You'll save some (impossible to know how much with the lack of details)

But, you're going to be paying for before and after care, vacations, and summer. You may have to pay to cover random days off. So you will save, but not sure how much.

I hate post that lack some type of personal detail. We don’t know how much you currently pay. We don’t know how much your before and after care will be nor the summer camps. However, you can look all of that up and figure it out yourself.

Anonymous wrote:DH and I have hit some financial troubles. We have 2 more years of day care. Does it get better financially after day care or does that money go to other things?
(we will still have to pay for before and after care)

I have wondered the same thing. Our oldest is starting kindergarten in the fall, and if you look at purely the cost of care alone, I think we should save about $9,000 a year. BUT, we are going to have to start commuting separately, and that's probably going to add a few thousand dollars to our budget. We also have lunch covered by daycare currently, whereas when he starts school we'll have to pay for it. I doubt that will add that much to the budget, but it's something. Also, I wonder how significant the increased costs are for food and clothing as he gets bigger. I suspect there is a bunch of other stuff I'm not even thinking about. So yeah, I've wondered if the daycare cost savings is going to be subsumed by other stuff.

OP, we are all rolling in dough after daycare years. Come join us!

it gets better when daycare ends.

summer camps can run expensive, but if, by chance, you live in/near Reston, RA camps are great and not too pricey. (my kids love them.)

We are slightly different because we had a well-paid nanny plus PT preschool, but yes, two years after, we have saved enough to do a nice home renovation so you will see the savings!

We don't need before care which helps, and I WFH a few days a week so don't use after care every day, so it's super cheap. Summers are pricier, we have camps and a pool membership. But yes we've seen lots of savings since we have two in public school.

For us it’s a large difference in the early elementary years. Our daycare was $1600/month or $19,200 a year. Our before/aftercare is $325/month or $2925 a year plus camp at $450/week. We only use 4 weeks of camp this summer due to travel and grandparent visits, but even if we used all 9 weeks it would be $4050 for the summer or $6975 for childcare for the year. We alternate who takes off school days off and grandparents visit or we travel for spring break and winter break. That’s a savings of $12,225 for us in early elementary. Activities start to get more expensive as do clothes and food costs as you get out of the early years, but for us, Pk4 -3 grade were the sweet spot years.

I’m finding that before/after care is much less expensive than daycare ($570/month versus $1900/month) but we’re not saving as much as I’d hoped. Summer camp puts a dent in the savings: we splurged on 2 weeks of $500/week camp but went with roughly $300/week options for remainder of summer. Also spent a little more on sports/other extras. This was our first year without daycare and I started catching up on house expenses (furniture, decorations, etc) that had to be postponed while paying daycare. It feels like juggling, this year I’ll need to spend less on the house and save more for next year’s summer camp and family vacation. It is nice not having the big daycare expense each month.

Also, we live in Montgomery County, and our aftercare program covers snow days and most school holidays. If the MCPS admin offices open, then the aftercare program opens. I haven’t had to take as much time off as I did for our daycare.

Good luck!

Anonymous wrote:Yes, but summers can be very expensive if you do high-quality camps. Their are cheap camps, but many of them are poorly run.

There are camps that are in the $250 a week range that are well run and fun. I know the FC Park camps tend to be well received and they are not badly priced. Reston Association camps are great and affordable. The Y camps are a bit more chaotic but DS enjoyed them well enough and they are affordable.

As in all things, there is a wide range of camps at different price levels.