How much do you spend on extracurricular activities? Mine seem so expensive

[extracurricularsomuch]

How much does everyone spend on extracurricular activities?

admitidly I live in Switzerland, and everything is expensive here, but I’ve just totalled up how much my daughters clubs are going to be this year. She’s desperate to do dance too, but I just can’t make it all work with work. And also worried about her being tired.

so, climbing, gymnastics, all yeat round. Skiing in winter, football in summer and autumn, is costing over £2000.

and she’s desperate to do ice dance in winter too.

luckily the 2 year old is too young for all this, but it’s going to be crazy when he’s her age.

And the skiing isn’t the most expensive one. Climbing is. Madness.

We spend slightly under that for swimming, dance and gymnastics. A week of skiing lessons tips it over £2k but I consider that a holiday cost!. Very middle of the road area of England.

I guess that between 2 teenagers we spend about the same as you over the year. One has much more ‘expensive’ hobbies -
dance and music and swimming. The other does a lot of hers through school and it’s free.
You don’t have to keep saying yes. I don’t know how old she is but three hobbies (especially paid for hobbies) is plenty. If she wants to try new things she has to choose one to swap. So dancing instead of gymnastics. Or ice skating instead of climbing.

To be honest I think that seems extremely cheap for what you're describing! So around £170 p/m? We live in a much cheaper country than Switzerland (and than the UK), and if we didn't have some scholarships my daughter's extra curriculares (ballet, swimming and music) would cost ~€300 p/m. She's 6.

yes good idea. It’s sort of what we said for dance. She did climbing first year we were here, dance lasy year, and we said she had to choose one or the other.

skiing in non negotiable as we live in the mountains. It’s twice a week so is actually probably the most reasonable price wise.

she’s 6 in November. I teach her piano, so thank goodness theres no cost there.

intersting that it’s all basically the same as UK. When we were there a few years ago I was under the impression activities were much cheaper than here. I guess not.

We are in England and spend just over 2K for each of them for extra curriculars. Probably more if you factor in hotels and travel for competitions.

Ok. So actually not too bad then. Skiing is twice a week from December - March. Climbing September - April. Football is only September, may and june. Gymnastics is September- may.

There's been a very long thread in the AIBU topic over the last few days about expensive hobbies.

I think that sounds incredibly reasonable!

Plus, they can cut back on quantity when they’ve found “their thing”, although that won’t lower the cost 😆

I’ve just worked it out and it’s about the same and they aren’t even really expensive hobbies.

Judo £25 a month
Athletics £25 a month per child for two children
Swimming £43 a month per child for two children (I know this counts as an extra curricular but it’s not really a hobby, more an essential skill for safety that they’ll both stop once they reach a good enough level. They’re happy to do it, but it’s not their choice).

£161 a month total
£1,900 a year.

In the East Midlands of England. Across 4 kids we have per month:
Swimming £53
Football £30
Scouts £20 plus camps - up to £80 3 x a year
Beavers £20 plus camps - £80 1 x a year
Dance £50
Martial arts £48
Forest school £35

I think that’s really cheap for all those cities and It includes skiing! My dd does one sport but to a high level (trains 6-7 sessions a week). Costs us £90 a month membership, plus competition fees, equipment , over night stays for competitions, then an annual away training camp. The extras probably come in at 1.5-2k per year on average.

My DS is only in year two , I have just added this up and we are spending around 3k a year , which seems high I've never added it up yearly .

That's for football , piano , school football club, goalie training , MMA and swimming .

We are going to get him so ski lessons at the indoor ski slope ahead of us going, no idea how much that will cost . Luxkily our youngest is only one.

I haven't got it calculated by month or year but for 7 year old DD at the moment it is £68 per month for swimming club, it's 5 hours a week of training, and £122 per term for her theatre club, which works out about £12 per session. Also occasionally wrap around at school for £7.50 a time.

This is an improvement on the end of the last school year which also included about £150 per term for gymnastics and £40 a month for normal swimming lessons.

I was spending £300 on music lessons and orchestra alone, exams, performance related costs etc on top

Music is super expensive yes.

I think it feels more expensive because I have to pay for the year for everything now. So forking out basically everything this week. There doesn’t seem to be an option to pay by month or term. So it’s 700 here, 800 there. I guess then it’s done at least. She just can’t quit anything!

£200 for one and £300 for the other, per month, but only in term time. Just realised that’s £6k a year!

Germany, DS(9)

Football 2x a week, €60 per year
Athletics (inc. running) 2x a week, €120 a year.

Chess club was free via an enrichment programme.

Can‘t get him into music, but 2 years of an introductory music course from 5 including how to read music and play the Glockenspiel cost €25 a month.

I think judo used to cost us €180 a year.

15yo : scouts £500 including camps
Archery £20
Climbing £560

17yo dance £800
Theatre £300
Cadets £100

I pay about £2500 in East of England. Gymnastics the most expensive at £95/month, music lessons for 2 children and then an additional hobby which is relatively cheap at £20 a month. That doesn't include extras like music exams and gym competitions!

It would be a lot (and a big commitment) to pay for everything up front like the op.

I put £400/month into an instant access savings account to pay for music: two lots of private instrumental lessons and music school, plus orchestra fees - if they do a residential one that can be thousands. We also have hockey but that’s cheaper - probs £500 over the year, plus some kit costs.

We pay £100 per month for gymnastics, £50 per month for dance, and £40 a month for swimming. Thats without the extras for gymnastics like competitions and squad leotard.

I spend over 2K a year on stage school, swimming and gymnastics for one DD. Her swimming is getting really good now but she still lacks confidence in deeper water so until I’m assured she’s confident here I’ll keep the lessons going.

Oh dear, I've just added mine up:

child 1 - 1 activity that costs150 per month
Child 2 - 2 activities at 40 and 70 per month

Yearly total 3120

Yikes. I had no idea. Its a weekly riding lesson, weekly football lesson and weekly martial arts lesson.

Wow that's insanely cheap! Are they all state subsidised?