Can’t decide whether to have a third baby?!

[SFLS301]

Hi!
My husband and I have 2 children; DS is 8 and DD is 3. I am absolutely desperate to have a third child but DH is worried about the finances.
Between us we earn £65k before tax etc and both our jobs are quite flexible so don’t pay for after school clubs etc. DD gets 30 hours free at nursery and DS is in primary school.

We live in a 4 bed house in the north and our mortgage is £650 a month. Our monthly bills including food etc comes to about 2k a month.

My questions are really for those of you who have 3 children, is the financial jump really noticeable?
Do things get easier as they get older? (In terms of money)
What are the biggest expenses you noticed going from 2 to 3?

Thankyou! X

First of all, if you'd had a child starting uni last September, even with 2 other children in education, you'd be expected to pay £5,066 OF THE LOAN (for living, not the tuition loan) on your income. For everyone saying, they'd just have to live on the loan, parents on household income of more than about £62k HAVE TO PAY MORE THAN HALF OF THE LIVING LOAN. SO £5k PER YEAR. The living expense loan is about £9,400 for living away from home, outside of London, but they dont get that on your income. They'd get about £4,400 from the government, you as parents have to pay the rest. The cost of halls can be £5k or £6k so if the parents dont pay the loan, they wouldnt even be able to pay for accommodation, let alone anything else. Obviously not all children go to uni but some responses on here are just ignorant of the current rules. Not saying of course they'll be the same in 18 or 19 years but it's a genuine consideration to having more children.

I think it does get more expensive. You can absorb quite a lot of the early costs but with 3 teenagers here, everything is really expensive. Clothes, meals out, holidays are usually based on 5 x adult prices. As other people have said, those are few and far between but every additional ice cream / milkshake etc, plus everything is set up for 2adults + 2 children - for a 'family' ticket. Its an extra ticket etc every time. It all adds up. I wouldn't change it and our No. 3 really completed the family (as cheesy as that sounds) but it's definitely expensive when you add up the extra childcare, out of school activities (No. 3 turned out to be very sporty), on top of all the luxuries like holidays etc.

Thats £5k PER child PER year by the way.

I have three and can honestly say that I have never had a second of regret .Financially I cannot remember it being an issue when the children were young but we have obviously paid for three now to go through Uni .
Our third is actually brilliant with money and has always earned money from age 13 and has a job at Uni .
Absolutely no regrets having my lovely son .
Just feeling quite sad that he is now in last year at Uni and our home is very quiet

My two other children were pretty easy children which obviously helped when our youngest was a baby.
If you really want another child I would say ...go for it

@Africa2go

Thats £5k PER child PER year by the way.

No need to shout.. we heard you.

@Viques sorry, my phone wouldn't let me write PER in lower case, autocorrect puts it in capitals. It was my phone being shouty, not me! Apologies

[quote Africa2go]@Viques sorry, my phone wouldn't let me write PER in lower case, autocorrect puts it in capitals. It was my phone being shouty, not me! Apologies[/quote]
You were a bit shouty in your other post too, was that also your phone?

Was just trying to correct obvious misunderstanding of previous posters. Lets not derail the thread.

Also those pesky environmental reasons or are we not bothering about that any more?

@MsTSwift

Also those pesky environmental reasons or are we not bothering about that any more?

Actually that was another point my husband put forward when I said I wanted a 3rd and he wanted to stop at 2

I have 3 and it's the best thing ever. My 2 girls love him. We didn't need to change our car. He fitted in perfectly x