Anyone pay more than $6000 per year for your teen to participate in an expensive sport?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:swimming is cheap, ice skating is not. I think you can go slowly and just do the group classes for awhile.

My niece's volleyball was around 1k/mo between club fees and travel, and you basically had to be on the club team to get the experience to keep up with the high school team.

All of the sports add up, but I think horseback riding and skating are the highest.

Riding puts it all to shame. Tens of thousands without even considering how much it costs to buy a horse, truck, trailer.

I was talking to my old coach recently and asking casually for a friend about buying a Children’s Hunter for their 12 yo. He said you need to spend in the six figures to get something competitive now. It is insane.

You can spend an infinite amount of money on riding. I saw an article a few years back about the top riders in the U.S., and I think Bruce Springsteen's daughter was the poorest person on the list. The rest were mostly the children of billionaires. It's difficult to compete if you're just a plain old 1%er.

Yeah, I've seen that the teenage daughters of Bill Gates and Steve Jobs are really into riding. Unless you really have money to burn, it seems best to avoid that sport in favor of so many other sports.

Yes but a Children’s Hunter is kind of an entry level show horse. Crazy.

Anyway, I still ride and compete and have a horse farm, so in many ways it is a terrific sport if you are willing to pursue it without Olympic dreams. We aren’t wealthy. I got my kids’ horse in a trade and she is lovely and locally competitive. My other horses I bought either off the track or as foals when they are cheaper. Still, I continue to spend more than 6k a year! I offset it by boarding horses and some sales. You can make it work if you really love it and are willing to work hard. It is a great thing to have a life’s passion and to model that for your kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes but it’s tennis which is a lifelong sport.

So worth it IMO for hours m to have that.

Good point.

[Anonymous]

Squash for my oldest is easily $2k+/month. The “elite” squash players are paying $4500/month. I wish we could do that for our DC but just not in the cards. We

[Anonymous]

Wow I was thinking of signing our kids up for squash but more of a rec league. How does squash get so expensive and at what age? TIA

[Anonymous]

Pp - more of a rec league to start but I’m cautious given what these activities develop into - and costs

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DS plays chess and squash. We spend ~45k a yr. entrance fees, traveling to tournaments, hotels, food, private coaching, camps, etc.

The costs pale in comparison to my niece who is an equestrian.

Yay

Are these country club fees?

No. Entry fees for tournaments especially for chess. We at at one right now where the entry fee was $127 if paid early + 4 nights at a hotel...

Squash is cheaper since we don’t travel as much for tournaments. I am not counting club fees just private lessons.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DS plays chess and squash. We spend ~45k a yr. entrance fees, traveling to tournaments, hotels, food, private coaching, camps, etc.

The costs pale in comparison to my niece who is an equestrian.

Yay

Are these country club fees?

No. Entry fees for tournaments especially for chess. We at at one right now where the entry fee was $127 if paid early + 4 nights at a hotel...

Squash is cheaper since we don’t travel as much for tournaments. I am not counting club fees just private lessons.

The 45k is total not just entry fees... most of it for private coaching and travel costs.

[Anonymous]

Go look at a swim tech suit. They are about :490-$500: these suits generally have a recommended life span of about 4-8 swims and then they are considered worn out. Meet fees, swim parka, praxtice suit, club fees, summer pool membership, lessons, equipment fees (fins, goggles, snorkel, kickboard, buoy, hand equipment), two swim bags, swim caps (high end ones for meets are $40 or so each), etc.

It’s not the most expensive sport but it is expensive.

[Anonymous]

This thread is blowing my mind!!!!!! Guess I should be happy my kid is a coder and not into sports, especially squash, skating, hockey and horses.

[Anonymous]

Wow! My son just started playing squash but it sounds like a bargain compared to that. I pay $40/week for two 1 hour group lessons. He took a few private lesson in the spring at $80 for 45 mins just to see if he liked it but I couldn't keep paying that. No tournaments yet but hopefully he can join to squash team next year in high school which won't cost me much of anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Go look at a swim tech suit. They are about :490-$500: these suits generally have a recommended life span of about 4-8 swims and then they are considered worn out. Meet fees, swim parka, praxtice suit, club fees, summer pool membership, lessons, equipment fees (fins, goggles, snorkel, kickboard, buoy, hand equipment), two swim bags, swim caps (high end ones for meets are $40 or so each), etc.

It’s not the most expensive sport but it is expensive.

You don't need tech suits and if you are paying $40 per swim cap you are getting ripped off. You don't need a pool membership - we do team at a county pool. You don't replace most of the equipment except goggles regularly.

[Anonymous]

How can poor, lower middle class, and regular middle class afford all this? Geez

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Go look at a swim tech suit. They are about :490-$500: these suits generally have a recommended life span of about 4-8 swims and then they are considered worn out. Meet fees, swim parka, praxtice suit, club fees, summer pool membership, lessons, equipment fees (fins, goggles, snorkel, kickboard, buoy, hand equipment), two swim bags, swim caps (high end ones for meets are $40 or so each), etc.

It’s not the most expensive sport but it is expensive.

It does seem like you are exaggerating. Tech suits should get you more swims than that - like 20 which is maybe only a couple of meets but you should only be wearing them at championship meets. There are so many kids wearing tech suits who don’t need to be.
Most of the other equipment doesn’t need to be replaced very often.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow! My son just started playing squash but it sounds like a bargain compared to that. I pay $40/week for two 1 hour group lessons. He took a few private lesson in the spring at $80 for 45 mins just to see if he liked it but I couldn't keep paying that. No tournaments yet but hopefully he can join to squash team next year in high school which won't cost me much of anything.

No sport is truly expensive at the beginner level including riding. Group lessons are not expensive. It is only at the elite level that it gets $$$$$ mostly due to private coaching and traveling for competitions and training: I can’t put DS into local camps because he is higher rated than the instructors.... So don’t worry about it until it happens.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are between $25-30K yearly for figure skating, so it sounds like a bargain to me! The majority goes to coaching as it’s all individually coached. She does around four half hour lessons a week and coaches are $100/hr. Ice time and travel make up the majority of the rest.

What is your annual household income? Lobbyist?

Interestingly, in my experience in figure skating (where we spend $6000 per year on our 8 year old DD), many of the families involved in figure skating are definitely NOT wealthy (or at least live in very modest homes, have modest clothing, modest cars, etc). Many of the parents are first-generation in the US (often from Russia or China), and really like the sport of figure skating for its discipline, etc. It seems these parents make huge financial sacrifices for their kids to do figure skating.

In my experience, the wealthy parents tend to be in sports like lacrosse, tennis, and golf.