Private school - how do you afford it?

[worriedandstressedAAA]

In the process of applying to various private schools for DS as the local state secondary is pretty dire. Doing the sums now and, whilst we can afford to send one child, sending two children (DS2 is in year 4) is going to be very tight. I need to go through the sums in more detail but basically think it is doable with a lot of sacrifices, stress and worry. I am divorced so my ex and I will try to share the fees. We are both middle class professionals living in London. I earn 130k p.a. and DH around 90k. I think it's the fact that we are divorced that is making it so difficult as we are basically paying for 2 households. How does everyone else afford it? It's a sh*t load of money.

I didn’t say we were struggling. I said we couldn’t comfortably have put 2 through. And our outgoings and situation are better than ops.

You realise if you earn £160k a good proportion of that is lost in tax and pension, yes?

Thanks all. I need to go through the figures in more detail but do think that we can cut back a lot. We typically go away several times a year, kids do loads of activities etc. One key point though is that I am spending £1,200 per month on after school childcare and around £300 to £400 per month on tutors, both of which we wouldn't need when DC2 goes to secondary (am def not paying for tutors and private school). Issue will be for the 2 years that DCS is still at primary as we will still need childcare then.

Regarding letting DS1 start at the local secondary, how do I know he is not doing well? I am not expecting any massive dramas but think he is at risk of coasting/underachieving. Not sure this would become apparent until we get his GCSE results! I think DS would be ok/happy there.

As for moving into catchment of a good state secondary, we almost did this last summer but, having work out the cost of moving (stamp duty, estate agents fees etc) as well as the massive upheaval and that we would be getting a smaller place in a worse area, decided against it at the time but thought we would revisit for DC2 who will go into year 5 in September. I thought we would afford the fees for private but, going through it now that we are getting closer, I am worried that paying for 2 is going to be very tight and will mean cutting back massively on holidays and other luxuries.

I think, at this point, we will wait to see what, if any, offers he gets from privates and then decide. I am tempted to send DS2 to a private school for 2 years then move so that DC2 gets into a good secondary then try to get DS1 in via the sibling policy ) but accept that posters think this is a bad idea! Maybe local secondary for 2 years then move, or move even sooner and go on waiting list. If we move though, we will still be spending at least 70k on stamp duty so we still pay, just in a different way.

Gah! Why do I read these threads? The unbearable snobbery is so ugly and stomach- churning.

Yes, it will be tight and as PP have said, you need to factor in other costs like lunches, uniforms, trips and external exams. Plus the fees will go up every year.

We moved out of London. Renting plus school fees is less than paying London school fees.

If your children are smart you won't need to pay for additional tutoring no matter what school they go to. A girl at my daughters bog standard comp (yes, where a high proportion of children live on estates shock horror and who aren't white and middle class) got 11 level 9s at gcse last year.

If you have a spare room with en suite I would consider an au pair to provide your wrap around childcare. You would be very desirable in central London and could drastically reduce childcare costs

I’ve been doing the sums myself for future years and however you look at it, it is a major commitment and you would have a chance in lifestyle, particularly for years where you were double running fees. However, while your numbers seem toght, I’d be tempted as you have the following going for you:

1. considerable equity. You would have options around remortgaging plus a great safety net if everything ever went totally wrong. Are you already on a reasonable rate? Could you extend the term?

2. could you look at your pension contributions and temporarily reduce? You seem to have some fairly chunky dedications for something (so I was assuming pension). Even with a 10% pension, salary calculator suggests you should be getting £6k plus a month not the 5.6k in your post. If those deductions are for tax on benefits, could you reduce those? As an example, we were shocked when we realised how much my ‘free’ gym membership and my husband’s private health insurance was costing us in tax and have been a bit wary of benefits since.

3. your bonus after tax would go a long way to paying for one child’s fees and you can expect support from your ex.

4. again this might be an incorrect assumption but I’m assuming you’ve got a city job with expectations of long hours. If you move and commute, your quality of life might not be as good. I couldn’t make my commute work with childcare where I live if I was single and my commuting costs are high.

I’d also say your chances of a bursary might be slim due to your equity. One of the schools near me is unusually transparent in its criteria and it is quite clear that they would be looking at capital as well as income.

Husband and I worked 2 jobs each for our 2 children for 16 years. Worth every penny, would do it all again. Fantastic.

Speak to the schools regarding help. Everyone has a different situation and you should look to be paying fees on your own, using any maintenance you receive as contribution towards the fees. Financial help income limits quoted by a PP sound like the limits for one DC not two.

The other option you have not talked about is to consider boarding school. You will qualify for financial help and it probably makes more sense for the 2DC to be away during term time. It will allow you to focus on your career and get your income up.

Like a number of posters, DH and I both work full time. Small mortgage (have compromised a bigger house / mortgage for DCs private education). We could have moved but decided longer commute and stamp duty etc not worth it

Regarding letting DS1 start at the local secondary, how do I know he is not doing well? I am not expecting any massive dramas but think he is at risk of coasting/underachieving. Not sure this would become apparent until we get his GCSE results!
This appears to be an increasing uncertainty for all parents with the very inexact science of yearly grading, especially by inexperienced teachers and with the new GCSEs. We all want the teachers who have the capability and experience to get the best out of DCs, whether that means pushing or taking off the pressure. Even better if they can awaken an interest in a subject. I also prefer teachers to be straightforward about their opinions of my DCs We we’re lucky with our DCs and their schools but from second hand experience paying for private education does n’t guarantee any of the above except in a minority of schools. It can all be a bit hit and miss for most schools depending on year and subject.
Parent evenings and talking to parents of older DCs give an insight into the teachers and their teaching capabilities in relation to your DC. There of course is not one size fits all.

I think that with your £40K savings, annual bonus of £11K and £1.5k pcm (18K pa) maintenance from your ex, you can manage it going forwards. If you didn't have this triple combination fallback, I definitely would not commit to one set of school fees let alone 2 sets unless you either increased your income/decrease your expenditure significantly.

Focus on secondary school fees i.e DC2 should stay in state primary until end of yr6 which allows you another 2 years to increase your savings or decrease your expenditure.

We paid down our mortgage significantly in advance of DC1 starting YR7 and have technically paid it off in advance of DC2 starting secondary 3 yrs later. School fees currently total £36K pa and we're able to pay out of income merely because of our negligible mortgage. However, even if our income dropped in the future, we do have savings/investments as backup. The only obvious area you could reduce your outgoings on is your pension contributions since your income would be £6.5K net excluding them instead of your current £5.5K net including them

Thanks all. Regarding my income, until pay review this year, I was taking home around £5,500/£5,600 per month on a basic salary of £113,000 (salary got increased this month to £116,000 (3% increase). Not sure what my take home will be. Weird as for the last few years I have had similar 3% or 5% increases but my take home salary has barely increased at all. Never understood why. I have private healthcare, travel insurance and pay into a private pension (I think I am paying 10%) so maybe I am beign taxed on those. I also buy 5 days holiday per year which I think costs £150 or so per month. I will definitely look at reducing my pension contributions or stopping contributing for a few years and getting rid of private healthcare and travel insurance.

Actual bonus this year was 18k, around 11k after tax. It can vary year to year.

Don’t stop your pension contributions! You will need them

But you could ditch the private health insurance - if you are young enough to have primary-aged kids you aren’t likely to need it. NHS care is fine/better than private for emergency care, and you can pay out of pocket for stuff like private physio if you need it (though we’ve always had NHS physio for sports injuries and it was excellent, just had to wait a few weeks for the appointment).

Travel insurance: shop around. We have multi-trip annual cover with winter sports from Insure&Go for about £100, if you are paying much more than that you should cancel.

Surely everyone suggesting the OP moves out of London is missing the point that she would not likely earn anywhere near that salary outside Central London?
Even the home counties/commuter belt would quite possibly mean long commute times (the clue is in the name!) and if children are young this won't be helpful or even maybe an option. Plus taking them away from their father and possibly family and friends.

Good luck OP in what you decide. We are similar situation - made simpler as we have one child rather than two

I am also figure out how to send my two privately, being a scared by the local state schools. I am also foreign with no connections to the UK or family money / support, so really want to give the children the easiest start in life here.

I am on just below 100K, can probably increase that to 120K if I switch to full-time. Ex is absent through choice, and in any case won't participate financially as he has some left-wing political ambitions (and apparently sending the children to a private school will bury them). Modest mortgage as for London, but still cannot see it all adding up.

*I am also trying to figure out

I totally get how all consuming this seems OP as I’ve been round this loop regarding secondaries a lot recently and there isn’t an easy answer.

What I would say though, is that secondary school in the grand scheme of things ends up being a fairly tiny element of life in and of itself, once looking beck. Moving your entire lives for an area and a school none of you know is probably going to negatively impact your DCs much more than either of the other decisions (scrimping for private or settling for the local comp).

It sounds like you live in a house and a place you love where you all have a community. You and the kids have already lived through a divorce. A move could be really awful for all of you and it’s so final you can’t tell if it’ll work out until it’s done!

It sounds like in a pinch if you lost your job or otherwise struggled you could (a) get a nice quiet lodger for £700 a month (2) fall on mercy of GPs to top up (3) convince ex to pay more (4) still downsize at a later date and release equity if fees were still the priority.

Unless you have total fees in the bank and ringfenced agaist every eventuality, everyone embarking on private education has a risk of their circumstances changing and not being able to continue. It’s a risk many people do take so you’ll be in good company.

In your shoes I’d do what I could to stretch for the fees at a school that keeps the DC in the family home, and trust that if things change one way or the other you’d deal with it, still in the place you all love.

Aw, thanks, Hula. Agree and have had that exact thought many times. I fought tooth and nail to stay in the house when we were getting divorced as it felt like the only stability the three of us had, and I still sort of feel like that. Moving would indeed be stressful for all of us and I am not convinced that the move, upheaval and cost is definitely worth it. It would definitely change all our lives quite significantly and none of us really want that. As you say, there are options/solutions if I find that we run out of money!

One issue I have though is what if DS1 gets into one of our back-up schools and if it is still worth paying. There are 3 schools I have seen that I think would be perfect for him but, due to numbers, he is unlikely to get an offer (think 400+ for 40 places). If, by some miracle, he got an offer to those schools, I would have to find a way to send him and DC2. What though, if he only gets offers from back-up schools? Seems harder to justify all that expense when you have some reservations about the school. That said, I think the teaching and pastoral care in both back-ups and the fact that it would avoid him going to the local state secondary would be worth it.

Silvercookcoo, sounds like we are in the same boat! Hard doing it alone isn't it?? What I have actually found hardest is doing all the tutoring/prep with DS1, who is v reluctant to study. I would have LOVED to have a dependable other half to help with that. Difficult to carve out time to sit down with just DS1 when DC2 needs attention, esp when working full time. I hope you can manage it. One tip I am definitely taking, and which I should have looked into before but didn't as thought it unlikely, are sports scholarships. Both mine are very sporty so could be a way to reduce the fees. Good luck in any event!

Wow. We have 3 boys at public school. Similar income and mortgage to you. We do it because we want to and go without other stuff. If you want to do that for your kids, do it. Sacrifice your ideal lifestyle, don't whinge and just get on with it. Otherwise don't. Simple.

Random 2p worth
Living near your child’s school- state or otherwise is a huge advantage-
Love totally out of London and you’d have the life of Reilly
Northamptonshire, Warwickshire & Leicestershire all 1 hours into central London
If your house is 1.3 in London it’s probably 400k here, you’d be mortgage free and commuting would be c.7k year
Schools are good but private fees also considerably less
I say that as someone with a London centric career btw