How do families have SAHMs?

[LikeDaisies]

Financially - I cannot comprehend how it’s possible!

Husband is a teacher. Earns around £44,000. That isn’t enough to cover our bills if I were to leave my job and stay at home with our baby.

Mortgage is £900. Other bills come to around £700 - not considering food, leisure, etc.

Not that I’d want to leave my job, but I’d love to be able to drop down to 3 days a week. But financially it just isn’t possible. We wouldn’t be able to afford our mortgage and bills.

So it leaves me wondering how I see so many families who are able to manage having a SAHM.

Please can anyone who is in this situation explain how it is possible/how you make it work?

Who pays for the house you live in? No mortgage or rent?

What work is it for 15 k please? Looking for ideas

Higher earning partners and/or living a frugal lifestyle. It’s all about choices and sacrifices I guess. Personally I cannot comprehend the lives I read some SAHM’s describe: no money for even simple treats, no haircuts, never going out, only second hand clothes, one pair of shoes…sounds utterly depressing. Why anyone would give up financial independence to live like that is beyond me.

On the flip side I know many women would never make the choice I did - one year of mat leave and then returning to work after I had both DC - so horses for courses.

I’ve noticed a lot of SAHMs in the military.

I’m a military spouse and I went back to work after having DD. We then moved and I struggled to get a job (as soon as employers heard military they ran a mile as we move so often) and the kinda jobs I could have gotten wouldn’t have been worth what I’d be paid versus what we’d pay in childcare. Our overheads are small due to being in military housing. A lot of military families at Dds preschool are SAHMs for the same reasons

If we didn’t have the cheap military housing there’s no way we’d manage on just DHs salary. I count myself very lucky for this (despite the endless issues with military housing and the crap deployments but that’s for another thread)

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I’m a SAHM to a toddler and a baby, through circumstances rather than preference. Ideally I would have preferred to work part time and I’m hoping that will be possible in the future. Reasons we can afford it; my husband is a higher earner, we were older when we met so had a flat each which had appreciated in value, we bought a house well below our maximum possible affordability, we paid off our mortgage before having children (partly with money given to us by my parents),my parents also paid for our IVF and for my car (I know we’re incredibly fortunate), we minimise our outgoings (e.g. delaying replacing our kitchen and patio even though they really need doing, buying clothes on Vinted, cutting my own hair). I don’t think most of these would be obvious to people I only know on a surface level (even the hair!) so it’s entirely possible if anyone thought about it they might wonder how we could afford to have a SAHP.

I was a stay at home mum because we didn’t earn enough to pay for childcare and had no help. My husband was on £40K and we never went on holiday or ate out or had fancy phones, in fact we survived without a car for a long time. We cut our cloth as the saying goes. I went to a lot of charity shops! . I loved it. Am so glad I had that time. Money isn’t everything.

Or they just have a higher household income. When I was a SAHP we had 2 cars, 2-3 holidays plus weekends away, ate out fairly regularly, plenty of money for clothes, no tax credits or child benefit… some people just have higher incomes.

My Husband earns £43000 a year, but our mortgage is £500, our bills are £300 and our expenses are very little. We even manage to save and go on holiday at least once a year. We don’t come from money either, my parents are low income and his parents have nothing to do with us. Just lots of budgeting, and living in an area that’s inexpensive.

Bought a less expensive house so not mortgaged up to the eyeballs. Cut your cloth accordingly and it's absolutely do-able. If 1 of you was made redundant and it took ages to find work, you'd get by one way or another.

Are your salaries monthly or annually?

I’m a teacher and I earn £57k my husband works part time but evenings so it means he is around for school drop offs/pick ups and then leaves for work just before 5pm. We really don’t spend much money, neither of us like buying stuff and we manage to save about 1k a month. We spend a lot of time outdoors doing free stuff hiking/camping etc our holidays tend to be a few a year but rarely anything glamorous just camping/ forests/ beaches usually in the UK. We rarely eat out other than occasionally and obviously as the kids are young 7 and 4 they don’t want or need much. I buy most clothes secondhand but only when needed etc. Our biggest bill is food shopping but we meal plan to minimise costs. We only have one car. I just think people prioritise different things. We decided we would rather have one of us not working full time whilst the kids are young to avoid childcare bills and so far it’s worked well, but I appreciate we are lucky to have a choice.

It needs to be double that salary.

Not a SAHP then.

DH is on £65,000. I work 2 days a week and earn £30,000.

He takes home about 2900, mortgage of 900 so 2k left. Rest of bills are 700 (seems steep!) so 1.3k left. £500 a month for food. £800 left. Of course that is doable. It's about choices. Holidays. Take outs. Leisure activities. Schooling. Mobility.

The person working has to earn a lot more than 44k. DH earning circa 110k, have some income from a rental property aswell. We have no debt other than an v small anmount and small mortgage. Also have zero family support so quickly decided I wasn’t going to kill myself working whilst we had small child and really my income didn’t make much difference to daily lifestyle. There’s no way even with a small mortgage and no debt would we be able to make it work on 44k income.

So no SAHP then.

This was advice for the OP - with their income in mind. £44k.

Why? Plenty of people manage on far less than that, especially if they have a small mortgage and some debt.

I became a stay at home mom because my salary did not cover 2 babies in nursery. I returned to work after my first, but had the second soon after and I was not going to pay to work. My dh has a good job, so I am lucky to be able to do this. I guess that is the only way to do this, if one parent has a job that can pay all the bills etc....or if you both don't work and get on benefits.....

Are you asking whether they get 25K + 29K monthly? I am not the person you're asking, but I'd hazard a guess those are annual salaries. Not many people earn 29K a month.

You know very many single income household (like lone parents) earn around that much and support their home and family. It's quite possible.

yes senior teachers get paid well

We do it by -

1. DH earns more. Not megabucks though. About £20k more than your DH.

1. We had kids late (40) and had ploughed money aggressively in to paying off the mortgage ASAP. So no mortgage.

1. Sold the second car

1. Rent out the spare room on Airbnb.

However, we have additional large outgoings - DH pays a lot towards two kids from a previous relationship which is as much as a mortgage.

My "allowance" is 1k per month, plus Airbnb income, from which I pay the energy and water bills (£350?), all food (£400), most child activities, gifts and clothes and anything for myself. And towards holidays.

We buy nearly everything secondhand where possible. We buy little tbh as we are both natural savers. We are clever with holidays (eg £50 for a week at Butlins! But also Airbnb abroad wherever flights are cheap).

I know sahms whose partners earn very little and they live very frugally. They adapt their lifestyle to fit. Don't have expensive holidays, hobbies or cars or buy many clothes.

But I don't understand why people can't afford to stay at home if they are paying for childcare! Childcare was so expensive it was cheaper for me to be a sahm!!!