Author Topic: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.  (Read 12440 times)

Goldielocks

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #50 on: August 30, 2017, 02:42:03 PM »
A parent was telling me just today, that it costs $15K a year for private sports teams, and that's just for the fees. Wow. That's unbelievable.

Kids cost exactly what you will spend on them.

Ha!  Until you need braces, or therapy, or a broken leg, or glasses, or unexpected start of school fees, or ......

Yep (remembering that 3K ER visit...)

These sound like complainypants symptoms.

Not at all, just that with 4 people in a household, you are 4x as likely to run into unexpected and unplanned costs.  No one plans to have a health / medical issue, or something else.   Having a kid can be like renting a car -- sometimes they come with hidden charges that you find out about too late.

If unexpected costs routinely show up, you shouldn't really be surprised.  I would suggest rereading MMM's complainypants article:

https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/10/07/how-to-tell-if-youre-a-complainypants/

Fun quote: “Oh, listen to that self-aggrandizing thirtysomething who has led a privileged life and doesn’t understand real hardship like I do, because of the following reasons I have it harder than him”, then guess what – you are still a Complainypants. Keep working on it, sucka."

Hah,  honestly?   The costs for annual school and after school sports, clothing, food, regular annual costs can be sort of planned, for certain, along with occasional surprises that you can also budget a "something is going to happen" fund.  (like a car accident or appliance failure).


Braces are once in a lifetime issue.   My kids have never broken bones, but fellow parents are shocked at the cost being 3x what they think.  Needing therapy or extra educational assistance or medical issues such as these can range $5k to $15k...Some kids really mess up and cause damage to others property...     At the risk inviting hate responses from pet owners, I will say that kids are different from cats, you can't decide to quit them just because an unexpected event will cost you thousands and thousands of dollars more than you budgeted for.

I am reacting to your statement "Kids cost exactly what you will spend on them."   Because sometimes, you can't actually say no, like you can to extra dance lessons, out of town field trips, etc.   And it is often something you could not foresee.  That is not the same as complaining, or saying that it can't be done, not at all.....

Your flippant statement(s) and accusing me of complainypants and posting links is either intentionally rude or excessively naive of you.

LiveLean

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #51 on: August 31, 2017, 08:27:26 AM »
A parent was telling me just today, that it costs $15K a year for private sports teams, and that's just for the fees. Wow. That's unbelievable.

The Tampa Bay Times recently did a piece quoting a local family with a softball-playing high school daughter spending this much. But they were doing a lot of traveling and that was baked in to the $15K. Likewise, the current HBO Real Sports episode (available on demand, if you have it) has a segment on travel-ball, mostly baseball, and similar numbers were tossed around.

Our son is in a year-round competitive swim program here in Clearwater, Florida and we host two large meets during March/April where kids come down mostly from the NE during spring break, when airfares and hotel rooms are at their yearly high. Some kids come together with a coach or two, but many parents come. So figure one parent and one kid (two airfares), one hotel room and rental car for at least four nights at peak season, meals and cost of the meet, that's $1,800 (conservatively). Do a few of those meets over the year and add to the base cost of swimming, I can see how some people could get to $15K. Some parents justify it as a "vacation" but with swim meets you basically go to the pool at 7 a.m., swim until noon, go to the hotel for lunch/nap, come back at 3:30-4, swim until 8:30, dinner, rinse and repeat. Nobody ever sees the beach.

 Thankfully we host a lot of meets and don't travel that much.
« Last Edit: August 31, 2017, 08:32:12 AM by LiveLean »

mm1970

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #52 on: August 31, 2017, 10:33:05 AM »
Well, you know, mustachians have a buffer for surprises.

That doesn't mean you are being a complainypants when you get surprised.  I mean, it's even weird to say that.

Like the broken bones.  I've never broken a bone.  I've got two boys who (so far), have never broken a bone. 

My neighbors up the street with girls?  One daughter has broken an ankle twice.  Another daughter once (two in the same summer).  Neighbors down the street, also a few broken arms/ wrists.

It's like teeth.  Sometimes you have good teeth (me), sometimes you have bad teeth (brother). Sometimes they are crooked, sometimes not.


ManlyFather

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #53 on: August 31, 2017, 12:18:25 PM »
Well, you know, mustachians have a buffer for surprises.

That doesn't mean you are being a complainypants when you get surprised.  I mean, it's even weird to say that.

Bringing up negative things in exasperated tones, and offering no solutions is complaining.

ManlyFather

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #54 on: August 31, 2017, 12:28:22 PM »

I am reacting to your statement "Kids cost exactly what you will spend on them."   Because sometimes, you can't actually say no, like you can to extra dance lessons, out of town field trips, etc.   And it is often something you could not foresee.  That is not the same as complaining, or saying that it can't be done, not at all.....

Your flippant statement(s) and accusing me of complainypants and posting links is either intentionally rude or excessively naive of you.

I stand by the logic statement that something costs what you pay for it.  I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings, that wasn't my intention.  I was trying to encourage folks to avoid complaining, and instead focus on solutions.  It seems like many arguments in this discussion boil down to 2 things:

1. Sports/School/Music/Ballet/etc. cost money, sometimes more than what some people think is reasonable.
2. Medical/Dental/etc. issues can crop up, and cost a lot of money.

Whatever you pay for 1. and 2. is exactly what they cost you.  This is not offensive, this is fact.

So, to avoid complaining, I propose the following for each "problem":

1. Pay what you want to pay, don't pay what you don't want to pay.
2. Carry health/dental/etc. insurance, and either have enough money saved in an HSA, FSA, or another non-med account to cover your max out of pocket expense for at least 1 year.  (Currently, I have 2 years of max out of pocket expenses saved in my HSA.)

Remember, this is the MMM forum, not reddit, let's not bring each other down.


Goldielocks

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #55 on: August 31, 2017, 02:32:42 PM »
I am laughing at myself, ManlyFather.   I got suckered in by your comment and implied insult (to me HAH! I should be less serious about my ideas..) and link telling me I am a complainypants.. I thought I was reading a comment by GitarStv twin at first....  I should have looked you up for a moment before replying.  We are certainly on different ends of the child rearing process , MMM involvement, and FIRE....


Age 32, Post count (now 10), age of first kid -- 1 month.


Welcome to the forum and please keep posting!

ManlyFather

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #56 on: August 31, 2017, 04:16:05 PM »
I am laughing at myself, ManlyFather.   I got suckered in by your comment and implied insult (to me HAH! I should be less serious about my ideas..) and link telling me I am a complainypants.. I thought I was reading a comment by GitarStv twin at first....  I should have looked you up for a moment before replying.  We are certainly on different ends of the child rearing process , MMM involvement, and FIRE....


Age 32, Post count (now 10), age of first kid -- 1 month.


Welcome to the forum and please keep posting!

It's easy to lose your shit in an internet forum and take things the wrong way, I forgive you!  We all need friendly reminders of our weaknesses every so often, so I'm glad I got you to snap yourself out of a complainypants mindset.  Always striving to continue to build oneself into a better person never ends, I'm glad you haven't given up at your stage in life!

Goldielocks

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #57 on: August 31, 2017, 11:12:06 PM »
I am laughing at myself, ManlyFather.   I got suckered in by your comment and implied insult (to me HAH! I should be less serious about my ideas..) and link telling me I am a complainypants.. I thought I was reading a comment by GitarStv twin at first....  I should have looked you up for a moment before replying.  We are certainly on different ends of the child rearing process , MMM involvement, and FIRE....


Age 32, Post count (now 10), age of first kid -- 1 month.


Welcome to the forum and please keep posting!

It's easy to lose your shit in an internet forum and take things the wrong way, I forgive you!  We all need friendly reminders of our weaknesses every so often, so I'm glad I got you to snap yourself out of a complainypants mindset.  Always striving to continue to build oneself into a better person never ends, I'm glad you haven't given up at your stage in life!

  I do not have a complainypants mindset and need zero snapping out of it.  HUH?  WTF?

Rather than newbie MMM (per benefit of the doubt), I can now identify a Troll.
« Last Edit: August 31, 2017, 11:14:42 PM by Goldielocks »

ManlyFather

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #58 on: September 01, 2017, 05:23:28 AM »
I do not have a complainypants mindset and need zero snapping out of it.  HUH?  WTF?

Rather than newbie MMM (per benefit of the doubt), I can now identify a Troll.

You've committed more than three logical fallacies in your arguments, and have now resulted to name calling.  I'm done trying to help you.  Unsubscribing.

https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/

charis

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #59 on: September 01, 2017, 06:39:25 AM »
I do not have a complainypants mindset and need zero snapping out of it.  HUH?  WTF?

Rather than newbie MMM (per benefit of the doubt), I can now identify a Troll.

You've committed more than three logical fallacies in your arguments, and have now resulted to name calling.  I'm done trying to help you.  Unsubscribing.

https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/
Thank goodness someone finally recommended carrying health insurance and funding an HSA. Maybe I should stop paying out of pocket and start spending the 20k+ that we have saved in ours. 🙄

You are being called a troll because you appear to be trolling people on this thread. You might want to have that checked.

GuitarStv

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #60 on: September 01, 2017, 11:40:20 AM »
I thought I was reading a comment by GitarStv twin at first.... 

GuitarStv is a unique snowflake.

Goldielocks

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Re: How to deal with expense of kid's activities.
« Reply #61 on: September 01, 2017, 11:57:06 PM »
I thought I was reading a comment by GitarStv twin at first.... 

GuitarStv is a unique snowflake.

Ha!  I caught a snowflake by mentioning his name...

:-)

(or is that "speak of the devil?")  Anyway, GuitarStv keeps it lively.