Hi all, I know this is a question asked many times over, but ...
We are interested in sending our two children (baby and toddler at present) to the local independent school. My salary isn't enormous, £65k, but I am doing an MBA (paid for by work), so hope it will go up. My wife isn't working at present. We've had a lump sum settlement and so have £1.5m sat in investments and £1m put aside for a house. We could spend less of course, but this is kind of the ball park for a 4 bed detatched in our part of the country, which is what we would ideally like.
My wife does plan to return to work when our second child is in school, and when working her salary was ~£70k. Fees still feel like an enormous amount of money to me. Our financial adviser says it's doable, but I'd like to hear other people's opinions. Our local primaries are very poor, and the local independent school has a great reputation. I didn't attend a private school but my wife did, and admittedly did benefit greatly from it (I know her salary / work situation might not show that at the minute, but life intervened - she was on a great path beforehand). Life has been very hard for a long time, and I am finding it hard to be an optimist or make big financial commitments despite receiving this lump sum... I'd really welcome any thoughts... thank you!