Is this sufficient for 3 kids?

[Newnamenewnamenewnamenew]

apologies it’s long.

Posted before got a bit of a wake up call in terms of my budget. id love another child and time is ticking for me age wise, so it’s starting to be now or never. The question is can we afford it. I’d like a bit of impartial help when everything is laid out, because sometimes if feel like yeah, our income is fine (I’ve put it on that min income calculator thing online and we’re a few hundred quid up a week)

Ive worked really hard with DH do a budget, it’s below. We have 2 dc, is a third viable here? This is the here and now too, we have scope to get better jobs in the medium term and bolster our earnings. We have a small 4 bed house right now and a 7 seater car, so the ‘big’ things are already taken care of. Though we’d likely need to upsize in the future.

our gross income is £110k per year base. Bonuses can vary between £10-£15k, last year was a good year and we got £20k but that’s not the norm. 3-5% annual pay rises.

monthly income 6,400 salary + £170 (child benefit)
our living expenses (mortgage, car insurance, life insurance, food, fuel, household bills) £3130. Our mortgage is £1350, I’m confident this will go down when our fix is up though.
child savings £170 (CB)+ £100
£180 credit card (0% not too many more payments this is a mix of some work on the house and a root canal I needed)
£60 mobile phones
£500 childcare (this will reduce to about £350 in the new year)
hobbies- £75 (dance, football and swimming)
£90 car insurance
£100 days out
savings £1000
that leaves us then about £1000 which we then split equally between us and the basically give ourselves a personal allowance of about £100 a week, basically £800 a month for personal stuff. We buy kids clothes from the personal allowance as well as stuff for ourselves, haircuts etc.
which should leave about £150/£200 for us to use a sink fund for any unexpected events, if there’s none then it gets saved.

for another child we’d save the additional child benefit for that child plus an additional £50 a month. Worked out that way in the investment account that they have it could be about £25k at 18, to use for uni/ whatever (it’s the same as what we do currently)

private school isn’t a priority for us, we’ve several grammar schools around us and if that’s not a viable option we live close to one of the best state schools in the area.

we like our holidays but I shop around and I’m confident I can find holidays for 5 for not too much more than we pay now (I’ve checked)

what do we think?

There sounds like plenty of money to go around but i can see you have factored in current childcare costs but not additional ones for baby? That could easily swallow your £1k

I have 3.

monthly income is about 7700 total. But our mortgage is higher at 2100. I don’t feel like we struggle financially. However, we are past paying for childcare now (youngest is 3). Its the mat leave and extra childcare that will screw you over I would have thought.

Also we really struggle to find holidays for 5 of us in school holidays.

It depends on your lifestyle. Our income is slightly more than yours, our mortgage similar, but outgoings lower as we don't have childcare anymore. And we chose not to have a third, and whilst our income was lower when we made that decision (and it wasn't solely finances that dictate for) financially, I am very glad we stopped at 2. School trips are £1000+ at our stage school, we chose to upsize our home for more space, we really enjoy holidays, we also spend quite a lot on days out etc. We couldn't have the lifestyle we have with 3, we really value our lifestyle and I am glad we are able to give it to our too.

But of course it's do-able, just depends what you want out of life.

*state school

with the governments 30 funded hours from 1, it would cost us an additional £90 a month.

rationale, my eldest costs £90 wrap now (before tf childcare), this would be the same cost for my youngest (as by the time I’d go back to work they’d be in school) and 4 days at nursery cost between 55-60 a week (before tf childcare). It would be £91 a week before tf childcare.

God I won't correct the plethora of SPAG mistakes, apologies, fat fingers today!

ive been able to find some really nice (last minute ) 4/5* holidays for around £2500/£3000 in school hols.

mat leave I grt 6 months full pay, as does dh, so the plan would be for him to take 3 months at the start and then hold the rest back for shared parental leave and id go back part time at 9/10 months before going back full time at a year. I wfh 4 days a week so that should be manageable with breastfeeding etc.

childcare were very lucky with our setting, It would only cost an additional £90 a month to what we pay now

Off topic, but how come you get child benefit on those salaries? You might need to factor in not getting it, or having to pay tax to repay all/some.

They moved the threshold to 60k paying it back.

i put it in a regular saver that pays a good whack interest wise and will pay it back with that.

ive done the calc online on hubs predicted earnings this year and we’ll have to pay £300 back.

as our earnings rise, we’ll make up the deficit lost in cb with the increase in salary

I’m probably quite fussy in that I want separate rooms to the children and a kids club 🫣.

Sounds like you can afford it to me.

Just don’t underestimate the extra work. 2 kids is 2 kids. 3 kids is 56 kids. I can’t explain it. Only that I was a competent parent with a full time job with 2 kids. With 3 kids I’m barely holding it together whilst part time 🤦‍♀️

You earn substantially more than us and we’ve considered a third. I guess you’ve not taken into account extra clothes and food for the child (I know you think you might have hand me downs etc but they’ll still be needing new shoes, and then as they get older it’s another mouth to feed). You also don’t say anything about days out etc. As another PP said we love our lifestyle which includes regular days out, lunch out, holidays including little trips in this country. I always think if we have a third it’s that area that would suffer as it would be the first area to cut if we had less disposable income, and it would also cost more to take any extra one out.

Ignore me - you did have days out there! I also missed your saving £1k a month. I think you have more than enough, if you want one go for it.

In my experience 3 small children are affordable, 3 teenagers are pushing us right to the edge and we earn £160k between us. We moved house so they all had decent sized bedrooms so have a high mortgage, 3 lots of driving lessons, will be 3 lots of uni expenses , 5 adults to go on holiday, 5 adults with huge appetites, it goes on and on.

That said you obviously want 3 so just have another one. You will never have enough money if you sit and do the sums and life can change anyway, one of you might be made redundant, get ill and be unable to work or have a midlife crisis or something and you would manage then because you would have to.

@Newnamenewnamenewnamenew

Are you sure those nursery figures are accurate? They look more like day rates round here than weekly ones to cover 4 days 😬

Yeah my youngest will be on 30 hrs soon and we got sent the contract and it came with an illustration of the cost, so it is accurate. My eldest went there too.

for us the 15 funded hrs knocked £200/£250 off the bill as he does 4 days. Be both work condensed hours

@Newnamenewnamenewnamenew Impressive! I'm not at all jealous 😂

In which case your numbers look fine - a few of my friends do the same with slightly less ££ and don't seem to struggle. I think it's a lot more abstract until you have the 3rd, and then it just becomes life!

I'm not commenting on the figures, but I think it's important that you don't buy children's clothes - or anything for the children - out of your personal allowances

Why are you even asking? You have a substantial income, four bedroom house, good career prospects that many can only dream of. The information you have provided has the whiff of a stealth boast.

If you want a third child then go ahead and have one. You have so much more than a lot of other parents of three children.

I hate to be the one to say this and will probably get roasted but have you factored in what would happen if you didn’t have a healthy child? Could you afford 3 children on one persons wage if one of you couldn’t return to work and had to stay home? What type of life would your existing 2 children have in that scenario?

I’m the eldest child of a large family and subsequently had a disabled sibling come along and it turned our lives upside down, we went from financially comfortable to living in poverty and that’s before you even factor in the rest of the upheaval.

All children are of course a blessing however you already have 2 who you need to consider; do you think you could adequately provide financially, emotionally and with time / attention if you had another with additional needs?

talk to me more on this…

I debated, what to do budget wise? Less personal allowance? Maybe save £900 a month instead?

x mad and birthdays we just pull from our annual savings a pre set amount. But we’re trying to adopt a more minimalist style in terms of clothes, and presents to avoid over consumption

for the purposes of this conversation I’m assuming you mean a disability that wasn’t detected in pregnancy. if it were, that may be another question.

I’m not familiar with benefits but I’d imagine I’d have to claim disability living allowance and carers allowance as well as finding some work on the weekends. It wouldn’t be ideal and our lifestyle would have to change. Childcare for instance would go. But my husbands salary covers all our absolutely essential outgoings.

Mate if you read my other thread….

I mean, obviously you can afford another child. The question is whether you can afford the lifestyle you want and another child, and only you can answer that.

I think it must be subsidised by the council or something because it’s soo soo much cheaper than the other centres.

with funded hrs it’s just £7 a day. Food included. After school wrap til 5:30 is like £10 on top. It’s linked to a lovely school too, so the facilities that they have are wonderful. A pool, soft play, vegetables garden, all the school grounds and various play areas, school rabbits and chickens.

How are you eligible for any child benefit on those salaries!!?