How Much Should You Pay Your Kids for Chores?

Chores can be a fun, low-pressure way to teach kids about money and responsibility. Whether you pay per task or hand out a weekly allowance, this guide covers how to think about the numbers, age-appropriate chore ideas and a few easy ways to keep track of it all.

Kids chore calculator

Calculate how much to pay your kids for completing their chores by selecting your state, child's age, child's savings goal, and chore.

State

Select Alabama Alaska Arizona Arkansas California Colorado Connecticut Delaware District of Columbia Florida Georgia Hawaii Idaho Illinois Indiana Iowa Kansas Kentucky Louisiana Maine Maryland Massachusetts Michigan Minnesota Mississippi Missouri Montana Nebraska Nevada New Hampshire New Jersey New Mexico New York North Carolina North Dakota Ohio Oklahoma Oregon Pennsylvania Rhode Island South Carolina South Dakota Tennessee Texas Utah Vermont Virginia Washington West Virginia Wisconsin Wyoming

Kid's age range

Select 4 to 5 6 to 9 10 to 13 14 to 17

Kid's weekly savings goal

Add chore

Select Clean bathroom Clean bedroom Clean car Do homework Do laundry Feed pets Make lunch Mop floor Pick up toys Set table Take out trash Vacuum or broom Walk dog Wash dishes Yardwork

Which days will this chore be completed on?

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M

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W

T

F

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Add chore Please fill all fields

Chore	S	M	T	W	T	F	S	Rate
Add chores to work out weekly total
Weekly total								$0

Your child is 0% toward their weekly savings goal of $0.

Print chore calendar Start over

Chore rates are based on suggestions from experts. See our methodology.

• Methodology: How we built the chore calculator

  Our chore calculator is based on suggested costs per chore and age range submitted by four external financial and parenting experts and two Finder banking experts. Expert advice and guidance was prodivded by Michael Benninger, Mark Evans, Brianna Leonhard, Mo Mulla, Alexa Serrano and Jeff Zhou. We alsdo asked each expert to submit suggested costs for 15 chores across four student age groups: preschoolers, elementary school kids, middle-schoolers and high-schoolers. We then averaged suggested reported costs to result in a baseline average for each chore and each age group within it. If an expert chose not to suggest a cost for a particular chore or age group, we averaged the suggestions from experts who did while accounting for the current 2022 inflation rate of 8.5%.
  We then used these baseline averages to calculate state averages, relying on the state cost-of-living index compiled by the Missouri Economic Research and Information Center. These adjusted state averages make up the data in our calculator.

3 steps on how to use Finder’s kid chore calculator

Estimate how much your kid stands to earn per chore using these steps:

1. Set up your basics. Choose your state, your child’s age range and their weekly savings goal.
2. Add chores. Pick a chore, select which days it’ll be done and click Add chore. Repeat for each task.
3. Review and save. Check the schedule and weekly total, then print the calendar or start over to reset.

Should you pay kids for chores at all?

This is really a family values question before it’s a money question.

Some parents treat chores as baseline responsibilities that come with being part of a household, no pay attached. Others treat them as a hands-on way to teach kids about earning, budgeting and saving. Neither approach is wrong, it just depends on what lesson you’re trying to teach.

Some reasons families choose to pay for chores include:

• Teaches earning and saving. A paycheck, even a small one, gives kids a real reason to practice budgeting and setting goals.
• Builds a sense of ownership. Kids who choose to do a task and get rewarded for it tend to feel more invested in the outcome.
• Reduces friction at home. Payment can cut down on nagging and negotiating over who does what.
• Creates a natural consequence. No chore, no pay. It’s a low-stakes way to learn that effort and reward are linked.

On the flipside, here are some reasons why families don’t pay kids for chores:

• It adds to the budget. Weekly chore payments add up, especially with multiple kids.
• It can undercut motivation. Kids may stop doing tasks the moment payment isn’t on the table.
• It makes chores optional. If a kid decides the task isn’t worth the money, they may just skip it.
• It can blur “family responsibility” with “job.” Some parents want kids to see basic upkeep as something everyone pitches in on rather than a transaction.

When establishing a chore system, give your child specific instructions about what you expect them to do. Consider your child’s age, maturity level, physical capabilities and whether you live in the city or suburbs.
We’ve compiled a few age-appropriate chore ideas to get the ball rolling. But keep in mind, you know your child’s ability the best.

Cleaning the bathroom

Doing the laundry

Making lunch or cleaning up after meals

Yardwork

Washing the car

4 ways to track your kid’s chores

• Chore checklist. Create a list of items that kids can check off as they complete it.
• Chore spreadsheet. Design a chore spreadsheet with the days of the week as columns and the chore in each row.
• Chore app. Use an app like OurHome to set up, assign and monitor one-time or recurring tasks.
• Debit card for kids. Sign up for an all-in-one chore tracker and payment platform like Greenlight that lets you set up a chores list and pay allowances once completed.

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Our top pick: Greenlight

Teach your child to spend, save and invest all in one app. Get 5+ financial literacy tools, including chores and allowances. All with powerful parental controls to decide where your child can spend and how much. Includes up to 6% savings rewards.

• Spend, save & invest
• Chores & allowance tools
• Spending controls & limits
• Up to 6% savings rewards

A third of parents not giving their kid an allowance

While most parents say they pay their child an allowance (68%), about a third (32%) say they don’t give their kids any money.

Bottom line

There’s no right or wrong answer to whether you should pay your kids for doing chores. If you decide to reward your children for completing household tasks, consider a kid’s debit card with chore tracking capabilities and automatic allowance payments to make the entire process easier.

To make sure you get accurate and helpful information, this guide has been edited by Bethany Hickey as part of our fact-checking process.

Written by

Kimberly Ellis

Writer

Kimberly Ellis is a personal finance writer at Finder, specializing in banking and financial literacy. After teaching in public and private schools, Kimberly zeroed in on personal financial education to help families and kids develop lifelong money skills. She hails from New York City, graduating summa cum laude from Queens College with a BA in elementary education and mathematics, as well as a New York State teaching certificate. She’s also an aspiring polyglot, always in a book and forever on the hunt for the perfect classic red lipstick. See full bio

Kimberly's expertise

Kimberly has written 47 Finder guides across topics including:

• Kids' banking
• Financial literacy for kids
• K–12 education