that is because since I am quite young I can recoup the money even if I lose it ah, so 5% is what I am willing to completely throw away. High risk, high reward.

Clara: I guess I am mainly exposed to all this stuff like through ads online, youtube and social media. More on youtube ah because they force you to watch it and then you hear it. It’s also on tiktok but I usually just scroll past it. Sometimes I see financial advisors on tik tok also appearing on my “for you page”. But sometimes the financial advisors talk about interesting things and I just like it and would watch it later. It sounds interesting, like there’s good tips which makes me feel motivated to manage my finances better

Daron: It would be maybe not putting my money in the bank, which would be a wise choice, because of inflation.

Yucheng: I think it would be the investment plan lor.

Owen: Wa, very few ah. I feel like the only wisest financial decision that I made is just my insurance plan only. Uh, insurance, the investment one, as well as other insurance, not just the investment, like the health and accident kind. I think the accident one is the most beneficial to me right now because I'm at the age where I like to play sports, which means that I will injure myself more frequently. The accident plan one is only $14 per month and I can claim the money when I go to hospital or clinic from prudential. Yeah, recently it's just the risk that I injured, right. I went to this private hospital and saw a specialist. So, I just went there and talked to him for just 20 minutes and the medical fees were $250. Yeah. That's what I earn for two days and yeah.

Aiman: Wah I never made any great financial decisions ah. All of it has been spending or saving. I guess, saving is one of the wisest financial decisions, because I'm thinking about my further studies, I'm thinking about my future. So, saving that money, which I probably need in the future, I guess, would be the wisest financial decision that I have made.

Jeslyn: I think it would be me setting aside $500 every month in my savings account. Deposited at the start of every month so I literally do not need to think about savings.

Leticia: I bought my tablet from the carousel at a $1 discount. Even though it was second hand I think it was super good.

Kieron: Buying books and new clothes. Books, well knowledge is power, there is discipline in learning, it correlates with financial habits, if I can read for two hours or three hours, which I haven't been able to do yet, you can be able to practice more patience especially when it comes to investment, and not succumbing to short term gains. For clothes, last time I didn't have a sense of fashion, starting to care about how I look is also quite a wise financial decision for me.

Solihin: To purchase gold often.

Sabrina: Wisest decisions would be buying gold jewelry instead of just other materials or other brands. Like gold is expensive, that's one thing and other branded jewelleries such as Gucci, louis Vuitton. They are also expensive, but they don’t hold value over time whereas gold jewelleries do hold a bit of value over time.

Loh Chuan Ren: Probably not spending too much on games. That's all I have. Hmm, wisest? I don’t really have any sia.

Ryan Goh: So I think the wisest would be to have a large portion of my stock portfolio in index tracked ETFs, so as to act as a safety net. Of course there would be growth also. Like the S&P, which on average would grow like 10% a year. It would be much safer than investing in penny stocks or crypto.

Clara: I guess other than saving right, when I was really young I was able to save quite a lot easily and also now let my money grow.

Have you used excel to track you finances? Why and why not?

Loh Chuan Ren: Oh no definitely not, it sounds very troublesome, that's the main point it’s just troublesome so I did not get into that.

Ryan Goh: I have ah, but I find that excel sheet as a whole is kind of ugly, it's not really user friendly, since there are all the commands like “equal” and “equal sum ah” and people may not know what they mean. Maybe a more user friendly like a User interface would be great, like maybe instead of typing in commands, you should like press a button and it automate easily. Maybe more integration between the 2, like if I can export the information from the bank app to excel then it becomes much more clearer than making my own excel sheet.

If there is a tool created to help you with your financial behaviour, what are some of the functions/features you will find attractive ?

Daron: I think maybe like a chat bot, if someone does not have an idea of what to do or is clueless about their financial situation maybe they can book a consultation or like a phone call. You know how we can now take medical certificates online, we can do that as well. Like digital online financial consultants, and free of charge one.

Yucheng: Something that can track your expenses or link to your bank account or webinars with like those Q&A on where to start off if you want to be financially free. I am quite a simple person, if the the tool runs smoothly, and has security it is fine.

Owen: I think quotes is a pretty good idea. Personally, I would feel inspired by quotes but it’s just a short-term feel, feeling. Like maybe I see the quote right then I will feel motivated for maybe like a few, few hours.

Aiman: I like visuals. I like to look at things and process them. Yeah so I guess colours are important, maybe quotes, but just not plain words la of course, maybe infographics. I like to look at infographics because they contain a lot of information in a condensed page. I like to watch short videos, like under 10 minutes. I think anything above 10 minutes. I think it's too long for me already. Maybe interactive so that you can use like personalising some sort of way. So yeah, you can keep track of your spending habits, I guess.

Jeslyn: I think I want to know my average spendings , I think the banks are doing but they do not track cash withdrawals . If there is a tool that I can key in my cash spending right now and also auto sync to the bank would be the best. I think notifications will be able to help me alot and are good. It's only because of notification that I will start investing. Some inspiring stories and quotes will help.

Leticia: The first thing is that it has to bring some value, so you need to give me some value like having better features. I don't want have too many tools. But the tool itself has to be secure, else there will be privacy issue

Kieron: Daily quotes on financial behaviour and colourful interfaces. One of the most important things would be a structured and seamless system that starts free. I hope it guides step by step not just like investment advice that do not take into account how much you have, some people have $100k, some people have $100 dollars, I wish the app caters to that. The ways to invest based on the money you have, the ways to invest based on the money you have, the ways to save, based on the money you have, basically tips customised to income level, and step based learning, searching for financial tips and education is tough to do so online, its all over the place. The UI itself I don't mind if its messy, I just wish for the process to be organised.

Solihin: Most importantly it is easy to key in and easy to navigate.

Sabrina: I feel that rather than a bunch of words which will make things dull and boring, charts/diagrams and making it colourful having like notifications like to remind the user on how much they have spent during the day, a week, would be helpful.

Loh Chuan Ren: I would like a lot of tips and advice in this kind of tool. I think segregation of the sections in would be good.

Ryan Goh: I think maybe like push notifications, maybe like if you spend over your budget, there would be a warning.

Clara: Maybe like giving an easy to understand, teaching you how to manage your finances or like tips. Maybe like an online personalized advisor since everyone goals are different right. Maybe something more personalised and can keep track since everyone is busy right now. They might even pay for that kind of service to help them manage better.