Can two fed govt job family afford to send two kids to elite private school?

[Anonymous]

I think you might get some interesting responses posting this to the independent school thread. You'll get responses from parents doing exactly what you're asking about...

My anonymous 2 cents:
-yes I would do whatever it took to go private over public
-no, you wouldn't be 'poor' at a private school with that HHI
-there's almost no chance you'd get any financial aid anywhere with your HHI
-a parochial school is very different from an independent school. I'd personally choose public over parochial.

Why not move somewhere like a VA suburb with good schools for elementary, then reassess after a year or two of public? You could easily find a sub $1 million house and have time to save for middle/high school while you try out public school.

[Anonymous]

On the surface, there are ways to make elite private schools work on 300K combined income. I make half of that, but send my child to public school. Double my income, keep everything else the same (except taxes....), we would probably have 75K extra. That will cover private schools, easily.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:With how little you have in retirement savings you are insane to think about spending that kind of money on private schools.

+1

[Anonymous]

No. First, you must assume cost of schooling will increase. Figure 40k/yr by time kids are in H's. Second, I believe most UMC parents will be unhappy about being able to provide kids with vacations, trips to nice restaurants, new clothes, summer camps, extracurriculars, etc. Kids can do well in public. Focus on saving for college.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good gravy, there are scads of pricey private schools in the Washington area. If so many people think $300k is not sufficient HHI to have the kids go to these schools, how much is needed? $500k HHI? $1 million?

Yes. Private school is for rich people who have substantial assets. Full stop. If you have to ask if you can afford it, the answer is no. It will never be a comfortable fit for you: what highly educated, well paid person wants to essentially live paycheck to paycheck? Being unable to provide the UMC extras that kids today want and even expect to a degree?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This income level is way beyond my league but will a child from a home with a HHI of $300k be the poor kid at a private school?

It's one thing to be a scholarship kid at Georgetown Day when your unmarried Mom is making $50k but the OP's situation sounds quite different.

I was thinking the same thing. Kids in a 300K household can't be considered "poor." Their parents won't be able to buy a house on the coast of Maine but they'll be renting one for two weeks in August!

No they won't. They won't be able to afford it because of the cost of paying for k-12. That's the whole point of why people are telling OP not to do this. She said herself that raises in future will be minimal. So no vacations, nice restaurants, clothes, expensive extracurriculars, sufficient savings for college or retirement...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Good gravy, there are scads of pricey private schools in the Washington area. If so many people think $300k is not sufficient HHI to have the kids go to these schools, how much is needed? $500k HHI? $1 million?

We make over $400K and would have to seriously change our standard of living to spend an additional $5K a month on private school. We save a bit more than that each month, but who wants to live that close to the line?

I completely agree with you. It is simply crazy to me that people will struggle to pay $60k a year on private school when we live in a region with some of the best public schools in the country. Unless and until something goes wrong at our local public school, or I feel that my child has issues that require private education, I simply can't rationalize that outlay year and after year. Of course, if 60K was nothing but a drop in the bucket because I made 1 mil a year, then paying for private school would be a no-brainer.

+1

Plus, it'll be more like 80k/yr by the time kids are thru 12th. No thanks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With how little you have in retirement savings you are insane to think about spending that kind of money on private schools.

+1

+2

Don't want to pile on but catching up wrt retirement should be your #1 financial priority at this stage. You're really behind for your ages.

[Anonymous]

I would seriously consider buying a three bedroom house in a good school district (MoCo or Arlington). You should be able to find a home like this for between 700-900K and your HHI of $300K should make this possible. If you buy in a good school district you will have an asset that should appreciate in value and you should have more room in your budget to save for college. I recognize that your current home isn't worth as much as you hoped for but you have to look at the big picture and you have to consider the long term not just the short term costs and benefits.
With 300K you have a lot of flexibility and a lot of good choices.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just to be clear, when you make in the 400k range through salary and live in Montgomery County about 38% is going to taxes. Through in maxing out on SS, Medicare tax and the new health care tax and other taxes and a good chuck of your income is allocated to the gov't. So 60k for school post tax is a lot more than 60k. Also, if you have two parents working fulltime you usually have to pay extra for care to cover before and after school, summer vacation, and the random days off so that adds a good bit on top of the private school tuition.

All very good points.

[Anonymous]

Also, OP, frankly you do NOT know what your kids are going to need educationally right now. At 2 and 4, you are really kind of guessing. Learning differences like ADD dont show up for a while, for example.

As to "excellent public schools", find out what that even means. Actually investigate.

You would do well to consider any solid option for your kids at the early stages, but beware of the possibly meaningless snob appeal of "elite private schools" at the kindergarten level, for example. Again, actually investigate. You might gain insight that way that mere number crunching cannot provide.

[Anonymous]

In my part of Fairfax County (Vienna), the only people that send the kids to school do it for religious reasons. The publics are as good as almost any private.

[Anonymous]

Why was this thread resurrected? It's more than 2 years old.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What's wrong with your public schools? You do realize that as educated upper middle class professionals, your children will do well at any school, don't you? It appears that you may want to send your kids to a private for the status it gives your family. Not worth it.

It is a NorthEast thing where everyone thinks their kids won't be "successful" in life unless they attend private grade school. The only time a brand name private high school will help a kid get into a top college is if they are mediocre students. A driven smart child with involved educated successful parents will be able to succeed regardless of the school they attend.

As for affording the tuition, I am sure you could at a cost to your retirement and building a nice savings. It will be harder to wean your family away from private school later on if you start them young. I would wait a few more years, saving at least 70% of what you would otherwise be spending on tuition as a PP mentioned.