These formative years are a key time for developing your young adult’s financial skills. Teaching them to save & invest while also being able to spend efficiently can have a profound impact on their future. This guide lays out the practical options available in Israel for helping your teens hone in on these important skills.

Spending – cards for teens

Let’s start with what your teen likely cares about most – being able to spend his/her (and your) money – without having to rely on physical cash.

This following chart compares most of the options available based on the following key criteria:

• Monthly fees (דמי כרטיס) – This is the monthly fee you will pay just for having a card.
• Loading fees (עמלת טעינה) – This is the fee you will pay everytime you add money to your teens card
• Whether or not your teen needs a smartphone in order to use it.

Most of these options are only available if you currently hold a non-bank Israeli credit card. If you don’t have one yet and are eligible, this may be another good reason to consider getting one.

Card	Monthly Fees	Loading fees	Age	Is teen required to have a smartphone?	Best for:
Paybox Young – digital card	4.9 ₪ per month per card (6 months free if you sign up by February 28th, 2025). 3rd & 4th child are free	0 ₪	14-18	Yes	Parents who prefer to transfer smaller amounts of money in frequent intervals (5-10 times per month or more) & who already have a Paybox Digital Card
Paybox Young – physical card	7.9 ₪ per month per card (6 months free if you sign up by February 28th, 2025). 3rd & 4th child are free.	0 ₪	8-18	No, can use physical card	Parents who prefer to transfer smaller amounts of money in frequent intervals (8-10 times per month or more) & who already have a Paybox Digital Card
KashCash	0 ₪	0 ₪ (beyond fees your bank charges for a regular bank transfer)	Any age	Yes	Teens who specifically make purchases at the supported stores are are looking for a free option
My Max	0 ₪	3 months free and then 1 ₪ fee (can load up to 1,000 ₪ at a time & up to 3,000 ₪ per month)	Any age	No, can use physical card	This is often the cheapest option available for parents who have any Max non-bank credit card
My Cal	0 ₪	2 months free and then 2.90 ₪ (can load up to 1,500 ₪ at a time & up to 5,000 ₪ per month)	Any age	No, can use physical card	This is often the cheapest option available for parents who don’t have a Max card but do have any Cal non-bank credit card
Isracard נטענציק	0 ₪	3 months free and then 3.5 ₪ fee (can load up to 1,000 ₪ at a time & up to 4,000 ₪ per month, up to 10,000 ₪ per year)	Any age	No, can use physical card	This is often the cheapest option available for parents who don’t have a Max or Cal card but do have any Isracard non-bank credit card

No-foreign-transaction-fee US cards

For those Olim who have US based income and bank accounts – another option to consider is using a US based option. Revolut < 18 (for those with Revolut accounts) and Apple Card Family (for IPhone users) both offer robust tools to help teens manage their spending and offer no-foreign transaction fee cards for fee-free use in Israel.

Saving – banking for teens (חשבון בנק צעיר)

When your child turns 14, it might be time to open them their own bank account. Here is a summary of many of the options available. If you have a personal bank, be sure to reach out to them and see if they can offer better benefits.

Bank	Age	Fees (עמלות עו”ש)
Discount	14-25	0 ₪ until age 25
HaPoalim	14-20	0 ₪ until age 20
FIBI	14-20	0 ₪ until age 20
Mizrachi	14-18	0 ₪ for first 2 years
Leumi	14-18	0 ₪ until age 18

Opening a bank account is great way to teach the important financial skills of savings and tracking spending. Using Keren Kaspit or Pikdonot (for Americans) is generally accessible via these accounts. This is a great way for them to start learning & using the simplest savings tools available in Israel to earn interest on readily available funds.

Some general points for all banks:

• Opening an account for a teen between the age of 14-16 requires written parental consent.
• Opening an account online/via mobile app can only be done for a teen aged 16 or older. Teens 16 or older can open an account without parental consent.
• Those with American citizenship may be required to appear at a branch in order to open an account, even if they are older than 16 (due to FATCA requirements imposed on Israeli banks)
• While banks may allow you to keep the benefits of a חשבון בנק צעיר until the age of 20-25, the account must be opened when the teen is 18 or younger.
• If you are earning a salary, make sure to negotiate directly with your bank to extend benefits beyond the age limit.
• From the age of 14, you can recieve an ATM card for withdrawing cash from an ATM. 400 ₪ is the maximum you will be able to withdraw per day using this card (until the age of 18).

Investing – building a portfolio “on paper”

Learning to invest is certainly one of the most important financial skill worth learning from a young age. Given the magic of compounding, time is the essential ingredient for investment success. But how does your child actually set up an investment account and get started?

Practically, opening an investment account in your child or teen’s name can be a bit complicated. One of the more popular options is to help the child invest his/her funds in an account in the parents name – and gift that investment to the child in the future, once they can easily set up an account on their own. (US citizens should consider US gift tax when planning the gift.)

Practically, there are 2 main ways to set this up:

1. Set up a new sub-account (or accounts) w/in an existing account – this is generally the best option is you are already using a US based brokerage which has no minimums or monthly fees for opening an additional account.
2. Invest in a specific stock or ETF on behalf of your child (or on behalf of each child) within your existing account

With each of these options, you can empower your teen to make actual investment decisions (which you will carry out with them or for them). If you don’t want to give them login in access to the account, (as they would have access to your other own personal accounts), you can set up an easy tracker to allow them to see their investment performance over time at anytime. You could have them update this tracker every time you bought or sold an investment on their behalf.

You can use a free online tracker like Yahoo Finance or Portseida, but most of the time I recommended boring old Google Sheets. Investing is not about the excitement of daily ups and downs in the market but rather about slowly and consistently building wealth over long periods of time. Using a simple, rather than flashy, tracker can help instill this message.

If you want to use a Google Sheets tracker, put in your email here and we will send you a copy of our simple and easy to use template:

If you haven’t yet set up an investment account before for yourself, now might be a great time to get started!

Financial education tips for teens

The best accounts are worthless unless you help your teens learn how to use them. Here are some tips:

• Teens can’t learn to use money unless they have money. Depending on your philosophy you may want to give them an allowance, pay them for jobs around the house, or encourage them to get a job or start a business. But whatever the method, they need money to play with.
• Let them make mistakes. Teens need the freedom to experiment and feel the impact of saving vs. spending; spending on things that bring them joy vs. spending on something that only gives short-lived gratification.
• Introduce basic concepts like budgeting early. Provide them with our free Spending Plan Worksheet (or a simplified version) and have them fill it in. Encourage them to plan their spending, saving, giving, and investing to ensure they are giving every shekel a job.
• Don’t jump in to save them when they make mistakes. If you provide them with an allowance and expect them to use that money for going out with friends, try not to bail them out if the money runs out too soon. The pain of staying at home, or only buying a drink, is a valuable learning experience.
• Learn together with them. Find articles, TikToks, podcasts, and Youtube channels on finance and watch or listen to them together. Learn to invest together. (Several parents and teens have learned how to invest together through our online investment program.)
• Help motivate your teens to invest. Investing can be hard at first because even 10% growth of not much is still not much. Consider providing them with a boosted rate of return, especially when their balances are low. For example, give them a 20% guaranteed annual rate of return on top of their actual investment returns. This will encourage them to maximize their investment contributions and will show them how lucrative getting started early can be.
• Talk to your children about some of your money dilemmas. You don’t have to open everything up (and likely shouldn’t), but money doesn’t have to be a taboo topic. Your teens will respect you for the transparency and trust. They may even learn something. For example:
  • “Where would spending a little extra each month bring more value to the lives of you and your siblings?”
  • “I’m thinking about if now is the right time to reduce my pension investment track from 100% stocks to 70% stocks. Do you have any thoughts? Maybe let’s learn a bit more about this together so you can help me decide?”
  • “We are considering increasing our monthly savings by 2000 ILS in order to retire a few years earlier. Any ideas of where we could reduce expenses?”
  • “We have 30,000 ILS spare. Do you want to help us decide if we should reduce the mortgage or invest the money?”