How can it be possible that we would be so skint!

[BasinHaircut]

Just doing some sums to basically work out whether we can ‘afford’ to have another child. We can, but I’ve just worked out that even though DH and I bring home £4500 per month net, PLUS childcare vouchers of £385 per month, once paying another set of childcare fees 4 days per week, after everything was paid out each month we would have £750 left over for food, petrol and other spends. There would be 4 of us to feed so let’s say £300 a month, plus £100 petrol. £350 for all of us for anything else.

How is it possible that we would have so little? I know it would be short term (until free 15 hours kick in and then better again once they started school) but what the fuck???

Going through our expenses it’s only things such as amazon prime and Apple Music that we could feasibly claw back each month. Nothing that would make a dent.

We are lucky I suppose that we own our house, have renovated it already so not expecting any big expenses in the medium term. But still, even Xmas would be a real struggle!

This is not a stealth boast I promise, I genuinely cannot understand how we can have so much coming in and still not even have enormous go to justify a takeaway if we have another child.

Rainbow I love that it covers some shoes costs for you. That's excellent managing it in 15 mins!

I live in rural Scotland so totally get in some places a good weather worthy car is necessary. A fair number of folk round here have 4x4's and while it seems odd during the summer in the winter DEFINITELY necessary - not just snow but also heavy rain which smaller lighter cars don't cope as well with (scary memories of being stuck in what could only be described as a temporary ford when I first moved here)

I think you need to weigh up your desire to have a second child, benefits to your son having a sibling against 3 years of being fairly tight with money until the youngest gets free hours.

My DD and her husband are expecting their second DD and have planned it so the 30 free hours kick in for their eldest at 3 just as my DD returns to part time work and has to pay for the baby. They use the tax free childcare scheme for their eldest DD at the moment. We have our granddaughter one day and other grandparents have her another so they just need to pay for 3 days.

I think unless you have family help or a really high income (I actually don't think £80k for London is amazingly high) it is expensive to have kids. I have not rtft but is asking grandparents for help on one day an option? I know you should not have to but it may help you bridge the gap until they are both in school and you just need wrap around care. I agree that £750 is not huge but I would think it is doable if you are careful using vouchers for days out etc etc. It will obviously mean things like holidays would need to be cheap but many families with young kids cannot afford holidays anyway.

I don't get why people are questioning the OPs need for a car. We lived in outer London (until priced out 30 years ago so moved to south west luckily on job move for DH) and would still have needed a car to get to railway station, take kids to nursery or childminders and get to work as I did not work in central London. Greater London is a big place and even if you have a season ticket it does not cover kids and some places you still need a car to get there especially at weekends.

"I never said the car saves me time. You have invented that" no I didn't invent it I was responding to a pp who suggested that may be a reason

Actually I UNDER estimated

Childcare -

You £1100+£450 = £1550
Me - £1200

So that's £350

Travel - I asked if the gold pass would save you or if you were eligible for yp railcard I don't know how much either or both of these would save you.

Loan - would depend on your credit rating

Council tax - would need your postcode but based on my own area the difference between the 2 lowest bands is £150 a year

Water - reduce usage - loads of ways to do this without it even hardly affecting you

Energy - reduce usage, do you have a smart meter yet?

Car insurance - i asked if you'd shopped around i believe the ones that a "black box" is used are quite a bit cheaper

AND it depends on the car but I get that if its on finance you can't change that right now. Generally speaking you don't need a weather tough 4x4 in London

Insurance - shopping around but you've said you've done that so ok

Petrol - checking apps for cheapest supplier nearby, efficient driving, using car less where possible

Prime/music you've said yourself could go

Swimming lessons - if it costs more for you + DC that's shocking. But I don't have the same issue here (free swimming for under 18's)

If I say £10 average saving for each item listed without an amount cos I think that'd work out about right, thats £450pcm saved.

Cornishclio - genuine question what would you have done if you couldn't have afforded a car?

Ok so you are plucking figures out of the air. Fair enough.

Graphista - genuine question what would you have done if you couldn't have afforded a car?

DH had a company car and I had one which we bought ourselves as he worked long hours and I did not want to be transporting the children on public transport. If I could not afford it then obviously I would have used public transport or walked. I would have given up other stuff before giving the car up though. We moved out of London because we could not afford to live there.

Ok thanks Cornish

Op no ESTIMATES based on EXPERIENCE

Trust me you could not reduce the cost of my public transport expenses, council tax, energy, Insurance’s, water, swimming lessons, or claim the childcare savings or cancelling prime etc as your ideas as I had already said that I was aware of the savings to be made there.

That leaves the car and loan.

The car is paid for and yes we could sell it, buy one for £500 and bank the difference but from my own experience that would be a false economy in the short, medium and long term.

We could potentially re-do the loan and extend the term or find a marginally lower interest rate (but I doubt it) than when we took it out so possibly another tenner saved there.

Yea ok then 🙄

OP my suggestion to you would be to take around 6 - 12 months before making your decision and during this time put away the £1,100 that your child care would cost and see how you feel when you are actually living on your new budget. This has the benefit of also giving you a savings buffer as I don't think that £350 per month for all expenses aside from essential bills and food is a lot at all. I say this as someone whose income is around half of your family income but with far lower outgoings.

FWIW in a slightly different position to yours we made the decision to stick with one DC. This was partially financial and partially around my age - I don't regret our decision as there have been occasions where DH has been out of work for a couple of months and we have been able to get by on my salary due to our low essential outgoings. I know that DS would have loved a sibling though.

Well, it is what it is OP. Just a case of one or the other really, would you prefer a more comfortable lifestyle or another child? Either way you'll be making a sacrifice you'll have to live with.
It's a bit like living on cake and still wanting to be healthy. It's not possible and you either want cake the most of you want to be healthy the most. Which ever you decide you'll still want the other but you lump it.
We have 2/3 your income but about 3 times the spare cash. It's all down to choices, we both walk to work, I've dropped my career and work part time, we only have one DC, live upt north yadda yadda. The point is, you have choices and there's no right or wrong. Bit of soul searching and a pro's and cons list is what you need ☺

Just to pop up with the figures for food etc:

Per the ONS an average household (different data set says average size is 2.4 people) spends £56.80, on food and non alcoholic drinks per week. This excludes toiletries and household goods (which come under “miscellaneous goods and services” and “household goods and services” which are another £3970 and £35.50 per week respectively. Assuming reasonably conservative estimates we can add another £5 per week for this I think (shampoo, conditioner, shower gel, razors, dishwasher tablets, washing up liquid, clothes washing liquids, white vinegar, bleach, soda crystals, dishwasher salt, rinse aid, napisan/alternative stain remover, scourers, washing up gloves, toothbrushes, loo roll, sanitary ware, I’m classifying this as totalling £2 per person per week, and I think frankly it’s very likely to be more than that) and then there’s another £11.40 per week average on alcohol and cigarettes. So let’s add £5 per week (again conservatively) for alcohol.

Suddenly we are up to an average spend (for 2.4 people) of £66.80. The OP says they anticipate spending £75 for 4 people, so this would be Less than the average.

Note also that even households in the lowest decile of income spend on average £40 per week (plus whatever additional costs on toiletries, household goods and alcohol), for their average size of 2.4 people.

Sources: www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personalandhouseholdfinances/expenditure/bulletins/familyspendingintheuk/financialyearendingmarch2016/pdf

www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/families/bulletins/familiesandhouseholds/2016#average-household-size-remains-stable-over-the-decade-to-2016

Compared to some of my friends on a similar income youre mortgage is quite small and you’re already quite frugal with your food spend. I’d struggle to do 350 a month for 3 of us and were often at over double that which has been a bit of a wake-up call for me reading the thread and the responses to it. Unfortunately double child care is a killer. My sister had to use savings until her’s were both past 3. You do still have time and the income to be able to do that. On our current incomes double childcare would be tight for us but doable in the short term. We are planning a gap so we’re not double running nursery for too long and we will have the 15 hours. Twins would mean a nanny which would be a lot more problematic as we couldn’t afford 3 in nursery.

Personally I’d struggle on having 350 left because I’ve grown used to a certain income lifestyle. That isn’t to say I’d be poor but it would be an adjustment. It’s natural that people get used to their income and raise their spending accordingly. Things others perceive as luxuries become essentials. We have high fixed costs and it can be easy to question where our disposable income is going but ultimately our choice to have a big mortgage and commute is a choice and hopefully one day the mortgage will allow us to build a lot of equity. It doesn’t always feel that way when you’re under pressure to sustain a certain level of earnings though.

The other thing is that it is very easy to get into a bubble where certain things seem normal but aren’t. As an example, all of my friendship group and people in baby classss seemed to do baby swimming at £15-17 a class plus 1-2 other cheaper classes while on mat leave. That alone would take out a big chunk of your £350 spare a month and clearly for lot of people isn’t an option and would be a luxury. But to me that seemed normal because everyone was doing it and i would have felt left out if I wasn’t too. I think that is how lifestyle costs start to ramp up especially if you’re in an affluent area.

Someone, graphista I think, was suggesting upthread that you shop around for water companies. Do you have a choice of them in London then? I'm in the north west and we just have the one in my area.

One comment: many of you assume "30 free hours". In and around London, these are very, very hard to get as the state funding is miles below the actual costs. Around here (outer london/ surrey border), hardly anybody offeres 30 hours (and the ones that do often are in financial trouble, or "require improvement "), and even the 15 hours are subsidized, hardly ever free. when our oldest son got them, it saved us about £150 per month. a nice saving, and very welcome, but not "free childcare". especially if you have a £2000+ childcare bill (2 kids)

Right, having had a bit of a sleepless night for other reasons, I have been thinking a bit more about this and its clear that the obstacles really are childcare and mortgage, even though my mortgage is relatively low already. Even if was possible to save a couple of quid here and there on utilities etc, it wouldn’t be enough to change the scale of the issue IYSWIM. Some things are what they are, e.g. travel to work, expensive but nothing I can do about it.

So I’ve looked at what would happen if we extended our mortgage term up to 30 years as someone suggested - this would save about £200 a month on a 3 year fixed deal.

I’d have to look into the specifics as I’m not sure of the rates of childminders other than my own and she doesn’t take babies, but I’m going to say £75 a day for one all day and one wrap around school care, 4 days a week which is £300 a week (£1200) plus another average £100 a month to cover school holidays so £1300, and if I used the tax free childcare scheme I could knock about £300 off that. Does that sound right?

If it is, then that’s £750 a month better off.

I almost never posted that as I know some people will be offended about the amount of money I’m talking about, but for those who are in similar positions, I’d be interested to her what you think of my calculations and approach.

When my DH and I had twins and I later lost my job our income was 27k and we managed fine with little disposable income. We cut our cloth accordingly, had one car for years and lived frugally but happily. If you do have another child you will do the same automatically, but looks like you need to just wait for free childcare is all.

We both now earn about 1k or so less than you a month but still have more disposable income than you and our weekly food bill is not much different to yours, with two tweens and two adults.

My point being that it will be doable if you wait for childcare fees to pass.

We lease a car for 166 a month including MOT/tax. Is it possible for you to sell car and lease?

That sounds like a good plan Basin. I hope nobody flames you. Whether youre a millionaire or on income support everyone wants to make the most of the money they have comng in.

OP we used a childminder for our two at one point as we couldn't afford nursery (this was before I lost my job!) and I compacted my hours into longer days too to save on fees. It did work so think your childminder suggestion is very sensible.

Cab't advise on mortgage as we seem to have been stuck on 20 years forever (even though mid 40s now).

So, you currently have £1490 spare a month.

Let's say you start TTC in the summer and are lucky enough to be pregnant by November...baby will arrive next August, which is 16 months away.

Let's say you could save £1200 from that spare £1490 a month.

(That still leaves you £290 a month to blow on frivolities).

£1200 x 16 months = £19,200 tucked away in a savings account by the time baby arrives.

I don't know anyone who has been that fortunate, tbh.

EVERYONE has to tighten their belts when they have kids.

No idea why you've been so snippy with Graphista who has taken an awful lot of time to try and help you.

husky the reason I was being snippy with graphista is becyae she was basically calling me a liar, banging on and on about how she didn’t understand why I needed a car (which is irrelevant anyway), implying I was wasting money there that could be saved when it can’t.

I was trying to tease out how she could save me money when she wouldn’t give me a straight answer, seeing as I responded to the suggestions she made saying I’d essentially already done all of those things. But she just made the same suggestions again as if they were new ideas.

Swimming where I live is £27 per month per child but I'd have to pay £8 per session for me and one child, so I think it's quite common for swimming lessons to be cheaper than paying for 2 lots of fees. OP Have you looked at PCP for a good second hand car? Mine is £130 per month and includes servicing etc. It's also an electric car, so no petrol . When I got it? there was a government deal where they paid for an electric point in our house. Our bills aren't noticeably higher. Or if you get a hybrid, the fuel costs are much lower. Other than that, wait until child 1 is 5 if you can.

Based on your latest info OP, I think it still boils down to preference and what you're most comfortable with. Do you want a second child or a shorter mortgage term more? And that's such an individual call. Nobody here can make it for you.

I agree with other posters about starting to save more now too. If you can build up more of a cushion then the inevitable car repairs, house maintenance etc doesn't have to come out of whatever your spare money pot will be.

@MiniTheMinx @BasinHaircut yep, that includes breakfast and dinner for two adults for a week, materials for lunch at work (usually something like avocado on toast, cup a soup and two pieces of fruit) and snacks for my toddler like fruit and yoghurt plus his meal stuff for non- nursery days ( he gets three meals a day when he's there so we just give an evening snack, but we feed him four days he's not there of course!), cat food, cleaning supplies etc. I'll happily screen shot my last receipt from last night if it helps! How does it work? We shop at Aldi ( I know you said you do too!), we always but what fruit and veg they have on offer and plan meals around that. I batch cook on a Sunday or use my slow cooker to save time as we're both at work. I will say that we like to either go out to eat or cook an elaborate meal and have people over on a Saturday and we do pay for that separately out of our personal spends. Same if I fancy going out for lunch or a coffee during the week - these aren't included. If we need something like washing powder we will get it from wherever has a good offer and go there to get it. It does sound frugal but I never feel we're going without food wise or not picking what we want. My husband is a wealth manager and I work at a university, we're both on decent incomes but have a few hefty expenses. He's quite penny pinching when it comes to stuff like the food shopping and has passed it all on to me! But it means that we have money left over for a couple of nice holidays a year, regular days out, bought new car for cash last year, new clothes etc most months and still save for home renovation works and rainy days. He's much better financially than me as you'd hope and has taught me a lot, including building up a cushion of money in the joint account by us both overpaying into it and watching expenses that covers unexpected car repairs, replacing washing machine and other shock costs. Mortgage will be paid off by 40 and no debts. No one ever handed either of us anything - we both graduated with debts and no inheritance. He's a clever one and tbh I'm lucky to have him because I was awful with money when I met him - a student with a new outfit every week on store cards! I shudder now when I think what situation I might be in if I'd carried on like that. I feel for you though. It annoys me when people try to be sanctimonious about how much disposable income is the right amount. We all have choices to make about money and different circumstances and everyone that works hard has the right to a decent life where a day out isn't some unimaginable luxury. One other thought - is there any way you could take on some extra work to provide more pin money? I do occasional freelance writing and consultancy that pulls in a little extra. I use holiday, evenings or lunch times to fit it in. Really wouldn't be enough to live on but it's extra on top of normal salary to go into savings or spend on treats, at the cost of a little downtime. It means I'm busy as I won't do it in my time with my son but it's worth it. I'm hoping it will supplement my maternity pay with my second baby while I'm off for a year also x