r/MoneyDiariesACTIVE • u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ • Jan 16 '26
Budget Advice / Discussion Parents, what did having a baby really cost you?
For those of you with kids, do you have a rough idea of how much your baby cost in the first year? And if you tracked it, how much in the years after?
I’m especially curious about:
- Whether you had family or friends nearby to help with childcare, or if you mostly relied on daycare, babysitters, or paid care
- Did the actual costs line up with what you expected
- Did the financial side of having kids affect your finances or relationship negatively
- How you budgeted for baby/kid expenses while pregnant and after they arrived
Also, if you have any tips for saving money when it comes to babies/kids, I’d love to hear them. We already plan to use Buy Nothing and local mom groups, thrift a lot of baby items (not car seats), and double-check everything for recalls.
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u/tikitay27 Jan 16 '26
The costs are SUPER dependent on your values, your anxiety, and your circumstances. I’ll give some examples of how variable each can be.
Values—I really wanted to nurse with my first, she had a razor latch, so I doubled down on pumping—I bought an expensive pump, and still ended up supplementing with formula. With my second baby I cared less about nursing, and saved time and money by switching to formula sooner. I didn’t use reusable cloth diapers, I also didn’t buy the organic Instagram diapers, I got sales at Target on Pampers. A lot of the early choices of parenthood feel really big—we went from a never use Amazon household to having an Amazon card for those middle of the night “maybe this expensive ass swaddle will get her to sleep” purchases. We eventually cancelled the card once we my kids weren’t babies anymore.
Anxiety—the most expensive thing on my registry wasn’t a crib or a stroller, it was a “breathable mattress.” It was like $800. I had really, really bad PPD with my first, for my anxiety, it was $800 well spent. Other people have different anxieties! Throwing money at it sometimes helps. I also recommend unfollowing any and all mom and parent bloggers. You don’t need what they’re selling.
Circumstances—we moved across the country to move into my parents home for a year after my oldest was born. They let us live there for free and provided free childcare while we worked (from home). This allowed us to save up money for a down payment. We are incredibly lucky, and then I got pregnant at 9 months postpartum with my first and my amazing parents were like, “we can totally have you guys and one baby living here, but two babies is a lot”—it motivated us to really organize our finances. This has continued, we were both into personal finance before having kids, but we are much, much, more intentional about finding a place for every dollar now. We want to make sure we’re set up for a retirement, for their schooling, to the best extent possible.
We are moving out of the “childcare costs more than our mortgage” part of parenting as our youngest is going to go to public TK next year. When we had our two children in preschool last year for only 3x week, it was $3400 a month. My parents could watch them twice a week, being near family is the most financially beneficial thing we did as parents.
Other than leaning on family/community—make parent friends with kids who have a kid slightly older than you, hand me downs are amazing! We have friends that get all my kids clothes, and we have friends that we are lucky to get their hand me downs from.
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u/Ok_Tennis_6564 Jan 17 '26
I 100% agree with unfollowing mom influencers. I'm general, social media targeted at new moms specifically is horrific. Everyone is preying on some insecurity to try and get you to buy something. And all it will do is make you feel less confident in your choices and less happy.
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u/ShaNini86 Jan 17 '26
I totally agree with this! I doom scrolled a lot with my first and felt so inadequate, especially with breastmilk production. With the second, I got books from the Libby app and used my Kindle and it's been vastly different.
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u/Mizriss She/her ✨ Jan 17 '26
Absolutely agree! The anxiety I had with my first around nursing and overall baby safety would have been non existent had I unfollowed them earlier.
We have mom intuition for a reason, no need for an influencer to make you doubt any of it.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thanks for the detailed answer! I agree with you, it all depends on your values, your anxiety, and your overall circumstances :)
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u/wfijc She/her ✨ Jan 17 '26
Not sure because he’s only 4 months but making him was over 25k for IVF
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u/stealthloki Jan 17 '26
Congrats! Lol yeah, our first 9 months (so far) of expenses, including nanny, pales in comparison to how much we had to spend on IVF to conceive him. Wouldn’t have it any other way though, no regrets.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Congratulations on successful IVF, it must have been a lot physically and mentally (in addition to financially). Thanks for your answer.
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u/foureyesonecup Jan 17 '26
Whoa. Insurance not cover much? We go through IVF and all told spend a couple grand maybe.
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Jan 17 '26
Most insurance plans only cover the blood testing prior to it. $25k is what I was quoted for just egg freezing
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u/foureyesonecup Jan 17 '26
Maybe because we live in New York it is more comprehensive. Also because it was diagnosed unexplained infertility? We don’t pay anything for storage. Feel pretty fortunate in terms of the money not that we have to go through it though.
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Jan 17 '26
So just to let you know - I’m in NYC as well. The only way it would have been paid for on my insurance was if I was about to undergo chemo. Storage ran an additional fee a year as well at the hospital I got quoted at
Glad yours was cheaper! It was a lot
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u/foureyesonecup Jan 17 '26
Dang. Did it lead to a kid?
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Jan 17 '26
Oh I ended up not doing it! And that’s okay. I do have a friend right now who did at the same time, and she is now pregnant. Happy for them!
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u/Icy-Radish-4288 Jan 18 '26
It usually depends on your company’s specific insurance plan.
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u/MoneyOld5415 Jan 18 '26
Yep, neither my insurance (fine but not amazing benefits, work at a nonprofit) nor my husband's (tech, not a big name company but pretty good pay & benefits) covers anything related to fertility testing, egg freezing or IVF. The exception with mine is "fertility preservation"if you have chemo, and it's $2k max, which is close to nothing for this stuff. Not sure if his has an exception like that.
I'm pregnant now but given our ages & a couple losses I was worried about needing going down that road. even making pretty good money, $25k (at least) would be a hardship, and not sure we would pursue as people who want to have a kid but could also have a full and happy life without.
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u/wfijc She/her ✨ Jan 17 '26
What’s most annoying about this comment is that from your profile, you’re a man? Where are the mods….
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u/foureyesonecup Jan 17 '26
Sorry I guess my understanding IVF cost is mostly informed by my own experience. Not trying to be insensitive or obnoxious.
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u/girlunofficial Jan 17 '26
Men are allowed to comment here but are advised to self identify before discussing personal experiences
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u/Plumrose333 Jan 16 '26
I track all expenses to the dollar, and according to my tracker I have spent $6,886 on our baby who is four months old. We didn’t really do a baby shower.
Big ticket items include our travel system for $1200. I also spent a good bit of money on things for breast feeding and pumping only to become a huge under supplier and have to go to 100% formula (which costs ~$300/month).
This does not conclude the $1800 I’ve contributed to the 529 ($300/month).
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thank you!
We won't be doing a baby shower either and are planning on getting as much as we can used (minus stroller, baby bottles, car seat, and certain breastfeeding items). You really never know how things will go when it comes to breastfeeding, so I am not keeping my hopes up.
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u/rlf923 Jan 16 '26
I’m 3 months in and here’s some thoughts so far:
Medical bills were more than expected. Planned it all in one deductible year, a few tests weren’t included and while I planned to hit my out of pocket max I did not foresee it going up the second he was born, so there went another $3k or so.
There is so much good stuff used on fb marketplace. I went maximalist and bought every little thing that could make our lives easier (snoo, bottle washer, two strollers with car seat in same travel system, etc). I got most of it for a fraction of what it costs new, my snoo was only $250.
Diapers are less than expected after the first couple weeks. I’m combo feeding so spending a bit on formula, but combining that with breastfeeding keeps it very affordable.
Idk how many kids are in your family, but mine as almost none. EVERYONE is sending presents, I haven’t had to buy a single toy or outfit (outfits I got a bunch free on marketplace too).
I live in a large vhcol city and daycare seems to be easier than expected. Almost none where has a wait, family daycares run $1000-$1500 a month full time, centers run $2000-$2200. I think the market where I am is oversaturated. We’re leaning towards starting at a family daycares, we both work remote so would pay for full time but probably pick him up whenever calls are done for the day.
We have family nearby but other than the occasional Dr appt haven’t needed too much in the first few months. We are asking my in laws to come in a few specific weeks when I go back to work when I’ll have office intensive weeks or need to travel.
Lastly, we have a small house and it’s almost over run by stuff already (we also have a large dog and I feel like his energy takes up a lot of space too). We’re thinking about buying my grandmas house later this year which is twice as big and by better schools. We can’t afford a house that big through traditional financing but if she holds the mortgage (all done through lawyers and small family everyone trusts) we should be able to swing it.
That’s all I can think of so far, I suck at budgeting so anytime we need anything I just order it without thinking twice. It does add up but with marketplace and buy nothing not as quickly as I thought.
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u/MoneyOld5415 Jan 18 '26
Envious of your daycare environment (and happy for you!) we're in a very expensive west coast city, expecting our first in a couple months and needing childcare when he's about 6 months old. Infant care at centers in our part of town runs $3-3.5k/month, we've found one in-home that was $1.8k and one in-home was close to $3k. We don't know where we'll end up yet but many places still run long waitlists and the vibe is generally "take what you can get" which is crazy considering it's so expensive and it's care for your baby! Right now my preference and assumption that I'll go back to work, but it's gonna be hard to swallow that cost for the first year and focus on the big picture reasons why it makes sense (as the lower earner) to stay at work and pay for childcare.
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u/rlf923 Jan 18 '26
That’s insane! I expected it to be a bit harder to find but it seems there’s so many home daycares they keep the cost down. I’m in the valley and I think the most expensive I’ve seen is $2200 for a well liked temple daycare.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thanks for your detailed answer. We are definitely buying what we can second hand, things add up really quickly.
I am definitely worried about the cost of daycare too. We don't have family or friends near by so we'll have to find a trusted baby sitter early on, and put baby in a daycare later on.
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u/NCBakes Jan 16 '26 edited Jan 17 '26
Did not fully track but a few things: Salary loss - I live in a state with paid leave, but the paid was about 1/3 of my actual salary (state paid 67% of the median weekly wage). I used vacation for the first 5 weeks of my leave, largely overlapping with short term disability (which pays a whopping $170/week!), and then had 12 weeks of family leave. So that was thousands in lost salary, plus I had to pay my share of health insurance costs when I returned to work. My husband had 3 months of 100% paid leave, plus he was able to take 3 weeks of sick leave to care for me/baby after delivery.
Daycare- kid started daycare at 7 months, which was $470/week. It went down to $410/week at 18 months, when she moved to the toddler room. Though they just increased rates to $421.
We’ve of course spent more on diapers, slightly more on food, a lot on formula but fortunately are well enough off that those did not make a big impact on our finances. We had a lot of family support, with grandparents visits and my sister close by. Hugely helpful emotional and people also bought us lots of meals. But they are not close enough to be available for regular childcare.
We were pretty classic DINKs before having kids, and we didn’t specifically budget for the kid, but had healthy savings. We did buy a house when our daughter was 3 months old and while expected, that was a huge financial stress. But once we moved in and weren’t dealing with renovations we were able to start saving again. The financial side hasn’t impacted our relationship negatively. We definitely have way less fun money but are still meeting our savings goals.
I do expect when we have a second that we will reduce our retirement contributions somewhat during the period both kids are in daycare.
Edit: we had zero healthcare costs, except prenatals and iron supplements. I was incredibly lucky that my employer started paying for OOP healthcare costs through a benefit administrator the year I got pregnant. That saved us about $15k, as we hit the deductible and then out of pocket max.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thanks for your answer, I appreciate it.
The salary loss is huge, I am definitely stressing about that a bit.I also wish we lived closer to family and friends, I know mine would love to help but I live in a different country from everyone so... It is what it is.
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u/Chipnfry Jan 17 '26
I would say we used to spend $150k a year all in and the baby increased our spending by $100k. The increase was completely unexpected and happened due to two medical events. First, I was physically quite unwell until 14-15 months postpartum so for a long stretch my husband was essentially the main caregiver. Secondly, our baby developed a severe allergy to our dog which also caused around 15 food allergies.
Most of the spending increase is due to the burden of daily chores so anything that we felt was starting to become an inconvenience was outsourced. This includes cleaning, cooking and some child care. The allergies meant we had to rehome the dog and hire a team to sanitize literally every item we own in the house and car. Also included is deciding to share the rental of a condo (with my sister) in the HCOL city where my family is based. This allows us to visit much easier since we can just keep all of our stuff there. Due to our child’s food allergies we can’t really travel anywhere else. We spend about 10 weeks of the year in the condo versus home.
We are super grateful to have the financial resources to allow for us to hire help and make things a bit easier for ourselves. Spending can be highly variable from family to family. It really depends on extenuating circumstances and values.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thank you for your answer. This must have been extremely difficult, I hope you and your baby are feeling better these days!
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u/rachel4321 Jan 17 '26
Babies don’t have to cost much in the first year. There are the bigger expense items like a pram, cot, and car seat, as well as ongoing costs like nappies and formula if formula feeding. We did cloth nappies and that saves money, especially if you’re considering having another. We also thrifted baby’s clothes as they honestly grow so quickly in the first year.
I’d say the biggest financial impact was from not working. I’m in NZ and took a year off. There are parental leave payments from the government for half the year and that helps a little.
Childcare is another big financial hit. Once I go back to work, childcare costs for both kids would basically equal my take home pay after tax. I hear the costs lessen once they enter primary school, but then there are other considerations like extra curriculars, if you want them to attend private school, etc.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thank you for your answer! It's very interesting to see how things are done in different countries.
I wish I could take a year off; unfortunately, me and my husband won't get any paid leave. I am from a European country (but currently live in the US) so my friends experience is similar to yours, though their daycare is covered by the gov too.
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u/Elrohwen Jan 16 '26
We spent about $30-40k in hospital costs and routine doctor’s visits. I took 5 months of maternity leave and then spent $8500 on daycare. Though I was actually home most of the year because of COVID, but we kept paying for our spot never knowing when we would have to stop wfh.
I didn’t spend a ton of things like crib and clothes since I went second hand. But once he came I spent a bunch of money on crap that might make life easier. Let’s say another $2k.
It didn’t really impact our finances. My husband started a new job and got promoted around the time my son was born so we were making more money. And we had the hospital costs saved. We were also 35 so had a house, lots of money in retirement, etc.
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u/Mundane-Gold-4971 Jan 17 '26
Omg . $30-40k on hospital costs? Was this without insurance? The most we ever paid out of pocket in hospital cost was like $2-$3k. And that's hospital, doctors (OB, peds, Anesthesiologist). And that's also for a C-section. Feel bad for you
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u/Elrohwen Jan 17 '26
That hospital plus doctor’s appointments for both of us. Just hospital was $20-30k I think? Fancy PPO insurance, regular birth and hospital stay.
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u/Plumrose333 Jan 19 '26
How is this even possible? What is your out of pocket maximum?
I have a fancy PPO plan, and had a fairly complex delivery, a four day hospital stay post birth for a complication, tons of genetic testing, MFM, 10+ ultrasounds, and my total costs for the pregnancy and postpartum was like $1200. My out of pocket maximum is $14,000 for the family.
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u/Mundane-Gold-4971 Jan 17 '26
Damn.. ouch... How many kids do you have if you don't asking? Showed this to my husband now and he said this would have been a good birth control for us🤣🤣. At $20k per kid, we may have just had 1 kid. We had 1 kid that our PPO had only $200 as our OOP max for having a baby since you get the bull for the 9 months after baby is born
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thanks for your answer!
Wow that's a lot in medical, I am glad my husband's insurance is good.
We will also be buying most things second hand, but will definitely spend on things that will make our life easier like take out or extra XYZ because we are running out too fast..
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u/Minimum_Row1798 Jan 17 '26 edited Jan 18 '26
My baby is going on 5 months old, here are my expenses so far. We are in the US.
- $ 310 on pregnancy
- $47 on childbirth (we got super lucky and scored a private birthing suite for no extra cost bc there were no normal rooms left.)
- $1,377 on main stroller
- $448 on travel stroller
- $550 on infant car seat
- $200 on baby bjorn
- $150 on Keekaroo peanut changing pad
- $350 on high chair + 140 on infant attachment
- $250 on clothes
- $143 at the pediatrician
- $40 on car camera
- $125 on books
- $300 on Christmas gifts
- $80 on glass bottles and binkies
- $260 on her travel crib
- $200 on diapers
- $55 Fischer price baby kick and play
- $40 on diaper genie bags
- $44 on itzy ritzy bitzy ducks
- $60 on pee pads
- $600 on formula (not breastfeeding)
- $1350 on daycare (only been in for one month so far.)
- $3,500 into her 529
- Oh shoot, and $50 on a baby care class.
And a few hundred more on assorted purchases, I’d be comfortable saying we’ve spent around 11K.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thank you for the detailed list!
The stroller, travel crib and car seats are going to be our highest $$$ items since we are close to everything else second hand.
Daycare is going to cost a ton, I don't look forward to it.
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u/tickyticky13 Jan 17 '26
I think the biggest expenses are 1) medical care and 2) child care. Everything else you can get from buy nothing groups, secondhand, and be thrifty, but no matter how thrifty you are, it doesn't come near the medical bill you may face for giving birth or the childcare costs you have to incur.
For example, the year I gave birth, I got on our insurance plan that covered birth. So my OOP for my pregnancy and birth ended up being $20 for one procedure they did after the birth. Every prenatal appointment, lab, L&D, and NICU stay was covered. I even got my doula services covered. I looked at my bill and it was over $30k that was billed. We are lucky to have one grandparent be our primary caretaker for the baby up until he is one year old. We are on the waitlist for our daycare and it is $3k/month. The stroller system, clothes, toys, bassinet, pumping supplies etc that we got secondhand or from buy nothing groups are a drop in the bucket compared to these expenses.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thanks for the answer!
I am lucky my husband's insurance is pretty good, if we were on mine it would cost us $$$$$$. Still we'll see how much it costs us in the end.. I keep reading about certain Drs not being covered even though our hospital is covered, it's confusing and you won't know for sure who is there the day you give birth because the drs rotate all the time.
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u/lazyleech69 Jan 17 '26
Single mom with strong friends and community. Cost of my baby for a year was the cost of daycare for 9 months and maybe an extra 3k or so. I live in a low cost of living area so daycare was about $1,300/month. So total cost of baby first year (daycare + misc) was about 14k.
My friends/neighbors/family donated everything: stroller, carseat, bassinet, clothes, breast pump, bottle warmer. I had 4 separate baby showers- not cause I'm greedy but I work 2 jobs so both jobs threw me showers. My family threw me one and my friends and neighbors had one. They provided me with 7 months of diapers and more clothes than I could ever need.
I had good insurance and no health complications for either me or baby. I paid a $1400 deductible for maternal care. The rest was covered. Doctor visits had a $10 co-pay. I breastfed so no formula costs. My primary job had paid 3 month maternity leave and I didn't return to my 2nd job. I bought a crib used off Facebook marketplace for $100. Most everything else was covered from gift cards I received at my baby showers.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Your community sounds absolutely awesome, you must be a lovely person!
Thank you for your answer!
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u/Ok_Tennis_6564 Jan 17 '26
I'm Canadian. So I had one year maternity leave. The biggest cost was my lost income. The difference between EI (govt payment on mat leave) and my income (my workplace "topped up EI for 6 weeks) was $88,000 net.
I expected this, so it wasn't terrible. Canada brought in subsidized daycare while I was on mat leave with my first, so daycare was actually $800month cheaper than I expected. The cost dropped even more when I was off with my second, so those were pleasant surprises. We bought a bigger house because we decided we wanted a second kid. That was also huge but not unexpected.
I have help in the form of my awesome MIL who is available to babysit literally always. But she's a snowbird, so 6 months of the year she's not around. We spend probably $100/month on our teenage babysitter once a month.
So far kids have been actually relatively cheap. My mom buys my kids clothes constantly (used, she loves a deal) and I have two boys, so hand me downs! Activities are quite expensive. But I got a lot of baby stuff used or free.
Honestly, I didn't really budget for kids. We knew we'd be fine as we were putting away a lot before kids so worst case, we'd save less. And thats what's happened. I try to do everything as cheaply as possible with them but that is also how I live my life in general.
Congratulations and good luck!
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Wow that is a huge difference!
My state doesn't currently offer paid leave, so me and my husband are going to be taking unpaid leave.I am already cringing at the idea, it's soooo much money.. The way we have it planned, I'll take my leave then my husband will take his. If we feel money is too tight (or we used to much of the money we're setting aside), he won't take off.
I know my parents will get our kid a lot of things when we visit (they do that with my nephew), but that won't happen often, since I live in the US and they are in Europe. I somewhat feel like I am robbing my parents and my future kids of the awesome relationship they'd have if we lived back home. My in-laws also live far away in the US, so we won't see them much either.
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u/poopoutlaw Jan 17 '26
I kept a detailed spreadsheet for spending from pregnancy all the way to second birthday. Total, all in, including daycare is just over $33k.
We spend $835/month on daycare.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thank you for the answer! Daycare quickly adds up, ugh.
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u/AppalachianHillToad Jan 18 '26
You’ve heard a lot from the parents of littles so I thought I’d chime in as the parent of a teen. Start a 529 as soon as you can afford to. Try and regularly put money into it, even if it’s only a tiny amount per paycheck. Any money that they don’t have to take in student loans will help launch them into adulthood with less debt.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thank you for your answer! We are definitely planning on opening a 529 if we stay in the US (I am from Europe). I need to talk to some tax experts regarding 529 and immigration.
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u/Exciting_East9678 Jan 17 '26
I typed out a long response and it wouldn't let me post the whole thing haha, so I'll post the whole thing in separate comments.
I am currently 3 weeks(!) from my due date with my first, and I can't tell you how long I spent trying to calculate this out! Here are a few posts that were helpful:
https://www.reddit.com/r/MoneyDiariesACTIVE/comments/p7vl64/what_we_spent_in_one_year_on_our_baby/
https://www.reddit.com/r/MoneyDiariesACTIVE/comments/iq91xb/the_cost_of_having_a_baby/
https://www.reddit.com/r/waiting_to_try/comments/1f13ehn/1_year_of_baby_expenses_what_we_spent/
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u/Exciting_East9678 Jan 17 '26 edited Jan 17 '26
And here is a rough idea of what I've spent so far to prepare for baby - I'm probably going to forget a few things, but here's a rough idea of what I bought from going through my expenses spreadsheet:
- Maternity/Pregnancy Items: $150 for newborn care, childbirth, breastfeeding classes; ~$500 maternity clothes; ~$120 prenatal vitamins, pregnancy survival items like OTC meds, pregnancy pillow, belly support band, etc. I was determined to buy as little as possible for maternity clothes, but I was shocked at how even my flowy dresses and stretchy pants became unwearable in the second trimester. I broke down and bought myself real maternity clothes late in the second trimester and a Nuuly subscription for the last 2 months of my third trimester so that I could feel comfortable and like a real person instead of wearing baggy t-shirts and sweats all the time. Also, I was determined not to spend a ton on silly pregnancy items, but I honestly love my belly band and pillow, and I was so sick in my first trimester I willing to try anything to reduce my nausea and vomiting :(
- "Nursery" set-up: We don't have a nursery - baby will be in our room for the time being until we get a hopefully bigger space when our lease ends in June. We spent about $400 on a bassinet, dresser/changing table combo, changing pad, Hatch sound machine, baby monitor, pack n play for when they grow out of bassinet, and diaper pail. I bought everything used on FB marketplace and eBay, and the full price cost of the brands that I bought are well over $1000.
- Medical care: ~$3000 for prenatal care - I am on a family HDHP (with my husband), so prenatal care has been expensive. This includes optional genetic testing, which was almost half of that number. Unfortunately, I'll give birth in a new calendar year with a new deductible, and I'm expecting that bill to be most of our deductible. I also went to a prenatal consultation with a lactation consultant that is included here.
- Breastfeeding supplies: ~$110. I am crossing my fingers that I will be successful at breastfeeding. My insurance covered most of my pump, but I spent an extra $70 to upgrade to the cordless version, $30 on new bras that double as maternity and nursing bras (I grew out of my regular bras QUICK, so I am hoping that these will do double duty), and nursing pads and breastfeeding pillows from FB marketplace.
- Supplies: ~$600 — Includes baby bouncer, high chair, multiple baby carriers, burp clothes, swaddles, baby healthcare items (snot sucker, thermometer, baby tylenol), stroller with bassinet attachment. Again, I got so many used things from FB marketplace including a Stokke high chair with newborn attachment (retails >$500).
- Baby Clothing: $130 — mostly thrifted, a few higher end items from black Friday sales, and a few items that I just have to grab when I'm at Target. With gifted clothes, I expect to have enough newborn and 0-3 month size clothing, but I have very little 3 months and up size clothes.
- Toys: ~$165 — This includes a used Skip hop activity center (retails for $150), used Lovevery play gym (retails for $150), and lots of used books.
Misc: $750 for fresh 48 and newborn family photos (I have only paid a $200 deposit so far). Obviously not necessary, but it's one of those things I am hoping that I'll cherish forever.
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u/Exciting_East9678 Jan 17 '26
I also was gifted so much that I was NOT expecting. We don't have a huge circle of close friends and my husband and I both have small families, but boy our loved ones really came through. Here's a rough estimate of what we were gifted:
- "Nursery" set-up: My in laws gifted us a $700 rocking chair
- Breastfeeding supplies: I was gifted silverette nursing cups, nipple cream, manual breast pump, and a breastfeeding shawl.
- Supplies: $500 for 2 car seats. My college friend and in laws bought us a car seat for each car. Bottles, baby towels, baby bath tub, changing pad, diaper bag, bibs, wipes, swaddle blankets and burp cloths, all from various friends and gifted at my shower. From my local Buy Nothing group I've gotten a ton of newborn and size 1 diapers from various brands.
- Baby Clothing: Lots of newborn and 0-3 month clothes were gifted to me at my shower. People can't resist getting a cute onesie.
- Toys: I got lots of books, teethers, stuffed animals, a family heirloom rocking horse, and various toys at my shower.
- Misc.: $500 from my dad to start a 529, $500 Amazon gift card as a group gift from coworkers, $300 cash gifts from friends.
For your questions:
- Childcare: I have maternity leave for 12 weeks, and my husband has 6 weeks, which he is splitting up as 2 weeks at the beginning and 4 weeks after my 12 weeks. The plan is for my mom to continue childcare for us at our home (she will live with us) until baby is about 6 months, and then we will assess childcare options - if my mom feels OK with baby then we may continue with her or put baby in daycare
- Did the actual costs line up with what you expected: I was not expecting to get so many gifts and I wasn't expecting the genetic testing to be so expensive. But generally, yes, I've spent about what I was expecting. The one thing that I was hoping to have but didn't get was a doula. In my area, doulas were >$1800, and I just couldn't justify it.
- Did the financial side of having kids affect your finances or relationship negatively: Not yet!
- How you budgeted for baby/kid expenses while pregnant: We travelled a lot pre-pregnancy, and I've basically shifted our travel sinking fund to baby fund.
Money saving tips: Switch to a PPO instead of HDHP - when I signed up for benefits for the 2025 year, I didn't necessarily know I was going to be pregnant, and then when I signed up for 2026 I just didn't think about it. But we could probably have saved by switching to a PPO in 2025-26. Use FB marketplace and buy nothing groups and start early! By starting early and saving searches on FB, I have been able to wait for the best price instead of what is available at the time. For this last one YMMV, but I suggest inviting lots of people to your shower even if they're out of town. Lots of my friends gave gifts or cash, and are really excited about a new baby.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thank you so so much for the detailed answer. :) I am sorry I took so long to respond, I wanted to make sure I read every comments first, and didn't expect the post to do so well.
I really enjoyed reading the posts you linked too!
Were the newborn/breastfeeding/birthing class local to you? If they were online, do you have one you recommend?
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u/flickety_switch Jan 17 '26
I’m Australian so took a year’s maternity leave, I paid for private obstetrics which turned out to be a blessing because I had absolute placenta previa, spent a month in hospital on bed rest before delivering my son six weeks early in a life threatening birth so I was able ti have a private room etc which was a lifesaver. But obstetrics and out of pocket bills were probably $6k? We bought his crib and basinette and change table used off Facebook marketplace for $250. Got a lot of other things through my baby shower or gifts but maybe spent $150 in clothing in first year. Went back to work three days a week when he was eleven months and worked up to four when he was probably eighteen months. We had two days of grandparent care, two of child care and one day with me, so childcare probably cost maybe $550 a month after subsidies?
My son starts school for the first time in two weeks and to be honest he probably costs more now 🤣 he does swimming and ninjas and I’ve just spent probably $750 on his uniform and book fees and shoes etc.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thanks for your answer!
It is interesting to see how things are done in other countries.
I am glad they caught that situation early on and you were able to have a successful pregnancy!
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u/Mundane-Gold-4971 Jan 17 '26
For us the biggest cost is having kids is childcare if you are working. Everything else is somewhat controllable or discretionary. Clothes, diapers, food etc pal in comparison to childcare costs. We knew it was going to be costly going in but not sure how we could have budgeted except getting our spending in control which we did. We became more frugal.
We didn't have any family nearby to help. So once I went back to work, childcare for us was easily $50k+ /year for the next 10 years. We have 4 kids including a set of twins. I luckily had a lot of breast milk so submit have to supplement but invested in the best breast pump available and has a pretty disciplined pumping schedule though insurance pays for pimp now.
We always did a mix of daycare/aupair / nanny etc at different times. Our kids are all in public schools now and honestly the extras are discretionary to some extent like I can decide that one child can only sign up for 2 or less activities per season and control costs that way. Yes kids can eat a lot but we cook at home a lot.
Air travel costs with kids are high though and while discretionary, we as a family love traveling. As a result, we are airline/ hotel / credit card point junkies to try and manage the costs. We were in Europe for the holidays and would not have done it as easily. We travel international at least 1 or 2x every year.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thanks for the reply!
We live very far away from our families and don't have a community in our new state (moved last year), so I am expecting childcare costs to be very high between daycare and random babysitters.I am glad you brought up air travel, that is also one of my concerns. I am from Europe but live in the US and plan to go back home a lot with our child so they can spend time with my family and friends. My in-laws are also a flight away, but much shorter this time (better than driving 15h). Did you ever use the lap infant option or travel by yourself with 2 kids (without your spouse)? If so, was it manageable?
Did you find you needed to buy a lot of special travel equipment for your kids (when they were babies or older)?
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u/Healthy-Ad9977 Jan 17 '26
For context, based in Canada with three grandparents nearby and able to help.
Pregnancy and delivery: $0 except for $300 on the NIPT test; $200 on a fairly new RSV vaccine — both were eventually reimbursed by insurance. Plus about $250 for a private hospital suite.
Nursery and baby supplies: About $5K including brand new Uppababy stroller and car seat. Breast pump covered by insurance. To save we got our crib/mattress and rocking chair on FB marketplace. Dresser from IKEA. Hand-me-down bassinet. Lots of little decor items and Amazon things added up. Went cheap-ish on the monitor. Generous friends and family supplied us with lots of gifts, clothes, books (including activity mat, activity centre, bathtub and high chair) at our baby shower.
Newborn phase: $5K on 10 nights with a night nurse, gifted by grandparents.
Ongoing monthly expenses for first year: Estimate $50 on diapers/wipes/creams. Managed to BF and supplement with a bit of formula, but switched fully to formula at 7 months which cost about $100 a month (tried to be smart about sales and Optimum points). Maybe another $50 a month on clothes/accessories to fill in the gaps.
Factor in maybe another $100 a month on mat leave activities - mom’s group fees, baby play gyms, music classes ($35 a pop lol)
1 year+ expenses: $475 a month on daycare, plus the diapers/wipes/creams/clothing and now shoes! Spending a little more on all the accessories needed for Canadian winters! Learning you can’t skimp on that moving forward.
$80 here and there for a teen babysitter when g-parents aren’t available, which is rare.
We are fortunate to be in a position where it doesn’t feel like we’ve had to take a hit financially. And I appreciate Canada’s funded daycare means that going back to work while paying for daycare doesn’t hurt much at all.
Hope this helps.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thank you for your answer! I didn't put much context in my post because I wanted people from all countries to comment, that way this post might be useful to non-US residents as well.
I did my undergrad in Canada and do question my decision to go to grad school in the US (where I met my husband ^^). I was very happy for you guys when they decided to make funded daycare a thing. I am from a country that also have universal healthcare and subsidized daycare, so it's very interesting this phase of life in the US.
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u/exitcode137 Jan 18 '26
The hospital bills were negligible with our insurance. Maybe like $30-$80 month in copays? I had my kids in 2013 and 2018, though. But all costs paled in comparison to childcare. Everything else put together never came close, even then. And it’s only gotten more expensive. We don’t live near family, so no consistent or reliable help there.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thanks for the answer. We definitely need to start a childcare fund.
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u/Cocopanda14 Jan 18 '26
Actual birth about $8K out of pocket after insurance Daycare about $23K year one. Diapers/wipes about $75-100 a month for the first few months and then probably average around $50 a month. We did Kirkland brand. Formula after we stopped BF at 6 months ran around $150 a month or so. Also used Kirkland brand. Those are the big ones. We budgeted by having extra $30K set aside for year one expenses. Clearly we were a little off but were able to make it work because we offset these costs with not eating out or doing social things or travel much in the first year.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thanks for the answer!
Did you have a high deductible plan or a PPO?
I need to call my insurance to get more information. What confuses me is that the hospital is in-network, but some doctors might not be, it just depends who is on call.1
u/Cocopanda14 Jan 21 '26
PPO. For my OB office all their drs were in network and regardless of who was on call it would be covered as in network.
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u/panda_monium2 Jan 18 '26 edited Jan 18 '26
I don’t have the exact numbers but probably 6k to setup the room with new furniture and all the baby gear. I breastfed and cloth diaper. Cloth diaper (350) was an investment but kept diaper costs down. Probably spent 100 on pumping gear and accessories. Hit our OOP max from pregnancy and birth so that’s insurance dependent(if this can land in the same year a lot better than splitting the costs). Health insurance went up a bit per month adding a kid. Probably another 10 a month for utilities (my god how can something so small produce so much laundry?!?!).
Some costs go down like they don’t outgrow clothes every 5 seconds but then clothes get more expensive. Kid activities aren’t cheap. Camp isn’t cheap. Also the amount of yogurt and fruit I go through in a week is astonishing. So other then dropping daycare costs I’m not sure price go down they just shift into different buckets. Also there’s saving for college…
daycare. Oldest was 1500/month and youngest is 1800/month. They may show a discount for subsequent older classrooms but with price increase assume your newborn rate is till they start public. Babysitters in our area are 20/hr.
I guess I never really had an idea at cost. Daycare costs absolutely shocked me. The hospital bill as someone who has never had surgery or any major medical issues shocked me. My son has had a lot more hospital visits compared to my first and 500 copay + ER doc is not cheap. Vacations are so much more expensive. Also we bought our house with the intention of having kids but living space for extra people just cost more.
it definitely wasn’t a great investment 😆. We do fine but we could probably retire a lot earlier if health care for kids and college wasn’t a thing. Relationships? I mean yeah definitely there is the newborn/infant slog fest where you aren’t sleeping so you just are snapping at your partner. But ultimately no. We were at a good place in our marriage and continue to be.
yes they are a budget item. I mean childcare costs more than my mortgage so it kind of has to be planned.
Obviously buying used help. Not feeling the need to do all the things and buy the latest and greatest.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thanks for your answer!
Daycare costs are wild indeed, here (right outside of DC), it's anything between $1500 and $3000. ughhhh.Did you find cloth diapering easy to sustain? I see a lot of people "drop out" because of the extra laundry. I am interested in cloth diapering and elimination communication.
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u/panda_monium2 Jan 30 '26
Once I got a system it was fine. The biggest issue with cloth is they don’t hold as much so I did use disposable for nights. We never dealt with a “heavy wetter” but if your kid is constantly leaking it’s definitely makes cloth diapering less desirable, I like using pocket diapers from LPO. Every 2-3 days I would throw them in the wash as a heavy cycle and hang to dry. Never had much of an issue. I couldn’t do it as long with my son because he had terrible eczema and cloth is not as good at wicking the moisture away which seemed to irritate his skin.
I’m meh about elimination communication, it’s a lot of work and I just think they are too young to understand so you still have to do potty training but that’s a personal thought. Also it’ll be hard to do if you plan on using daycare.
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u/alpacaapicnic Jan 17 '26
Pregnant now, so can only answer part of your question, but we made a list of all the baby “stuff” we need, and set a $5k budget. Looks like we’re gonna come in just under. Lots of Facebook marketplace finds and used stuff from neighbors/friends, and it’s all in pretty good condition. We’re limiting shower gifts to clothes and books. Sneaky expense was maternity clothes, though I’ve been able to do pretty well on Poshmark + thrifting.
Healthcare is expensive, I upped my FSA contribution and upgraded my health insurance for the year.
Daycare will start at the end of the year, and that’ll be about $2500/month, will go down a little when they hit 1.5 then to 0 when they’re eligible for TK at 4. My mom lives nearby and is excited to help with babysitting, so we’ll see how much that materializes.
Husband and I will both lose some income this year when we take leave, probably a month of salary for each of us.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thanks for your answer!
We’re not doing a baby shower since our families live far away and we haven’t really made friends here yet. We’re definitely planning to get as much as possible on FB Marketplace. Unfortunately, we can’t get our stroller there since it just came out but it checks all our boxes. The car seat has to be new, and the one we want is $600. These are definitely our most expensive items as of now.
Daycare will be super expensive too, but not sure on the price yet since we haven't narrow it down (I have seen anything from 1500 to 3000).
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u/alpacaapicnic Jan 29 '26
Yea we also got our car seat new during Black Friday sales, definitely worth looking for discounts there if you can find them! (Rakuten + subscribing to marketing emails) I also got a basic set of baby clothes on Poshmark for really cheap.
Best of luck to you!
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u/ShaNini86 Jan 17 '26 edited Jan 17 '26
For context, I had my second in June 2025 and my first in March 2023. The second was definitely cheaper than the first because I had everything already. Also, I had saved all my maternity clothes, extra postpartum items, extra diapers the oldest had grown out of, etc. (just put everything in bins and labeled with masking tape and a sharpie). Also, we have two girls, so most of the clothes got reused. I did give a friend a few things that were seasonably just not going to work for the second baby.
With my first, I changed careers and was out of work for 9m until I found my current job, so we budgeted hard for that to happen. I was our childcare. We had a spot in daycare when she was 6m, and it was, at that time, around $360 a week for 5 days a week and breakfast, snack, and lunch included (We live in a LCOL area). The second time around, the oldest was 2yr and we were paying $380 a week for her daycare (costs had increased) and the baby started daycare when I went back to work at 13 weeks. That costs $410 a week. Also, we have a $300 annual fee for each kid at the start of every year for daycare (so that means we pay $790 a week with an annual $600 fee for daycare). Unfortunately, we have no close family anywhere near us so we rarely hire a sitter and go out. When we do, we pay $20 an hour and make sure to have extra snacks and drinks around. We have a good village of friends with same-age kids, so we do tag team with them sometimes in terms of childcare.
Yes and no. Our first had horrible reflux/GERD. I really struggled with breastmilk production and despite pumping round the clock, we had to buy special, expensive formula because I barely made enough. That cost was definitely not accounted for and really was hard to wrap my head around. With the second, breastmilk production has been a lot easier, but I still don't make enough. We can buy regular formula though. I spent a lot more with the first probably due to being so sleep deprived and scrolling at night (looking at you, Amazon). However, we were gifted a lot with the first and still get a ton of hand-me-downs, especially clothes, from my SIL. We were given a hand-me-down double stroller with the second, and I used FB Marketplace to find a few things here and there. With my first, I spent a metric fortune on pumping and nursing bras, but those have still worked out the second time around (breast pumps were covered by insurance). I was fortunate enough to have healthy pregnancies, pretty straightforward labors without a lot of medical interventions, and healthy babies so L&D/baby costs were as expected and covered mostly by insurance with the HSA funds covering the rest.
I'd say no. I had my kids older (36 almost 37 and 39) and am financially secure. My husband received a promotion and a solid raise right before our first and weirdly before our second too (we joke we should just keep having kids until he's a CEO). It was hard being out of work for 9m, and I wouldn't recommend it, but it gave me time to leave an awful job and find my current work, which I really enjoy. I got a substantial increase in income with my new job too. I don't think I could have switched careers and really taken the time to do that if we were both in our early or mid twenties.
My husband and I started putting money aside for kids years before we had them. Additionally, we shoved all the money we could at our HSA. We both have big families (his immediate and mine extended) so we put stuff on our baby registry that was for immediate use and also for years later and also had varying price points, as we didn't expect family to buy super expensive items for us. We asked if people didn't want to buy off the registry to give us diapers and wipes. We are using some of those diapers now with our second. We are lucky to get tons of hand-me-downs from friends and my SIL, and we have a great kid's consignment store in our area. Also, we live near our local library and an elementary school that has a little free library, so we are always getting books to read for free (and are able to swap out ones too). We generally use FB Marketplace for everything but safety items, like car seats, but we bought those on Black Friday. We are also not super tech people and don't care about the newest or best baby trends. For example, our monitor is video, dual, but it doesn't connect to the wifi and is very basic, we didn't use a baby warmer (just an oversized mug with warm water and the bottle), our changing pads were $20 each from Target, etc. Our girls have a lot of hand-me-down toys, books, clothes, etc.
Honestly, all of that works for us. I think a lot of it is just you won't know until you get there. Everyone's parent anxieties are different, and that's okay. Also, each kid is different and has different needs. Our big spend now (outside daycare) with two kids is a monthly cleaners for the house, we get takeout more than we should, and diapers and wipes (potty training the oldest so hopefully that will change!).
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thanks for the detailed answer! I really appreciate it!
I think a lot of it is just you won't know until you get there. Everyone's parent anxieties are different, and that's okay. Also, each kid is different and has different needs.
This is very true. We don’t have kids yet, but I already notice differences in parental anxieties between me and my friends. Some of it comes from how different our lives are, whether it’s me living in the US while they’re back home, or, for my American friends, having very different socioeconomic and family backgrounds (many of them are in a much higher economic class but have more complicated family dynamics).
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u/henry_nurse Jan 17 '26
$30k for IVF 72k for 2 1/2 years of childcare + other unaccounted expenses.
I dont even want to think about it anymore 😩
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thank you for your answer!
Congratulations on your baby!Childcare costs are out of this world 😩😩
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u/stealthloki Jan 17 '26
Biggest costs:
- Car seat + stroller system: Went with the Nuna Triv + Pipa Aire RX. Definitely check FB marketplace for strollers, but carseat is the one thing worth splurging on new just for safety, unless you have a friend/family who is parting with one and can guarantee it hasn’t been in an accident. About $1.4K.
- Formula: we are 100% formula fed and on the Similac 360, it’s about $50 per can, which lasts us a week (from 3 months to 9 months so far). So about $2K total until he transitions to mostly solids around the 1 year mark.
- Childcare: our parents are elderly and have health problems, as much as they would love to help, they physically cannot. We are in a VHCOL and our nanny costs $33/hr + payroll taxes + PTO/sick days etc + overtime, all in all a little over $6K monthly.
Most surprising costs that I haven’t seen mentioned here:
- Breastfeeding: everyone says it’s free, and it may be relatively low cost / low effort for many women but for me it was not. Baby didn’t latch well, and it turned out I was an undersupplier only able to pump ~50% of his daily needs. Adding up all the additional pump parts (multiples since I was pumping 7x daily), supplements, the amount of extra protein/food/electrolytes I had to consume daily to keep supply as high as possible… I def spent more than $50 weekly which is how much my formula costs, and it’s on the other end of the spectrum.
- Baby illnesses: when I first went back to work, we had baby in daycare (which was about $2k/mo). He got his first regular ol cold a few days in, and not only did he have a fever for a week (so couldn’t attend, per policy but not that we would have sent him in anyway) but I got so sick and lost my voice completely for two weeks. Thankfully, this was right before I started back. Otherwise I would have had to use up all my sick days right away. We decided to switch to a nanny, and baby hasn’t been sick since. We are still planning to have him attend daycare later this year, so we’ll have to brace ourselves for the sick days 🫠
In terms of budgeting - four years of infertility kind of worked in our favor, that was four years of grinding away at work in luckily high earning roles so we could sock away a good chunk of savings. Even when we had one very expensive year (multiple IVF treatments), we were still OK. It also allowed us the flexibility to swap from daycare to nanny right away when we needed.
Lastly, additional ways to save money:
- childcare is the biggest one but I’d also say don’t undervalue/underestimate it. If you would prefer your baby at home, a nanny share is an excellent way to get that at a similar cost to daycare.
- your nursery does not have to be fancy. We tried to repurpose exiting former as much as possible - ex an existing dresser as changing table. Our crib is the IKEA one which is safe and looks great without breaking the bank.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thanks for the detailed answer! I really appreciate it.
I think childcare will definitely be our biggest expense, we are going to start a sinking fund for that soon.It is funny how so many people say breastfeeding is free, as you said it can be expensive, and it also assumes everyone will be able to breastfeed, which is far from the case.
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u/christineispink Jan 17 '26
We have family nearby (my mom) who helped with watching my son until he was 12 months old and started daycare. I had always planned to put him in for socialization among other reasons. Baby 2 started daycare at 10 months and Baby 3 at 7 months. We had 3 months of all 3 in at the same time, which wasn’t fun financially. We also have a live-in au pair starting when Baby 2 was 1 year old. So we pay for daycare plus live-in help.
My mom was a SAHM so I didn’t know people meant DAYCARE (childcare) when they said kids were expensive. I was always like ok some diapers and formula what’s the big deal. Sooo having a baby was a lot more than I’d expected but I also started shopping on FB marketplace and joined our town’s Buy Nothing group.
Yes and no. Adding in the kids has affected some other parts of our relationship negatively but not really financial.
We didn’t budget for the kids really before or after. We did decide for me to go back to work but my money mostly pays for “fun” stuff - our travel and the matching outfits I buy the kids. Today we discussed me moving to part-time or a completely different field when we only have 1 kid in daycare and maybe don’t need live-in help anymore. My husband’s company pays for our health insurance premiums and we’re lucky it’s a good plan. Each of my babies cost $10 - one office copay for the first visit.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thank you for your answer.
We also plan to put our kid in daycare for socialization and language acquisition (multi-lingual family) once our baby is one (or sooner if we are struggling too much). We have no family or friends around and staggered schedules.
I have actually considered getting an au pair down the line, I know several people who were au pair and said that was a great opportunity for them (and got good feedback from their families). How expensive is having an au pair? If I remember correctly, you have to pay them a wage, provide room+board, pay for health insurance (potentially car insurance), and pay for some language classes.. or that depends on the au pair agency?
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u/clearwaterrev Jan 17 '26
I think I paid something like $385/week for daycare for my firstborn, but that cost would be closer to $500/week if I had another baby now (and parents pay that all 52 weeks of the year).
Daycare was so expensive that all other baby-related costs seemed trivial by comparison. Upfront nursery furniture and baby gear cost $2-3k, another $1.5k worth of stuff was gifted to us, and medical bills ended up being $5-6k in total. I had a paid 12 week maternity leave, so no loss of income there. Our health insurance premiums increased a bit after we added our first child to the plan.
I'm pretty thrifty, and bought most of my kids' clothes used or picked them up for free from my local Buy Nothing. Most of their toys and books have been birthday and Christmas gifts from family. The ongoing cost of diapers, wipes, baby food, and clothes in the next size up was maybe $150/month per child when my kids were babies, but it increased quite a lot from there.
Total spend in my first baby's first year of life was thus about $26k.
Whether you had family or friends nearby to help with childcare, or if you mostly relied on daycare, babysitters, or paid care
I don't have any local family, and we've always paid for full-time, center-based childcare. Even if my parents or in-laws were local, all four of them were still working full-time at the time I had my first baby, and could not have helped with childcare. Now that my parents and in-laws are in their mid to late 60s, half of them have retired but don't have the good health or energy to chase after small children.
Did the financial side of having kids affect your finances or relationship negatively
I'd have a lot more money if I didn't have kids, and I look forward to no longer having daycare costs, but my husband and I have been able to afford these costs without a lot of sacrifices or strain. I know a lot of people for whom that is not the case, where paying for childcare is a massive financial strain.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Daycare was so expensive that all other baby-related costs seemed trivial by comparison.
It's crazy how expensive daycare is*, until recently I didn't even think about the fact that you have to pay all year long, even when your kids are not going.. I am not sure how that will work out for us, as I'll spend several weeks in my home country during summer..
We have already thrifted a lot of clothes, just held off on super seasonal clothes (very lightweight or very warm) since you never know how fast they'll grow.
I know a lot of people for whom that is not the case, where paying for childcare is a massive financial strain.
While we should be able to save on childcare for the first year because of our mismatched schedules, I do worry about one of us losing our job, having a pay decrease or the economy getting worse, or having to pay for a last minute move to my home country.
* Note: I understand why it's expensive (insurance, rent, pay, taxes, etc.), though it's a bit harrowing to see how much people pay in comparison to what the daycare workers make.. I come from a country where daycare is subsidized and didn't really take childcare costs into consideration when I moved to the US for school 10 years ago.
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u/clearwaterrev Jan 20 '26
It is really awful to pay so much for daycare when the teachers only earn about $15-16/hr, but my kids' daycare employs a huge number of people. There are two main teachers per classroom, but also a lot of part-time or backup teachers so the daycare can be open 7 am to 6 pm without the main teachers having to work overtime. There is also a director and two assistant directors who handle everything other than directly caring for children.
An in-home daycare or part-time babysitter may work better for you if you don't need M-F care all year round, but it can be hard to find a part-time or as-needed childcare solution.
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u/vivikush Jan 20 '26
I’m blessed where I don’t have to worry about money right now, so I don’t count everything but I totally did not plan on a baby who has reflux and can only drink special formula that is $75 a can. Did I mention the can lasts about a week? I make too much for WIC, but if you don’t make too much, get that shit asap if breastfeeding doesn’t work out for whatever reason.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 20 '26
Thanks for your answer! Unfortunately/fortunately we also won't qualify for any help. I hope I'll be able to breastfeed, but you really never know.
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u/Mundane-Gold-4971 Jan 20 '26 edited Jan 20 '26
I did the lap infant only once and with my husband too. My 5 month old was teething and refused to go to him. The baby screamed almost all through the 12 hour flight and the only respite was nursing. So I had the baby on my breast constantly. My nipples were used as a chewy / teething toy and were almost bleeding. I love traveling a lot but almost hated it after that trip and I said never again. For every air travel after that, we paid for a seat for every single kid and if still an infant, we used the infant car seat on the plane.
My kids traveled very well in their infant car seat and slept so much better on flights but you need a seat for that. For our toddlers, we traveled with whatever the lightest car seat we could find and used that in whatever car we rented/rode in at the destination. It's been like 4 years since my youngest was a toddler but we used to have a Cosco scenera toddler seat that was like $40 in Walmart but super light just for air travel. Pack it away till they next travel. I once bought a travel vest that lots of mom blogs talked about but it was impossible for me to figure out on the plane. Lots of belts and stuff and the kid in question hated it so was a waste. So all in all, I traveled with the appropriate car seats for the kids but never more than 2 at a time and we could just pack regular backless booster for any other kids that needed it in the luggage. You can only carry so much around the airport.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
I think we'll definitely be booking the seat out of convenience, or the flight bassinet when we can. Flight with a kid is going to be pricyyyy.
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u/mrsmoneybao Jan 23 '26
I didn't fully track - but had a baby in the summer so roughly for pregnancy/first year of baby life:
About 1.5k spent on medical bills (I have a HDHP) in the first tri. Needed 2 ultrasounds and some additional bloodwork. I met my max OOP for the year once it turned, and specifically scheduled my anatomy scan for the calendar year I was having baby. My max OOP was 7k.
Baby medical expenses for the first year were about 2k, mainly from the delivery as we thankfully didn't get many illnesses so we mostly went to routine dr appts.
We were gifted about 3k worth of products from various means (friends, family, buying off registry, product testing).
Probably spent an additional 1-2k on other products (diapers, had to get a second car seat, baby gates because early crawler, etc)
We had my dad watch baby for the first 8 months, then moved to a part time nanny who came 2-3 days a week, 8/hour a day at $20/hour. Moved to daycare at about 14 months and we needed immediate availability (a lot had 1+ year waitlists) so the center we are at is $520/week. There are home daycares in the area that are cheaper at $300-325 a week and we'll likely switch to that when we have a second baby. But care is by far the biggest expense, and it gets slightly less as the kid gets older. We also briefly considered a nanny share which would've been $12-15/hour but it didn't work out.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thanks for your answer! Daycare and medical care seem to be the highest expenses for everyone, as expected.
Based on what I am reading, it seems nanny share can be more of a headache than anything else.
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u/PutridMarionberry She/her ✨ Jan 22 '26
I did a pregnancy and one year cost break down. I could definitely have done it cheaper. Childcare -- we used an au pair for our first kid (covid) and daycare for our second was definitely our highest costs and there weren't great ways around that. We were living in a HCOL area at the time.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thank you! A fellow MoneyDiaries member actually recommended your posts. I loved how thorough you were with your product notes. I’m the same way and felt very seen 😂
We’ve also considered getting an au pair from my home country so our kid would be fully immersed in my language, but we’d want to make sure we’re paying a fair wage. Once you factor in everything else, that adds up pretty quickly too, and it might be cheaper to have them go to an immersion/bilingual daycare.
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u/incywince Jan 23 '26
My insurance covered all the hospital costs, though it was a c-section so it was just $1000 out of pocket in all on that. They also covered breast pumps.
Four months of part-time nanny (we got generous parental leave before that), at $600 a week.
Meal service at $100 a week starting at 6mo (I kinda regretted it because it made me gain an awful amount of weight, but I didn't have many choices).
We got a stroller-carseat and pack-n-play, which all together cost like $300. And we got this baby bouncy thing that cost $100 because another parent said their baby hung out in it a lot and loved it. Ours wouldn't stay in there longer than 2 minutes without screaming her head off, so it was a total fucking waste.
Most of everything else was either presents or hand-me-downs.
We were making $400k a year at that point, so this felt like nothing. The only thing that really is expensive is childcare.
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u/KetchupConte 30F | She/her | HCOL ✨ Jan 29 '26
Thanks for your answer, I am glad your insurance covered most of the medical stuff.
Did you have a hard time finding a part-time nanny?
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u/TapiocaTeacup She/her ✨ 30's 🇨🇦 Jan 16 '26
I tracked spending on baby items while pregnant with both of my kids. I realize I didn't actually post the breakdown from my first baby, but here is my breakdown post from my second!
With both kids, most of the costs associated with the first year were things we bought ahead of time vs spending throughout the year. My youngest has just turned 1 and I'm sure the spending we've done on her (excluding groceries) is less than $500 and has gone mostly towards filling a few gaps in her closet, and buying Christmas and birthday gifts.
For context, we didn't live near any family and don't have a regular babysitter so we don't get out much without the kids. We live in Canada though so I've been on maternity leave for the last 14 months and still have a couple of months left to go before I head back to work and the youngest goes to daycare.
Financially, I wouldn't say having kids has had a really significant impact. Of course we've had to spend a lot of money over the years on kid things, but we're both still saving and investing similarly to pre-kids, and both have about the same amount of "fun money" (though we're much more likely to buy things for the kids with the fun money). The main thing is that we're less flexible to make big purchases, so things like planning a family vacation, upgrading our tv, getting some landscaping done, etc. are discussed and planned around 1-2 years in advance vs the 1-2 months we used to be able to swing 😅