cost of children

[PrincessFiona]

I was just at the pediatrician and picked up a 'Parenting' magazine. The cost of having a baby (year 1) fed formula is estimated at $11,000. Breast-fed is 9300.

Hope that helps..

kris

[PrincessFiona]

ooops...that was supposed to be in the cost of children thread..sorry.

[Michele]

9-11K?!?! Ouch!

[migirl]

9-11K?!?! Ouch!

Exactly what I was thinking! I've been following these threads closely because I've been wondering the same thing. We may start TTC this summer/fall, and I feel like I have no clue what's in store for us (financially speaking, that is). I had actually heard anecdotally once that it is around $10,000 per year so this seems to confirm that figure. Yikes.

[mommax3]

Like I said before, there are lots of different ways to approach child-rearing and the attendant costs, but there is NO WAY our first child had even half that amount spent on him during his first year......and I would venture to say the same about our second and third kids as well. I just thought I would add my perspective as food for thought......

Sally

I'm guessing that the bulk of those costs are for childcare. There is no way we are spending that much on Anna (esp with hand me down clothes).
Given what quality childcare costs, we may have approached that figure with our first.

[PrincessFiona]

We didn't spend that much either...because we bought most of our big ticket items used or got them as gifts...They did an interesting breakdown of where the costs came from and they actually calculated that formula costs $1700/yr. I don't know if anyone else has this article....but it was interesting....It broke it down by all of the little stuff too that we don't tend to think about. I thought it seemed like a high number too...but that's what they said...

kris

Wow, I know we haven't spent anywhere close to that much. Our daughter is only 7mo, but we'd have A LOT of ground to make uo t reach that figure by her first birthday. We get a ton of hand-me-downs as well (she has six older girl cousins 8) ) and she's out of them so fast anyway, who cares? And like many of you we have very supportive parents who live very nearby and are very excited to be first-time grandparents. I can't really remember a single bigger ticket item we had to buy ourselves. We also hit the garage sales as someone else mentioned. We go to the nicer neighborhoods, they tend to have better stuff. Its especially nice for items to keep and grandma and grandpa's. I'm sure once we have money we'll spend more. I wonder how they came up with the figures. I'm always curious about who is answering surveys.

[peggyfromwastate]

I never calculated it out, but I don't think the cost of twins for us the first year was that high. We did buy quite a bit, cause we only had one of everything, but diapers were by far the big expense, and we get those at Costco. I think we spent about $150 a month on diapers. We didn't use much formula, so 1 Costco sized can lasted a long time. Baby food when they started solids added up, but I wouldn't say to more than $100 a month. No child care costs, since I'm a SAHM and our kids were absolute tyrants... Anyway, I wouldn't stress about the cost of raising kids. You'll work it into your budget. You probably won't buy as much stuff for yourself, but then buying a cute bib or whatever for baby turns out to be buying something for yourself.

[PrincessFiona]

I guess I won't be subscribing to Parenting magazine...... I have no idea how they calculated everything...

kris

[peggyfromwastate]

Does anyone actually subscribe to those magazines? It seems every time I have a child I get Parenting, American Baby, etc. and I have never actually sent in subscriptions...

[Sheherezade]

When we had our first we were dirt poor and we did ok. I remember a fellow grad student telling me all I really needed was diapers, a couple of t shirts and a drawer for the baby to sleep in. Obviously we had more than that, but it did put things in perspective and relieve my worry. I think we have elevated many things that used to be "optional" to "necessary" and that raises average cost. We had no childcare costs (except my lost income) and arranged our lives such that we had VERY limited fixed expenses. We did use cloth diapers and washed them ourselves. It didn't get gross until the baby was about 8-9 mos. and eating more solids. I think we spent about 250 dollars on diapers and diaper covers from Natural Baby. I bought his toys at consignment shops or got them as gifts. We had lots of hand me down clothes from friends/family. He slept with us for the first year. Honestly--I can't imagine him costing us much at all the first year!!! Parenting has a more affluent readership than Child or Parents---their articles are slanted to the dual income household. Was it a magazine survey? (American Baby is basically a freebie given out through the OB offices----my husband used to have a million free subscription things.)

Angie

[houseelf]

I'll be honest and take the minority position here. We probably spent close to this figure when we put my son in child care at 7 months. When you start out with annual child care expenses at $5500, it ain't hard to reach that figure quickly. He wore a ton of hand me down clothes and his grandparents were extraordinarily generous so this saved money. Still, we had to buy a top of the line breast pump, freezer bags for milk, diapers, not to mention the 10,000 other things that they need.

So, I'll admit it, I certainly don't consider us affluent, but this figure approximates what we have/will spend. We do tend to spend the lion's share of our disposable income on our kid/kid to be. This is why we live in a place that we can more than afford, drive used cars that are paid off, and don't belong to gyms or have cable. Meanwhile, our son takes lots of activities and will go to private school. We joke that we want to come back reincarnated as our kids.

Kelly

[migirl]

*another bump* for Cheri...