People overestimate how much children cost on here?

[Bankin]

Yesterday found an old bank statement from 2019 and worked out after paying my rent I only had 400-500 a month to spend on everything else with one child.
No idea how I managed that but I did and now it has me wondering about all the threads where people say they can't afford kids because they'd only have a couple thousand left after the mortgage/rent? Am I unreasonable to think these people are being a bit dramatic?

They are deffo being dramatic. They whine about how expensive kids are but then reveal the costs include ski trips, tutoring and private school fees. My heart hardly breaks for them!

There was a thread another night about the cost of teens but the op was spending £100 a month on riding lessons!

Just pay for these things without moaning or don't!

It wasn’t half the price it is now though, so it wasn’t massively cheaper.

The point remains if you have a teenager who doesn’t live with you full time now then your bills really are not reflective of the costs of having and raising a baby right now.

That leaves £165, so £1980 a year for savings. If you only pay £5 a month for your phone, then you meed to but one outright. That isn't a lot to play with if you have a big expense each year, white goods etc. To manage on that you'd need to have cheap/free child based activities/libraries/ etc close by, or life would be very basic.

No I just don’t believe for a second “£140 max” a month covered every single meal, drink and morsel of food that you and a teenage boy ate.

£140 a month for basically 2 adults is around 75p a portion for each of the 3 meals a day. Thats really struggle levels and leaves nothing whatsoever left over for the occasional snack, piece of fruit or milk and coffee. Nor does it account for laundry detergent, cleaning products, toiletries shampoo, shower gel, deodorant, toothpaste, tooth brushes etc. And household things and toiletries aren’t listed as a separate item either.

It’s nonsense that you can feed and maintain 2 adults for £140 in the long term that doesn’t involve basically plain rice and porridge for many of the meals.
Can you live? Sure, can you eat a minimally balanced diet? No not at all.

I'm not disbelieving any posters, think it's been implied I'm lying too but in Covid I couldn't find a job so had to receive welfare which was between 400-500 a month for one adult and child at the time after the rent (not the bills just the rent) You could probably look this up if you didn't believe it.

Some people just don't know how to budget and can't live without every netflix, now TV, Disney etc . Which is fine but then they can't moan they can't afford kids because if they wanted them they could and I'm talking about the people claiming they earn 50k+ and can't afford kids

It's very clear that they mean they can't afford to give them the life that they want.

Not just scrimping and saving for the basics.

@Bankin the thing is, people don't WANT to live like that. And those people are allowed to feel like they can't have kids, because they can't afford the lifestyle they would like. And god forbid, they are allowed to complain about it too 💁‍♀️ It's not 'oh they can't budget' 😂

Physically, yes it may be possible. People have to raise kids on the breadline for many reasons. But there is no way I'd plan for a child with that budget. I enjoyed doing all the enrichment activities with DS, having a large enough house with decent heating, a wide variety of fruits and veggies, having a car to get around, having holidays... without that, honestly, not only my, but also his standard of living would have been reduced. And I don't want that for my child.

I do see what you're trying to say. We have a baby, I'm still on maternity so no childcare costs yet, but I will be returning to work (4 days) and my wage will be more than what I pay for nursery.

We're going to just have the one child, partly due to money, house size etc. I agree with what I've seen at least one other poster say, we don't want to just cope. We want to go out when we want, have meals out, takeaways, days out, nice clothes, toys etc and we probably couldn't do that with two, despite technically being able to afford to if we really wanted, just with a lesser quality of life.

Then they should admit that and be more honest instead of acting like it's financially impossible for them to have children at all.

They think their childrens lives would be terrible without netflix and iPhones but I had a relatively humble childhood and was a much happier kid than many of the kids who spent all summer in foreign countries and always had the latest toys.

I grew up the same but it didn't feel happy at all, it was miserable watching my parents scrimp and save and stress over money and we could never afford to do anything.

I didn't want my children to have that life and wouldn't have had them if that was the only choice.

People who don't have kids don't realise that for the first few years your social life and activities grind to a halt!

Pre toddler, I'd be in the gym four times a week then meet the girls or my now DH. Weekends I'd go to gigs or galleries or plays. Or we'd pop off to Rome or Barcelona or simular!

All this stopped with DD, lovely as she is.

That few thousand they probably spend on social lives. They forsee that continuing with Babe in arms. Nope. It goes on Peppa Pig magazine, Paw Patrol pasta and nursery fees! But it's actually fine because cuddles 😄

I'm sorry you went through that. Even with just under 500 a month for everything after rent I wasn't stressed enough for my child to pick up on it and could afford some nice things.
However I know some people's rent is so high it's over the limit welfare helps towards so they'd have to cut into their 400-500 meant for them and their child. Which must be very hard.

However we're talking extremely broke here and my post is aimed at people on this site who claim to earn 50k+ and are saying they can't afford children

Because they want to provide more than the basics for their children. They will also have to consider childcare costs which in some places, will automatically be £1-2k per month before anything else.

I don't keep an inventory with links to every thread I read but here's an active one where people put their income into a calculator to work out what percent of the population they are richer than (in this country only) and the amount of people saying they're top 10% and still feel broke is interesting to say the least
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5260946-household-income-where-are-you

@Bankin 50k isn't the flex you think it is - round here it wouldn't even cover a 1 bed flat and childcare, let alone bills! You'd genuinely be worse off than being on benefits, and I've checked (because those were my circumstances, before increasing my earnings asap) and you wouldn't be entitled to anything! I was in my savings every month for the basics.

Everyone is allowed to feel squeezed, including higher earners. Lower income people are not the only ones 'allowed' to complain. If that were the case MN should just ban everyone you consider rich!

Sorry I don't believe you'd be worse off on benefits like I said I had to claim welfare myself because I couldn't get a job in Covid and had a young child. It's a Mumsnet myth that people on benefits are better off than someone on 50k. My household income is about 40k now and I can hands down say I have a lot more disposable income than I did three years ago.

Yes 1 bed flat 1k rent. Nursery place 2k.
That's 123 a month left over from 50k if you have a student loan. Not london.

But obviously if there is another earner as well there will be whatever the second earner has to use too.

MN classic ‘I’ve been more skint than you could ever imagine therefore I am correct’ thread. Sure you could probably live in a studio flat on Lidl bargains and just about afford a kid (not full time childcare though). Hard to know what the point of this thread is.

@Bankin most of the time you'd be right - but the nursery years were an absolute killer.

50k = 3,200 after tax
100 child benefit
= 3,300 take home every month

2,400 nursery fees (appreciate its slightly cheaper now - after funded hours my local is 2,200 after funded hours according to the website)
1,700 private rent for a 2 bed

= all income gone before looking at bills/food etc.

I could have stayed in that job, drained all my savings and then relied on benefits, but decided to increase my income and use my savings to stay afloat in between. Appreciate this isn't possible for everyone, but I was determined not to lean on benefits. That decision is also valid, the same as yours to do the opposite. It doesn't make me bad at budgeting!

So you may not believe it, but that doesn't make it not true 💁‍♀️

Fair enough 1700 for a two bed is insane. Some areas are definitely a lot more difficult to live in than others

What benefits were you receiving that totalled £4-500 a month when you have a child?
I feel like those numbers don’t work out.

Well maybe they dont want to dramatically down grade their lives to have kids, and maybe they are accustomed to spending more that you did.
frankly if you really want kids you’ll have them, if you are undecided then the costs are more important.

I think the activities I spend £££ for my kids are pretty vital parts of what I believe to be important aspects of parenting. But other people will regards them as unnecessary.

So even after nursery costs (which is a massive expense) there are 15 years of language and music lesssons, sporting clubs and classes, enriching day trips, mindful toys and games. Comfortable and appropriate clothing, nutritious food. And parents with enough of a financial buffer that they are safe when unexpected things happen.

yes it’s all privileged stuff, but before you have kids is a good time to think closely about if you can afford them, surely.

That's after paying the rent. Universal credit is just one benefit with different parts the rent part and then the adult and child part which totalled between 400-500 together. This was 2019-2022. Might be more nowadays I don't know.

I just googled and apparently people over 25 get a fair bit more for their adult aspect of it. Didn't know this