What is your biggest expense? Home (rent/mortgage), childcare, or something else?
And I am even more curious... if another thing is your biggest expense, does daycare cost more than rent/mortgage in your area?
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The mortgage. We refinanced and added our truck payment in with it so it's pretty high...but lower than it was!
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Our mortgage is about $1300; our childcare runs about half that, but L is only in daycare part-time.
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Our mortgage is our highest payment.
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Right now my mortgage is, but if i was actually on the standard repayment for my student loans they would be way more!! must. get.loan.repayment!
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Daycare in my area costs about $100/month more than rent.
And now that I see about everyone pays more for rent... I need to do some more searching! -
@pastemoo: that might not be a bad thing, though? I look at the weekly cost of the day care, somehow that seems less shocking to me, even though I know what it costs per month, if that makes sense.
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Our mortgage will be higher by about $100, but it is very close to what we'll be paying for daycare. I add about $50 onto each mortgage payment so we make an extra payment each year, otherwise they would be much closer together.
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Daycare is about the same as our rent but we're house hunting. Our mortgage + housing expenses (insurance, property tax, etc) will be about double daycare.
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We have a great, reasonable rent amount each month and our daycare is actually pretty reasonable for our area too, but when LMW starts next week our double daycare payments will far exceed our monthly rent payment!
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I voted rent/mortgage, but if we had 2 in daycare full-time, that would be more. One of the many reasons I SAH!
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Rent, because we don't have a LO
if we did & chose to put them in daycare (we don't plan on using daycare), it would be about the same as rent. Daycare around here is ~$300-450/wk for an infant.
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Our mortgage is more than double daycare. Once we have 2 kids in daycare mortgage will be $200 more than daycare.
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@mrs. bird: o....m...g... That is a lot of money for daycare!!
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Mortgage, with childcare coming in 2nd. Our daycare/preschool is actually really affordable comparatively, so even if we put both our kids in daycare it'd still come in below our mortgage.
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Full time daycare would be a few hundred more than our rent, which is part if the reason I'm staying home. So rent, unless you count my lost salary as childcare expenses.
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They are about the same.
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@pastemoo: I think it's very much dependent on the area you live in- there are parts of the country where you could find a daycare for $200/wk, that's not a possibility in other areas, especially in states with higher standards for childcare facilities (lower student teacher ratio makes care better, but more $$)
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Right now, our mortgage. Once LO arrives and I go back to work, it will depend on what kind of childcare we end up with. The daycare we're hoping to get into is a couple hundred less than the mortgage, but a nanny would be about the same amount.
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Our mortgage.
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we don't have a lo yet but I've done a little research on child care in our neighborhood, and rent will still be more, though not by too much
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@mrs. bird: Daycare is super expensive here, too -- the cheapest I've found near my office is about $1800 per month with most falling in the $2000-2200 range. It's a little cheaper outside the downtown core, but most of the centers pride themselves on the fact that they exceed the legal requirements (i.e. a 1:3 ratio where 1:4 is required) and there's no shortage of people willing to pay the prices they ask.
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Mortgage and DH's school loans and childcare are around the same amount
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Mortgage for us.
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Mortgage. The day that our house is paid off, I will be so happy!
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Mortgage here.
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Mortgage, but they are both in the same general ballpark.
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I said other. If P was in daycare full time, then our rent would be slightly less than childcare. But, we live in the cheapest possible place we could find for now...
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When we have two, daycare will be more then our mortgage.
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@pastemoo: If I was renting, it would cost the same (based on the last apartment I lived in). My mortgage, however, is double my daycare payment! So it's a big difference if you are renting vs own (especially since my payment includes escrow, home insurance, etc), and dependent on where you are. My mortgage is a lot cheaper than rent in NYC!
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I would say generally it's our mortgage, but this month it's our dog!!!
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Rent- it is about 25% of our income. Child care is 15%.
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Depends. Technically just the mortgage is pretty much the same as what our daycare costs will be. But if you add in interest, taxes, and condo fee, our housing total is about $600 more per month than daycare.
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Oops. I voted and accidentally hit mortgage instead of daycare. Daycare is $600 more a month than our mortgage. But I have two kids in the infant room to pay for. If it was only one baby, our mortgage would be most expensive.
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Mortgage is higher only because we pay more than we have to. If we paid on what we owe right now, they would be even.
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Rent
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Mortgage is only marginally higher, but I voted "the same". We live in a small apartment in the highest-cost area for childcare in the country.
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Shoot, I voted for mortgage but actually our daycare and preschool costs more! Once my son is out of preschool, our mortgage will be our biggest expense.
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Rent for sure. Daycare is HEAVILY subsidized here, so it is extremely affordable for everyone.
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@mrs. bird: Actually we live in a pretty cheap area... both for rent and for daycare. It means that wages are also low. It's good to see that they are at least pretty close for most people.
if we did & chose to put them in daycare (we don't plan on using daycare), it would be about the same as rent. Daycare around here is ~$300-450/wk for an infant.
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