Small house & stay at home, or big house & keep working?

RainbowLaura · 30 June 2018 at 8:19AM

Hi money savers,

I know it's an age old question, but...

You're thinking of starting a family. The options are:

1) Remain in your fairly small house (with a fairly small mortgage) and be a stay at home parent until your child(ren) are both at school. Then go back to work and think about the bigger house.

2) Move to the bigger house now, but then have to go back to your (relatively low paid) job and also worry about covering the bills after childcare.

Which would you choose?

Money_maker · 30 June 2018 at 8:24AM

Everyone will pick differently. I would pick number 1. If you are lucky enough to be able to stay home with the children then do so. It's wonderful to be able to be with your children as they grow up and it's a limited time offer. To be honest, they grow up so quickly that you may not need to think about the bigger house provided you can fit them in!

Money_maker · 30 June 2018 at 8:26AM

Forgot to say, there's nothing to stop you picking up a little part time evening/weekend job which also gives your DH some one on one time with the children.

PasturesNew · 30 June 2018 at 8:27AM

Bigger house .... staying at home in a small one would drive you nuts... being at work/away from the kids will at least mean that evenings/weekends etc you don't feel "hemmed in" in a small house, but can freely have the space to do "great stuff with the kids".

In England, most of the time, it's wet, and/or windy ... and all that staying in, in a small house, "trapped", with the kids, would make you want to leave home!

harrys_nan · 30 June 2018 at 8:31AM

I would definitely choose number 1, I never had the chance to stay home with my kids, I had to work.
Our kids don't stay little for long, enjoy them. You can never get back that time.
As long as you will not be getting into money troubles by not working, you can always get a part-time that will work around you husbands job so he can also have 1 to 1 with the kids.

JReacher1 · 30 June 2018 at 8:41AM

It depends how small you are talking.

Trina90 · 30 June 2018 at 8:50AM

I'd pick number 1, as that's what we have chosen to do. But then our 'small' mid terrace is not really too small, as it has 3 double bedrooms, so plenty of space to raise a family (we know we won't have more than 2!).

gycraig_2 · 30 June 2018 at 9:07AM

As long as you have enough space to be comfortable with kids I have never seen the benefits of a big house to be honest

Red-Squirrel_2 · 30 June 2018 at 9:17AM

How small is the house? Everybody defines it differently!

Spendless · 30 June 2018 at 9:20AM

I did the first but there wasn't a huge amount of choice in this. My house was in negative equity. Also, we could not afford the childcare fees. The cost was the equivalent to my net salary, meaning the household was no better off. My day job had no alternative but for me to work f-time. I found a p-time evening/weekend job instead but when my husband changed jobs and the relatives helping me out with the overlap between me and husband coming in/going out to work developed serious health issues, I could no longer do that.

We remained in small house till DS was 21 months, then we were able to buy a larger property and have a second child. This was due to buying something that needed a lot of work on. We rented my house out and 2 years later on a price boom had happened and we could sell it and use the money to pay for some of the things the bigger house needed.

Something I'd take into account when making your choice is the cost of childcare. Also because I wasn't able to return to my daytime job, by the time I was in the position to do so, my skills were out of date due to technology advances and I had to go back to college for a few years first to gain new qualifications.

RainbowLaura · 30 June 2018 at 9:22AM

Some interesting and varied responses, thank you!

Here's our floor plan:

Small house & stay at home, or big house & keep working?

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