How does anyone afford childcare!!

[Char1997]

Hello,

I know there’s lots of discussion about this always but I am currently on maternity leave with my second and working out childcare costs to return to work at the end of the year/beginning of next year and for me to go back to my job full time it’s going to cost me £1800 a month!!
How on earth does anyone afford that but then on the other hand how does anyone afford to not return to work with two children?! Just seems insane to me that anyone can afford to live, buy essentials when needed, go to work full time PLUS pay that obscene amount of money?!

I mean it shouldn't be a shock that childcare is ludicrously expensive, people talk about it all the time. Most people afford it by considering options prior to TTC; looking into whether they'd recieve UC towards childcare based on their household income, whether they're eligible for TFC which shaves 20% off, if its more viable to cut hours at work, and if there are other settings ie a childminder that you'd be happy to use.

How are you fine if nearly 50 percent of your take home is child care, that means you just over 2 grand a month left to pay your mortgage, all bills and feed yourselves?

Just a reminder to also apply for tax free childcare which will help and you’ll also get some child benefit

A lot of people also condense hours so do x4 long days each which would mean only x3 days in childcare (also just to agree with a previous poster, we have a big mortgage but no way we would be able to pay that childcare bill and everything else on your income! SAHM here!)

The only way we managed when DD was younger was because my mother and father were able to take on the childcare.

It's one of the reasons DD is an only child. If I had another my parents wouldn't be able to help.

Also you lose out so much on career progression if you take a couple of years out. It's so hard to afford childcare. When my DC were small my Mum had them. Now I've got dgc and feel really guilty I don't do for my DD what my Mum did for me, but my DD and DGC live over 150 miles away from me. I've compromised by paying my DD for 4 days of childcare a month. That helps her out a bit. Also now eldest at school and youngest still in nursery I go down for a couple of single weeks during the summer holidays to care for eldest and I drop youngest off at nursery and collect. I've also been down for a fortnight when the first DGS got chicken pox, then 6 days later other one went down with it. It meant my DD could continue to work and she managed to get a promotion, she doesn't think she'd have got it if she'd taken time off when DC were unwell as it would make her look unreliable. Do you have anyone that could help you out a day a week? Also would a child minder be cheaper than nursery?

We were paying £2.5k a month for our 2 to be in childcare.

We sacrificed a lot for ourselves to break even - it was one of the hardest times but our the other side now.

Hopefully you qualify for tax free childcare which helps.

£68k though isn’t great for an expensive area, which I’m assuming you live in as your nursery costs are quite high. Pretty much average for two full time jobs for the uk as a whole, but lower than average for expensive areas. Is there a way to increase your earnings?

Does anyone know if Labour are going to stick to the Tory childcare subsidised hours plan?

It's great that you're clearly grateful and happy with what you earn compared to others, but I would say that as a proportion of your salary, it is disproportionate compared to others that are your situation.

£1800 a month is A LOT.

I'm.shocked that you're shocked. Never has there been so much help towards childcare.

There’s a lot more help now, but childcare costs are also really high compared to wages.

I suppose with twins that's the only way to afford it.

We don’t know yet, they e hinted that they will change it and means test so only the lower earners get it.

Some people work around each others hours for a few years so no or very little childcare costs. May need a change of job for a few years obviously.

My niece did 4 long days so got one day at home each week with her baby. She's knackered though with the long hours and not much sleep.

I have 2 under 2 and will return to work 4 days a week after maternity leave.

4 day nursery place is around £1500 a month, £1350 with tax free. So two places are £2700.

My husband and I are around 1k short each month when we pool all our income and outgoings, but are fortunate enough to have savings to cover this shortfall for a couple of years.

I am not complaining as we knew this when we had our second so closely in age to our first, and are very privileged we are able to afford to do this, as for many this wouldn't be a possibility.

If it wasn't for savings, we would have waited and had a longer age gap until our eldest gets subsidised hours, but then unfortunately our biological clocks wouldn't have been on our sides!

Yes true but childcare costs have risen a lot in recent years ( along with everything else ). When mine were young there was a bit of help through child tax credits if income was low enough to get them. Now there is up to 85% help through UC as well as all the free hours coming in soon.

OP, please go on entitled to and put your incomes and the childcare bill in (as if you dc are already in it).

My dh and I earn 58k combined (pre deductions) and had a scare recently - I checked entitled to, just in case, and would qualify for about £550pcm against a possible £900 childcare bill (our elder two no longer need childcare).

Its possible there may be some UC for you.

I hope they do stick to help for all parents. It's very shortsighted to not give support to higher earners because if they stay home with DC they'll just get less tax.

Could you look at both doing condensed hours so five days condensed into four ?

I've just ran the figures on Entitled To (your salaries and childcare costs). I made some assumptions - you both earn half that salary each, both work 37 hrs each, both pay 200pcm pension and have council tax band a.

UC entitlement, £148 per week (12 monthly acts of £641. Plus CB on top (172.90)

I've not used tax free childcare so not sure how that bit works, but the above alone would cover over 800 of the 1800

I work 3 shorter days, I do 33 hours per week - it doesn't help for nurseries as you would still need a full day but it means we only need 2 days of after school club.

Going part time doesn't necessarily need to mean full days off, depending on your job.

£2k is pretty good though unless you're in a very expensive area most people I know have less than that.

Grandparent does one day, I do one day, DC are in nursery 3 days which works out at £1400 per month for both of them.
We both earn well though. It would probably be pretty much unachievable on an average salary.