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D.C. Area Babies
s/o debt and kids....
I'm just curious since everyone answered that kids did not put them into debt/they would not have TTC if they would have...
Were you at least somewhat nervous about the financial impact of having children and do you feel like it's perhaps not been AS challenging as you expected now that you do have children? Like many said, I know that the money will come from somewhere so that we're not paying for groceries on a CC but sometimes I do find myself worrying a lot (maybe more than necessary?) about making it all work. I know it will be fine for us personally once we have a child, but it's sometimes hard to see from this side of the coin. Just seems like many of you felt quite financially stable prior to having kids but unfortunately for us, even in our early 30's we're only a few years into our careers thanks to grad school. It would be impossible for us to have our financial house totally in order before having kids. And I feel like I worry about this a lot more than some other friends (who don't live in this area, I should add).
Help me feel like my anxiety over this is normal. 
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Re: s/o debt and kids....
it really wasn't a huge concern of mine. i made sure that we would have enough money after bills and daycare expenses to put a little into savings and that was all we were going to get. if we'd waited until we had a years' worth of savings in the bank, as is recommended, we'd never have kids. it's just not practical for our COL.
we have two credit cards with pretty low credit limits that we keep for emergencies. we just had to use them to get a hefty fix done to our car and will be paying that down for a while. in the meantime (and at all other times), we live within our means. we don't take vacations that we can't pay for in cash. we have one car, no note.
we are particularly cash strapped right now as i am in the process of a career change and investing $$ into a business that isn't returning it yet at the same rate of investment. but that takes time, and i'm lucky to have a super supportive husband.
Yup, absolutely. I was petrified with before DD1 and was worred with DD2. Now looking back I wonder what they heck we spend all our money on before we had kids. I still worry even though we are doing fine (and I work part-time and could always go back full-time if needed). It's one thing to feel like you won't be able to afford groceries. It's another thing to know that you just can't go on big trips or buy the latest gadget just because you want it. If you can cover the cost of groceries, bills, a roof over your head, daycare, etc. then you are going to be okay - you just may have to live frugally for a while.
The best way to calm you anxiety is to sit down and work out a budget (then add a safety factor on top of that, lol).
I wasn't worried b/c we lived our "with a kid" budget for a few months before trying.
We continued to live on that budget (mostly) during my entire pregnancy & saved the money allotted for daycare to have a better cushion.
that said, we had already paid off our student loans & we only buy used cars for cash so no car payment. our only debt really is our house.
No - I wasn't. But during the economic downturn - my husband was only employed for 5 hours a week - so his boss could keep him on payroll - and we lived only off of my salary - which was pretty frugal for this area. So I knew having both of our salaries we would be ok.
I would have loved to be a SAHM - but my husband is in an industry and a job that go up and down w/the markets - whereas I have a very safe job. And I have much better health insurance. Plus - while we could live off of one salary - it would be cutting it really close - and w/o saving - which didn't feel like a good option to us. So me working makes sense. Plus, my job is very flexible - so I get to see DS a lot more than w/a traditional job - so it all works out.
You will figure it out though - just take a good look at your budget - living only off of my salary for a year really taught us how to cut corners.
Good luck!
We worried but I was pleasantly surprised that other than childcare the impact of children on our bottom line was really minimal. DH and I were catch-up saving for about 2 years before DD came along. I had lost my job at the start of the downturn and had gone through a good portion of my savings and DH had to sell a house he owned with his ex fiance and had to pay off a large amount of credit card debt from a medical emergency. We knew we wanted to buy a house and have kids, so we rented cheaply, made do with one older car, and lived like we were on one salary for those two years. Other than our honeymoon to Italy, we didn't go on elaborate vacations. That really allowed us to save.
I think the anxiety is normal and I think all of those articles on how expensive it is to have kids are misleading. There are ways to make things work at all price points, sometimes that requires a bit of creativity and being open to new possibilities.
I was nervous about money when I quit my job right before DS was born. I didn't know how it would go. I was working as an attorney in DC until DS was born.
A couple of things helped, DH finally got his disability from the VA approved. He gets a monthly check tax free.
Kids are tax deductions.
I find that we don't eat out as much and when we do it's more likely to be Chik-Fil-A then a four star restaurant. We rarely go anywhere 'nice' to eat. We rarely drink. We no longer pay for me to commute, I ate lunch out every day when I was working. I spend way less on clothes now that I don't have to dress up for work. We also spend less on ourselves. DH doesn't drop money at BEst Buy like he used to.
I don't want to sound smug because we are not wealthy by any means, but no. We live in a small house with a small mortgage, DH is a super saver and for a year or more before C was born we basically just banked my salary. So, no. I wasn't worried about #1.
Hypothetical #2, however, is a completely different story. We plan to move in the next year (bigger mortgage) and plan to put #2 in daycare full time from the start (as opposed to C, who went to grandparents solely for the first year). The thought of two in preschool/daycare full time is making me really pause and think about a second kid.
I admire anyone who didn't worry at all about it - like pp's said - we were fine on paper but I still was anxious about the possibility that we hadn't thought of everything and that a baby would actually cost more than we thought. Turns out we were fine.
For us: Baby #1, no problem, Baby #2, slight discomfort but fine, however...
Baby #3 has been much MUCH more of a financial pinch for us. We are barely affording three in daycare/preschool, and I mean barely. But, we saved beforehand knowing we'd be living off of savings for at least 18 months of our lives (18 months = the amount of time we have three overlapping expenses of the three of them in daycare/preschool). We technically do not make enough money to pay for three in daycare, but our "Baby #3 Savings Account" supplements that. We have six months left of the 18 - and I admit, there are definitely times we feel deprived. We live in a very small, older house that needs a lot of cosmetic updates that we are putting off. One of our cars is 11 years old and we plan to drive that thing into the ground because it's paid off. We don't really spend much money on extra stuff and we have to track every dollar we do decide to splurge (like eating out). We haven't had a vacation - well - ever really. The last trip we took that was not an obligatory family visit of some kind was our honeymoon in 2005. We've never taken a family vacation - not even a really cheap one - and we probably won't for another two years or so.
But it was a conscious choice to have a third child - it was a no brainer, really. We planned for it, we're in the thick of it with 6 months left of our 18 month crunch. I wouldn't change it for the world.
I appreciate everyone being so candid with their responses, and like artslvr, I also admire those of you who didn't/don't worry about money. And just like it is among my group of friends, everyone's answers are different. On paper, we're good. We started working with a financial planner a few months back to help us get on and stay on the right track on all financial fronts. We also still have room to make improvements in our budget that I know will allow us to manage and that some of the things taking up space in our budget now are temporary.
I know that many of us are at different points in our lives/careers when we start down this road so it's hard to compare ourselves, but it's nice to hear how you all have made it work. Thanks for sharing. = )
i always love your posts .... inspiring! thanks for sharing.
we were in our mid-thirties when we had DD so we were financially in a much different place than we were 10 years ago. We did still worry about how it would impact our financial goals. We knew we had the money to cover daycare and expenses but we were both concerned more with the long term things. Also, I have seen a friend spend $1000s on therapy for her son with autism and that was always in my mind too as a what-if situation.
It was important to both of us to be able to provide a financial security to DD. We purchased things like life insurance, set up a trust for the life insurance so if something happened to both of us it would be managed, and started contributing monthly to her 529. These are not things that are necessary for kids but they were important to us (and $$ wise they add up). I never had student loan debt and I don't want DD to have it either.
Things that did change were that we don't go out to eat as much, we don't take vacations right now (DD is a terrible traveler) and we have stayed in our current house because it saves us money on gas and car wear and tear.
I have been swamped lately, so I missed your first post. However, I can give you some insight into the idea that it will work out and your anxiety is normal.
We were better than we had ever been, but not where we wanted to be when we got pregnant. The housing market crushed our dreams of moving from our two-bedroom condo, so we were feeling trapped since our savings was not enough to upgrade. However at the 16-week mark, my husband was laid off. At this time we had a car loan, the mortgage, and about $4K in credit card debit, and I was making a little over $40K that year.
For six months, we scrapped money together--still going on a family vacation and trying to prepare for the nursery. We stopped eating out, didn't host any parties, took public transportation more often than before, and I had literally a week's worth of maternity clothes. Somehow with only tapping into savings one time (for a $1K transfer to finish the CC debit) we not only got rid of our credit card debit, we paid off the car loan early, and had everything we needed for DD. Which then made it much easier to adjust when he began working after she was born since all of a sudden we had a double income again.
I think if you wait until everything is in line where you want it to be, you will never be satisfied. I would actually guess that everyone would like "a little more money."
You can always try to get used to what you think you will need for a month or two and see how you feel about it. Being proactive will definitely give you a sense if it will work for you. I will also say that I grew up outside of this area.
When I watch my high school friends feel so care-free making similar salaries and houses double the size we will probably move into, I realize more and more that this area has a lot to offer, but is expensive and can sometimes put extra pressure to be financially stable because of that. It's much harder to keep up with the Jones if you are still in the five figure salary and the Jones are making mid-six figures with only one child.