What are a new mother’s KiwiSaver options?
Sunday, 7 June 2026
Senior business reporter Rob Stock answers your money questions. Got a question for Sunday magazine? Email it to sundaymagazine@stuff.co.nz
QUESTION: My husband and I are having our first child. I want to know what KiwiSaver options I have.
ANSWER: It’s smart to think about KiwiSaver at this time.
In an ideal world, you and your partner would carry on maximising your KiwiSaver benefits (including getting the full government contribution, and employer contributions) with a view to sticking to your long-term retirement savings plan.
But as everyone knows, it is a rare household that is totally flush with cash when the first baby comes along.
Research shows there is a KiwiSaver “gender gap” with women’s average balances lagging men’s fairly dramatically at later ages. Part of the reason is that women are more likely to take breaks from work to raise children, temporarily stop making KiwiSaver payments, and then never quite recover their pre-motherhood career trajectories.
The KiwiSaver savings gender gap between the average man and woman was now 24%, a difference of $9240.
Imagine how important even a few extra grand in KiwiSaver could be for a woman after a messy split. Remember, KiwiSaver can be accessed in times of hardship.
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These motherhood KiwiSaver breaks perhaps wouldn’t matter quite so much if couples decided/could afford to make voluntary payments to keep on with contributions to each of their KiwiSaver accounts.
It is not hard to make voluntary payments into a spouse’s KiwiSaver, so it’s usually a lack of thought, or a lack of money, that prevents it from happening.
There is emerging evidence, which was referenced at the recent Retirement Commission National Strategy conference, that just a quarter of splitting couples consider KiwiSaver when dividing assets.
This is grossly unfair as KiwiSaver is relationship property, and it does argue for women insisting on KiwiSaver contribution equality throughout their marriages and long-term relationships, so the total amounts going into their accounts are the same as that hitting their partners’.
In an ideal world, that would include contributions through their caring years.
I can tell you where that ideal world exists: Australia.
Rupert Carlyon, head of the Kōura KiwiSaver scheme, says Australian law allows people to stream some of their super contributions into their partners’ account. And why not allow that with KiwiSaver? It’s relationship property, after all, employer contributions, and all.
That, surely, has to be the next change to KiwiSaver law, if we are serious about narrowing the KiwiSaver gender gap.
Happily, people taking parental leave (women or men) are entitled to parental leave payments from the government (check this out on the Inland Revenue website).
And since 2024, people getting government parental leave payments can make KiwiSaver contributions from it, and the Inland Revenue will make employer contributions.
That’s excellent, and well worth researching as you work out your plan.
But remember, any payments to KiwiSaver are basically locked in until certain moments in your life.
These include falling into financial hardship, buying a first home, permanently leaving the country, or becoming 65 years old.
Having a new baby throws up all sorts of new expenses, so deciding to put money beyond reach needs thinking carefully about.
There’s a lot of talk currently that that government should be teaching kids to save money by opening accounts for them at birth (again, this popped up at the Retirement Commission conference), and even ACT’s David Seymour has big-upped the idea, and he’s never been a fan of KiwiSaver.
So, perhaps, give a moment’s thought to opening a KiwiSaver account for your child when she/he is born, and see whether any grandparents are up for making birthday contributions to it.
One thing I remember when my girls were small was that a hell of a lot of money was spent on gifts that were basically nice, but unnecessary. Had that money been put into my girl’s KiwiSaver, they’d have been that bit wealthier now.