For me to be a SAHM my DH would have to earn.....

[CPHB2021]

Following on from a thread of 'if you knew all would be ok, I would...' and a resounding about said 'leave work and be a SAHP' I would absolutely LOVE to do this and by scraping the barrel, we probably could but we'd have little to no disposable income. I would only leave if I was able to still take my children to do things, meet friends for coffee etc. Go abroad once a year still. Have some money in savings. I often wonder HOW some of the mums at school don't work, we are technically 'above average' income which seem LUDICROUS given that we use almost all of it, every month! We live in the SE and I think our outgoings must be quite high! How much would one person have to earn for you to leave work?

I'm a sahm and DH earns just under £30k, no benefits apart from child benefit. It's only until youngest is in pre school which will be in another year

At the moment our joint income of around £47K a year is fine for us. I only earn £15K part time, and if we lost that we'd get a small amount of universal credit on just his income, and things would be tighter but we'd still manage. We have plenty at the mo to cover bills and food, even with the costs having risen.
We have a cheap mortgage though, don't really like holidays abroad (love a haven caravan site!), children don't have expensive hobbies, and only need to run one car as partner has a work van. We do have takeaways every week and both smoke, (him straights, me rollies), and go on occasional expensive days out. We'd have to cut those things out, and I ain't giving up my takeaways and smokes 🙈😂 so I shall not be become a sahp!
I'm happy working part time, best of both worlds for me, and I hope to do it till I retire, although will need to think about extra pension contributions at some point.
Astounded by some of the amazing salarys on here, I know no one in real life on anything over about £60K.

The SAHM parent isn't sitting around drinking cocktails, they're working hard too, in a partnership. It's usually a joint decision and can benefit everybody.

No of course not but the thread is about wanting to be a SAHP and choosing to do so if the option was there, so it’s obviously something the person would find more enjoyable than working FT.

I personally would think it was much more fair that both parents had equal working hours, childcare duties and housework duties.

DH wouldn't want to work part time and is happy in his job as is. He'd be happy for me not to work if finances allowed it.

My husband could earn 1 million a month/year and I would never be a SAHM

I personally would think it was much more fair that both parents had equal working hours, childcare duties and housework duties

but how is that fair if it’s not what both parents want? That’s arbitrary fairness

I was a SAHM when DH was earning £29k initially. Financially it was incredibly tight and we did a lot of robbing Peter to pay Paul.

Now we both work and in total earn around £110k combined. Things amazingly are still tight courtesy of a large mortgage and I know we couldn't afford to live on less.

We could afford it - just - now. But it would be tough as our mortgage is big and expenses just seem to go up all the time. So I am working 3 days, my husband does 4 and our children have 2 days in childcare. In an ideal world I’d love to be an SAHM for a few years until both my children were at school but only if we wouldn’t miss my salary at all which isn’t the case for us.

But sometimes some parents have no choice especially if child care becomes too expensive and no need to feel guilty if your dh is the only one working or the other way round. I was made to stay at home and look after my 4 children while my husband worked and most of his work was abroad so it was too much for me to work and care for 4 children and he was earning a lot and never struggle for anything and I went back to work last year

To cover my earnings then I'd say 65k. But that's money to save and still have treats and a few uk holidays a year. Our monthly outgoings are about £2400.
Some of those salaries are astounding!!

About 50-60k would be comfy I think. I would work and have DH as the SAHP though- I like working more than he does and he’s a better cook!

I don't think the earnings matter, it's what your expenses are. So if all expenses are covered and some left over to save then that's 'enough'

On that income with more than one child you should be entitled to some universal credit. Have you tried a benefits calculator?

Interesting thread. I’m surprised that so many would want to become a SAHM given how most threads go on here that SAHM is the hardest job in the world, 24/7, no breaks etc. I wonder how much money the DH would want the mum to earn to enable them to be a SAHD. Surely all the mums would jump at being a high earning working parent.

Really interesting reading all of these....
Our monthly outgoings are £3,700. This is inclusive of all bills, food, fuel etc. We then have between £700-£1500 disposable each month ( varies as DH is self employed ) and we use the bigger months to put into savings, book holidays etc. So I suppose for us, as a family, we would need absolute minimum £65k net.

I have just dropped a day at work so disposable has dropped too, but we decided that a 4 day week for me was worth the loss.

No amount. I value my independence and would never rely solely on another person to support me. I want a partner, not a parent..

I think you're missing the point, often to be a SAHM you need your own money, not your husbands! I stayed at home until my eldest was 5, I did this because I had my own independent means of income at the time. I could do it now, again with an inheritance but prefer to spend it on other things (I work full time these days) I have a friend who is a SAHM and although her husband earns a 6 figure salary, her dad is a millionaire and worst case scenario he tops up their income. So it's a bit of a myth I think. The women I've known who have stayed at home on their husbands salary are sadly ones coerced into that situation with no means to escape. Not to say all SAHM are in that position but it's not always something to envy. Having done it for 5 years myself it was brilliant but wouldn't go back to it. Fun when you can hang out in the sunshine and do things with friends in your own time, less fun when you're just traipsing up to school and back and doing housework.

Of course people can't resist the opportunity to say they could never be a SAHM and reliant on a man, the pension thing etc etc - ad nauseum. That wasn't the question, was it.

100k just to have the (cheapish) lifestyle we have now, for a more comfortable lifestyle probably more like 140k ish? (We live in the North though, se we'd probably struggle on this I suspect with a huge mortgage)

East with low mortgage, DH new salary of 65k will be fine

DH earns 40k & I’m a SAHM. We can easily afford reasonably priced days out, don’t think of coffees etc. But holidays take some more planning ahead, but we still go once a year.

Friend’s of ours… DH earns 70k & DW earns 20k & they're forever complaining about being skint. Depends on the people. This thread highlights that. 100k+? Really?

My DH's income is nowhere near as much as other people's here but for us the thing that's allowed me to be a SAHP is a really cheap mortgage;we pay £198 a month;most of my friends pay a mortgage/rent of about £700-£1000 a month so on an average of £850 a month we save £652 on mortgage/rent payments.

My dh earns 60+ and I earn 50+
we have no mortgage,car payments or debt. Very little childcare and we save 1.5-2k per month. There’s no way I would give up work! It doesn’t interest me. I love my work, I have great colleagues, it’s my social outlet and It makes me feel productive.

All these blokes apparently earning more than 100k per year…!

What job do they have?! Or are posters making stuff up? 😉