How do parents afford private school

[Tonnnnnn]

Around here private school fees for secondary school are around £30k per year.

What sort of salary is required to fund two kids at private school? I am assuming both parents need to earn around £100k mark or one parent needs to earn £250k.

Even then, mortgage, holidays etc.

Aside from a few high paying industries ( banking, law) most places would t pay this much unless you were senior, and there are thousands of private school places around London.

Wonder if people are using their salaries or if it’s family
money paying for the fees

It is. Academics have studied it :
"For those who grew up in Britain in the latter half of the 20th century, there is known to be a strong association between social class or family income and attending a private school"
Anders et al et al 2020 "Determinants of private school participation: All about the money? British Educational Research Journal

Obviously there always are outliers but it is a self-perpetuating system. For example, you attended a private school and now your DC attend. Whereas the majority of people in the UK will have attended state schools and so will their children. Private schools have, and always will be, exclusive, by virtue of cost.

Similar salary here - sent three kids with 50% fee reduction but was still tight. Can’t wait for youngest to leave uni!

They just earn or have a lot of money, more than the average person.

I wouldn't be putting 2 children through private school on an income of less than £300,000. The fees alone cost a fortune then everything else on top, uniforms, clubs, no doubt expensive holidays. I would want the lifestyle of a private school parent, not just to be able to afford the fees alone.

Others earn less than that but they might only have one child or might not have the frills to go with the private school. They might get a helping hand from grandparents paying towards or all of the fees too.

Even if we wanted to we will never be able to afford private school, we couldn't afford the fees so it's one less thing to pay for.

When I lived in London, everyone I worked with who had kids sent their kids to private school. It was like it was just the ‘done thing’. In all cases, both parents worked in high-earning jobs.

I’ve heard about grandparents paying school fees only on MN. Never come across this IRL.

I think you underestimate how many people earn £100k+ It is not just banking and law but any sort of very senior corporate job of which there are hundreds in my company alone and we are Pharma adjacent.

I'd assume you'd cut back a bit on other areas but £100k+ is not as out there a salary as many believe.

We only know of one family with their kids in private school, and the husband is a self made millionaire with a huge company. Nobody else we know has gone down that road, and amongst them are some pretty high earners, (couple of bankers, lawyers, VPs, entrepreneurs)

A generation ago I think private school was a lot more doable for many families. I went to one myself and my parents were certainly not loaded, they made a lot of sacrifices. Nowadays it tends to be ridiculously high salaries, grandparent funding or scholarships.

But @Crushed23 would you really tell your colleagues if your parents were paying your DCs fees or if they'd gifted you a big deposit for a house or would you keep that info to yourself?

Salaries are always mentioned but many wealthy people own businesses and property. They have other income streams such as profits, dividends and rental income. Even asset sales. Not everyone pays for fees from income from "going to work".

Some of these figures are eye watering.

Then you have international students. Their parents incomes will be affected (good and bad) by exchange rates.

14K a year for one child up here at my nearest in the NW. So, good salaries should cut it.

My parents paid from their salary; about 30k p/a for my brother and I.

Sometimes companies he worked for included school fees as part of the package, as we lived overseas.

DH currently earns c. £300k, he is self employed in a tech consultancy role with multiple clients.

DS1 who is 4 is in reception at the local private school, and DS2 will start there in a couple of years. At the moment we pay from DH’s earnings, but we are lucky enough to be able to save and invest a significant amount each month so that we will have a large pot to fall back on to allow for a reduction in income in the future.

If need be we could remortgage our house as we would not move our children from the school unless it was an absolute last resort. No generational wealth here.

We would have liked a third child but have decided not to have one as it would be too much of a stretch to pay fees for them too.

True @Feelingstrange2 I know someone who was given 40% of his dads company, so doesn't and has never worked there. Quarterly he gets a dividend payment from the company that will pay for at least one of his DCs fees.
Plus he has a successful business of his own.

No inherited wealth and no help from grandparents. Both first in family to go to uni. tho DH had bursary/scholarship at local private school.Two slightly above average professional salaries - mine took a hit during child rearing years. Didn’t mortgage ourselves up to the hilt & bought in a less desirable area than our peers, didn’t go on holiday every year, never bought a new car. Lived within our means as far as possible and rarely used credit.

Local schools are a very mixed bag and couldn’t cater for older DC
SEND issue, DH old school could and did so brilliantly. I started my own side business and earned enough extra income to cover DC2 fees. It was the right decision for both our DCs & nine of us regret it.

Honestly, don’t bother with prep. The state primary kids who went on to the private (which my kids were) had no issues with the work or the kids. In fact my two were more knowledgeable than most (if not all with my younger) of their new classmates. No disadvantages at all.

My friend’s dc go but they get 75% discount as she’s a teacher in the school and they have no mortgage (her dad paid it off for them 7 years ago). Their salaries add up to £100k between them but they are definitely lower end of the spectrum in terms of earnings in the school.

Prices have gone up significantly in recent years to the point where value has to be considered as well as affordability.

Agree with this, 30k plus a year is a significant amount of money. For us the value added wouldn't offset the lifestyle change, future security, choosing to only have 1 dc etc.

Fees are about 2/3 of your amount.

DS went for a maths scholarship aged 10. He won it which got 50% discount off fees.

I cut back to the bone on all other spending, delayed planned work on our house, cancelled holidays (easier than it sounds since covid struck six months later and I didn't have any choice). Worked from home so didn't need clothes. Spent nothing that wasn't absolutely essential.

I have one year fees left to pay. I was paid off from my job last autumn and the redundancy money will cover the VAT. I managed to find another job within a week or two.

Summer 2026, I shall collapse in an exhausted heap in a darkened room. 😁

My son’s best friend had all his fees paid by gp’s.

Out of salaries. Both of us earn c150k and that’s for 2 kids. Delighted it’s coming to an end. School has been great but I wouldn’t necessarily make the same decision again.

I agree it is a self perpetuating system to a degree. You are right that lots of private school attendees later send their children to private school.

But what I was trying to set out is that before fees massively outstripped inflation, it isn’t true that generational wealth/ land ownership etc was as significant a factor as you suggest. I really wasn’t an anomaly at my school. Nowadays private school is unthinkable for most.

I am well aware of how insanely privileged I am to be in a position to manage it. But I grew up pretty poor until I was about 7/8 (at which point both my parents were promoted and we were suddenly better off) and that isn’t the experience of most parents of private schools these days because now you either have to earn an absolute fortune or have help from family money.

Mixture of salary, inheritance, grandparents paying, bursaries… but remember 93% of children are in state school and more “only” children are in private

We are looking at sending our DC to private school but it would "only" be 26k a year for both. We would pay it from salaries, we earn about 130k between us. But also we are currently building up a healthy savings pot so we can still have nice holidays and anything else we might want over those years. There is no way we could pay almost double that in fees though.

We plan to send ours (one DC) by saving £1k per month for the next 10 years (DC is 12 months old now).

if we have another we could save £2k per month but would be a bit tighter.

combined income of £145k.

It's also not just the cost of private school, uni is ££££ now and will go up. We want to give them chunky deposits for housing as again so expensive. I also worry about my own retirement and if state pension will move out further, may need private healthcare etc

So you’ve got to earn at least like 34k before tax , is your 130k take home ?