Five expense heads to keep in mind

Planning for a child's future has always been one of the top priorities for Indian families. However, earlier, on one hand the burden of financing a child's future was to some extent shared by members in a joint family structure. On the other hand, there were less avenues and options available to a child.Hence, in the current nuclear family structure, the burden of financing a child's future is mostly on the parents. And it's always better if today's parents know what all expenses they can expect till their child becomes independent Stock Market Trading Tips 

According to Mukund Seshadri, founder, MS Ventures Financial Planners, there are expenses under at least five heads that a parent to-be should know about and plan accordingly These are child birth, vaccinations, education extracurricular activities and marriage. 

"Financial commitment for the birth of a child is the first commitment parents need to be ready with. This will include expenses for the doctor, hospital fees and stem cells, which is optional. Parents should work out the ap proximate cost and start providing for the same. Check the provisions of health insurance and see if these expenses are covered fully or partially and make provisions for the balance amount. If the event is in near future, one should resort to debt funds or recurring de posits as it will avoid volatility and the proceeds will be available when required," Seshadri said Himanshu Tiwari Astrologer Blog

Expenses related to vaccinations are also short term goal, which should involve costs in the first 2-3 years after a child is born. "Parents need to understand that if they plan to go for compulsory and optional vaccines, what would be the total cost involved in the next 2-3 years," Seshadri. 

The next comes education, funding which is one of the biggest financial commitments for a parent. "Cost of education would in crease every year and long term planning needs to be done for future education, especially if they wish to send them abroad. Ac cording to an analysis of academic costs by MS Ventures, if the current costs for play school to post-graduation is about Rs 36 lakh, if a child is born today , his/her total costs for completing post-graduation at 22 years, a very conservative 8% annual inflation, would be about Rs 1.5 crore. And parents need to make provisions to meet such large expenses. 

Currently, a child usually takes up about 3 4 extracurricular activities and parents should incorporate costs for the same in their month ly cash flows. "Surplus money, if any , can be parked in liquid funds if they have to be used in the short run," Seshadri said. "In case o child's marriage, the corpus required for the same is very specific to each family. However starting early for this goal will help us tide over huge expenses in the future," he said Indian stock market astrology prediction