Can I actually afford it?

[Thisisembarassing]

Another child. I have 2 already. I really want another but there’s been a lot of posts lately about this sort of thing and it’s got me second guessing my own financial security for another child whereas previously I thought it would be fine.

mortgage 4 bed- £1400 a month
council tax 160 a month
elec/ gas- £160 (very energy efficient house)
food £500 a month
car insurance £80 a month
neflix- can’t remember £16 a month?
internet and phones £60
childcare £600 (funding we’re lucky that the nursery is one of the cheapest in the area but one of the best, it’s attached to a school so they do the funding very fairly, so we actually benefit from the government funding quite heavily)

income £6k

lifestyle. We like 2 abroad hols a year (nothing really extravagant, but we deal hunt and get a free child place, we go for wherever we get a deal, normally spend 2.5k on the hols) and a UK city break (nothing fancy premier inn and do tourist stuff, Edinburgh flights are free through work, london etc) and a UK hols (haven, butlins etc)

we save £50 for each child a month and now we can get CB again will save that equally for the kids. There are progression opportunities at work. We both have good parental leaves 6 months FP and phased return to work at full pay and 30 days hols each.

we save for us too, probably around £700 a month.

we both get bonuses too, probably between 10/20% of salary depending on performance and pay rises above inflation.

space wise even though we’ve enough bedrooms we might struggle but could make it work.

we already have a 7 seater car.

its fine right, this works? Honestly before MN I’d have thought this is fine, but since joining not long ago, it’s actually got me worrying. I cant think about moving up yet job wise either, just took a promotion at work

I'd rather be comfortable with 2 then risk being stretched with 3. I think with the cost of living how it is and you are managing to save some money I personally would stay as you are.

There are always ways to afford top level instruments if you ever get to that point. There are grants, funding or you can take out a loan if needs be.

due to inflation or?

That’s what I mean really, if my eldest said mum I want to play the flute, I’d say ok, here’s one (one that I’ve come into ) and get a block of lessons, see how they get on. But I’m not setting back 12k for flute lessons for a child in primary school, that’s silly lol

Well I’d hope and most certainly be constantly working toward moving up work wise

It was a recent thread we’re someone paid around 12k for a musical instrument. It wasn’t a gift for a child. It was purchased for a professional musician who paid for the item out savings and they were going to claim some of the money back through self-assessment as it was a tool for their job.

Ah well that’s very different the implication upthread was that it was for child’s music lessons

I suppose the other thing to consider is whether you're confident you will still be able to reach your full career potential with 3 kids (both you, I don't just mean you) sorry to be somewhat morbid but whilst also considering what would happen if the child had additional needs (something I was really mindful of when weighing up a 3rd due to impact on my other children, felt like rolling a dice much more the third time).

Also finances aside, it sounds like you both have careers, just bear in mind how much time kids do need you, when they're younger it's during those childcare hours, but as they get older child nurturing looks different, it's helping them with their homework in the evening, it's taking them out for the day 1:1 getting them to talk as you've noticed a change in behaviour and you're worried, it's driving them to their friends houses. Time consuming stuff that adds a lot of value to a child's life and your relationship but that you will have to reduce across 3 children especially if both working careers.

Sorry you can tell where we landed on the discussion can't you 😂

Inflation would be a good start, but, if one person lost position at work would the numbers still stack up? Do you have a good emergency fund because if you haven’t that’s an emergency

Kids clubs? Hair cuts, your gym, life insurance, pension contributions, etc

ive Just got one child (2 months) and in such a baby bubble I’m convinced I now want three kids. Our outgoings and income is similar to yours and for us it would be doable. Also, I think you do just adapt and make it work.

Kids clubs is factored into childcare, hair cuts adhoc so from our own personal fund, kids hair cuts are around £10 each if they want fancy ones as they get into the teen years then that’s where jobs come in, don’t go to the gym or pay memberships for that, LI are deducted from our pay (so prior to the £6k monthly) for us and the kids, it cover CIC and IP and DI as well as LI, it’s far cheaper through work than on the free market. Pension deducted at source around 15% contributions, we pay 4/5% and employer the rest.

So if one of us lost our jobs, say from redundancy (poor performance is unlikely and then it would still come with a settlement after probation) there would be the settlement firstly and then we have about 6 months living expenses in savings. Atm 3 because we just bought a car. But in that eventuality holidays would be the first to be paused as would childcare aside from maybe 1 day but all wrap around care would be paused.

worst case there to ensure income we’d go to day to day contracting, even if it was at a lower pay rate to ensure cash is coming in. Tbh we’d do that regardless of 2 or 3 kids

Personally if I was you I wouldn’t, but of course everyone will feel differently.

For me it would mainly be that 3 young kids are significantly cheaper than 3 kids at say age 10/11+. I felt very fortunate growing up that my mum and dad took us on an abroad holiday & some kind of staycation every year, if we wanted or needed new clothes they got us them, once we were getting the bus to school (secondary school) we needed phones and they got those for us ( 3 x phone bills could add another £150 to your monthly budget straight away), we could go on any of the school trips we wanted to (school trips in primary & especially in comp aren’t cheap), once we were old enough (11/12) if we wanted to go to the cinema/food/shopping with friends they would give us the money to go do that, if we went food shopping and fancied something it was never an issue to pop it in the trolley, once we were older they paid for our driving lessons for our 17th birthdays… even things like Christmas/birthday presents, age 0-8 ish you could spend £100 and have a huge pile of amazing presents they love, whereas at age 10 it could be a £200 games console or a £300 ipad.

Essentially for me I’d rather be able to give my children everything, rather than stretch further just to have 1 more. I also think right now you’re in the cheapest parenting years, it will look very different in say 5 years time.

would you say you wouldn’t based on our income or just more generally 3 kids is x amount more expensive ?

We used to pay £1000 a month in childcare, surely it can’t get more expensive than that, their day to day living expenses?

re money to do stuff with their mates, i feel that’s a prime example of a) pocket money and b) a job for my kids. I think it’s a lesson in budgeting and not frittering money away so 1 kids or 3 that will be my position.

Full career potential? Hmm interesting, for us, i think our kids lit a fire under us to make us be more proactive at advancing ourselves because if not we’d have coasted frankly. Full career potential? I don’t know, i doubt we’ll make it to c suite level, i can see us both at snr roles, and maybe dh as a head of but i think it would stop there, but there’s enough money in those salaries tbh and the balance of stress.

my parents never helped with homework, ever. No revision or anything it was this is your life, it’s on you. I’m not sure I’d do the same as them but I think I’d definitely make time on an evening, after school for homework time as a family and dh and I can support in what way we can.

driving kids around and stuff, i feel that’s where compromise comes in for all
kids. I was never allowed to go anywhere as my mum didn’t want to drive me so I was reliant on friends parents who felt sorry for me or I just didn’t go. Couldn’t do that for mine so that’s I guess where organisation and compromise comes in and public transport I guess

Based on your income & 3 kids.

Even just thinking of your abroad holiday, once they’re too old for free child places that could comfortably be £3500 just for a cheap week in Spain.

Once all in primary/comp if they take an interest in any clubs/sports that is all money. My youngest cousin does cheerleading, £150 a month, her brother does football at £100 a month. None of them are cheap and all add up even with 2 kids.

3 kids in comp even just bare bones could be £150 in phone contracts, £120ish a month in bus fares if they need a bus (ours is £1.50 per way, 5 days a week for 3 kids). Even if you’re going to do pocket money/earning for jobs (which my parents also did), you still have to fund that amount.

School lunches in comp, say £3/4 a day, could be another £100-120 a month.

Is it doable on this income? Yeah, as in you could keep a roof over heads and food on table (depending on cost of living in general of course). But would I personally, with 6k a month, have 3 kids to fund through to adulthood? No. It is personal preference though and just depends on lifestyle you’d want to be able to have/give your kids.

In that scenario is our income as it is as of today by the time our kids are teens I’d definitely expect us to have made at least one career jump.

realistically DH’s next move which isn’t far off is to high 60s and that’s just s logical next move not a big jump and mine would be around 60. Dh could make that in the next year maybe 18 months. I maybe in 2 years. Even that would take our take home to about 7k a month

Again, for me personally, I wouldn’t make any huge financial decisions such as having another child based on “maybes” and “could be” changes to income. Unless you have the new job contract signed and in your hand, you don’t know if it’s coming. As a rule we make all decisions based on where we are right now, if I’m happy to do it where we are now then we’d know IF everything pans out perfectly and the extra money appears then it’s a bonus, but I wouldn’t base anything on income thats not a guarantee.

Anything could happen, work places fall into administration, even public sector jobs if there are budget cuts then promotions and recruitment freeze, sometimes for years at a time.

So I wouldn’t even consider what incomes might potentially be in the future when deciding if it’s doable. For us it’s a simple question of would we be able to have the lifestyle/give our kids the life we want to give them on the income we have now if we had another. The answer (for me personally) to that would be no.

I also think your current income would make things fairly tight having 3 DC.

Maybe make an annual budget for the whole year including absolutely everything, and see where you'd be in your current scenario, and with +1 DC.

Six months is to be fair not a very high emergency fund in today’s climate

@Thisisembarassing I definitely relate to the being motivated by kids argument, having kids young certainly put a fire under us and is why we are where we are, but equally, I knew our limitations.

I think you're being a tad naive repeatedly comparing parenting from your parents' time to ours, it's a different era. Is that really the kind of parent you want to be? I know I want the best for my kids, I want more for them than I had.

Ultimately, it sounds like you're emotionally invested in a 3rd and have made your mind up, you have an answer for everything (though I don't agree with your answers, from my own experience) and that's fine, but I think you need to consider realistically what that means for you and your kids, and not try to pretend that our arguments don't relate to you, because otherwise you won't actually be able to rationally consider the potential problems.

For me, 2+ is weighing up what is in the best interests of the children that already exist, and I've never been able to satisfy that a 3rd is more beneficial to the children than the time and resource parents of just 2 children can give. But plenty of people disagree with that, it's just being honest with yourself about your motivations and resolutions.

I heard an emergency fund of 3-9 months of necessary outgoings mentioned on a Meaningful Money podcast today. But it does depend on your exact situation and risk tolerance - I'm very risk averse, so I like to have 12 months of outgoings in my emergency fund.

You do have a good income so perhaps look at other reasons. What if your child had SEN could you still return to work? What if you ended up with twins?. You sound like you have a nice life... only you know OP how much you want baby no3. I think one thing to add is that I find kids around aged 8 expensive they eat full on meals (adult) well my DS does when we dine out, they want all the fastest things Ipad, nintendo switch. Clothes are more expensive for older DC too.

Financially I dare say that you could make it work.

But I would ask yourself how thin you want to stretch yourself in other ways whilst both trying to push up the corporate ladder. For example 3 kids is 1.5 times the amount of days off school/nursery with illnesses - that could be a lot unless you have significant family support. 3 sets of parent evenings, birthday parties to attend, plays and shows. 3 sets of homework to oversee and supporting the 11+ (dont underestimate how tough this can be). Compromising on who can do what activity - hard for everyone to play the same sport for example when you then have 3 different matches in a Sunday morning but only 2 of you to take them. is that all doable, yes with compromises. But it’s also tougher than 2.