Are the finances really that different between one and two child families?

[May487]

I know it’s probably obvious but just wondering about this one. I’m pregnant with our first and thinking about whether we’d like one or two children. I think if money were no object it would easily be two but naturally it is, with childcare, housing and the general cost of living all being very expensive!

Older relatives of ours seem to believe ‘it all works out’ but when I look around, the ones saying this with multiple DC have either had grandparents provide full time childcare, bought their homes when interest rates were low, one parent can afford to be a SAHP etc.

I love my career and want to stay employed and same goes for DH. We have time and could potentially leave a 5 year+ age gap but also even with that surely there is summer holiday clubs to pay for, uniform, hobbies, just alongside maternity leave and then childcare fees for the second?

Am I missing something or is the world just changing now?

I’m in my mid 40s, and have spoken to my parents, friends’ parents etc about this over the years. I remember one mum saying they were terrified in the 80s when their mortgage rate went up to 16%, and they had four primary school aged children at home. Thing is, she was a SAHM, who got her mum to mind the children so she could work part time for a couple of years till it all got less mental. The house the mortgage was on was massive, in an expensive area. The job her DH had had at that time was the exact same job I had at the same age they had been then (which is how the subject got raised, she didn’t understand why none of us had houses or children yet). I had to point out that in the same job that had let them have 4 children, and her not go out to work till mortgage rates went nuts, I couldn’t even afford a one bed flat on my own. So yeah, mortgage rates don’t actually reflect affordability. Plus Uni was free for that generation, a lot even got grants! Plus there were council provided cheap nurseries (that’s what my mum used), and more availability of things like social housing.
Older people, especially women, are retiring later for financial reasons, so aren’t available to provide free childcare. My mum was working full time when I became a parent, and she couldn’t afford to quite or go part time to help me reduce nursery bills.
Also, nothing wrong with people wanting to support their children more than they themselves were. I never got the ‘extras’ like music lessons, or holidays, or activities, and it was boring and means there’s stuff I’d have loved to do but never got to, and yes I want to do better for my family. We didn’t always have food, and I sure as hell don’t want to put my child through that.