To ask your household income with 3-4 DC in private school?

[Lemoning]

And are you comfortably living, affording savings and holidays and not worrying about money? Pre tax income, and obviously including the school fees in your outgoings, ie: they're not paid by GP or similar.

I sometimes wonder if we're going to regret starting down the private school road because of money worries later on. Our income pre tax is about £200k.

Ah well there, you go - my experience was completely different.

I rocked up to the nearest one and said 'How much?' and they were quite happy indeed.

We were in SW London and all three of the local preps were happy to have him as long as we could write the cheques.

Same here, both privates here have very little in the way of admissions policy as long as your bank account is solid.

It might not be very nice, but it is very simple.

OP I expect the issue for your DH is that 30 years ago, a lawyer working in London and doing well would just assume that a big house in a nice area, kids at private school, and all the other trappings would be very affordable. Perhaps he has grown up with that assumption, so now it is hard for him to accept that he can't do for his own DCs what was done for him.

Our post-tax income isn't far below yours, and we have a much, much smaller mortgage although we do want to move in the next few years. We have two DCs, and have decided against private primary largely on the basis of cost. We will keep secondary under review, but we are looking at moving into catchment of one of the best state 6th forms in the country and the two outstanding comprehensives that feed into it so that private remains a choice rather than a necessity.

You can only afford it if you are prepared to put holidays on the back burner, because even with your mortgage paid off, holidays for 6 are going to be eye-wateringly expensive.

As per Morloth (not London though)

Morloth where in the country are you?

We were foreign though, and everyone knows us foreigners steal all the school places.

So, you cannot afford it on current earnings. Our income more than twice yours and educating three privately has been painful at times. Your budget nos are just not high enough. My Elder DCs are at schools where fees look like they are 6-7k so20k ought to be enough of a budget. I never seem to write a cheque that isn't close to 8k. So you need to realistically assess his future earning power. If he will be earning a million in five years then of course it will be ok.

You also need to think more clearly. Getting to Oxbridge is NOT about private school it's about ability. frankly if your DC are bright enough they will be MORE likely to get in if they are at state school I reckon based on kids I know. And given your interest and commitment you will be doing so much for them beyond state school they will be very well off.

I wonder if he is suffering from a sense of he needs to have them at private school to keep up with others at work? This should be about what gives your DCs the best overall life, not what gives him kudos.

That was when we lived in Fulham.

I'll confess that I've only read the first few posts of this already very long thread, but a few things spring to mind:

a) if your children can go to a reasaonble state primary school, you can tutor for secondary entrance exams which is much cheaper and you can do this throughout their primary school years, rather than just the year before;

b) you've mentioned that your husband is relying on increasing earnings, if this is a fairly secure career progression, eg to hospital consultant with a private practice, or to partnership in a big law firm then that's fine, but otherwise I'd be cutting your cloth to what you earn now;

c) can you move to an area with selective state grammars or exceptional state secondaries (something that Labour policitians always seem to achieve in London) - we've always assumed that our kids would go private for secondary because we both did, but in fact our local state secondary is outstanding, and the issue is that we might have to put our son into a prep school because there are too few primary school places in our area - I do think that the move from prep to state secondary is not great as your kids are unlikely to have friends moving with them and may be stuck with the 'posh kid' tag.

Private education is always a challenge financially I think, unless you're really minted, but more so if you have 2 or more kids. I was an only child and benefitted from an assisted place which meant that my fees were calculated according to my (self-employed) dad's last year's income so it was mostly affordable for them but there were certainly some sacrifices. My school did have reduced fees and bursaries for multiple kids, but I think this was mostly reserved for the less well-paid middle class professions, eg clergy and teachers, so may not apply to you (and this was in the NW in the 80s, not London today).

£12k by the way would almost educate 2 kids a year privately round here up to age 11 (would be around £13k), it's slightly horrifying that you're expected to pay that for one child for pre-prep.

There are a lot of perfectly good state primaries in London. Given that you can fill in any gaps with extra home work, I'd say that state primaries are reserved for those who are either money-no-object wealthy (insane as it sounds, that's not you, not with 4 DC) or having very serious problems with their state options.

I'm in SW London too, Morloth. There are non selective preps who are happy with anyone who pays the fees but there are virtually no non selective secondaries and that's where life gets tricky. You can offer all the money you want; if you're not in the top 90 or whatever, you won't get a place

Private education is a bit of a 'nice to have'. It isn't necessary.

If you want it and you are not minted then you will have to lose a couple of other 'nice to haves'.

Only you guys can decide where that line is drawn.

OP you said you want the DCs to mix with different cultures and social groups. You won't find much variety at private schools, I think.

Utter and complete bollocks, frankly, and spouted by someone who has not in the past two decades had anything to do with an independent school. Most independent schools are FAR more diverse than the state school options. The only situation where this might not be true is London.

I give you my DS's 4 bessie mates.

A: Both parents born and bred in Trinidad. Both medics, both black
B: Both parents born and bred in London. One medic, one teacher who married up.
C: One parent born and bred in Yorkshire (an Engineer) married to a travel company owner born and bred in China.
D. One parent born and bred in Suffolk (a banker) married to a lawyer born and bred in Spain.

I can assure you that an independent education is a cosmopolitan education.

I did not know that Marsupialsrule, we hadn't looked into secondary school in London because we never intended to stay that long.

So with that in mind OP maybe scratch my advice!

DS1's class in London was like a United Nations meeting.

But to be fair, it wasn't economically varied.

I also have a friend whose private girls school peers did nothing afterwards academically, but then my state school lot are pretty much the same. A lot depends on the child and the direction from parents.

I have many friends who were privately educated, and many who went through the state system like me. I see no discernible difference in their respective levels of success or happiness tbh. It's true that among my friends from Cambridge, more of those from wealthy backgrounds opted to go into lucrative careers such as law or finance, whereas more of my state educated friends chose the public or voluntary sectors. I guess there was more pressure on the privately educated ones to earn enough for their kids' school fees!

I do think there can be an assumption among some privately educated people that private schools must be better. Most of my state educated friends are happy to send their dc through the state system. I see no difference really between the children themselves. In my experience, intelligent, proactive and supportive parents tend to produce kids who do well, regardless of where they go to school.

I'd rather have the holidays as well. We have had some amazing experiences as a family while travelling.

naturalBaby that's really wonderful. Makes me really think about doing it myself.

Yes, talkinpeace take it to the drunk thread hm?

I give you my DS's 4 bessie mates.*

A: Both parents born and bred in Trinidad. Both medics, both black
B: Both parents born and bred in London. One medic, one teacher who married up.
C: One parent born and bred in Yorkshire (an Engineer) married to a travel company owner born and bred in China.
D. One parent born and bred in Suffolk (a banker) married to a lawyer born and bred in Spain.

I can assure you that an independent education is a cosmopolitan education.

I can see this ticks the different cultures box, not sure about the social groups, all pretty middle class.

But it isn't just about paying the basic school fees, it's about everything else that goes with it. My GF was a very successful businessman and he put both my DM and DA through private school. But there were some things that he couldn't always afford on top of the fees - the overseas language trips, the overseas art trips etc etc. And when all your classmates are going on them and you are the only one left behind it can make life very difficult. This was the late 1940s/early 1950s and my DM is still scarred about it.

Certainly my DPs could not afford to send me to private school - as they both went into the public sector - but I guess I was lucky as I went to a school that used to be a grammar school - and all the teachers still acted and taught as if it still was.

My friend has a DS at private school, he is a bright and very clever boy but she is struggling to pay for the stuff over and above the fees. His rowing outfit - which the school has decided he must have - costs a shocking amount of money. She isn't too proud to ask the school to help, which they have done. But if they couldn't he'd be in a pretty shit place. Please don't imagine that the cost of private school just stops at the fees. It goes on and on and on.....

£200kand can't afford school fees??

I don't get it.

I was privately educated. My dad's a teacher, my mum was a nurse and I got a thirty percent bursary, as did my two brothers. A LOT LESS THAN £200k, more like £50k in today's money.

I think when you mention 50 pounds a week for extra activities it is per child. I just calculated and my sons piano, daughter's percussion, both singing lessons+ yearly exams + theatre school on Saturday + choir on one evening = 4.5K/year, no sport or any other paid for activity for them. They do few clubs at school but aren't sporty at all.

I really am marveling how we managed to put both of them through private primary which admittedly was cheap by comparison with prep schools in the area
I just checked, in their primary top fees are 2.4K/term. I clearly remember it being half that price 12 years ago :)

With their dedication and well chosen tutoring both passed 11+, and they are now in Grammar schools and doing very well.

I feel somehow we were lucky to get it right. But i put a lot of research in getting it right. I live in Sutton borough where we moved many years ago with the hope of getting to Grammar schools. Now both are walking to their schools.

Oh how naice that your children had well-chosen tutoring and are doing very well in grammar school. I was given ONE previous paper to have a go at before I took the 11+ aged eleven, and I went to a bog-standard state school, not private primary, but I got through.

So you bloody well should feel lucky and proud of your research. Because it is an advantage you have gained at the expense of clever but deprived children.

caff school fees have risen astronomically over the last 20 years in comparison to other goods. How long ago were you schooled?
My friend's parents put 4 children through fee-paying school from pre-prep to sixth form on 1 dentist's salary. I know dentists earn well, but it would be impossible today, even if they had no housing costs other than bills.

Well. If school fees are tough on £200k a year, it gives the lie to the "it's not the super rich elite at independent schools" threads, doesn't it?