Cost of a baby

[FlowerPower25]

Hi everyone, we are pregnant with our first, and would like some advice on how much a baby costs once born, so we can plan our finances.

We have money put aside for getting things ready (cot, pram etc), but am interested to hear how much your monthly spending went up once baby arrived?

Thanks!

I have a 15 week old and she usually costs around £20 per week. That's includes Formula, nappies, wipes, nappy bags. Obviously we spend extra on activities and clothes. Hope this helps!

There are so many variables Flower it’s really hard to say. Things like washable nappies and breastfeeding are believed to cut down on cost. Only buying things when you need, rather than buying tonnes of equipment that’s recommended that yiu never use helps too.

I know some that only dress their babies in designer gear and others whose babies live in hand me downs. Things like paying for classes or going to the free ones at libraries, nct and children’s centre can make a cost difference too.

How long you have off on Maternity leave and if you will be paying for childcare make a huge difference too.

The biggest cost is loss of earnings. The actual cost of baby can be very little. We breastfed and used washable nappies and wipes (initial cost of £200 but will last us for another baby). Our now toddler has always eaten what we have so no extra cost for food. Most clothes good quality second hand.

On the other hand you could be buying formula, nappies and wipes and use Ella's kitchen pouches for every meal at £1+ each.

Far too many variables to give a figure.

Day to day living ours costs us very little. Nursery however is £400 a month for part time.

I would work it out based on an average week:-

a pack of 40 nappies (£6),
a pack of wipes or cotton wool (£2)
a box of formula (£11),
maybe some ready mixed formula for when you are out and about (4 pack £4)

so about £25 a week.

Then you need to factor in stuff monthly maybe clothes, toys, baby's bubble bath/shampoo, calpol, nappy rash cream and baby classes.

Once they start weaning at 6 months it can get more expensive if you want to buy ready made baby food and yoghurts and babybels and Pom bears etc etc but if you do baby led weaning the idea is they just eat the same food as you which will be cheaper.

6 month old costs £6 a week probably? Nappies wipes and nappy bags.
He’s breastfed, but I’m going back to work and started him on bottles aswell so an extra £10 every 2 weeks.
He got bought loads of clothes so haven’t bought any for months, other than some white baby gros.
Potatoes, carrots, parsnip etc bought at Tesco for 50p for a bag or so, blended and frozen for his meals. I add chicken etc if that’s what I’m having, and cheese.

Doesn’t cost too much, it’s the big things in pregnancy that cost.

Obviously you’ll need to save for childcare but my mum is a childminder and kept a space for my son and says he’s family and she’d never ever charge me (I offered of course).

The general cost didn't go up by much initially. I think it worked out at £20 a week but we did buy in bulk.

The real big cost was childcare. Currently 1051 per month for a full time place. If you're in London, it's near on £1800 for one child.

Ours didn't cost much in the first year. We bought nappies, wipes, food from 6months +. I breastfed so never bought formula and only did local very cheap baby groups (approx £2 per session with tea included).

For clothes we were lucky to get some hand me downs and with newborn/ birthday and Christmas gifts we haven't had so buy much, although I picked up some nice things from charity shops.

It started to get expensive after maternity leave when we started paying for childcare.

We budget £1400 per month for the baby once I go back to work four days a week.

On mat leave it's varied greatly.
We spend £140 per month for classes 3 times a week.
We bought reusable nappies at £2.66 and asda own when we used disposables.
I got given LOADS of stuff (as in pram, car seat, cot, ect) as well as clothing.
I've bought everything else second hand (I have a great fara near)
Most classes around my area are £14-£18 a class. We try and do free rhyme time at the library and playgroups where the cost is £3.

It's been cheaper than we expected for her upkeep.

It's the loss of earnings that's the real killer (I'm getting like 15% of my salary at the moment!)

Thanks everyone, that's so helpful. Loss of earnings is a big worry for us, too, so starting to think about whether going part-time would be sensible after mat leave, and of course saving for when the mat leave income becomes minimal!

I'm hoping to BF, and would be quite happy with hand-me-downs etc, so hopefully won't be too pricey to start with!

Thanks again 😊

If you are hoping to BF Flower and want to save money, I wouldn’t buy any bottles or formula as it’s been proved that you are more likely to give up if you already have them in the house. If you do decide to ff most areas have at least one supermarket which is 24 hours. You probably only really need some breast pads, a couple if decent nursing bras and maybe some lanisinohm I didn’t even that the cream.

If you’ve got a La Leche League near to you, yiu can go to the groups while you’re still PG and lots have books which you can borrow, again saving on cost

As others have said, it can vary hugely but biggest cost comes after 1 year when you need to pay for childcare.

In our case for first year, we spent about £1500 before baby was born - this included travel system, car seat and base, crib, first clothes, washable nappies and wipes, disposable size 1 nappies, baby monitor, electric breast pump, starter kit of bottles, steriliser - basically all the essentials. The only additional things I got after baby cane were a few nicer breastfeeding tops, a good quality breastfeeding cushion and baby carrier.

Our ongoing costs were minimal - greater use of washing machine is the biggest one I can think of. We received so many clothes as gifts and had handmedowns so I barely bought anything. We did maximum of one paid-for class each week, which cost around £8-9 and rest were free children's centre classes. Met up with NCT friends at each other's homes and each brought biscuits/cake along so minimal cost there too.

They don't need much in the way of toys either to start with, a couple of simple things is more than adequate. As they become toddlers, then the stuff starts to accumulate and the toys have the potential to get expensive.

We are incredibly fortunate and managed to save all more than 60% of my mat pay while I was off, which we then used to fund the final 3 months plus a nice holiday.

I would recommend joining parenting and breastfeeding groups on Facebook. People regularly give away bundles of clothes (both baby and nursing / maternity) if you will collect and they also sell breast pumps and bottles and other breastfeeding paraphernalia for cheap too.