Income needed for 2 sets of private school fees in London?

[Londonhither44]

I know these topics are always inflammatory (hence username change!) but am really curious, if you’re sending 2 kids to private school in London (in particular starting from a young age) and not relying on family help or inheritance but paying out of income, about how much do you make?

DH and I combined have what would be deemed a very comfortable salary, and pre kids I’d always assumed private school would be an option. We have 2 toddlers so now considering options more seriously. Looking at the fees now for the junior privates near us, if I add the fees for 2, plus wrap around care (which would be an absolute necessity to keep our jobs/incomes), plus our mortgage (a small London house, we aren’t overextending ourselves but any mortgage is pricey now..) and bills- we can do it, but not if one of us were made redundant or had to take a material pay cut. We work in finance so those are not totally remote risks.

Colleagues at our jobs with similar household incomes seem to have wildly different approaches which I suspect boils down to a combo of priorities, risk tolerance and the unspoken parental help.

Im not interested in turning this into a state vs private debate (please!) but rather seeking honest opinions on what income you felt was comfortable to take the risk with two London school fees? And if you felt you needed some kind of buffer in terms of savings / mortgage being paid off / parental help etc?

Pretty big assumptions there. You’re wrong.

Agree with PP about value of time spent in state education for your child and you- even if you can affford private all through. You’ll all be living in too much of a bubble otherwise.

There are really lovely and excellent London primaries and some great secondaries too. I would buy a house in great catchment area instead personally.

It's extremely common for grandparents or inheritance to be used to pay private school fees, OP. (Or to to be used to buy a house, thereby freeing up money for private school). If you're wondering how colleagues on a similar income to you can afford it, it's probably this.
Prep school starts at 7. I'd send them to state for at least infants, start saving a year's school fees for both from now and then reassess once you actually have experience of your local primary school. If your children are happy and thriving you can wait until secondary, if you're not happy with your local state school, you can look at prep.

We have a very good joint income so there was never really a question of whether we could, more whether we should.

But one of the things that made us seriously consider it was that two sets of nursery fees, without any funding, weren’t causing any difficulties for us. Prep school cost the same per year. So we knew we could manage the fees without having to tighten our belt in other places.

So how are you coping with nursery fees?

This is what has happened to us!

Just after we turned down the state school place, my husband was made redundant, and he is struggling to find another job. A number of our friends at the same stage of life are in the same position. It seems to be someone else every few weeks - from a variety of different professions.

Fortunately the mortgage is paid off and I can pay the fees from my salary. We had also worked out before we applied for the school place that we would be able to cover the school fees by repurposing early retirement savings if needed.

We will be fine and I don’t think we will need to dip into those savings unless I also can’t work , but every now and then the fact that our income has halved and I am now the sole earner hits me.

I would strongly advise anyone looking at sending their children to independent school to consider what your contingency is if your income were to significantly fall.

EDIT - This is for one child at secondary school. I could not afford to pay for two from my income alone.

£300k and above

@Londonhither44 im a single parent on 100k. Two children in private, no mortgage, and I get £700 a month child support. Fees are 50k a year. I have dipped into savings at times but mostly salary covers the fees each month.

Life in London seems especially expensive if you need £250k+.

We are well outside of London, no mortgage. Total gross income about £180k and pay 2x £20k fees per year. But we can't afford the full fat 2x £65k boarding fees.

The ones near us who sent their kids to private school mostly had family financial help. A few were v high earners.