To ask how you afford private school fees

[Elephantslovetofly]

We have a young DD, and although it's a while away yet we are thinking about school. The area we live in does not have a good local school, and we are considering an independent school for her

Disclaimer - I went to a private school and for what it's worth had a great education. I enjoyed being there and did well in exams. I believe my parents decided to send me there also because of a lack of a good local state school. I might have done fine at a state school, but will never know I guess

We are probably 45 min drive from the school I went to - further than is ideal. DH doesn't mind driving her there if we decide to send her there though (if she is fortunate enough to get a place)

The issue is whether we can afford it. The fees are about £9k per year for junior and £12k for senior. Assuming we therefore need to find £1k per month for fees

My cheeky question is this - if you have a child at private school, what does your household earn and how difficult is it to find the money each month to pay the fees? Our income is about £60k, and at the moment I don't think we can do it (along with our other current expenses). Wages might go up a bit before we would need to start paying, but if this is always going to be a pipe dream i'd rather get over it now

I know we could move closer to a good state school, but am exploring my options at this stage. Don't really want to move, as we have a good house here and are settled

Thanks for reading

Depending on where your secondary schools are, if you are thinking of moving to get into a very good primary school for 100k more for a house (also factor in moving costs, including stamp duty, additional interest on mortgage) will you have to move again to get into a good secondary? If you do then you are coming close to it being possibly cheaper to send her to a private school. Would second others comments about a 45 minute trip though, I'd try and find something closer. Are you sure you won't have more children, at a 60k income for 1, it's just about doable.

It's simple. Take your income, deduct your out goings, add a bit for contingency and if what's left is more than school fees, you can't afford it. Then you look to see if you can save money anywhere to make it affordable.

And if not, consider moving to an area where you like the state school. We were in a similar situation. In our case private schooling wasn't an option because our daughter has a disability and they don't provide the same level of support as the local authority, or if they do, you have to pay extra for it. Our reason for not going to the local school was lack of accessibility, rather than just not liking it. We had little choice so we looked into moving. This turned out to be far cheaper than school fees.

Children might always get "lost" in classes, be it a class of fifteen or a class of thirty. Teaching quality is what counts. A good teacher doesn't lose children.

I have two children at Garden House School, fortunately I come from a very wealthy background so money has and never will be an issue.

Most of that salary is mine, my job is one that is very much in the news right now (think Jeremy Hunt). DH is self employed and is becoming more of a SAHP hence why his contribution is low. Will save us a fortune on nursery fees though!

We have some equity, not masses though

Both of ours started off at state school. We moved DD to private for year 5 (state middle schools were not appealing), and DS a year later for year 4 (different holidays were a logistical nightmare).

Our combined salaries when DD went private were probably around £65k. However, it was clear that my salary would increase quite substantially (I was re-training at the time). Three years on our combined salaries are around £140k. So we've done it by increasing our earnings.

With hindsight, the single decision that enabled us to afford private school was never dropping to PT hours after having children.

Private school has made a huge difference to DD in particular. I really wish I'd switched her across earlier, rather than keeping her in state school to 'save money'.

Will your salary go up OP?

Can you start saving a thousand a month out of your income now. If you manage this, you will have a big wedge of cash when your DC starts school. I only sent the DDs to boarding school for 6th form but managed to negotiate a good discount by paying for 2 years up front.
I can't believe there are any state schools with 40 pupils.

If I had the funds I'd move my kids into private school (long backstory i wont go into and hijack your thread) in a heartbeat but unfortunately I don't.

I do echo other PPs though in saying if possible, to move, and get into an area with a nice school if you can. My DS is in a school in a nice area and he absolutely loves it. My DD is currently in a god awful school would love to go to his school too but sadly no spaces as of yet.

I'm just curious, if schooling is so important to people why buy a house in an area where the schools are crap, if you are planning on having children n? If it's purely down to not being able to afford the extra in the better area then isn't this a sign that you wouldn't be able to afford a private school either?

Or is it, OP, that your household income has gone up since you bought your house and now you're wondering if private were possible?

is it possible to downsize for a few years in a better area?

Yes my salary should go up before she will start school, she's only a baby now

Agree with Pp

Start stashing the 1000 a month now and see how you go.

Is it likely your DH will earn more once dd is at school?

The other option is send her to state primary, and then private for 11+, but save a good chunk of money each month until then, and see if you can negotiate a discount for paying for it upfront?

Long backstory regarding this house move which will likely out me, but children were not on our minds at the time as DH was seriously ill

I agree with Sue paying in chunks can also help. You can negotiate a discount with the burser and secure fixed fees for as long as you can afford. I've spoken to the financial team for the school our DC will hopefully go to and conversations with the burser are confidential so it's worth negotiating hard, they can only say no! Also you could argue that they can invest your lump sum to their advantage using their charity tax status and have the security that you are a reliable 'customer' rather than having to chase you for payment.

You are right Kathy - independent school fees used to be far more within the reach of 'normal' incomes. So with a bit of scrimping and saving you could send two kids to the nice private day school down the road.

However as others have pointed out, private school fee inflation has gone through the roof in recent years. If you aren't earning a LOT of money, then it usually some serious budgeting and determination to get them there - and there will often be help from GPs as well.

OP, you need to think very carefully. Are you planning any more DC? This is very important, because if you are then you need to think about whether you will be able to send them all? If not then how are you going to manage the 'gap' and the perceived unfairness between the DC at private and the DC at state?

You also need to consider fee inflation. I have a close friend who is educating her 3 DDs privately. When they were all small, it was fine - a bit of budgeting required but her and her DH both earned good money (over £150K p.a.). Fast forward to when the eldest was 12 and things were starting to get really tight. Her income had dropped so joint income was down to £100K p.a. - still a fantastic amount of money but the fees had started to climb as had the extras. Hockey, tennis, athletics kit, a history trip to Spain, weekends away at activity centres, riding lessons - and they will want to go to all of these.

Two have now finished school and the youngest has another year to go. They are in debt up to their eyeballs as they took loans and credit cards to keep paying the fees. When she started educating them privately the 3 of them were costing £20K p.a. plus extras (piano lessons etc.). She totted up the last year that all 3 of them were there and it cost over £70K. The problem that she had was that it started getting more expensive, but they were settled and had friends so she didn't want to move them. Then they started getting near to exam times so she couldn't move them.

Private fees are a treadmill, so you need to make sure that you can go the full distance before committing to them - or have a plan (like educate privately from 10/11 to 16 and then do 6th form college somewhere else)

Dh's earnings are much higher and we have one child.

Her friends situations vary. Some are very wealthy, some grandparents pay, some have businesses which pay, some live more frugally and forego holidays, etc. It also varies whether parents went to independent schools or not - we didn't, a few did.

Some people are incorrect with their class size info.
At key stage 1 class sizes are restricted to 30 children per teacher. There are no restrictions at key stage 2 (other than the PAN of the actual School) and it is very common to have class sizes in excess of 30. Many local state schools, including the junior school near to to my infant school, are 35+ with one class teacher.

The Telegraph has a fab section on the top 10 cheapest all round value for money private day schools. All under £15k pa, no e less than £11k pa. Some I know are fiercely academic and competitive to get into.

I think parents shouldn't assume their dc will get into the highest performing academic schools providing they pay. It's a careful cost benefit analysis. In Lo don we didn't feel we had a choice. Out here in Surrey the choice wouldn't have been as straight forward.

Here's an interesting article on how fees have risen enormously.

We have 4 dcs at prep. Fees range from £10k to £14k p.a. depending on what year they're in. I wish they'd have a flat fee from the beginning! Class sizes range from 15-20. It's a good school in lots of ways.

It's very tight though on a £215k salary.

We moved to an area with grammar schools. Ds1 will go grammar next year. We hope that the others will pass the 11+ too because frankly I'm not certain any secondary school is actually worth £20k++ p.a.

Op, I would move to an area with good state and or grammar schools. Supplement with private tuition.

40 minute drive is very long. Petrol costs would also go up.

One thing to take note on bursaries. My SIL and BIL rely on these to send their kids to a local private school.

Their finances are regularly scrutinised and I believe more than once they have been called in to go over the details of their application.

Elephants it sounds like your job is very similar to mine. In which case, given a few years you should be able to earn enough to send your daughter to a private school if you want to. It helps having a SAHP and if your DH is happy to do that until your DD starts school then that's worth thinking about for the saving in nursery fees (assuming he wouldn't earn enough to cover the childcare with any meaningful amount left over) - and the lack of headaches over what happens when your day overruns, as I am sure it does as often as mine did.

Our two DDs go to private pre prep school. We couldn't afford it personally (I currently work part time and our income is less than £60k at the moment) but a family education trust pays.
My husband and I both went to private school - in the 80s/90s when it was relatively cheaper and affordable to normal 'professionals'. These days our only friends sending their children to private school are those with help from grandparents/trust funds/the occasional banker. This is despite many of our friends having been to public school and/or top universities.
I totally agree with you in principle - private school is lovely if you can afford it. But a 45 min trip for a 5 year old is CRAZY. So definitely consider a different private school or moving house.
Looking back at my own schooling, I went to a 'cheap' private school from 5-16, then state sixth form followed by Oxford university. Whilst I loved the little private school up to 16, I'm not convinced it was responsible for my academic success (more likely genes and interested parents), while the brilliant state sixth form was where I developed social skills! My friends all come from sixth form and university - not school.
Good luck with your decision - I'm sure on £60k/one child it is possible to make work with a few sacrifices, but ask yourself what you are hoping your child will really gain from private. A small 'cheap' private school with 10 in a class might actually be more limiting that a larger state school.

Shartsi why on earth are you surprised about 60K salary between 2 people despite private education?! I find that comment quite offensive actually. In the real world 60K is not at all a bad income for a family, much more than the U.K. average, and a private education does not guarantee anything, including a high income. I find that comment also quite indicative of one of reasons people send their DC to private school, but I'll stop there.

We are older parents in our DS cohort - we have no mortgage, my DH is independently comfortable and has a small inheritance and recently can draw his pension too I have a big savings amount (depleting with fees) and a very small family income.

Other families in DS year group are a good 10 years younger than us - have huge mortgages and more children than we have - they have good city type jobs and most parents are working rather than sahm

We chose to not send our DC to private school, we could easily afford this without any sacrifices. DH earns a lot, I used to earn an OK wage, we have investments and we paid off our mortgage by the time we were mid thirties. DH attended a top public school thats fees are crazy expensive these days last time we looked they were about 25k per annum and that was a few years ago. I attended a state school. DS goes to a very average comprehensive. He has just finished his mocks and got excellent results and DD got decent grades though not as good as DS.

Educational outcomes are still I feel mainly down to parental input and the raw intelligence a child has which no amount of educating can change. Its the whole nature vs nurture debate, mindset is the one thing a parent can assist with rich or poor, private or state.

I worked in higher education for over 25 years and at the graduation parties that I attended for my students meeting parents and finding out post graduation plans was always an eye opener. The student that got work experience at the UN, the one whose parents bought him a flat in Docklands, the one whose Father was a diplomat. They left clutching a. 2.1 each like the vast majority but had advantage over many.

Its the old chestnut of who you know, my brother has offered my DS an internship when he is old enough in the states as he is one of the VP's of a global company. That's what's unfair right there, who you know. Is it old boys public school network, some of it is obviously by not all.