starting a family with debt and no savings

[pinkmallow]

is this totally irresponsible?!

pinky I hope that was supposed to be sarcasm. Kids are expensive.. The money will have to come from somewhere OP. If I'm honest I'd do everything you could to clear the debt..you do have some time on your side ..in the knowledge that you are doing it to bring a child into a secure home. But that's easy to say I know when you really want to start a family now...but what better motivation?!

I just worry im leaving it too late

pinky I hope that was supposed to be sarcasm.

I think that this is intended for pinkyredrose who said just do, you get money from the goverment, as opposed to pinkymallow also known as op.

I would ttc now , 30 is not old but it's not young either and you don't know if you will have fertility issues.
£2700 is not a lot. If you could pay back £200 a month you would only owe £900 once you have a baby, even if you got pregnant today.

I would aim to clear the debt in 6 months. Overtime, savings, minimal spending. Then look at your position in 6 months time

SoonToBeSix that's what I was thinking but then was worried how to pay the rest off and still have money spare

I'd say do it. It could take you a year to conceive, then 9 months pregnant, that's 17 pay days till maternity leave. That's £160ish a month of it's 0%.

It's not a massive amount of debt as long as you're not on a very small income. What % of your household take home pay is £160? How much are your outgoings/disposable income?

at the minute im paying off £250-£300 a month which leaves me between £100 and £150 disposable income a month

Or the OP could get caught the first month, still have most of the debt and then be on reduced maternity pay with no savings to supplement it.

Don't forget you will get £88 a month child benefit. Babies are really not expensive in the first year just wipes and nappies( can buy reusable) and possibly formula. Clothes can be bought very cheaply from Facebook, eBay etc.
Pram, cot, extra also very cheap secondhand or even free cycle.

Etc not extra!

This is a good chance to pretend running your household with a child. Figure out what your estimated costs would be and build that into your budget. Instead of actually spending the money pay your debt off. Once that is done put the money into a savings account. If you TTC once the debt is paid off you should have a little cushion by the time you go on leave.

Also, don't waste your money on new stuff for your baby. Buy from car boot and NCT sales. I got everything for $1500 (about £750) and could have spent £350 if I had bought a 2nd hand stroller. I got my maclaren 2nd hand for $12 and its $425 new.

If I were you I would sit down one evening and work out everything that you and your oh(?) can cut back on. If you need help or suggestions as to what to aim for then people on these boards will help. For example, how much is your mobile phone? I personally think you don't need to spend more than £7.50 a month. This might free up some money so that you can clear the debt more quickly. It's not a big debt but if you don't clear it before you have a baby it'll hang around for ages.

If you're paying £300 per month it'll be gone in 9 months so a little extra effort would have it gone. Is it on a 0% interest card? That would help. See if you can get rid of the interest and commit to paying £300 a month and then ttc in 3/4 months time.

Thanks iamnotanugget, yes it's a 0% so I have never paid any interest on it. Dp and I have roughly worked out the figures but do need to do it properly. I need to think of how much we'd get for mat pay, child benefit etc as well as how much our shopping will increase for nappies etc!

Childcare and cost of not working full time will be far and away your biggest costs!

Yes it makes me laugh a bit when people say oh just get a second hand pram and babies are cheap. The stuff for babies even brand new high end stuff is all cheap compared to loss of income from a parent, maternity, or childcare.
Even if people spend £5000 on a pram, it's still a drop in the ocean compared to loss of an entire wage or full time childcare ( about £500 a week per child here)

Agree with Artandco.

We had no cc debt and a (small) amount of savings, then a mahoosive vets bill hit when I was 30 weeks which wiped out the savings and put 2500 on the cc . You can't plan for the future so I say just go for it and budget, budget, budget. Maybe look at the possibility of swapping to a 0% card? We did that to freeze the interest.

We had ds when we had just become debt free and dh lost his job a couple of weeks after ds was born, a couple of months of job hunting later he got a good job but we never quite caught up financially while I was on maternity leave and I stupidly allowed him to put a large purchase in a credit card so we are now about 3.5k in debt and I am 7 weeks pregnant with dc2 and about to give up work to be a sahm. We made this decision because dh has been offered a job with a salary we can live off and still pay the debts off a bit each month, and be debt free by the end of the year. I say as long as you can pay enough off each month to clear it eventually (in a year or so, not like 10 years down the line) then go for it.

I'd go for it, pay it off by end of year and live on very little until then, if you can.

Contraception is presented as something we can control, which we can switch off, and back on, like a tap. But I've known lots of women spend lots of money on IVF to try and get pregnant from their mid-30s onwards. Hope it goes well for you.

£2700 on a 0% card is nothing.

It's whether you can afford childcare that's the financial issue.

Agree, child care and/or loss of earnings is the real killer. Research local child care costs now and find out what your work's ml policy is like.

It will be paid off then even if you get pregnant straight away, so just do it
People cope. You cut your coat according to your cloth

Thanks for all the recent replies, I do want to get it paid off by the end of the year. I don't know exactly what works maternity leave is but it'll be the most basic.