What’s your household income if you are sending 2+ kids to private schools?

[Anon22224]

Just as the title really, we are considering number 3, 1st child currently attends a small private primary due to SEN, we’d like to be able to send DC2 aswell if it would suit her.

This particular school is fairly reasonable but the secondary schools are much more expensive and I was just wondering what a household income looks like where this is a comfortable option.

Depends where in the country you are. I’m in London/South East and think you need to be earning min 300k to do two kids in private school. If cheaper housing costs you could get away with less. Also depends on what else you want in terms of holidays and lifestyle of course.

We have 2 at private school, both work full time household earnings 400k. Still feels tight financially but our childcare and mortgage costs are high. Really whether you can afford it depends on many factors not just household income. Mortgage, childcare, car, all add up but if you are mortgage free with one stay at home parent you will need a lot less income than us!

I’m not sure that info is helpful without more context. Our household income would be considered enormous on MN. We live in the expensive leafy southeast with a huge mortgage and no family help. We couldn’t consider one let alone all three. With VAT added fees are £27k per year here so over £80k if all three went private. Madness.

If you’re mortgage is paid off, you have family money, or are in a cheaper area it’s a different story.

Thanks we are south east and have a large mortgage, I’m part time and fairly low paid in HC but DH earns £300 ish, we’ve done the sums obviously and on paper it would just about work but we’d have to really tighten down on other things like holidays so just wondered what others think is reasonable earrings to be comfortable with that outlay

We sent our DD to private school with joint income of £110 k had paid off the mortgage by time she went to secondary but still flew long haul for holiday annually - although was a few years ago she is through uni now earning thankfully!!!

It sounds tight for three kids close in age on a single wage of £300k as you’re not benefiting from the two tax allowances. You are also exposed if your DH loses his job - much more than if you had a combined income of £300k.

What’s wrong with state for your kids who don’t have SEN?

In your case I would think seriously about job security and what you would do if your husband stops earning

DH is on 160k, I'm on 74k and we are in the north so it's cheaper. Very relieved we're coming to the end of it gradually. Our wages were lower when we started, I think 90&30 ish.

I think it also depends on what the rest of your financial situation looks like. Our combined income is about £140,000 but both our kids are in state primary and will go private at secondary. In the meantime we've been saving like buggery for the last 5 years so that we won't have to pay fees out of monthly income, by the time DC1 starts secondary we will have saved about 3 years worth of fees for each of them and will continue to save (and hopefully see salary increases) that mean by the time DC2 starts secondary we will have covered 90% of fees to see them both through their GCSEs - A Levels are another matter but we have excellent state provision for A level studies in this area so will encourage the kids to go down that route.

You’ll be fine on £300k

Curious how much do you pay for mortgage?

I'm also curious about what your mortgage payments are

@Anon22224 I would consider getting income insurance that covers private education costs in case your other half has an income shock.
I am wondering what your mortgage payments are.
If the payment is anything like ours (we just bought so hoping in 5 years it will be a bit better), then I would say 300k is not sufficient. 300k would just about cover 2 tightly.
I also don't think one child should go to private and others to state, I know some families have to do what they can but I'd like move to an outstanding state school primary and secondary catchment areas for all.
My opinion is private primary is better than private secondary, if we had to choose, but this is personal. It's also probably 1/4 of private education costs but my belief is that it is more worthwhile for a number of reasons, not just going to uni.

Mortgage is £3600, £100k of that 300 is also bonus dependent so really I should say 200!! Bonus has been consistent though.

Take points on DH job, I do worry about this but he’s in quite a stable industry

I would be happy for state secondary more so than DH, I’d like to send others to state primary too to make things fair really. We both went to state schools and were very happy but DD1 definitely will benefit from a smaller class probably through education

Good to hear others situations thank you!

Holidays are valuable family experiences. I wouldn’t sacrifice those if we didn’t have to. We have friends who seem to live on crusts to privately educate their kids but earn £300k. Not worth it IMO if you have decent state options.

Sorry private primary to make things fair*

In basic terms school fees are typically about £20k per child per year so £40k for two which means you need about £70k from gross income

F

Income of £100k with both parents working, no mortgage. We considered private but could not afford to send one let alone two.

We are about 3k per month mortgage.

North of England. Not going for it but did the sums and concluded that we could with combined income of about £130k. However we have a very small mortgage which was the only reason it was even feasible.

I would look hard at the secondary options in your area - depending on the SEN you could find that the best provision is actually through a state school in relation to the support that's provided, there's some private secondaries which are not particularly supportive of SEN.

In terms of insurance, I'd really do it unless you have a few years of school saved up. It helps a lot, you never know in life and wouldn't want to move the kids last minute.
Totally get wanting smaller classes, some kids really need it to thrive. I think it's only fair to send all to private and then focus on state secondary that has good sen provisions, you may have to move. Private secondary is much more expensive, here it's about £25-30k without covering 3-4 months of holidays through the year. So it does need much more than 300k, I'd say more 400k for 3 kids, even then you'd have to mind the holidays etc and not go overboard. It's crazy isn't it why everything is so expensive, but sometimes we just need very good state options available in case we can't afford to have that peace of mind.

£130k joint income in London and we're struggling.

With that income and three children I'd move into the catchment area of an outstanding school, especially for secondary