Richard Macalintal Helping people one blog at a time.
One of the regrets I have in life is learning financial literacy at the age of 31. I should have learned it earlier and started investing at early age. I could have save and invest enough to retire early.
Our kids will not have same fate. We promised to teach them financial literacy and investment at early age.
For a start, we open COL account to our first son Francis as soon as he have his birth certificate. Even though he is still too young to understand what investment is, we make it a point to start saving for his future at early age. We bought him shares of stocks and equity mutual funds on his portfolio. When he receive money during his birthday or christmas, we regularly add it on his COL account. As he grow and started to get familiar with companies, we started buying him shares like Jollibee (JFC) and SM (SM). Those are the 2 companies that he is very much familiar with. As he grows, we will keep on adding shares of those companies and perhaps other companies, on his COL account. We learned this tip from Ms Rose Fausto, the FQ Mom and author of Raising Pinoy Boys, and a regular speaker of TGFI Singapore.
For our second child Scot, he recently got his birth certificate. I will apply for his COL account and do exactly the same like what we did for Francis.
To start with, visit COL FINANCIAL website and go to OPEN ACCOUNT tab. There are guides and instructions there on what to do next.
For OFW’s in Singapore, here’s what you can do to open account for your children:
1. Download COL APPLICATION form and fill up. TIN is required.
2. On the account type on top of the form, tick ITF (In Trust For account)
3. One of the parent should be the primary account holder, then the child on the secondary account holder.
4. On the signature part, parent should sign on behalf of the child.
5. You need the parent passport copy and a child birth certificate. Put your signature on both copies.
6. Go to iRemit in Lucky Plaza and submit your documents there. Free of charge.
7. Wait for few days, COL sales will send you email for the account confirmation. They will give you your account number and instruct you to proceed with initial funding.
Your account is LIVE at this point. You can now buy funds or shares of stocks for your kids 🙂 In case you are not familiar with mutual fund, check this article MUTUAL FUND.
Aside from just extra savings for our kids, their educational fund is also on their COL account. Starting early will mean less money needed to save for their college fund, which we put mostly on equity funds. Take into consideration the cost of education few years from now on your chosen University so you can compute how much you need to save and invest today. Do your own research, put it in excel for records.
Happy investing!
