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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]If the security of owning your own is a goal then I would not have a fourth.

[b]Current average cost of raising a child to age 17 in the USA is $237,000[/b]. Can you manage to pay $1 million just to get your kids through their junior years of HS? Right now you’re facing fronting more than $700k just to do that with the three you already have.

[b]On two fed salaries doing that and owning a home is going to be basically impossible[/b]. I’d stick with three and be able to do some of the things having a fourth will make impossible or very challenging (modest vacations, summer camp, travel sport team if one is talented).[/quote]

Owning (or renting) a larger home is already included into the cost of raising a child, so most of the cost is already in.  Or do you think that feeding and clothing a kid costs over $10K/year, on average?

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Bless your heart if you think the only expenses in raising a child are rent, food and clothing  :D [/quote]

For some families it is - no activities, no extra and just the basics.  Kids pay for their own college.  They  also get very little 1-1 attention and  siblings are extra parents.[/quote]

OP here. I hadn't engaged in this conversation yet because these cost calculations just don't resonate with me. Like, we probably spend money so differently than others so I just don't think like this. We have very low housing and childcare costs. Since we never bought a home and live small, our monthly living expenses are probably way lower than comparable families in the DMV. 
- never paid for daycare (one year of cooperative play program run by DC DPR, then free PreK
- baby is at home with us while we WFH with split schedules.
- make our own food, breastfeed, get hand me down baby clothes, so diapers are basically the only increase in expenses with the addition of Baby #3
- get a lot of hand me downs from a cousin's kids, so I only buy kid clothes when really necessary
- we do take a local vacation once a year which is again, not a huge expense since it's a 3.5 hour drive away, we enjoy a national park
- and... Yes our kids will likely get scholarships to college, no plans to pay for theirs. This is what DH and I did, we don't really expect to pay their school.[/quote]

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