If you were a SAHM ... how did you swing it?

[TheBeesKnee]

Was the secret having a husband with a well paid job? Or something else?

I have a series of KIT days coming up. Baby is 8 months old. I can't bear the thought of leaving him. He changes so much day to day and I would love to stop work but we have a mortgage to pay. I am literally devastated.

Short of relocating somewhere VERY cheap I just don't see how I could take any more time off work. I'm only really able to take a year off because we were saving money for IVF when I fell pregnant after 4 years of trying.

It just all feels so shit.

😟

I was a SAHM for years. My then DH definitely wasn’t well-paid. Our secret was to have a small mortgage, obtained by choosing a cheaper house rather than stretching ourselves. We worked out how much we could afford based on DH’s salary alone. Of course, this was some years ago so we were helped by the more reasonable house prices, but, even so, there’s still potential to do something similar now.

Friends of ours got a bigger house with a bigger mortgage, but they based their mortgage on them both working F/T. She then spoke to me after the birth of her first child, saying she “had” to go back to work because they couldn’t afford the mortgage. Bearing in mind, they could have bought a cheaper house like we did, I did wonder why they hadn’t thought ahead.

Again, I realise we were lucky to not have the ridiculous house prices we have now, but if I was doing this again, I’d just look at flats or similar before I had children, then look to move up the property ladder a bit when they were older.

I also budgeted quite strictly. We were veggie so that helped food costs; I carefully budgeted for energy bills; and I watched every penny.

I was a SAHP for five years. When we bought our first house together, DH said he didn't want us to over commit as if we had DC he wanted one of us to be there for them all the time. When we had DD it made sense for me to be at home as I earned less, and I was happy with that. We had a two bed house so mortgage and bills lower, one car which we shared, enjoyed camping and walks, which are all reasonably cheap. We're good at managing our money as well, even now we're in a larger house, our gas, electric and food bills are a lot lower than others.

Oh, forgot to say DH was on an average wage.

There were a lot of on the surface 'sahm' on Mumsnet when it first started, nearly 20 years ago, waves @SarahAndQuack
but like @BreatheAndFocus and @RejuvenatedJJanuary our stories were rarely simple.

Some of us crammed in work outside of 9 to 5, several times I drove 50 miles to the nearest train station, parked in a free bit, got to the station with baby and stuff, met DH getting off the train, handed him the baby, got on the next train to go to work.
Getting a toddler and a baby out to school was a piece of piss after that professional logistics exercise.

I resent the whole you were lucky narrative or 'swung' , we made difficult choices that kept our family safe. DH is now on nearly 100k because I was there to raise his kids, give him the freedom to work for promotion rather than just get by.
He still loves a yellow label, too good to go is our family treat and this weekend like every bloody weekend we are doing DIY.
Going through photos, my clothes lasted years getting demoted from best, to school run, to DIY. The kids toys were fairly minimal and we used the toy library.
One car for years, so had to prep for the four days without.

No regrets but I didn't swing it, we worked hard to make it work.

@TheBeesKnee have you discussed if your husband might like to stay at home with your baby or work part time as well?

@AuntHike the toy library!. I only used ours a few times but the day I came home with that toy coupe car they could "get in" and move with their feet! Very expensive to buy but that was fantastic and when she tired of it... It went back.

Fabulous thing that toy library!

Yes to the "swinging" it. Extremely low outgoing and hard work.
I wouldn't take back a minute though as it made us better with money and saving.
Not perfect but much better!

We took on a smaller mortgage than we could have because we had in mind that one of our salaries should cover the mortgage in case something happened. We didn't consider bills but just mortgage repayments. Dh and I were on similar salaries and we'd already saved quite a bit.
By the time we had dc 5 years later, we were both in higher salaries so it was affordable.

I could have afforded to be a sahm but my work accepted my request for 2 days a week which was a shock but it was the best decision for us.

Its much harder to get a property now that could be affordable.

Im at sahm, have been since my oldest (now 6yrs) was 10 months old. I went back for two months but as I couldn't get part time it was unsustainable for us as a family. My husband is not a high earner I think at the time he was on 27k. We had an extremely low mortgage, which we have now paid off, this is one of the main reasons it has worked for us.

I now have three children and am hoping to go back to work part time once my youngest starts nursery in April

I was part time for quite a few years - high earning dp- but although I know plenty of part time parents I don’t actually know anyone at all who is or was a full time sahp

average wage for dh. i get a top up on UC. we’re financially fine but definitely not worry free and have no savings etc. but nursery would cost more than i’d earn. it was more like the only option rather than a choice. honestly i find it really difficult - the grass is always greener isn’t it

I'm a SAHM because my husband and I both saw it as a priority.

When we bought a house we used only his salary for the mortgage. I had a decent sized deposit from a previous house and from inheritance which meant we could afford a house, albeit in the cheapest part of our expensive town.

We only have one car, our holidays are camping holidays, and I buy most things secondhand.

It's worth it though. Nothing would be worth missing out on this time with my young children for.

But he’s cheerfully missing out on it?

Someone once asked me how my DS could afford to live on what he earned as a musician. The answer was that DiL was an investment banker. Later he became a SAHF. Back in the 70s it was possible to manage on one reasonable salary. Unfortunately it is no longer possible.

My husband wasn't a big earner when we had our first, and I had just come out of a temp position, so we simply planned everything on just one wage and have stayed that way ever since. I've been a SAHM through our entire relationship, and there's not a job in the world I would do rather than be at home with my children. I'd look at your finances very closely to see if there was a way of working it, or look for remote roles that you can do from home that you can work in to your day. Would your husband be supportive of you staying at home?

Yes I had a highly paid husband. I also married at 40, developed a chronic illness during first pregnancy and had to give up work during my second pregnancy. I could have gone back afterwards - I'd started a part time role I enjoyed, but the realisation that having two in daycare in London was more than my day rate and it seemed sensible for me to stop working. But my husband was very generous and I kept one in nursery two days a week after I had my second and then she started two days a week once she was one. I love my kids but found it very boring and craved having time to do other things that I didn't have to rely on to bring in an income. We weren't dripping in money (he had an ex and two older kids to support), but we were comfortable. It certainly was a privilege- unfortunately I was widowed when my kids were small which required very canny financial juggling on my part but I was still able to only work part time (downsized then eventually moved to a much cheaper area etc).

I wasn't a SAHM but I did feel like you do. What helped was working short hours, so I was able to do 9-2, but Monday-Friday, which for me worked better than 3 long days- it meant I could carry on breastfeeding without having to pump, and I was never away from the DC for long periods of time.
I was in a well-paid job, so that helped, but even so we were very hard-up for years: very limited holidays, very few new anythings, secondhand clothes, car, furniture, limited paid activities for DC, very rare eating out/ takeaways, and even so had to borrow from mum to cover food towards the end of the month. Trapped in a cycle of paying interest on credit cards for a while, too.
But I did spend time with my DC, which was the priority for me. I don't regret it.

My DP owns a company and earns a good salary. I do work for him but it's only a few hours a week and super flexible so I do it when DS is napping/ after bedtime.

I aware we're extremely privileged to be able to have this set up and I'm so grateful to not have to worry about childcare!

When DS was smaller I returned to work in a managerial position and I was close to having a breakdown with the stress and guilt. I know it's important to have a career as a woman/ mother but it just wasn't worth sacrificing my mental health for.

DH earned enough to cover it all which was very lucky because we had twins and the cost of putting the two of them through nursery at full time hours was way more than I’d earn. Yes, childcare is a shared expense, but we’d have been down thousands of pounds annually as a household to pay for it so it just didn’t make financial sense.

I now work part time around the children because they’re in school. Holidays get a bit sticky!

We had an inheritance which paid off 2/3 of our mortgage, which meant our monthly bills were lower. Which in turn meant that we could survive on DH’s salary without me working. We also skip a lot of the treats that other people have, so we can keep our spending low. No holidays or takeaways etc, we don’t buy each other Xmas presents, if we need decorating or repairs done we DIY it instead of hiring someone. But ultimately the major factor was the inheritance which pushed our mortgage right down.

I've been a SAHM for getting on for 20 years 😱 DH and I decided before we were married that I would be a SAHM. We have 4 children. DH works full time on a fairly average wage. We also get some benefits as we have a disabled DC.

Weve only ever based everything on one salary eg mortgage.

We live in a fairly cheap area of the country, have a "doer upper" house that needs constant work as it's almost 200 years old but was a bargain on paper 😂

Grandparents pay for national trust membership for us instead of a Christmas present, we have only ever had one car (or no car before children). We have a gym membership so use that alot for family swimming.

We only ever holiday in the UK.

I'm a regular at charity shops, vinted etc both for buying and selling.

DH got promoted while I was on ML- it was quite a hike in his salary. Then my school asked if anyone was interested involuntary redundancy quite close to the end of my ML. I took it and started doing a little bit of consultancy work a couple of half days while DS was at nursery.

Really? I know loads. Women mainly but a couple of men too. They all have a spouse/partner who is a high earner.

Another one who had a breakdown. Teaching.

Daughter was three by this time. ‘Lucky’ because we got on the property ladder 2001 and there was very little lifestyle creep so we could just about afford for me to quit. Mortgage was nearly paid off. Remortgaged so we were literally paying about £30 a month (it’s paid off now). Husband works but has ill health so salary not great. Run one old car. I work freelance from home. Have one child. Took me eight years to have her. I’m happy to be around for her, but still bear the emotional scars of how it all came about.

Yes, but the road blocker is the mortgage tbh.

I think the best we can hope for without relocating is both of us working 4 days so that the baby is only in nursery 3 days per week.

It's complicated though as he works shifts. I work a 9-5.