We are planning to be parents...

[Deleted]

What should we do?

My wife cousin that got married last October (the 40K wedding, mom living with them and husband unemployed for 2 years) just announced that she was 4 months pregnant. Besides my wife and her family being worried for their financial situation it got us talking about kids.

Some of you that have ben around since the last YM knows that we have been pushing having kids for the past 3 years.

And playing with the numbers, we think we can pull anything after 2012... meaning start trying at the end of next year. We still plan to move to the smaller apartment that will allow us to:
-> save $360-450 a month (I am pushing for the apartment that is not updated since it will cost only $1210 which is a savings of $460/month)
-> Pay off our credit card by the end of this year ($250/month)
-> Pay off my car loan by the end of next year ($435/month)

But that will require us to move again in 2012 to a bigger place... but I was told by friends that have kids that we can actually get 1 year out of it since the first year you can get away with keeping the child in your room. But knowing my wife she will want a room for the kid.

So that would require we get lucky our first try

For the people that are parents, what would you suggest we have in order? And I know, there is no such thing as perfect timing.

[Deleted]

Oh my...

I'm not at all sure you are ready... but most of us weren't ready, so...

A kid doesn't need his own room for a long time, at least a year.

I know you're wife will want a room for the kid (and everything else under the sun) which is why i go back to, are you sure the two of you are (secure enough in your marriage) and ready for a child? ... They NEVER make things better/easier... NEVER...

[backontrack]

I'll throw out there that keeping the baby in your room, doesn't work for everyone. With our first kid she was in our room for the first 6 - 8 weeks. With the second kid for some reason DH could not sleep with the baby making his baby noises in our room. He ended up sleeping on the couch when the baby was in our room! Not the end of the world, but just something to consider. Also while none of it is necessary, babies can have lots of large gear, like swings, bouncy seats, exersaucers, high chairs, bumbos, boppys, activity mats. You really, really don't need most of it, but if you have it you;ll need a place for it!

I don't quite know what things to suggest you have in order before the kids come along... We paid down debt, bought a house, and set up retirement savings as best we could afford. In non financial terms I tried to get into any habits and routines that I thought I needed. Like keeping myself healthy and keeping the house neater. ( I grew up in a hoarding household, so I had some habits to break!) If anything I would say to look at any projects you ever wanted to complete and do them now! Seriously time is soo valuable. If you always meant to scan in old photos or take a trip or whatever, do it now. My kids are still young, so I know I'll have more time as they get older, but right now I think back to weekends where all we did was watch tv and make a meal or go shopping and imagine all of the things we could have accomplished during that time!

Sorry that wasn't a very financial answer.

[giramomma]

How long are you and your wife intending to take off for leave? What do you think the benefits might be, and might you have to save up some money for leave? I like to take 4 months, one of which is unpaid. So I have to have one month of my salary all saved up.

What's your plan if you or your wife decide you want to work part time after the baby comes?

You might want to start working on a baby budget with your wife and projected budgets. Will you want to start a 529 for your child? Will private school be an option?

We found, though, for the most part, children haven't limited our travel. This summer, we'll be taking our 4th long distance vacation with our kids (we have two under 7), and we typical vacation for 2-3 weeks during the summer and take a few long weekends the rest of the year.

We also only had a mortgage for debt. But, we didn't have any debt when we got married. Our EF was 95% fully funded by the time the first child came. Actually, my husband and I knew that we wanted the SAHP lifestyle when the children came, so we were engaged, we began making financial decision to allow us to have a SAHP. I'm far too pragmatic with money than I should be.

[Deleted]

Feb 17, 2011 22:42:33 GMT -5 oped said:

Oh my...

I'm not at all sure you are ready... but most of us weren't ready, so...

A kid doesn't need his own room for a long time, at least a year.

I know you're wife will want a room for the kid (and everything else under the sun) which is why i go back to, are you sure the two of you are (secure enough in your marriage) and ready for a child? ... They NEVER make things better/easier... NEVER...

We are secure enough in our marriage and yes we know they never make things better or easier. Believe me, we know and understand the sacrifice that will need to be made (we are going to Europe next year and understand it might be a long time after next year that we will be able to do that again.)

Ready for a kid? Mentally and physically : yes.The financial part is the part that is seriously freaking the hell out of me.
I am stressed enough now about planning retirement for the both of us, budgeting, etc. now we are talking about adding a kid to the mix.

[Deleted]

Feb 17, 2011 22:47:15 GMT -5 backontrack said:

I'll throw out there that keeping the baby in your room, doesn't work for everyone. With our first kid she was in our room for the first 6 - 8 weeks. With the second kid for some reason DH could not sleep with the baby making his baby noises in our room. He ended up sleeping on the couch when the baby was in our room! Not the end of the world, but just something to consider. Also while none of it is necessary, babies can have lots of large gear, like swings, bouncy seats, exersaucers, high chairs, bumbos, boppys, activity mats. You really, really don't need most of it, but if you have it you;ll need a place for it!

I don't quite know what things to suggest you have in order before the kids come along... We paid down debt, bought a house, and set up retirement savings as best we could afford. In non financial terms I tried to get into any habits and routines that I thought I needed. Like keeping myself healthy and keeping the house neater. ( I grew up in a hoarding household, so I had some habits to break!) If anything I would say to look at any projects you ever wanted to complete and do them now! Seriously time is soo valuable. If you always meant to scan in old photos or take a trip or whatever, do it now. My kids are still young, so I know I'll have more time as they get older, but right now I think back to weekends where all we did was watch tv and make a meal or go shopping and imagine all of the things we could have accomplished during that time!

Sorry that wasn't a very financial answer.

Don't be sorry, you were quite helpful
THank you

[Deleted]

Feb 17, 2011 23:51:56 GMT -5 giramomma said:

How long are you and your wife intending to take off for leave? What do you think the benefits might be, and might you have to save up some money for leave? I like to take 4 months, one of which is unpaid. So I have to have one month of my salary all saved up.

You might want to start working on a baby budget with your wife and projected budgets. Will you want to start a 529 for your child? Will private school be an option?

We found, though, for the most part, children haven't limited our travel. This summer, we'll be taking our 4th long distance vacation with our kids (we have two under 7), and we typical vacation for 2-3 weeks during the summer and take a few long weekends the rest of the year.

It also might be a good time to discuss parenting choices, before you are both sleep deprived and can't discuss anything logically.

Thanks... the baby budget is why we intend to pay down our debt significantly by the end of 2011.

Basically we made goals for 2010-2011 and depending how our financial picture is looking toward 2011 we will decide if we should start trying or not.

Leave? My wife wants to just take the amount of time allowed and go back to work. But who knows that can change, so we will definitely try to have at least 2-3 months savings in place.

We currently have about 3.4K in savings which represent close to 1 month (we make combined mid 4K after 401K contributions, health insurance, etc).

The biggest expenditure that we are not looking forward too is daycare which will average anywhere from 1K to 1.5K a month in our area. So we will need to start budgeting for that
-> The other solution that was brought up to us was my mother in law moving in with us. My wife and I are not in love with the idea but we can see how it will be beneficial (her mom is retired and currently live in Long Island, NY which is about 1 and half hour from us)

T

[sbcalimom]

I would definitely look into your insurance situation as early as possible - find out how the copays work, what your deductibles are, and how the hospital stay is treated. You may have a deductible only for your wife or one for both wife and baby - sometimes it depends on if they're released together and sometimes it doesn't matter. If you know what will be expected of you there, you can start to plan for it well in advance. You should also make sure you have adequate life insurance and any other type of insurance you feel necessary.

Before we had DD we made a sort of worse case scenario plan for the budget - what if I had to go on bedrest for 3 months or had complications that required me to be off work completely for longer than planned. We figured out how to fund that and made sure we had over half the money for that before getting pregnant. We ended up having zero issues so the money wasn't needed but given that I'm a tad of a stress case it made me more secure knowing that we had that extra cushion. I didn't want to feel forced to go back to work at a certain point if it was medically necessary for myself or my child that I stay home so I liked having that freedom.

We also made a budget for what life would be like after baby and tried to follow that for the last 6 months or so of my pregnancy. This allowed us to bulk up our savings and get used to the changes. We don't do daycare but I've heard of people saving the daycare payment for 6-9 months so that they have extra set aside when the baby arrives and always thought that would be great if you could "practice" since that is usually such a huge expense.

[whoisjohngalt]

We didn't buy a lot of things for the kid, but we did have a 2 bdr appt. The second bdr was not a "baby" room, but a guest room bc both of our families are out of town. Withing 3 months it turned into my DH's room bc the kid didn't sleep AT ALL, and my DH needed to get sleep.

When the second kid came along, we were still in the same appt and were fine. We just bought a house and I will say this - I very much look forward to them playing in a yard vs me "taking them out" to the park, playground, whatever. They both VERY energetic and I like the fact that they have a lot of room to simply run around, both inside and outside.

Lena

[thyme4change]

I wouldn't move into a one bedroom apartment and then have to move back into a 2 bedroom apartment.

I know so many people that bought a 2 seater car, and then 3 months later got pregnant and then sold the car and bought a 4 door. If they were unplanned pregnancies I'd understand - but really, if you go off the pill and go around telling people that you are "trying" why make any decisions that aren't family friendly.

[Urban Chicago]

Consider too that your wife, even if she swears up and down that she'll be back at work full time in 6 weeks, my change her mind.

She may be physically unable to work, you or she may decide you just don't want day care, it may be more expensive to do day care than she's really earning, etc...

[giramomma]

Yes, babies don't need a lot.

However, I think it's unrealistic to expect cawiau's wife to dress the child up in $1.00 carter's sleepers that she's found at garage sales.

We were also a family whose children have largely gone without all the baby gear. But, I don't think it's realistic to tell cawiau that it's possible to raise a child that is happy and meets milestones without buying them a swing or an exersaucer, given what he's posted about his wife.

We also lived in tight quarters (two bedroom, 800 sq foot place) with two adults, a kindergartener and a toddler. Once again, I don't see this sort of paring down as a possibility for them.

I forgot to mention that I would not take all your sick/vacation leave for maternity leave. Babies have a ton of drs appointments/well baby check ups the first year. And, that's if they are healthy. Some kids get multiple ear infections, which will mean multiple lost days of work for you and or your wife. Day care centers in our city close when the public schools close for things like blizzards. And, in daycare centers (or preschool), there's the requests to volunteer and come for holiday parties. You child will notice if he or she is the only kid without a parent attending the holiday party.

We have only presaved for daycare/preschool expenses when we had multiple children. We're hoping to have a 3rd child, and, to make life easier on us, we have the first year of daycare saved up.

[Deleted]

My thought is that you should wait four or five years. You are both young and live in a HCOL area. Having children in a year or two will really cut down on your options. It will put you behind for awhile. While that may be something you can accept my sense of it is that your wife will want to provide everything that older, more established couples do for their children.

Some things to consider - are you having more than one child? How do you want them spaced? You may be committing to having children 5 years apart to deal with daycare costs.

When will your education be finished?

Do you want to own a home? Spending 1.5k a month for childcare while paying off student loans will push back this dream indefinitely.

[floridayankee]

I am pushing for the apartment that is not updated since it will cost only $1210 which is a savings of $460/month

Wow...I about choked when I saw a smaller "outdated" apartment rents for $1,210...and that it'll save you almost $500/month! My little bro and a couple friends rented a 2000+-sqft, 3br, 2 bath, 2 car garage canal front home in Tampa with a pool, dock and boat lift for a bit less than you're paying now.

I've been out of the rental loop for quite a while but I still find this to be pretty damned expensive. It's more than my mortgage, HOLOC and escrow savings combined. Where are you living that rents are this high?

[Deleted]

"it'll save you almost $500/month"

And this is questionable. When you move to a place without parking, laundry and other amenities, you end up spending some of that 'saved' money elsewhere...

[Firebird]

Ready for a kid? Mentally and physically : yes.The financial part is the part that is seriously freaking the hell out of me.
I am stressed enough now about planning retirement for the both of us, budgeting, etc. now we are talking about adding a kid to the mix.

I would say no, then. I'm the same as you - the financial aspect of major decisions almost always comes first. Why? Because life is so much easier when you're not stressed about money.

For some people, being stressed about money wouldn't put a major damper on starting a family. For me, it would suck a lot of the joy out of it. That's why (although I could have kids now and it wouldn't be a major financial disaster by any stretch of the imagination) I plan to wait until I am in what I consider to be an "ideal" (not perfect; there's a difference) financial situation before trying. Shouldn't take me more than a few years to get there, tops.

Cawiau, I would hold off. Get your house in order before you put a baby in it. And I wouldn't say that to everyone; I'm saying it here because you sound a lot like me.

[simser]

I thought your wife had said a long time ago that she wanted to be a SAHM. I see above you're saying she'll want to go back to work. Who made that switch (ie did she bring it up or did you?). Because it will get expensive if she decides to quit work (which isn't necessarily bad but is something you will need to talk about).

Also if you can't have kids... it will get expensive. And it's an issue your wife will get crazy about (every woman does). I say that as a woman who got crazy herself and sees everyone else get crazy around her. You may want to prepare for the "ttc" outlay (pregnancy tests, ovulation kits, doctors visits etc.).

[Wisconsin Beth]

I agree with Firebird, put your house in order.

Get your retirement contributions on autopilot and forget about them. Then start the "baby fund" to cover day care, copays, diapers, formula/bfing supplies, etc. We didn't expect to have kids, per our doctors, and now we have 2 toddlers. Our financial house is still a mess.

Make sure you and your wife on on board regarding parenting stuff - kids ok with hand-me-downs? spanking? timeouts? religion? who's getting up at 2am every night for months on end? Do you only want girly gifts/stuff for a daughter? will one of you want to shift to healthier eating to set a good example? Go green? what if you have twins? What form of birth control will you use after the baby's born (most of the birth controls out there for women inhibit breast milk, making bfing harder)? Breaks for each other/alone time.

And does having a mom come live with you mean you're going to need 3 bedrooms?

What about the washer and dryer? We average a load a day right now. Hell if I'm letting it pile up and then have to go sit for hours at the laundry mat or letting DH go without taking one of the kids. I'm "on duty" all the time as it is.

[Deleted]

just do it.

[BeenThere...DoneThat...]

...I say move in with MIL now, before baby, and see how you all like it for 6mos, then decide...

...it works for practicing at paying a mortgage payment before house hunting...

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

People make a lot of assumptions about what kids "need". They don't "need" anything but loving parents, food and a warm bed. They don't "need" a big house, their own bedrooms and acres to run on. You don'' need to rush out and buy a new minivan the day after you have your child. Not saying you will but saying warning you of many of the things I bought into.
You have to step back and just let things develop. Don't make a lot of big changes. Proceed with having your family, then after you have all the facts you can decide what to do. The point is to allow yourself options. Don't incur a lot of new debts for housing, auto, etc that push you into a corner.



While we did not fall into the bigger house and bigger car trap there is a lot of baby crap that I purchased that now I wish I hadn't because it turns out she doesn't like it or we didn't need it.

While not insanely expensive items the stuff adds up.

It would have ended up even worse if I had not made a point of taking my mom shopping with me. Having someoen who has been there and done it twice as opposed to the store salesperson guiding you thru makes a heck of a lot of difference!

[swamp]

Cawiau,

You've mentioned your wife can't help herself from buying cute outfits and toys for your dog. What makes you think that your wife isn't going to do this for a kid on a much larger scale?

You and your wife are only 25. What's the hurry? Just because your cousins are breeding at an alarming rate doesn't mean you have to. Child bearing isn't a contest. Do it when you're ready, not when your cousins are ready.

[TrixAre4Kids]

Oooohhh, have you discussed last names? Baby Au? Baby St Laurent? Baby Au-St Laurent?

Sorry, I don't have any kids so can't be of any practical use...

[The Walk of the Penguin Mich]

Spot on, Swamp.

Go back and look over your posts the last few months, Cawiau. IMO, you need to get your financial relationship with your wife in order first before you decide to bring in a child which will upset what you're trying to accomplish.

Breeding isn't a competitive sport you don't have to compete with your cousins.

[Deleted]

I agree with you Snerd. This is why i don't actually think 'save X and have Y put aside' is the most important issue here. I think reasonable rassurance that you can provide a stable life is much less about a fully stocked retirment and EF to cover every contingency, and much more about 'are we on the same page'... this includes general ideas of how children will be raised and disciplined (although kids do change a lot of those ideas... lol..) but most importantly i think it includes being on the same page financially... do we both have the same financial goals. Do we both work consistently towards those goals together. NOT just pay them lip service. Finances are the number one things couples argue over... and it doesn't get better with kids...

[telephus44]

I think that as long as you and your wife are agreed on it, then yes, you should go for it. I like to think of "being ready" as a scale of 1 to 10 - if you're a 10, then you have a full paid off house, maxed out retirement savings, and enough set aside for your kid to go to Harvard. You don't need to have everything perfect, but yes, some situations are better than others. You just need your situation to be one of the "better" ones.

When DH and I first tossed around the idea, he was unemployed and I hated my job that underpaid me and had no maternity benefits and we were just about paycheck to paycheck. That's NOT a good situation to be in, so we held off. When we started trying, yes the student loans weren't full paid off, no we didn't have a house yet - but overall, our finances were in good shape (DH was employed and I had a new job with much better pay and amazing benefits). Overall, I think your finances are in good shape.

And to add to the "baby sleeps in your room" discussion - for the first 2 years, we just put the crib and the changing table in our living room. We also had a 1 bedroom apartment. The living room was the biggest room. DS didn't care, and the only people we had over really wanted to see the baby anyways.

Last point - I would STRONGLY suggest having your own washer and dryer if you have a baby - our son threw up all over his crib at 2am the day after we bought ours - and it was great not to have to wait until the next day because the laundry room was closed :-)

[Firebird]

I disagree with the "all your ducks in a row" theory. In general, you should have reasonable resources, but you simply cannot plan out your entire life to the nth degree. And, part of raising a family is raising yourself with your child as well. You live, learn, and grow too.

That's why I said "ideal" financial situation rather than "perfect" financial situation. As I said, I could have kids right now and the world wouldn't come to a screeching halt even if I had to be a single parent, etc. I'm confident that I have attained the financial, mental and emotional maturity to be somebody's mom without screwing them up in any significant way.

Does that mean I should just start popping em out? Um, no. I'm not quite 25 years old yet, I'm not married, I'm not well-established in my career, I haven't reached my preferred percentage of retirement savings, I haven't stopped enjoying the freedom of NOT having kids, I'm not yet debt-free... these are ducks I would very much like to have in a row before doing something that life-altering.

If I had an "oops" right now, everything would be fine... but I'd much prefer to have a "hell yes" instead, at a time in my life when I'm not just ready, but excited.

[Firebird]

I think that as long as you and your wife are agreed on it, then yes, you should go for it. I like to think of "being ready" as a scale of 1 to 10 - if you're a 10, then you have a full paid off house, maxed out retirement savings, and enough set aside for your kid to go to Harvard. You don't need to have everything perfect, but yes, some situations are better than others. You just need your situation to be one of the "better" ones.

Actually, this is a good way to think about it. I would say I'm maybe at a 6 right now. No, I don't need to be at a perfect 10 (although I wouldn't agree that 10 includes having enough saved for Harvard, that's ridiculous when you have 18 whole years to save), but I think I'd be aiming for at least an 8.5 before taking the plunge.

By the way, cawiau, significant doubts on your part mean that you and your wife have NOT agreed on this yet. Just keep that in mind. You need to be 100% sure that you want this, even if you're scared to death.

[Deleted]

Ok will try to answer all the question but might miss a few. But first thank you to everyone that took the time to answe

Competition: We are not competiting with others as to whom will have kids earlier or how many. We always knew we wanted kids and talked about since we started dating 8 years ago. The issue was always when? It is more like everytime someone is pregnant or have a child in our surrounding it just bring up the question again: Do we want to have kids now or do we want to wait some more. Like I said before we starting going at it full force we do plan to look at the whole picture. For now we are just making plans that will put us on a better footing come 2011.

Wife Spending: LOL that one made me laugh. We are talking about a woman that had a baby registry for over 3 years now... yes over 3 years with Pottery Barn, Babies R Us, etc. She keep on checking on them updating them etc. That is the same woman that always volunteers to go with friends and family for their baby registry; she just offered to start her cousin registry for her since she was schocked that her cousin is 4 months pregnant and still did not start a baby registry. So not wanting to buy our kids everything under the sun, yes not happening. But we talked about it and she is getting into the realisation of wants vs needs and it will be a work in progress. My wife is my wife and I come to accept she will never change completely; all we can do is tone it down a bit.

Staying at home mom: She wanted that for awhile but thank God again she is my wife. She has come to desire a certain lifestyle and she knows without her income there is no way she will get to keep it. One thing she knew from day 1: there is no way on this green earth I am going to pay for her student loans. So it was her idea to keep on working because after all, she does want to keep her child fabulous.

[Deleted]

Parenting:

We are both haitians and she knew it was really important to me that my kids were part of their culture. While in my family, every kids in my generation and after speaks and write Creole/French fluently, in my wife's family her mothers generation did not pass down some of the things, in my wife generation only 2 of them can actually speak Creole/French. So that is important to me as to French/Creol will be spoken on a regular basis in my household, they will know about their heritage and we will take them to haiti as soon as they can go and appreciate it.

I know I will be more strict than she is but we will just have to find a middle ground for that. Education is really important to both of us and that will not be an issue: homework, maintaining good grades, etc.

We were both raised Catholic and both went to private Catholic school. I no longer consider myself Catholic while my wife does and she wants to raise our kid Catholic which I am ok with. The only issue we have yet to put to bed is: catholic private school and public school. You guessed it, my wife wants our kids to go to catholic private school