Stay at Home Moms
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Things to Consider?
My DH and I are expecting first baby (boy) in August. I will be staying home until January, but our ultimate goal is to have me stay at home full time.
I am wondering what things you considered in staying home? What were the biggest adjustments for you budget wise?
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Re: Things to Consider?
We had to cut back on how much we ate out. We used to do it all the time. Now we just do it occasionally. We also switched our home phone service to magicjack and switched our cell phones to prepaids and saved a ton of money.
Good luck!
You need to consider what you'll do if you find you want to go back to work. In this climate it isn't as easy as just getting a job.
We lived on 1 income for 15 months before DS was born, so money wasn't the issue. But I hated being home with a baby, I didn't expect to but I did.
Biggest adjustments were not eating out nearly as frequently and not just buying something random because we wanted it had a few extra dollars.
We gradually went to one income throughout my pregnancy - I am a contract worker and kept fading out clients - sounds like I am a prostitute! ?Im not.
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I clip coupons and we grocery shop smarter. ?We go out to eat once a week at best - obviously that didn't happen in the beginning, but DD is now 7 months so it is a ton easier and fun for us all. ?Therefore, we find ourselves wanting to do it more, but not having the money. ?
We saved a large percentage of my income during the 5 months before Baby came so we would have an account with money if we went over budget - which we did a few times. ?Luckily we were prepared and didn't have to dip into savings. ??
For me, staying home is SO wonderful, so it is worth the pre planning and sacrifices that we didn't previously have. ??
Consider the unexpected. If you are on a strict budget, how will you handle if his health insurance premiums go up? We're dealing with that right now. What if he loses his job? Will you start job hunting or continue to SAH?
This was our decision maker, I brought home $1800 a month, daycare would have cost us $1000 and it was not worth it in our opinions to send DS to a daycare when all I'd be bringing home after paying for daycare was $800
And we really haven't made any adjustments, we lived off my DH's salary before and saved everything I made plus a good chunk of what he made too, so we could afford it. We still are able to live off his salary plus put a decent amount into savings every month. I feel very lucky we are able to do this.