Along the way, we picked up a “modern” version of Monopoly. The $500 dollar bill is now $5 MILLION. Boardwalk is now Times Square and if you put a hotel up on it, the rent is $20 million.

Monopoly Money indeed. Growing up, we played all the time, so it feels like a big jump to me. But my kids have taken right to it.

I pulled it out of the closet during this strange time of Covid to see if they’d be interested as they seem ready age-wise. The twins are 8, my oldest just turned 10 (I’m shaking my head in disbelief as I write this). And money is a hot topic around here…

“How much money do I get for emptying the dishwasher?”
“Zero.”

“Can you buy me some Minecoins?”
“What the hell is a Minecoin?”
“Its for buying stuff in Minecraft.”
“No.”

“When are you going to replace the $20 you borrowed from my allowance jar?”
“Never.”

Given the positive reinforcement I provide around finances, I was interested to see how the three little wingnuts would take to this age-old board game. Turns out, those $5 million dollar bills gave them visions of BILLIONS.

It’s funny seeing their personalities on display as the games progress (we are on our third or fourth ongoing game, they love it). Hendrick typically manages to collect a huge pile of money, get all the best Chance and Community Chest cards and a nice portfolio of property.

He buys whatever he lands on and his money “organization” consists of a messy pile of bills that he pokes around in when it’s time to pay up.

“How much money do you have?”, his sisters will ask.
“I don’t know”, he’ll answer while shrugging his shoulders and looking at the mess.

Maren is quite the opposite. When she lands on a property, she’ll want to scrutinize the cost to buy versus the rent.

“Do you want to buy it Mare?”
“It’s $3 million dollars but the rent is ONLY $320,000? That doesn’t sound very good to me.”

Which initially cracks me up. But seeing this behavior over time is pretty interesting. She is very deliberate, taking a long time to weigh the cost versus benefits. A VERY long time.

Such a long time, in fact, that I have to point at our wall clock and set a limit on when she needs to make a decision before the dice roll, lest the other children devolve into our normal Lord of the Flies routine.

Milan is somewhere in the middle. Her properties and money are very organized but she doesn’t hesitate after seeing the purchase price against available funds.

At one point, Hendrick said, “Dad, I have all this property but no money to build houses on it.” Which prompted a discussion around being “house poor.”

In other scenarios, we’ve gotten trade discussions started which raise a host of questions on how to gauge the value. Another time, Milan allowed Maren to pay $5 million instead of the $10 million owed, to keep her in the game.

Until now, I had thought of Monopoly as just a fun way to pass the time, not as a legit tool for teaching your kids about finance. So, I have to give it up to Hasbro for keeping the game going all these decades and making it more relevant than I realized.