Who can afford private schools in the UK?

[wjchoihk]

Hi. I am not sure if this is an appropriate question to ask here. But I have always wondered how rich you should be to send children to private schools in UK. Fees are anywhere from 3000 up to 10000 per term. Even allowing for wide gaps in income, thinking of 'avearge' UK wage of 26,000 pound, math simply don't add up for a normal life with such high fees. I also know only 7% of children go private though.

How much of private parents live on "inherited" wealth and how much on simply superior current earnings? I have my kids at SW London privates but I wouldn't be able to afford this without current int'l expat package. Some parents at my kids' schools LOOK and ARE very very rich but most of them LOOK quite down to earth. But I can't ask....

Affordability is actually major long term issue for private schools. Fees have gone up so disproportionately, and housing costs, including rents, are so high that particularly at boarding schools, many, many pupils are funded by grandparents downsizing their properties or doing capital release.

However, once that asset is gone, it's gone, and current parents of private school pupils are unlikely to be able to do the same for their own grandchildren. This is why schools with any sort of international reputation are either courting the overseas market, or trying to set up franchises overseas.

Schools that can't compete internationally and aren't well endowed enough to offer good bursaries and scholarships to bright kids are going to really struggle in the long term. They will end up having to increase class sizes to afford teacher salaries and will lose a key advantage over the state sector.

Basically, unless housing costs collapse, for lots of schools the economics won't stack up.

Can't really say, diabolo,without outing myself, as I know these are unique to where we live. Cryptic, moi?

Usualsuspect- what makes you say that? (genuinely don't understand)

We could afford private if we wanted to but we don't want to. Dh is a GP and so well paid.

However, we regard being able to afford to do some very interesting travelling, having a holiday home (the house we used to live in, in a rural area - we rent it to tourists some of the time), me being able to work for a charity with hours that fit around school, "enrichment" type of activities (all 3 of our dc play 2 instruments, for example) more important than private education.

Our dc also go to a state school that offers fully bilingual education - something no private school we've heard of can. We couldn't pay for the amazing opportunity our dc have!

I am a stay at home mum, My husband pays the fees. We have x3 children and fees are approx £30k a year.

We didn't make the decision lightly. We decided to take our elder children out of a totally lovely primary school, as we didn't feel the love for the very good comprehensive, it made sense for our youngest to join them rather than have a different school run.

We were lucky we bought at the right time, and we are now mortgage free. We purposely don't live in a very expensive area as we don't have to pay catchment comprehensive prices.

I've had one mother (a very good friend) with children at our old primary school inform me that the rumours now are ...... we don't pay the fees, we have an inheritance as its obvious if we had money we would live somewhere else. ( why would I chose to leave my lovely home, and my great friends for a posher postcode?)

Of course nobody has said anything to my face, but that's apparantly how we afford to educate our children!

Well my reading is that usual is pointing out that anyone who thinks that any stay at home mum can easily walk out and earn an extra £12-15k specifically to pay for school fees is living and thinking inside a bubble.

Narked, of course there will be families with two earners both bringing in £26,500 and only one child to educate. They are still part of the minority of families who can pay school fees.

All this talk of "anyone can do it, it's just priorities" is rude as it wilfully ignores the different realities faced by different families and is designed to cast those who have managed it in a superior light.

That post was in answer to pugs.

I was a SAHM for 8 years, then went out to work for over £25k.

That's lovely, knows. I've also been very fortunate, I'm just not arrogant enough to assume my experience is universal, particularly in the middle of a recession.

Of course people have loads of reasons for the number of children they have. But the idea of limiting your family simply so that you can privately educate strikes me as being...questionable. If you ask most people wither they'd rather have gone to a state school and had a sibling or be a privately educated only child, I suspect I know what they would say.

Depends on the school...and the sibling

Ds will never have enough theory of mind to be able to answer that question, seeker...

I feel quite sure that the prevalence of only children in private schooling is not what you're suspecting, though. For medical or whatever reasons, people have only one child and then find that, ergo, then can possibly, at a stretch, afford school fees. I doubt it's rarely the other way around.

...the reason for the prevalence, obviously...

Ok, I see your point that not all SAHM's are willingly unemployed, but if you presume most 'could' manage to earn half the national average it is certainly possible to afford private school fees. Whether somebody chooses this option is obviously a matter of opinion!
I also think it is very unfair to judge those of us who have planned to have an only because we value giving that child every possible opportunity. Not everybody who has a sibling would put that above a good education!

I have five children, all privately educated. I don't think I had another 2 or 3 unborn children in me. Mercy! We had exactly the number of children we wanted.

There are inevitable a lot of smaller families in private schools, but the causal relation is smaller family > private education rather than private education > smaller family.

Should we interrogate state school families with only one or two children as to their motives?

I don't think I was particularly fortunate, hester. It was the fruits of my investment in my own education.

Should I be apologising for studying hard at the right time? I'm not prepared to do that.

No, people actually say, and have said on this thread, we decided to have one child because....or we stopped at one because.....

Cross.post knowsabit. Was just thinking the same - apparently having one child is the weirdest or most damaging thing one could do...?

Was about to post I must have missed someone saying that upthread. But then pugs went and said it anyway!

All the onlies I know are due to 1) disability, 2) failure to conceive others or 3) age of parents.

Seeker -
I hold my hands up, it was me! & I will never ever regret having an only if it means she gets better opportunities than I did. Judge if you wish

Er...last time I looked, the number of children people decide to have (and why) is a very personal decision Seeker...

And, yes, I probably would swap my one autistic child and his private school for two neurotypical children able to access state schooling of an acceptable/safe nature.

No- there are many reasons for having one child. Or 5. Or none. But better not born than state educated is......questionable.

That Seeker, depends very much on your own experience of state education!