Three in the city?

[Anonymous]

I have two and really want a third. Tell me about your life with three (esp if you make under 250k HHI). I want just as much the heart and soul talk but if you both work our of the house and aren’t making millions I would extra love to hear from you!

[Anonymous]

This is us. Three kids, two bedrooms, and we both work but don’t make crazy amounts. We are doing just fine in the city. Love that our commutes are both 15 minutes or less. We don’t have to drive anywhere if we don’t want to. We all walk a ton and spend weekends at museums and playgrounds. I’m not sure that we’ll be able to hold out forever, but with three in elementary or younger, it’s definitely doable. It helps that our three are all the same sex, too. So no qualms about sharing a room. People all over the world make do with less space than us. We are forced to make very conscious decisions about what stuff to keep, but it’s not bad.

[Anonymous]

We make under 200k, both work full time, live in the city in a small row house, and we stopped at two. I regret it. Our kids are my favorite things in the world and I wish we had more of them! We stopped more because of DH’s age than because of $ or space, though those we also a consideration.

[Anonymous]

Pp here with three kids and a few more thoughts. We make about 225k and we do often feel poor living in the city. We don’t mind, but we hardly ever eat out, we drive an older car, and we rarely travel, esp not by plane. I like cooking, and since we don’t spend hours commuting, it’s pretty easy to eat our meals at home. I wish we could travel more, but it’s just not feasible. We try to go on one vacation a year plus visits to grandparents. We also send our kids to public school. And we are pretty laid back people in general, I think that’s important. If this lifestyle seems good to you, i vote go for the third! I love how messy and joyful our lives are.

[Anonymous]

We just had our third. I am not currently working because I was doing contract work before getting pregnant that involved lots of travel to Africa so I had to leave that once I was about 4-5 months pregnant. I will be looking for a job at the end of the summer when baby will be 5-6 months. For now we have 170k from DH and about 70-80k from real estate rentals. We also have 2 mortgages of about the same amount of the rentals. Our older kids are in private school, no aid, but DH’s employer reimburses half of the tuitions. Once I get back to working, I am hoping to make 70-80k and then we will be much more comfortable.

[Anonymous]

3 kids in NYC in an apartment that’s about 1500 sq feet, 3 beds. It’s totally doable, at least while they’re young. Some things are easier (grocery delivery, walk everywhere), others are harder (anything that requires going crosstown, keeping a car). I never thought we’d still be here at this point but we really appreciate the short commutes. I’m also extroverted and love running into friends pretty much every time I leave my apartment.