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This week for the Baby Expense Series, two guest posts are tackling the big costs of raising your baby. Today Katie Doyle is sharing some wonderful tips on getting the best value. If you have any suggestions, please leave your tips on the comments.
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“Babies are so expensive.” “You’ll never have money to do anything anymore.” “Have you SEEN the price of diapers?!”
When people find out you’re pregnant, they have some uplifting comments for you, but mostly they want you to truly understand the financial impact this new life will bring.
But you can prove them wrong.
Our sweet daughter turned six months old this week and we sat down to figure out the financial cost of having a third person in our family. Turns out, she’s cost us $44.86 per month these past six months. That’s less than a tank of gas or dinner out.
You can save major dough if you’re willing to work with your schedules and do a little diaper math.
There may be cheaper ways to get diapers and wipes than Amazon.com/mom, but if there are I haven’t found them. We have 168 Huggies diapers autoshipped to our house every month and they cost us a whopping $22.92. The diaper math on that? $0.136 per diaper. And wipes and Diaper Genie refills? We have them autoshipped, too for less than $7 per month each. Just imagine the added savings if you used cloth diapers!
The biggest cost of having a baby is finding someone you trust to take care of him or her. In our case, we were able to negotiate working from home half of each day with our respective employers for the first six months after she was born. My husband worked from home and stayed with her in the mornings and I took over in the afternoons. This saved us about $1,000 per month and allowed us to have precious extra time with our little one.
7 Tips to Saving on Baby Expenses
Bankrate.com offers up seven other tips that came into play in our situation and may work well for you:
1. Barter online rather than buying baby items.
2. Hold a party to swap baby items.
3. Buy generic diapers and wipes.
4. Breast-feed instead of buying formula.
5. Use manufacturers’ coupons and grocers’ baby clubs.
6. Join baby-sitting co-ops.
7. Try free mommy programs at the library.
There are incidental costs that come up, but if you’re willing to do a little compromising, you can be sure that your little bundle of joy doesn’t require a wad of cash.
Katie Doyle is the mom of a 6-month-old princess and the director of content for Bankrate.com, a leading personal finance website.
Join In the Baby Expenses Series
Are you a parent or a parent to be with some helpful advice or stories? Please go ahead and join in on the fun, there are 4 ways you can be a part of it:
- Leave your tips in the comment section. I love reviewing thoughtful comments from readers. Some topics have several ‘right’ answers and I think sharing different view points can be helpful.
- Submit your stories for future posts. As you know, baby and expenses can cover a variety of topics. If you have a short story or some tips you want to share, please submit them. If you’re a blogger, please share your site’s address with the email so I can credit you if you want.
- Write a blog post about your experience. Please include a link in your bio for your site and if you have a relevant post on your site, please link to it in your post.
- Share you favorite posts with friends. If you have a favorite post, please share them with your friends who are expecting. I’ve included share buttons for Facebook and Twitter to make it easier and you can always email them your favorite posts as well. If you think it’s a great for them, please encourage your friends to sign up and receive updates through RSS or directly to their inbox. It’s free and an easy way for them to keep up with the latest posts on Couple Money.
If you’re expecting or raising a newborn, I wish you and your family the best!