to ask why having kids is expensive?

[HodgePodge23]

What do you need to buy them apart from toys, food, clothes and a few other bits and bobs here and there? I have an 8 month old so maybe things will get more expensive with time, but I really don't understand why people say having children is expensive. What are people spending their money on?

[formerbabe]

Even if you are a sahm and dont have to pay for childcare (like me) you are still worse off because if you didn't have the children, you'd invariably have a job.

[HmmAnOxfordComma]

So you're a SAHM? Then your do already costs you one lost income... £1k per month ish even for a minimum wage job...

[Pippioddstocking]

Childcare , loss of earnings , bigger house , transport for extra people , food for extra people .

If your lucky then school fees , holidays and hobbies on top of that !

[budgiegirl]

Babies are not too expensive , once you've got all the basic equipment.

But teenagers cost a fortune!! Food, food and more food. Clothes. School trips. School bus fair, or a bike. School uniform/football kit/cricket whites/karate uniform. Club fees. And shoes. One size up and suddenly you need at least four new pairs of shoes (school, 2 pairs trainers, football boots)

Plus there are additional costs that they don't necessarily need, but you may want them to have - phones, laptops, daytrips out, pocket money.
Possibly private school fees or tutors.

Plus if you want a holiday, it's far more expensive for a family than for a couple. Plus the premium because you can only go in the school holidays.

Children are VERY expensive !

[coff33addict]

childcare (we paid over the years in excess of £60k in nursery fees for our DC).

if you are a SAHM and don't pay for childcare, surely you have a massive loss of earnings. have you never considered it?

[GreyAndGoldInTheMeadow]

Ah I remember that little bubble of thinking this isn't so bad, got the routine sorted, life's calmed down and seams to all be running smoothly. Then they get bigger, hungrier, clothes and shoes are expensive and then there is school uniforms, they start having opinions of which toys they'd like rather than being happy with the simple inexpensive toys. Enjoy it while it lasts op things tend not to stay so simple.

[SurlyCue]

I'm a stay at home mum so we won't be spending any money on childcare

So theres your annual salary already it has cost you. Even at min wage youre talking at least £10k a year

[UrethraFranklin1]

Bit of a stupid question. Housing costs, heating costs, car costs, childcare, food, school stuff, clothes, shoes, furniture, entertainment, loss of future earnings, medical care, holidays, birthdays, christmas, toys, cleaning supplies, decoration, nappies, university the list is endless.

You think "maybe things will get more expensive in time"? Well no shit sherlock.

[GinandJag]

It's not about direct stuff for the child. Even the major items are often covered by gifts from grandparents.

The main thing in the early years is loss of earnings and/or childcare.

As the family grows, you may need a bigger car and house.

Holidays become more expensive.

If you pay for education, this is the biggest cost of all.

[NickNackNooToYou]

Ahhhh you have an 8 month old, explains a lot.

I have a 9 & 10 year old they literally leach money out of me - food (my eldest has been known to eat 5 weetabix in a sitting, very active child!) Clothes, shoes, extra activities etc etc. Plus as I went part time my career vamooshed so add loss of earnings in. Extra bums on seats for flights, ferrys, hotels - the list goes on.

You have no clue & I'm sure it'll get worse as mine his teenage years - revisit this thread in 8 years & we can re-discuss

8 months was a piece of piss, once they start talking & walking life gets interesting & more expensive

[AndNowItsSeven]

Kids within reason are as expensive as you want them to be. We have 7 dc ranging from 5 months to nearly 17.
Our dc share bedrooms, ( we have a four bed) pass clothes on , shop in Aldi , holiday in the Uk etc
They do activities but chosen wisely ie brownies £2 a week,weekly kids club free etc. Swimming here is free for under 18 year olds.

[IAmAPaleontologist]

Childcare

Time off work when they are ill. Or the childminder is ill.

Every bus or train trip once they turn 5 costs more as you buy their ticket plus yours.

In fact anywhere you might need a ticket for you have to pay for them too.

They eat rather a lot. A heck of a lot.

They keep bloody growing. And big child clothes cost more than baby clothes even when you buy off ebay/in charity shops.

They need more pairs of shoes as they get older. A toddler can do with one pair plus a pair of wellies. An older child needs a pair of school shoes, a pair of trainers that live in school in his PE kit, a pair of trainers for home. Wellies. Football boots/rugby boots/ballet shoes/riding boots depending on hobbies. Walking shoes and so on.

Bikes.

School uniform.

Coats.

School dinners/good variety of stuff for packed lunches.

"Voluntary donations" for school trips.

Endless sponsor money requests.

Subs for hobbies (and mine don't even do much!)

Books.

Toys. They might not need loads and loads but while a packet of tissues and a cardboard box might entertain an 8 month old you might get odd looks from a 10 year old.

Each additional child needs a bed to sleep in, a seat in the car and so on. Once you get past 2 children you've outgrown most "family" rooms in hotels.

Could go on.

Of course you can do it on less than many of the lists you'll find online and as a SAHM then yes, you won't have childcare and stuff. You will still ened resources to home educate though, even if taking an "unschooling" approach you will still have outings, entry fees, books and so on.

[ifgrandmahadawilly]

Childcare and keeping a roof over your head.

Many people suddenly go from 2 salaries supporting 2 people to 1 salary supporting 3 people. Paying more rent.

[ommmward]

HodgePodge - we home educate, and my lot are quite a bit older than yours.

Here's where the child-related money goes, out of the single family income:


Home Ed groups (usually about £5 per family per day, which covers hall hire and materials for particular activities - these are usually run as a co-op between the families. We do one or two of these per week)

Clothes (because the hand-me-downs disappear once the kindly hand-me-downers' children begin to have worn their clothes to shreds before they can be passed on. Charity shops also have less and less available as the children get bigger for the same reason. I get stuff off Ebay, but it's still not free any more)

Educational/play materials that is truly valuable to our family (and yes, lots of it is charity shop stuff, but it's still often necessary to buy things that make it possible for a child to pursue a passion)

Plastic crap from charity shops or Ebay (because: children)

Food

Season tickets to cool places (we limit this to 2 or 3 per year, and then cycle around - zoo one year; national trust the next year) but it still adds up

Cost of regular sports activities with other home edders (costs me £30 a week at the moment, sometimes £35)

Petrol (I drive about 100 miles a week just to facilitate their education and social life - slightly far flung community of HE friends)

Cost of one-off educational trips (this week it'll be £20; sometimes we go for weeks without needing to pay for anything)

Random meals out (about £70 a month) when I wasn't organised enough to pack lunch but we are out for the day

There is an excellent barter system around home edders - I got a free, almost new, bike for one of mine recently from a friend who just said "oh, pass their old one onto someone for free and we'll call it quits". And of course there's lots of skills sharing. But even pretty frugal home edding has financial implications :D

[HodgePodge23]

Well that shut me up! Sounds like a lot to look forward to..

[NewLife4Me]

HodgePodge.

We have 3 dc although two are now grown up. We haven't found it expensive but we aren't keep up with peer pressure types.
We don't have holidays away as we don't feel we need to get away from anything.
SAHP so no childcare costs, ever
I do think you can spend as little or as much as you want to.
If you encourage frugality (if that's a word) and teach them the difference between want and need, the value of money etc, they won't ask for much.
Children aren't expensive it's the lifestyle you choose for them that determines how expensive they are.

[meglet]

breaking the tv isn't cheap either. mine have broken 2.

[bittapitta]

My toddler practically eats adult sized portions now, so food costs soon mount up.

Shoes - £20-30 a pop and they grow out of them every few months

Childcare and or loss of earnings (didn't you have a job 8+ months ago then?)

[formerbabe]

my eldest has been known to eat 5 weetabix in a sitting, very active child

Mine too! Nice to know I'm not the only one!

[CaptainHolt]

Loss of income is the biggest thing (or childcare - up to the age of 11 usually)

Holidays are a fortune, we've only had 2. Travel is expensive once they are over 5 (trains) or 2 (planes). Extra curricular stuff adds up. Swimming is not to bad, brownies/cubs is cheap, music is a bloody fortune. Eating out when they are older is no longer taking a sippy cup and asking for a plate for the baby. They have an adult portion past about 8/9 (ds1 has been known to eat 2 main courses), then a drink each (or 2) and then because the baby gets a pudding included in the kids meal you feel bad for not buying one each for the older kids too. Shoes every 5 minutes when they go through a growth spurt (plus wellies, trainers, football boots). Bigger car, more petrol as you ferry them around. Food! My God, the food they get through. Bigger house than you need for a couple/single person. Clothes for a teen are more expensive than for an 8 month old, even if they don't give a shit about them looking nice.

[IAmAPaleontologist]

I will add that we are fairly low cost. I have 3 of them and we buy a lot second hand, clothes are handed down as are bikes, they don't have their own ipads and stuff (they have my old laptop which overheats after around 20 min use so I needed a new one for my degree and they have my sister's old ipad from when she upgraded). They only get new toys at Christmas and birthdays adn they get 50p a week pocket money. But things still cost money. The older 2 go to Beavers and Cubs at the village hall so that's £40 a term subs plus of course extra for camp and sleepovers or activitity days should we want to send them, which we tend to do as they have fun and do all sorts of things. They also play rugby and dh coaches so that is family membership to the rugby club. Over the summer they have played cricket. We have family membership to the National Trust rather than the couples membership you can have without children or with an under 5, the list goes on!

[sliceofsoup]

Babies are cheap. Once they hit school age thats when the real expense starts.

Schools are forever asking for money for this and that, the uniform, trips, birthday presents for the parties they get invited to, throwing whole class parties in the early years of school etc.

Swimming lessons cost a freaking fortune, dance lessons, all the gear they need for these activities, and the travelling to them.

Christmas and birthdays don't have to be expensive, but as they get older they do want the same as their friends, and the things they want cost more. Clothes get more expensive, and shoes, and they eat more.

I do sometimes wonder about people who have lots of babies close together and don't necessarily realise the extent of how expensive older children are, and do they ever feel like they should have thought it through more.

[LaChatte]

I live in France and have a 6yo and a 13yo. Childcare was state funded, so DH and I both work FT. All food is made from scratch and doesn't cost much at all. Both DC's have a small allowance (10€/month for 6yo, 30€/month for 13yo), we buy all their clothes and shoes in the sales in July and January, so it's pretty cheap. Seeing as we both work in schools we don't have to pay for childcare during the holidays, so as long as we have the energy to occupy them, it costs very little.

Overall they have cost much so far.

[Sallyhasleftthebuilding]

Clothes, shoes, activities, holidays, lost earning, food, friends over, nights out .. all adds up.

[YoureAllABunchOfBastards]

School shoes. Bloody hell, second mortgage time.

Food. Clothes. Keeping them busy.

Gin. That's the biggie.