What kind of income do you think is comfortably needed for a family of 2 adults and 2 children?

[oneandmaybedone]

I’m interested to know people’s thoughts, I understand people get by in a variety of situations and it is subjective. (By ‘comfortable’ I mean, appropriate housing, two cars, afford maybe one holiday a year, no worries about putting food on the table and I don’t know- spare change lying about for the ice cream van).

Would you consider having one child if it meant you were able to work less hours, retire earlier and go on more days out/holidays? (Both UK and abroad)

I know you can’t put a price on family support, which is what is keeping us considering a second child in several years time. I always wanted a huge family as we have so much love to give but it’s balancing that with what you can manage, I think?

We both work and have decently paid jobs, probably each earn the UK average which I understand is maybe unusual for MN. It’s unlikely to be higher than this as we are both in sectors where wages stagnate, and we love what we do.

Looking objectively at our finances- what with the cost of childcare, managing on reduced income over maternity leave, housing, holidays and days out… it seems clear we would be able to provide better for one child rather than having multiple. I’m not talking private education or 14 night holidays in the Med. If we had two they would likely need to always share a room, we’d both have to work more hours whereas with one I can comfortably go back to work 4 days a week. Holidays would be few and far between if we got to go on any at all. Any savings we manage for DD would be split between her and second DC.

Some older relatives have told me I’m overthinking, finances change, and you just ‘make it work’. I think that’s quite an outdated view in 2024 - but AIBU?

It's quite difficult when you only have one child and want to do day trips and holidays etc. Legoland etc is fine as long as you are prepared to go on all the rides with them, but many places are just not as much fun without a sibling or another child. Particularly when they get a bit older. I had my children with a fairly large age gap so I have seen both sides.

Just now we have a household income of over 140K live in a cheap part of the country, no childcare fees as the DC are all too old, nearly at the end of our mortgage, we are at a comfortable time of our lives. We have at least one holiday abroad, maybe another short break and several little mini-breaks UK wide.

Rewind to when the DC were babies/toddlers (we had 4 under 6) I couldn’t work as childcare would have been more than my entire wage, we had no family support at all, DH was on nowhere near the salary he is now, we had one cheap UK holiday a year, hardly ever ate out, had one old car. So it depends where you are in your life, when your DC are under 5 it is always going to be the most costly time of your lives, it does get better.

I would say that to be really comfortable right now you would probably be looking at a household income of somewhere between 60-80K considerably more in the SE

We have a household income of £120k, south east, 4 bed house (1.7k pcm) 2 cars, 2 kids in nursery 3 days a week. And ok we can afford these things but not much else. Nursery is killing me. Can we afford food and little treats? Yes. Can we afford big holidays? No.
I am putting money away however, in case one if us can’t work for whatever reason. I guess that’s a luxury

We’ve a joint household income of £90k, expecting our first and only child, live in a 2 bed terrace and have no cars. We’re in Cheshire.

We don’t want to feel stretched and enjoy travel adventures (budget ones, but they still add up), so we won’t be buying a bigger house or having more kids.

I’m in Cambridge. 4 bed house. Me, DH and 2 children. DH salary just gone up to £85k and we are comfortable. But i feel comfortable since DH £70k. Its not luxury but living nice life, without worry and holiday once or twice a year.

You’d both be best earning £49,999 each so that you can access all the support but still have decent incomes. Far better off than one earning more and the other at home/part time (unless you have to factor in nursery costs). Depends what type of holiday/house/car/hobbies you all like as well.

Our household income is approx 65k (around half that each). We have 2 kids one not yet school age. We only have 1 car, we regularly go into overdraft. 3 bedroom house but one if hs works from home a lot so one bedroom is a home office. We have to be fairly sensible with money and holidays are tricky. We have one planned on credit card at the moment (a bit of a one off). So I'd say you need more income than we have to be as comfortable as you suggest. We never think we'll go hungry though and do have little luxuries like takeaways.

I am going to throw my story into this mix as I think it's an important point. My second child is disabled and had ASD and probable ID and is non verbal. If you value days out, nice holidays, and your career and having a good life materially, it is worth considering this.

We are on quite a good income over 80k (we'll we think it is) fairly expensive part of the UK but not London. We don't have a lavish life on that (I don't have a second car, but I'd like one) but we can pay bills and are saving. It is really hard us both working with a disabled child - the system tries to ensure one of you gives up work by not providing wrap around care, holiday clubs, willing babysitters and some schools try to force a 'reduced' timetable on you. Then there's endless appointments and literal fighting to get care put in place - tribunals, chasing responses, researching.

Holidays abroad are out of the question for now. Any other holidays in UK need careful consideration too. Quite a lot of activities are no go.

I do sometimes wish I stopped at one child, not only because it is so hard, but because we probably gave up the possibility of owning our own home or being able to move where we can do this, and also a lot of things we enjoyed we can't do anymore.

Sorry for going off piste, but thought it is an important point if you really are not sure. My second child was an accident, and I was very unsure about having him but also wanted a sibling for my other child, but they don't have a huge bond because of his disabilities and my elder child worried about being burdened by his needs when he is older. That's not to say we don't love our youngest, as we do adore him. In many ways he is awesome, but life is very hard for all four of us too.

You can't predict the house prices rise

Not at all. Ours is big too. £1300 currently.

Yes, this. X1 earner on 120,000 is £1,000 a month worse off than x2 earners on £60,000 each, plus you’re not entitled to child benefit, tax-free childcare or 30 free childcare hours (you do get x15 at 3) (and you need to do a tax return!). Of course that’s offset by no childcare fees in the early years if one SAHP, (and the convenience of a SAHP too for school holiday cover etc)

It's totally up to you as a couple to decide.
I liked the idea of a busy family life so I prioritised that. Things work out because they have to. If dcs have to share a room while they're young then they do.
If, however, you have a boy and girl, then that'll put some pressure on you to provide more space.
In 10 yrs time, you don't know what your situation will be. Will you both have pay rises or change jobs so could afford more?
Or will one of you gave redundancy? Be unable to work?
You can overthink it all so just go with what you feel you want your life to be like then work towards those goals.

When you have children the benefits system can be very generous with top ups if you're on a lie income - you haven't specifically said what your income is but I wouldn't rule out a second child on finances alone,

I have 3 siblings and might as well have 0. I get on with one of them fine, but we aren’t close in any way. One of the others is a total mess and I’ll likely end up financially supporting them (again we get on fine, but don’t have anything like a close relationship), and the last one is a horrible person I haven’t spoken to in over a decade. None of them help care for parents- I might as well be an only child in that respect. They live hundreds of miles away.

My DW has a sibling and they haven’t spoken a word to each other in 8 years, and I don’t think they ever will. They were not close or even friendly growing up together.

My best friend hasn’t seen 3 of her 4 siblings for almost 15 years, and the last one maybe 5 years. Again, no falling out or anything, just not close or interested in each other.

You can’t know how siblings are going to be together, I wouldn’t gamble financial security or even having more holidays and fun on having more children who may or may not be an asset in later life.

When you have one child it’s REALLY easy to borrow another for day trips or holidays when they are a bit older- people love it when you take their kids and they can have a break.

So you can see your kid having fun and playing etc, then by the end of the trip when everyone is tired/fed up/bickering/needs to get ready for school the next morning etc, you can give the extra ones back and only have one to deal with.

Agree with Imtheother the suggestion that it's good to have siblings to help with elderly parents is lovely in an ideal world but as a 60 year old with elderly parents I can assure you that almost everyone in my circle with elderly parents finds dealing with siblings and their lack or inconsistency of help a huge problem.
Of course if you have a close knit family and everyone shares the care then it's great but you only have to read the threads on here to know that it's rarely the case.
You end up not only dealing with the care for elderly parents but dealing with the fall out between siblings ... and that's even before all the inheritance arguments !

I know a surprisingly large number of families, decent people in their own right but who have ended up in really fraught family situations so I would never consider having a second child so that they can 'share the care of elderly parents in the future' is a good idea.

I have only DC (by choice ... nothing to do with finances) and it's been great, he is a really outgoing, friendly, confident person who has had no problem making friends throughout his life. He's never been lonely (can make friends on the top of a bus) . Some people find it hard to make friends, some don't, but in my experience it's not to do with having siblings.

I also don’t think only children get lonely. My closest brother is 3 years younger, I don’t remember ever playing or hanging out with him to do anything growing up. I mean maybe we did as toddlers or young children but it must have been seldom. I used to stay at my childless aunt and uncles house lots during holidays and loved having just adults and no whining or fighting between us children.

My Ds happily plays alone, plays with children at nursery, and makes friends easily. We can pop out to a pub garden type place or playground and he’s playing with someone he’s never met in the sandpit within minutes.
If we take him somewhere on a bigger trip he’s fine with just dh and I for attention. He’s very happy with adult company also, including elderly neighbours or any ages really.

I think it’s a time thing more than money often. If we had a second, it would definitely be harder to have a work/ life balance. If you have lots of family who help then it might be different, but in our life Ds only has dh and I to attend events, childcare etc

We're only having one child "because of finances". Not because we couldn't afford a second child at all, but because we can't afford the lifestyle we want with two. Our household income is very high, but we can't afford the kind of house we want in our high cost of living area and still have holidays and other fun things with two children without a very tight budget.

We are up north. 3 children. Income around 65k and we struggle to afford much beyond basics. Not had a holiday for years.

Household income of £110kpa.

We live in South Essex, with £311k left on our mortgage, which is £2k per month, It's a 4 bed detached which we have around 50% equity in.

The mortgage is killing us. I made the mistake of buying a big house thinking my career was really taking off, so it would only be painful for a couple of years. I gambled and lost thanks to a bad mix of a terrible employer and then COVID. As such, we're only starting to get back on track now.

We're now starting to clear debts to the tune of around £900 per month, which hurts, and means we can't afford a holiday this year, probably not next year either. Not helped by the fact that my partner only works (and gets paid) during term times as a supply teacher. With 2 DCs, and all the clubs they do, life is expensive!

On the plus side, the only thing we don't do is holidays. The kids do lots of clubs, and we do a lot of day trips and things. So, it's not all bad.

The plan is to sell up and downsize upon retirement in around 20 years, at which point having bought and lived in a larger house should pay dividends. At least, that's how I justify it to myself for the sake of my own sanity!

Truth is though, we could really do with an extra £20kpa coming in, in order to make us properly comfortable.

£89k joint, south west (expensive tourist area). 2 primary aged DC

Two older cars, finance free, one big holiday a year and a couple of smaller ones (Butlins, camping). No real worries about paying for things that aren’t budgeted for if they are one offs, like uniform or a party.

However, if we have two or three bigger unplanned expenses a month, say a new outfit for DC, an expensive meal out or a theme park day, then I do start to watch the pennies again.

We shop at Lidl and DC don’t have masses of toys or clothes. We menu plan and DH is a whizz at utility bargains.

We both make the full contributions into our pensions and DC have money saved for them each month.

Our mortgage is pretty big too. But we don’t spend on beauty treatments, brand new everything, gadgets etc. I refuse to carry a balance on any credit card as it makes me worry

We are comfortable and I’m never not grateful for it.

Just over 100k, but i say this because next year, we’ll be paying over 2k for nursery fees each month.

2 key factors are where in the country are you? How much is your mortgage/rent?

Your question isn't about income though it's about whether to have another child or not. That can't be answered based on money alone. Think of whether you want the pregnancy and newborn stage again, the mental load etc etc.

I feel the same about mine, we can't afford endless days out but they have each other and they wouldn't be without one another.

However, maybe I would feel differently if they didn't get along or if they fall out in later years but right now I would choose another child over a day out to Legoland.

huh? a fortnight you were posting about being undecided to go for a second @Barnabyby

Depends on mortgage/rent, council tax band, other bills etc. doesn’t it?

We bring in about 80k and it’s just about comfortable but there isn’t much in the way of leeway. Car/van are owned outright (and old/shit), we haven’t been on holiday this year (although lots of days out), childcare costs are minimal. Our house is TINY (literally just imagine a small two bed flat spread over three floors) but the idea of having a bigger mortgage and having to pay the costs associated with moving is overwhelming right now.