“Don’t wait until you can afford to have kids, or you’ll never do it.” – my dad to my newly-married cousin
…….
I see friends post about how they can’t afford to start a family as, e.g. a teacher or a nurse. This is hard for me to believe, because
- Almost everyone in the world who’s raised kids has done so on much less money
- I’ve raised kids, and lived with other people raising kids, while much less spending than many people consider necessary.
Related: Vibecession: young people feel uniquely badly-off economically, but the economic data indicates most things (except housing).
It is indeed harder with high housing costs, and we should try to lower them. And having kids is an irreversible decision that you shouldn’t rush into just because it’s economically feasible.
But if you’re reading this, it probably is economically feasible. Jeff has written a good bit about our own budget over time (like from 2016 when we had a baby and a toddler, and two bedrooms for the four of us). I’ll walk through a different example: the couple we lived with in 2011 who were raising a baby on a modest budget.
You can live with housemates, even with kids
Our first non-family housemates after college were a couple we met on Craigslist. They were expecting a baby, and needed a deleaded apartment that allowed cats. Together we rented an apartment in the cheap end of Somerville (a suburb of Boston). It was a typical triple decker apartment: 1,200 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom.
We split the costs roughly 2/5 for Jeff and me (with one bedroom) and 3/5 for the other couple (with 2 bedrooms). At the time in 2011 it cost $1,700/month (about $2,500 in today’s money), and these days it’s listed around $3,300/month.
The housemates were
- Other couple dad (paralegal)
- Other couple mom (daycare worker, later full-time parent)
- Their baby, born 4 months into this arrangement
- Their baby
- Me (grad student)
- Jeff (programmer)
- Other couple’s 2 cats
There was no washer or dryer. The other couple used a laundromat, and I washed our clothes at the kitchen sink with a hand-cranked machine, and dried them on a rack. The apartment was big enough to hold parties with more than a dozen people; the Boston Effective Altruism group was born there when we invited some friends over to dinner and then made it a regular thing. When the other couple’s family came from out of town, they stayed at a nearby low-end hotel. We had one window unit air conditioner in the living room. The apartment wasn’t fancy, but functional and free of pests and mold.
None of us owned a car. All of us took public transit to work (I had the longest commute, 1 hour 40 min to my grad school campus). We brought our groceries home in a wire cart, took turns cooking, and ate a lot of pasta and beans.
……….
Is this still possible in today’s economy?
Here’s my current-day estimate for one earner, one full-time parent, and one baby in the setup we had:
| Monthly cost | Notes | |
| Rent | $1,980 | 3/5 of a $3.3k 3-bedroom apartment |
| Groceries | $500 | |
| Heat | $100 | 1/2 of $400 (source) |
| Internet | $50 | |
| Phone | $100 | Based on Google Fi, 2 lines |
| Electricity | $100 | 1/2 of $200 (source) |
| Laundromat | $20 | |
| Diapers etc | $50 | Generic brand |
| Public transit pass | $100 | 1 monthly pass, occasional fare for second parent |
| Health insurance premium | $522 | Either employer-subsidized or state-subsidized |
| Therapist | $260 | fortnightly visits for postpartum depression |
| Out of pocket medical | $250 | assuming maxed-out $3k deductible |
| Dentist | $20 | annual cleaning for each adult |
| Baby clothes and sundries | $30 | |
| Adult clothes and sundries | $150 | |
| Cat food and litter | $50 | |
| Taxes | $1,000 | assuming $70k income |
| Monthly total | $5,282 | |
| Annual total | $63,384 |
This budget doesn’t provide for debt, savings, travel, or emergencies. My understanding is that Massachusetts has better state healthcare assistance but also higher housing costs, so this might be easier in a cheaper city, especially with remote work more possible.
……
I know very few American families who share housing while raising kids. What was it like for us living with someone else’s baby?
- With our bedroom at one end of the apartment and their rooms at the other, we were never woken up by the baby crying.
- In the intense first few weeks of parenting, Jeff and I covered more of the cooking and chores, and throughout the year I helped with holding the baby so they could get a break.
- It was good pre-parenting experience for us; we felt we knew more what we were soon to get ourselves into.
What was it like for them? When we went to their parties later, the mother introduced me to her friends with “Julia saved my life.” That’s an exaggeration, and they would have made it fine through early parenthood, but it is indeed easier with more help. (Having housemates is a mixed bag, and I’m sure I was a mixed bag as a housemate. The typical housemate is more of a bemused onlooker to parenting than much of a helper.)
We all would have preferred to continue living together, but we had a remarkably bad landlord and after making it through a one-year lease we couldn’t find another apartment that met our joint space/cat/deleading/location/cost requirements. So they moved to a cheaper part of Boston where they could afford their own 2-bedroom apartment. They now have two children. Neither of them wanted to be a full-time parent long-term, and the mom went to grad school to be a librarian.
……
Sharing housing seemed pretty good to us, and we’ve done it ever since. We currently have one adult housemate, and one former housemate across the street whom we see most days.
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