Am I crazy to worry? Is my hope that expenses drop when the kids hit school a pipedream?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Look, OP, I'm not really interested enough in your finances to follow the exact amount of dollars you have described for your various expenditures, but I can tell you one thing from giving it a rough eyeball - you make enough to afford to consult with a financial advisor, which is what you should do.

+1

[Anonymous]

To go back to your question, this is what I found. Baby care was $250 per week. By age four it dropped to $220 per week. For school aged kids, we needed before and aftercare, which ran $120 per week. (This is all per kid and we have three). A lot of the savings, however, got burned up with the cost of summer camp. That runs from $235 per week per kid to $500 per week per kid depending on the choices we make, and it goes for ten weeks.

Here's what happened otherwise. One of our kids needed private tutoring. For the year that it was needed, that ran $15,000. Another needed some speech therapy. Not expensive because it was only co pays, but we either had to pay someone to take him or burn all of our leave. If I'm remembering correctly, that was about $100 per week, but also short lived, maybe a year and fortunately not the same year as tutoring. For the third, we did some private schooling instead of public, which ran about $12,000 for a year, including before and aftercare.

As they get older, the cost of feeding them increases exponentially. Over the past few years, my grocery bill has close to tripled (teenage boys). And eating out has close to tripled as well. Even if its just pizza, one used to work, but now it's a minimum of two, sometimes additional food. And, they eat off the adult menus, wanting things like salmon.

Cost of activities also increases. Many can be done cheaply through school, where your primary cost is the tennis shoes. But, if your child likes dance, gymnastics or travel team sports, your costs can go through the roof. I have one kid in competitive sports and my annual cost is $9,000 plus some donations to the scholarship fund for kids who are struggling to pay. Even dance for my casually interested kid is $100 a month. Tennis lessons run me $200 or so a month. Chess club, which is offered at school but not free, is about $500 a year a kid.

One last thing. Clothes and "toys" get really expensive. I didn't actually buy my kids much when they were little. I did lots of clothes and toy swaps instead. But now that they're older, Christmas is filled with electronics and princess castles which are, well, just expensive.

As a PP pointed out, so much of this is optional. You don't have to give your child everything that's out there. You can choose the cheap camps and decide to forego meals out and Competitive sports. We choose otherwise, and as a result, I don't see the savings from daycare days. However, your Childcare is super expensive compared to mine, so you are likely to see your costs decrease.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To go back to your question, this is what I found. Baby care was $250 per week. By age four it dropped to $220 per week. For school aged kids, we needed before and aftercare, which ran $120 per week. (This is all per kid and we have three). A lot of the savings, however, got burned up with the cost of summer camp. That runs from $235 per week per kid to $500 per week per kid depending on the choices we make, and it goes for ten weeks.

Here's what happened otherwise. One of our kids needed private tutoring. For the year that it was needed, that ran $15,000. Another needed some speech therapy. Not expensive because it was only co pays, but we either had to pay someone to take him or burn all of our leave. If I'm remembering correctly, that was about $100 per week, but also short lived, maybe a year and fortunately not the same year as tutoring. For the third, we did some private schooling instead of public, which ran about $12,000 for a year, including before and aftercare.

As they get older, the cost of feeding them increases exponentially. Over the past few years, my grocery bill has close to tripled (teenage boys). And eating out has close to tripled as well. Even if its just pizza, one used to work, but now it's a minimum of two, sometimes additional food. And, they eat off the adult menus, wanting things like salmon.

Cost of activities also increases. Many can be done cheaply through school, where your primary cost is the tennis shoes. But, if your child likes dance, gymnastics or travel team sports, your costs can go through the roof. I have one kid in competitive sports and my annual cost is $9,000 plus some donations to the scholarship fund for kids who are struggling to pay. Even dance for my casually interested kid is $100 a month. Tennis lessons run me $200 or so a month. Chess club, which is offered at school but not free, is about $500 a year a kid.

One last thing. Clothes and "toys" get really expensive. I didn't actually buy my kids much when they were little. I did lots of clothes and toy swaps instead. But now that they're older, Christmas is filled with electronics and princess castles which are, well, just expensive.

As a PP pointed out, so much of this is optional. You don't have to give your child everything that's out there. You can choose the cheap camps and decide to forego meals out and Competitive sports. We choose otherwise, and as a result, I don't see the savings from daycare days. However, your Childcare is super expensive compared to mine, so you are likely to see your costs decrease.

This is exactly right.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't know how I stress about money, and I'm sure I'll get some flack here... But am looking for guidance on whether I'm insane or if my doubts have any validity. Basically, we make a decent income but our expenses seem so high I'm not sure we save enough, and I'm kind of hoping that this will improve when the kids hit school...Some parents seem to laugh at this suggestion...???

Question for other parents: will my expenses really go down once our kids are school age? (we plan public).... What do you do?
Right now we pay 3,800 a month for nanny plus some play based programs. My hope is that we can cut that in half or better once we only need a nanny for a few hours a day (as opposed to 10+ a day)...

Is this an unreasonable hope?

(My goal is a net worth increase of $100k a year. This year we hit 78k. Without the absurd nanny costs, I'd have crossed the mark)

We live pretty frugally otherwise... two cars paid off, I max my 401k, as does my wife, we save about $1,200 a month into an emergency oh-shit-the-kids-took-a-hammer-to-the-couch fund. I've cut cable, cut cell phone, say yes to any business trip offered (miles, free food, etc), we don't touch annual bonuses, I game the hell out of offers when they get high enough (ie British airways offered round trip business class tickets for 2 to south America last year, for what amounted to $95 plus taxes), we only travel to family vacation homes, or use Starwood points, etc, and yet it feels like its not enough.

Requisite statement: yes I know I'm well off compared to many people, but still feel pressure to save.

Age: early 30s
HHI: 260k ish
Mortgage: 350 on 900k, rest equity
Retirement funds: 500k ish

Is your HHI gross or net (take home after taxes and everything else?

In general - when asked for HHI on this forum, is it take home HHI that is being asked?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know how I stress about money, and I'm sure I'll get some flack here... But am looking for guidance on whether I'm insane or if my doubts have any validity. Basically, we make a decent income but our expenses seem so high I'm not sure we save enough, and I'm kind of hoping that this will improve when the kids hit school...Some parents seem to laugh at this suggestion...???

Question for other parents: will my expenses really go down once our kids are school age? (we plan public).... What do you do?
Right now we pay 3,800 a month for nanny plus some play based programs. My hope is that we can cut that in half or better once we only need a nanny for a few hours a day (as opposed to 10+ a day)...

Is this an unreasonable hope?

(My goal is a net worth increase of $100k a year. This year we hit 78k. Without the absurd nanny costs, I'd have crossed the mark)

We live pretty frugally otherwise... two cars paid off, I max my 401k, as does my wife, we save about $1,200 a month into an emergency oh-shit-the-kids-took-a-hammer-to-the-couch fund. I've cut cable, cut cell phone, say yes to any business trip offered (miles, free food, etc), we don't touch annual bonuses, I game the hell out of offers when they get high enough (ie British airways offered round trip business class tickets for 2 to south America last year, for what amounted to $95 plus taxes), we only travel to family vacation homes, or use Starwood points, etc, and yet it feels like its not enough.

Requisite statement: yes I know I'm well off compared to many people, but still feel pressure to save.

Age: early 30s
HHI: 260k ish
Mortgage: 350 on 900k, rest equity
Retirement funds: 500k ish

Is your HHI gross or net (take home after taxes and everything else?

In general - when asked for HHI on this forum, is it take home HHI that is being asked?

Gross. Most people I think list gross....

[Anonymous]

$78K net worth increase is very substantial on your HHI. You are doing just fine. Stop freaking out - you're worrying your life away.

[Anonymous]

A lot of people disagree, but is pay down the mortgage aggressively too if I were in your shoes. Would give you psychic comfort.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My expenses went down tremendously this year thanks to free PreK3. Ex and I have schedules which enable us to avoid before and after care so I pay zero costs for child care. Also, DC wears uniforms so I'm paying less for clothing. We do alot of free activities. I don't intend to enroll DC into extracurriculur activities until next year, but it wont cost us much.

How is your PreK free?

Not PP, but probably hard for some of you filthy rich folks to understand but public school is indeed free. And in DC it starts at age 3. In fact my son wasn't yet three when he started.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My expenses went down tremendously this year thanks to free PreK3. Ex and I have schedules which enable us to avoid before and after care so I pay zero costs for child care. Also, DC wears uniforms so I'm paying less for clothing. We do alot of free activities. I don't intend to enroll DC into extracurriculur activities until next year, but it wont cost us much.

How is your PreK free?

Not PP, but probably hard for some of you filthy rich folks to understand but public school is indeed free. And in DC it starts at age 3. In fact my son wasn't yet three when he started.

What is filthy rich? Not on welfare? please enlighten us .

[Anonymous]

I think you are worrying unduly about money. I would suggest that you chillax.

[Anonymous]

Not PP, but probably hard for some of you filthy rich folks to understand but public school is indeed free. And in DC it starts at age 3. In fact my son wasn't yet three when he started.

Um, I am assuming the person who asked is just from VA, not filthy rich. No free pre K in my part of VA, unless your child has special needs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A lot of people disagree, but is pay down the mortgage aggressively too if I were in your shoes. Would give you psychic comfort.

Op here. Thought about it, even though I know it's not the right financial move.