Motherhood And Money: Planning Tools For Women Juggling Family And Finances

By Sanaa Zia Khan

Motherhood in India represents a critical monetary turning point, which alters the way in which women manage their wealth The orientation shifts from an accentuation of ROI enhancement to maintaining an economic buffer that can withstand shocks The Female Labour Force Participation Rate (LFPR) rose modestly to 33.7 per cent in the July–September 2025 quarter, up from 33.4 per cent in the previous quarter and for many mothers this translates into a financial journey that is nonlinear.

Data indicates that urban mothers often face an 18 per cent reduction in real daily wages, a structural reality known as the “Motherhood Penalty”. Therefore, the priority is building tools that acknowledge these life curves and make wealth management more convenient for women.

The current financial ecosystem frequently assumes a 30-year career with uninterrupted cash flows. This is a rigid framework that fails the modern mother. What they require are modern wealth planning tools that offer radical flexibility, such as “SIP Pause” and “Step Up” facilities. While the former allows a mother to halt her investments during a career break without attracting penalties, the latter enables her to increase her contributions by 10 per cent to 15 per cent annually to bridge the gap in her retirement corpus, once she resumes work.

The participation of women in the markets is growing. As of March 2025, "One in four mutual fund investors in the country, or around 25.7 per cent, is a woman, compared with 24.2 per cent in the previous year. Women manage over Rs 11.25 lakh crore of assets, more than double the level in the past five years."But even now, a significant portion of this money is stashed in regular savings accounts, primarily because it needs to stay available for emergencies.

The challenge is that this capital fails to provide any meaningful returns. Wealthtech platforms can improve this situation through automated liquid fund sweeps. Idle cash can move from low-yielding savings accounts into a Liquid Mutual Fund, where it earns better returns but can still be accessed within 24 hours, which is exactly the kind of liquidity a mother needs when something unexpected comes up at home.

Protection is the second critical pillar of this framework. In India, only 30 per cent of women aged 15 to 49 are covered by health insurance. For a mother, a standalone health policy with maternity and critical illness riders is a foundational tool. It ensures that a medical uncertainty does not destabilise the family's future. Furthermore, since women have a higher life expectancy of nearly 74 years, their wealth must last longer. Long-term protection is not a choice; it is a mathematical necessity for survival.

Decision fatigue is the silent enemy of financial discipline. Mothers manage the logistics of entire households, which leaves little bandwidth for tracking market volatility. Assisted professional online tools should function as a calm co-pilot through goal-based rebalancing. Instead of complex dashboards, a mother needs a single visibility score that confirms if her child’s education fund is on track. This reduces the mental load and allows her to engage with money with confidence.

Finally, we must modernise traditional preferences. Gold accounts for an average of 18 per cent of assets for Indian households, but physical gold carries storage risks and high making charges. Instead, they now primarily use SEBI-regulated gold Exchange-Traded Funds (Gold ETFs) and Gold mutual funds to build a liquid, cost-efficient hedge against inflation and currency risk. When mothers use these modern frameworks, they model financial agencies for their children. They prove that wealth planning is not an interruption but a tool for creating a more stable and equitable family life.

The author is Director, Centricity Overseas Financial Distribution Pvt. Ltd. | Founding Team, INVICTUS, Centricity WealthTech

(Disclaimer: Views expressed are the author’s own, and Outlook Money does not necessarily subscribe to them. Outlook Money shall not be responsible for any damage caused to any person/organisation directly or indirectly.)