How much does it cost to look after a dog??

[SeriesofUnfortunateEvents]

We're thinking of getting a dog and I was wondering what the ongoing costs were including inoculations and vet insurance etc. Thank you.

[anothermansmother]

I have a 9 year old boxer mix ( rescue so Heinz 57 variety)
Each month
Insurance 30
Food 40
Treats 20
Dog walker 250
Flee drops ~10
Dog toys ~10

On top of that vacations we bought a lifetime plan 120 plus kennel cough vaccine 30 each year and worming tablets 30 x 4 per year.

Any additional vets fees are 40 per consultation only.

However I wouldn't be without him, he's amazing and the kids live him too ( so much do that we may get another dog in 12 months time)

[SeriesofUnfortunateEvents]

Thanks very much another. Certainly adds up but great to hear how happy you are with him.

[Lurchermom]

We have a young lurcher cross. We spend:
£20 insurance
£13 pet plan via vets - this give us all flea and tick medication, yearly boosters, 10% off some medication, stuff in the shop, and free nail clippings. Any consultations are £45.
£38 for dried food. A large bag lasts about a month.
£30ish on wet food.
£30 on chews and treats. She's a destructive nut job so I pay a lot of money for things she can chew rather than my stuff.
£40ish for doggy day care, usually twice a month. (£20p/day)
Any kennel costs are £23p/day
Generally I try not to think about it!

[SeriesofUnfortunateEvents]

Thanks very much Lurcher.

[ChanklyBore]

Just to balance it out a bit, my dog died late last year, owned her for over 11 years and she cost significantly less than £6k in total - about £500 a year - that is taking into account cost of acquiring her in the first place, feeding her, vets visits and boosters, treatments, equipment, everything including the £200 to put her down at the end. Not everyone will be as lucky as us.

[SeriesofUnfortunateEvents]

Thanks very much Chankly. Sorry to hear about your dog.

[Pipandmum]

Mine (two mefium sized) cost about £600/year in food and treats. £300/dog groomer. £360/vet plan (includes worming and shots and 10% off treatments). Extras would be: every other year £650 kennel fees, £500 for both to have teeth cleaned with a couple extractions (once in a lifetime treatment). £200 for steroids and ear infection meds (once or twice a lifetime for mine). Maybe £100/year on new dogs leads/bedding and toys. They are 9 and 11 now and so annually about £1600 for both if I average out kennel fees and without extraordinary treatments. I did have insurance on one if them but became so exorbitant that I cancelled (never made a claim and was getting up to £70/month).

[StillMedusa]

I have a medium sized Eurasier... 14m old
Insurance £30 a month Petplan
Vaccinations.. just cost £79 for her booster (inc kennel cough)
Dry food £20?
Raw bits.. mostly free from the butcher
Nice food (treats, chicken from the deli etc) £15
No daycare yet but about to sort it £25 a day!
Umpteen dog toys and kongs on a rope.. I've spent hundreds!

petplan excess for hurting her leg .. £100 (and the bill for xrays etc under anaesthesia would be £850!!!!)

The love and joy she brings to our family...
utterly priceless!

[NoMoreJunk]

My bil's dog , became sick not long after they got it and cost them over £10,000

[MaleficentsCrow]

Mastiff owner here...per month

£40 per insurance
£11 flea treatment
£60 food (it literally eats like a horse and also has a sensitive stomach so has a special food brand, but I'm fine with that)
£10 on various toys ( powerful jaws, destroys most toys, likes to rip the stuffing out of soft toys, but I continually buy them as he needs toys to be entertained and play)
£15 on dental sticks treats, one a day

Then quarterly is worming I think about £8 that costs

Yearly is vaccination £60

Vet bills, consultation is £30 if we need to go, he is insured and is only young so we've not needed any major treatment as of yet thankfully.

Oh I lie he needed his paw seen to as he had glass in it that bill came to like £125 for consultation, wound cleaning and antibiotics. We didn't claim on insurance as the excess is £100 anyway.

[TimeWastingButFun]

I have absolutely no idea! I would have to check the bank statements to see how much I pay for insurance and inoculations (we're due a booster next month so it was almost a year ago). Grooming is probably the most expensive part - £40 every six weeks.

[Girlintheframe]

Apprising £250-£300 a month but half of that is on daycare.
The rest
£28 Insurance
£55 Food/treats
£10 flea/worming
£30 Training

Plus lots of incidentals on top like collars, bed, vets treatments which fall below excess on insurance.

[vanillandhoney]

Mine costs me about £100 a month when it's averaged out.

But that doesn't include a walker or daycare or kennel costs and they can all massively bump the costs up. A daily dog walker can cost £200 a month, for example.

[BiteyShark]

It really is going to vary by your circumstances and the dog.

You could feed it really cheap food or more expensive. A bigger dog is going to eat more than a smaller one. Ours is a cocker and we often spend £70 at least on food because we feed expensive wet tins. Oh and then there are treats on top

Insurance is going to vary depending on the breed and area. It will also vary depending on the policy but I would recommend getting the best you can afford. Mine is around £45 ish a month but we have claimed thousands and are still 'up' compared to premiums. Even with insurance lots of things will come under the excess so if you are unlucky you could be shelving out £100s. Expect insurance to increase with age.

Training will vary depending on whether you want to spend £0 and try and do it yourself from YouTube etc or lots if you go for 1-1 or specialised training. I used to do obedience, agility, gun dog and scent work. My cost right now is £0 as we no longer do classes but at some point it was a lot.

Grooming. Again dog dependant and even if you do it yourself you will have to get the equipment. I pay average £25 per month.

Flea/worm/tick is included in my vets pet plan which I think is now £15 per month but more for larger dogs. You might decide not to regularly treat but I wouldn't fancy tackling a flea infestation (been there once in a rental house and we had to get the professionals in).

Daycare/dog walkers. This is a massive expensive and even if you are at home consider whether your circumstances might change. Some dogs will not tolerate being left for long and can be destructive and noisy. I pay daycare at £20 per day. This is my biggest expense as I use it 3 or 4 times a week.

Boarding unless you never want a non dog holiday or have someone to always look after your dog when you go away. I typically pay £25 per night.

And then there are the incidentals which typically one off but more at the beginning like toys, dog bowls, leads, collars, tags, harness, beds, poo bags, better walking clothes for me etc.

[MothershipG]

The day to day costs can add up but don't forget the hidden costs, working part-time to fit around the dog, limiting opportunities to local work so you can be home for the dog, paying for dog boarding if you have holidays when you can't take them. All of it worth every penny but definitely a long term financial commitment.

[Whynow88]

Mine is less than I budgeted for..
£19 pm insurance
£12 pet plan for fleas and ticks and worms
£9 pm dry food
£10 pm treats extra food(like mackerel, chicken breast)
I have family to look after him so no kennel or day care costs
£30 Groom every 6 Weeks or so

He’s a joy and is worth every penny

[TeddyIsaHe]

Working cocker (9)

Insurance: £30pm
Food/Treats: £60pm (she has a v gentle tum so I have to buy specific food)
Flea/Tick/Worm/Vaccs - £14pm with local vet
Toys - £10? Roughly.
Groomer - £35 every 6 weeks in summer, every 8-10 in winter.
Dog walker - £30 x2 for the 2 days I’m on a long day. They pick her up at 10am and drop her back at 3pm so she’s only alone for 3 hours in the morning and 2.5 in the evening.

She’s a costly devil! But worth every penny. She does earn a few pheasants and grouse in shooting season when she’s on the peg though.

[GrumpyMiddleAgedWoman]

Two medium sized dogs
£50 decent quality dog food
£35 vet which includes vaccs, flea, worm and 10% off most treatment
£20-30 on treats
£20 toys and sundries - new bedding, new lead, replacing old collar, extra washing and fuel, keeping first aid kits stocked etc
£40-50 kennels average per month
£45 older dogs pain meds

Each year: £35 pair of wellies for me (I also go through waterproofs)

Add to that the older dog has cost about £1.2k in vet bills over the course of his life. We treat stuff like cut pads at home (hence the first aid kit). The younger dog has cost maybe £200 (one-off tenner to join the vacc/flea/worm plan, a couple of consults about a limp and a minor op).

The big one-off expenses have been their beds and the grille and tailgate guard in the car - and buying the dogs themselves.

I do a lot of training with the younger dog which tots up (group sessions are cheap but 1-2-1s are not) and I have tack bags, training dummies, longlines and sturdy clothing coming out of my ears, but that's my choice, saves having to join a gym and keeps me busy.

[RaspberryToupee]

Food - approx £40 - we buy a 6kg bag of dry dog food for £36, which doesn’t quite do a month so we supplement with raw dog chews and cooked meat from our meals such as when we have a roast (not included in the £40)

Treats and chews - approx £20 a month. We buy 90% high quality treats and chews, usually very high meat content and no additives. The 10% is cheaper stuff and fun things like doggy Easter eggs.

Training - cost £100 for 6 weeks initially. Ours is 3 now and still goes (£80 for 6 weeks now). She doesn’t need the training now but it’s more of an activity session now and we attend for socialisation and to get her using her brain a bit, which tires then out more. Other activity sessions outside of training probably cost an additional £15 per month. We do a lot of activities with our dog. It’s not something we originally budgeted for but we really enjoyed getting into the activities.

Insurance - £36 per month. She’s 3 now and the cost will keep going up as she ages.

Other vet bills - approx £15 per month for flea and worming treatment. Yearly vaccinations. Those incidents where it’s not worth claiming on the insurance, usually when you’ve just committed to something expensive. So we booked a holiday on the Sunday with a deposit paid, Tuesday evening we had an out of hours emergency vet trip and another trip on the Friday and other trip the following weds. Those visits totalled £400 and it wasn’t worth claiming on the insurance but it was a tough month.

Dog walker - we both work full time and got a dog walker 5x a week which was about £250 a month. Now we’re both working at home, we are still getting the dog walker because our dog has become used to that socialisation. She was really depressed when restrictions were really tight and so I think this is a cost we’ll always have to find, even if we’re working from home permanently.

Grooming - £40 every 6-8 weeks.

Toys - usually only one now on her birthday and one at Christmas. However, our dog is really good with her toys and doesn’t chew them so we still have some of her puppy toys. However, we probably buy a bag of tennis balls every couple of months (£10 a bag) and gundog dummies every 6-9 months depending on how much we do (approx £20).

We’ve done a few overnight stays without her, which cost £25 per 24 hour period at doggy day care. Our holidays have taken her with us (this year was the first year we were going to leave her until our holiday got cancelled). She goes with us when we stay with family and if family didn’t want us to stay with the dog, we’d have take that into account.

One off purchases to also consider - bed and or crate, something to keep them secure in the car (harness or crate). Dog towels - we got some micro fibre towels from mountain warehouse for when we’re out walking and then use old towels in the house. Food and water bowls including a collapsible water bowl or portable water bowl for long days out. If you have a spaniel or dog with long ears, you might want to look into a spaniel water bowl, which are sloped to stop them dipping their ears in the bowl which can lead to ear infections. Dog proofing the garden and house. Replacing anything that is chewed.

Our costs are quite high because we do a number of activities with her, we give her a high quality diet and pay for a dog walker. You can do it cheaper though if your circumstances are different. Like the others, I wouldn’t be without her. We were actually planning on getting a second one this year but coronavirus has sent demand for puppies through the roof.

[SeriesofUnfortunateEvents]

Thank you so much to everyone for taking the time to post this information. So useful.

The exciting news is that we have a Zoom call on Friday to look at a greyhound I saw on the Battersea website. About to post again here to ask for advice on looking after a rescue greyhound