Do you have to be reasonably wealthy to have a large family and live comfortably?

[ChoccieLover1]

I know it seems like a silly question but I would love to have 4 children (have 2 at the moment) but can't help thinking that I need to try and make myself financially stable/ more employable first.

DP works and we are doing okay at the moment but I can't help feeling that if we had another baby things would be tight and my kids would miss out on swimming lessons and fun days out.

I know these things are a privilege as it is and can't compare to the joys of another sibling but I don't want to feel like I've limited my current children's standard of life due to my own selfish desires to have more kids.

(This feeling is really strong and I don't want to leave the gaps too big and would ideally like to be finished having babies by the time i'm 30 as I started young.... i'm 25 now)

Sorry to waffle on, but would be really interested to know if parents of large families try to financially prepare themselves before extending their brood or just go with the flow and just manage.

Any advice on what you would do if you were me would also be appreciated.

Thanks

i think it is a really big hop from 2 to three.
If you ever need a hotel it is always 2 rooms, not one family room. Cars are difficult.
You also become very time poor as ,if you can afford all the activities they want to do, you will be permanently ferrying them around.
Once they reach 11 or so they eat like adults and it is quite frightening how much food you get through.
You have less time for each child. You always feel a bit stretched in different directions.
Once you factor in all of that; It is great.
I wouldn't change a thing.

View I agree with you about the ferrying around, i often have to be in 3 places at the same time!
Even though you have less time with each individual child they get so much from their interaction with each other. Whilst there can be bickering between them more often than not they all get on well and occupy each other.
I'm with you I certainly wouldn't change a thing!

Yes, agree with you too Usedtobe. I love the way they are together, the way they rub the corners off each other and the way that DS can be really soft and affectionate with DD2. I don't think they are in quite so much rush to grow up either!

I t depends,personally i think it can be as expensive or as cheap as you want it to be!We dont struggle with money but if we did i dont think it would stop me from having a large family,unless it got to the point where we were worried about if we could afford a roof over our heads or food!

I agree with cuddler.

Some people spoil their only child and would spend more than another parent on all their children combined. I think you just know how you want to parent and if it's possible on your income or not.

It is expensive (I have 4) but like others' said it depends massively what you want to do.

We were very lucky with property as we bought when we were in our late 20s so were able to afford a big house with a very small mortgage and effectively have an extremely low outgoing for that. Also we only have 1 car (albeit a big one) as we both work mainly from home, so the car is mainly for ferrying the children to activities.

Shopping bills are big but the biggest expense for us are travel, childcare and extra-curricular activities. We currently average £400 a month for the older two to do their activities so it will increase to £800 when they all start (eeek!). Childcare averages £800 but it will reduce to £600 when my third goes to school in September. This is without school holiday care!!

I work 3 days a week, it is stressful but my salary goes to pay childcare, holidays and extracurricular. Without my salary we would be doing no holidays or extracurricular, so I guess it is more a lifestyle choice in that respect. If we hadn't bought a house years ago, we would now be paying a huge mortgage and we would have had to compromise much much more. Not sure if we would have done it, hard to say in retrospect...

We are expecting dc4 and live on £24k pa quite comfortably really. I think it depends where you are in the country, what you aspire to and how you cut your cloth. Having said that I am dreading the food bills in a few years..... !

I think it's quite judgemental to say both parents shouldn't work. It depends what sort of life you want. I have 4, fifth on the way. My kids go to music , swimming & other activities. THAT IS WHY I WORK, so I can afford to do these things.

I was talking to mosman btw op. I think it's a personal choice.

im due with DC3 next week :)
we talked and talked and talked some more about DC3 and money and work and life in general.
DP would have waited longer, i prefered a shorter age gap. we made the decision that if we were going to have a 3rd then id stop working for a few years until theyare at school and then retrain as something else and go back part-time.
so for us, we considered the financial implcations of having 3 without compromising our lifestyle, our need to be supported (childcare, cleaner) our aspirations or the education of our children. we will not have a fourth for these reasons, we would feel too stretched. it'd be nice to have a fourth though... but i am happy with my lot and i am not superwoman either! :o

I agree with cuddler and usedtobe. I have 4 dc, we manage on dh's wage, which is less than any mentioned here.
We don't tend to go out for meals, or on fancy holidays. Days out can be done for free (or the cost of diesel) and are just as much fun.
We have a zafira - so not really into the realms of big-car-territory.
We have have to budget carefully, but we're naturally quite frugal, and extravagances are few and far between.
But, we have a fantastic life, and having our dc and spending time all together more than makes up for lack of money.
Tbh, I would also argue against bigger houses. Children "needing" their own room was, up until fairly recently, a privilege for the wealthy. Sharing rooms teaches children various life lessons, and it certainly isn't bad for children to share space. (IMO anyway :))

I honestly don't know what people spend their money on sometimes. I have 5 DC and earn 35K a year before tax, plus get CB and CTC. I consider we live comfortably and always have enough for food and bills. We live in a 3 bedroom house so mine do have to share but we have a big downstairs and huge garden so although others may think we're squeezed in, I think we're doing ok. I have a 10 year old car - that's fine.

Children all have swimming lessons (not DS5 who's just a baby but he will do when older) and they also do one other activity each. Somethings we're outpriced of like horseriding, but the girls do dance and gymnastics and DS4 goes to tae kwon do. I hand down clothes between them but usually buy new and not supermarket stuff - buy from Next or M&S and try to be organised with sales.

I shop in Aldi and bulk buy meat from the butchers. Pay for everything upfront and dont do credit. Save through the year for next years iykwim. We don't often go on big day trips as taking 5 to places by myself is hard work....but we have been to the zoo, farm parks, the safari park etc, probably every other month. We can also afford to eat out monthly. However, more often than not we do other things like going to parks, taking bikes along the trails, having a picnic, walking along the canal tow path etc.

We have at least 1 uk holiday each year and I book it in January so I can find something at the right price. Am currently saving up to take us to Euro disney in feb next year.

I suppose my point is that you don't have to have a huge income to make having 4 children plus affordable.....if you need luxury things then yes, you do need to earn alot more but if you're happy to cut your cloth then it is absolutely fine. The thing thatdrains your income is if you have debts or housing costs that are more than a third of your income - then it can be really tough.

We have 4 DC I'm a SAHM, DP works long hours but earns a good salary for her, were in Scotland where a 4 bed would be under 200K. We are in a cramoed 3 bed just now just about to extend. We have 2 cars, a 7 year old people carrier for me and DP has his dream car (even thought it's 7 years old too!) we have one UK hol a year and loads of day trips.

We could have stopped at two I could have gone back to work, we could have 2 new cars in the drive and a bigger house in a nicer area but we wouldnt have had DD3 and DS, no comparison.

We have four, and dh has a good job and we are financially secure. I suspect though that a lot of it is down to having children in our mid 30's (OK, I am 40 and had dd4 four months ago, dh the bastard is only 37), than being overly wealthy. We had a good housing deposit before kids, travelled a lot, set up our household etc etc. Doing all that while having a large family would have made it more financially challenging. Also meant we could both work full time until we had kids - we're in the lucky situation of being able to save almost a whole salary every month and live off the other - this was over the course of a few years - unachievable if we had had a family. Hope I'm making sense, but I think that has helped us. And then in the last few years since having kids, dh has gone a few rungs up the ladder at work. Without that though, I still think we would be living comfortably...

We're pretty much the same as Kidderminster Kate. Income is a few grand less (I have posted in on mn before) but we also have one less children.
A lot is about expectations. We have a food life. It can be a struggle but the good far far outweighs the bad

Yes you do need to be pretty well off, which involves a huge amount of work, planning, juggling and sacrifices. I think of us as reasonably wealthy, although money is always very tight and time is even tighter. With 5 kids it seems we earn more than many people we know but have a simpler lifestyle. There are some savings though - like you wouldn't dream of taking them to a restaurant / pub for a meal, or of taking them on a plane - oh the shame of letting them loose on a peaceful place!!!