Nursery costs in London, any tips?

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Hi there, I'm currently pregnant with our first child and I've looked into childcare costs in Bow, London where we live and have been shocked at the prices coming back - e.g. this morning - £1580 per month (plus an 18 month waiting list so we'd have to apply now). This is not far off our mortgage. My husband and I are on reasonable, professional salaries - or so I thought - but this cost is enormous.

We normally have about £1000 left over each month after bills/living costs etc which we'd normally put towards holidays etc but we bought our first flat in late 2018 and every penny over the past 1.5 years has gone into costs associated with this as it was a neglected ex-council flat in Bow (East London) so we have no savings and there are still house-related things we'd need to do or pay for before the baby is due. Also, we'd need to somehow need to save an extra £580 from our normal living expenses just to pay for nursery. We already don't have a car, rarely eat etc so I'm not sure where this money will come from.

We have no grandparents who could support with childcare. Are there any better options out there? I feel like we're taking on the impossible trying to have a child in London. We considered moving out back in 2018 when we bought our flat but we're not from the UK originally and if we left London we'd have zero friends or support network. Also, there are few jobs in our fields outside of London. I'm also now 40 (it took almost 20 years to get on the property ladder with current house prices) so it's not like we can put it off until we're earning higher salaries.

Any help appreciated, we don't know anyone with children in London.

Thanks!

is that for full-time childcare? Perhaps you should look at you both asking for compressed hours at work and having one weekday off each with the child?
Childminder may be cheaper?

Have a look at childminders. They are usually cheaper and do have some other advantages over nurseries. I had twins and it was the only way I could make going back to work cover my costs.

I could probably negotiate 4 days per week but the nursery said they still charge 92%

Is it just the 1 nursery you're looking at? Shop around.

You would get help with tax free childcare.

I've contacted 3, so far prices range £1500-1580. The only one not right next to a motorway/major road said this morning they already have 150 families on the waitlist for 2021, they give priority to children with siblings already there and I'm very unlikely to get in. I'm waiting on availability for the others but it seems like there's more demand than supply.

I don’t think there’s any major tips... you’ll get tax free childcare, and you can potentially both compress hours so you have a different day off, and you only need 3 days at nursery? Or see if there’s a childminder with better prices?

It is insanely expensive... A lot of the people I used to work with in London, in finance so pretty well paid, didn’t come back to work after maternity in the end.

Have you looked at childminders? They are often more cost effective but we still paid £1300 a month. We scraped through until the 30 free hours kicked in with credit cards and being as frugal as we could which wasn't ideal but like you I wasn't in a position to wait. Things are better now but we will be paying off the debt for another couple of years. Worth it though.

Seems like everyone I work with has some kind of work-around, like getting free full time childcare from grandparents. I work for a large charity so definitely not in finance.

Nanny shares are sometimes more cost effective, childminders are worth investigating and nurseries vary - ones with websites and who advertise cost more than the ones that are only word of mouth often, ask about, there will be dozens in the area

Nothing useful to say just hoping you find a way, I'm actually considering if I can have children at all because of costs like this...

Seems like childminders could be slightly cheaper but still £1300+, nanny-shares seem to still cost more than the nurseries.

It's amazing, the difference between having a single child and no children is the difference between being able to afford a holiday to somewhere like Mexico or Kenya every second month and barely scraping by. No idea how people afford more than 1 either.

Tax free childcare will get you 20% but that’s just what it costs

Tax free childcare will help a little, so check if you’re eligible. We worked around it by each doing 4 days in the office so DS is only at nursery 3 days a week - is that an option for you?
Otherwise childminders do work out less expensive and have shorter waiting lists.

If possible, it would be best if both you and DH could compress your hours to gain one day off per week each, then put DC into nursery or childminder 3 days per week. Not possible in all industries but that's what we have done. DS's nursery fees for 3 days per week are around £800 per month.

It creates a bit more of a work-life balance too, and you can keep some week day time with them. It's quite a good precedent to set for school life as you can facilitate activities and playdates on your off days and catch up on some much needed life admin.

We started shopping at Lidl when we had DC2 and it's saved us so much. Their nappies etc are the best too.

We both do compressed hours so we only pay 3 days a week

In our case, the fees were £1300 from age 1-2 (because the ratio of child to carers is so low), £1000 from age 2-3 and £600 from age 3-4 with the 30 free hours and TFC.

So the higher fees are only for a short period, if that helps?

No idea how people afford more than 1 either.

By not living in London for me! Childcare is expensive here (South East) but not that expensive.

I feel your pain, nursery fees for under-2s are painful. DDs full-time nursery fees were more than our mortgage every month, a shade under what you're looking at (we're west London). I went back to work when she was 9 months, and from then until she turned 2 (when the fees drop slightly because of the staff-child ratios) DH and I each had about £40 per month spending money to play with.
This is the hardest point though, fees drop at 2, free hours kick in at 3... And, personally, I was prepared to pay what a good nursery costs so that I knew DD would thrive and DH & I wouldn't be chewing ourselves up at work. We didn't look at childminders or nanny-shares because we needed 100% reliable childcare.
It was a hard time (we were used to a life with a lot of disposable income too) but you can get through it. We have one DC.

Only tips are as others have said, both do compressed hours so only needing 3 days.

Tax Free account - not sure if you can start as soon as baby is born to start saving I know with the old childcare vouchers my husband started paying the month after our first was born to start saving

We are not far from London and paid £900+ for my under 2 for 3 days a week. Eldest was £800 so for the first 6 months of them both being in childcare they were more than my gross salary (I know its a family cost etc but it hurt to know I wasn't actually adding much to the pot overall)! We had saved my childcare vouchers to use up till 30 hours kicked in!

Sadly childcare is tough - ours was a lot more than our mortgage!

I might be able to compress my hours as I'm in a charity that has flexible working. My husband already works about 50 hours a week and he gets emails at odd hours/weekends etc so I can't imagine he'd be able to have a full day away... maybe though?

We can work one day a week from home on Friday, he currently ends up in the office half the time on Fridays anyway but if we could 'fix' this day as a wfh, I wonder if we could cover the childcare between us on that day. We'd have to make an effort not to have videoconferences at the same time etc. Not sure how viable this really is though. We've never looked after a baby before, at that age (0-2), can you do work 50% of the time or do they need nearly 100% of your attention?

If we could pull off Fridays between us and I compress my hours, it could maybe work with 3 days a week nursery. It seems like you barely get a discount for 4 days but 3 days is proportionally much cheaper.

Thanks for all the advice!

I'm in hackney but the nurseries at the children's centres are cheaper, could be worth a look? Our local ones are brilliant. It is so expensive in London for nurseries.

Some employers will only let you work from home if you provide evidence that the child is in paid childcare that day, as they know otherwise people will be distracted by childcare.

As for how viable it is - it depends on the child really. With DS2 I can get a lot done as he entertains himself, so long as I’m in the same room he’s happy. DS1 has always needed constant attention and engagement, I’d never have been able to work with him,

Definitely look at nurseries attached to nurseries and schools, they are much cheaper than commercial ones.

Also childminders.

But yes for a lot of people you just have to really budget until the free hours kick in.

One of my friends took a mortgage payment holiday to cover the first year of nursery fees, then went back to paying mortgage once nursery got cheaper.

Our only option was for me to become a SAHM.

Childcare was £2,200 a month per child (Central London). There's no way I was paying that.

Sorry, can't offer any solid advice.