When did you start a family?

[Miami Al]

One nice thing about doing it south of 30...  four living grandparents that are able to be physically involved with the children when they are younger and it's still physical.  When our first was born, he had 4 living great-grandparents.  A few years later when our second was born, she only had 2 great-grandparents.  Our kids see one of their great-grand parents regularly.  I had a great grandmother I remember.

That's pretty cool stuff, my younger cousins have no memory of her.

Kids need love and support.  Financial stability helps, but my wife and I have never had that, despite good incomes.  But more family alive is nice.  I became interested in frugality blogs to bring our costs down (having mixed results) so the low periods weren't financial devastating.  I'm watching my parents deal with elderly not healthy parents, it's NOT fun...  and dealing with that and toddlers would suck.

[yoga mama]

We had ours when we were 33/35 and 35/37.  We tried for 1.5 years for #1.  Financially, it would have made more sense to wait another year or two and physically I don't think that would have been a big deal, but of course it would have sucked if we had waited to try, then waited another 1.5 years.  We are very fortunate that I make a good income so my hubby can be a stay at home dad and I highly recommend waiting an extra couple/few years if it means one parent can comfortably stay home or if you can reasonably work out both being part time.

[deborah]

My uncle had 5 kids - 3 while they were young, and then another 2 after a 15 year gap. One day he said that if he had his time again, he probably wouldn't have had the last two when he did. It was unfair to them, and unfair to him and his wife. As I remember his argument was:

When the first lot were small, we had nothing - an old house, furniture hand-me-downs - it didn't matter if the kids broke or damaged something because it was easily replaceable. The kids could be kids. Now we're older and we have nice stuff, and we are always scared the kids will break it. They have a lot less freedom to be kids than the older ones had, and we are probably more cranky as parents - yelling at them to be careful.

We were also older. It is no accident that people are physically their best in their twenties. You are made for having kids at that age. In your 20's you can stay up all night and party all the next day - or go and do a decent day's work. We now can't. It means that the kids don't get the attention they should deserve.

And it goes on right through - now (when he was saying this), I'm getting old, and the younger ones are just turning into teenagers. Will we be around for them when they finish school? Will I be able to do the things for them that I was able to do for the older ones?

[Helvegen]

We only have one and we were 24 and 25 when she was born. My husband had a vasectomy soon after that, so no more kids for us.

[FoundPeace]

My wife and I had our first when we were 24, our second at 26, and we will probably have our last between 27 & 28. We love having more than enough energy for our active toddler and our baby. It is working very well for us and we are loving being parents. Of course we have been blessed with 2 very easy children (our 2 year-old typically sleeps through the night and our 6 month old has slept very well since she was born).

I was still in school when we had our first. This route certainly isn't for the faint of heart, but we love it. This route will also minimize the length of time my wife will stay out of the work force for the number of kids we want.

[I'm a red panda]

I'm 33 and we are just now starting to try. (We have been married 10 years.)  I am happy I am in a good financial place, but I regret waiting this long because a) I worry we won't  get pregnant by 35, and we agreed to stop trying then, and b) I'm worried I'm going to be too tired to be a good parent, especially when the kids are older.

I really wish we had kids 5-8 years ago. 

[ShoulderThingThatGoesUp]

I was 24 and my wife was 25 when we had our first (she's 1 now). We probably would have done it earlier had we not made a couple of false starts on life plans.

We plan to space our children by several years, so starting young was essential. Also, we're both youngest children (our mothers were each ~40 when we were born), so now is when our parents are able to help us figure out what we're doing.

[LiveLean]

We were 34/33 and 36/35.

We were planning on starting a few years before, but taught a year of Sunday school at our church ---- and got assigned eighth graders. We never talked about it, but I think that caused us to put it off for a couple of years.

[wildflowersarefree]

We are trying now. I am 31 and my husband is 32. We've been married 10 years. We aren't financially independent but we're in a great place, rapidly paying off debt. :-)

I was absolutely baby crazy when I was 24. We were living across the country from everyone we knew, my husband was having a horrible time in graduate school (basically his graduate advisor was sucking him dry), we had no real money (but we had no real debt either), and no idea what the future looked like but I wanted a baby so badly. My husband talked me out of it, and I am very grateful.

Because we haven't had kids, we were able to experiment with our careers and our living situations without a huge amount of stress. I spent a year teaching sewing and learning every craft I ever wanted while working at a craft studio. I also started gardening more and I now know more about growing vegetables in Texas than anyone I know. I fixed up an 80 year old house and sold it. My husband taught high school for 2 years, something he always wanted to try, then decided to go back to graduate school and had an amazing time, did awesome research, got published and presented at conferences and eventually landed an awesome job as a space engineer. Between the teaching and the second graduate school, I found out what it is like to be financially insecure. We were living off my meager sewing-instructor paycheck. I sold our bed and sofa to pay our mortgage payment one month. I learned a lot about minimalism and what really matters in life. I learned our marriage can survive a lot. When my husband went back to school, I decided I wanted a more secure career, too, and went back to get my nursing degree. I no longer worry about my husband losing his job as I have one of the most diverse and employable degrees on the job market.

If we get pregnant soon, I will have two years experience as an acute care nurse and will be able to work PRN and make 2x as much as I do per hour, and work as many or as few days as I want. We live by my parents who are both retiring this year and are excited to be active grandparents. My husband will have 2 1/2 years at his job and will most likely be in a more senior position. He has great benefits.

If we don't get pregnant by 35 (I have PCOS, so this is always a possibility and not terribly unlikely, but so far everything looks good), I will hike the Appalachian trail, we will take a bicycle tour of Europe, we'll continue our current careers/passions/frugality and maybe we'll adopt children.

As for energy levels, I am more active now than I was at 24. But I'm also more comfortable with the realities of what life is all about. I worry less, enjoy life more, and I think those are really invaluable things I will bring into motherhood.

[NUF]

I tend to think that the important question here is "under what circumstances would you NOT want to have kids"; once you figure that out then you know what needs to be done in your life and the timing just works itself out. Some people wouldn't want to have kids if it meant they never got to travel, or if they didn't have a supportive partner or a strong safety net. Personally, I didn't want to have kids if it meant that I wouldn't be able to build a functional career because I felt that I would be unhappy and resent them. I also didn't want to have kids if my husband wasn't going to be able to prioritize us over his career and be an equal partner (both he and I grew up with cats in the cradle type dads and I wasn't comfortable signing up for that).

So we waited. Am pregnant now at 33 after almost 10 years of marriage and have no regrets about the timing because it wasn't about the timing, it was about the situation.

Every day now as I increasingly feel crankier and less comfortable and my ass and brain melt into a puddle of ice cream, I'm grateful for the fact that I don't have any financial concerns at this anxiety ridden time, that many of the previously moving pieces in my life are stable, that I'm able to plan to pad out my 2 months of paid maternity leave with 4 months of unpaid and that I built my career to a point where I now work from home 3 days a week (great during this frigid weather).

And obviously we can't control everything in our lives. Something catastrophic could happen and we could end up in one of the situations that we were trying to avoid but I'm comfortable knowing that we've tried our best to build the life that works for us and mitigate situations that are personally problematic. 

Good Luck!

[Toffeemama]

I had my first at 21.  I'm 27 now, and after having three, we're done.  It definitely makes things a challenge, but at least I get to look forward to being done with child-raising in my forties.

[Peacefulwarrior]

I was around 23 and my sons mother around 18. I had a great income all along though, which made that side of things worry-free. She never worked while we were still together. We split up when he was 2 years old. He's turning 5 soon. He's been primarily living with me since then. I was very mature early on and don't think I would have made that different choices had I waited until today. I still have a great income but if I want more kids in the future I want to wait until I don't have to work myself at all. It seems tempting though to not have more, as he is everything I ever wanted in a son, and I would be able to spend a lot of time with him while I'm still young without having to worry about new baby's.

[TabbyCat]

My husband and I are 27, he'll be 28 when our first is born later this year.  We wanted to have 2 before I turn 30 with the option to maybe have 3 before 35 if we decide to at that point.  I don't think there is a right age to start a family, just a right time for each couple.  We started talking about it two years ago, but I wanted to wait and be more solid in my career. 

We currently live on just his income and save all of mine and part of his - I will return to work after maternity leave so we can keep our savings up.  We have decent retirement account savings, and a down payment saved although we have not pulled the trigger yet (renting is ~$200 a month cheaper than buying where we live (not including additional utilities and property taxes once we do buy).  We could save more at a faster rate if we waited, but feel pretty solid and we want kids now.

I'd say if you don't feel ready now, wait.  If you DO feel ready now, go for it!

[newnewman]

We had our daughter at 29 years old. We are debating about when (and if) we should have a second. I would like to find a good full time job first because having a child really put me out of the job market for awhile - we moved while I was pregnant so no one wanted to hire me, the "pregnant woman", and then it was hard to find a job afterwards that paid me enough to justify paying daycare costs. I am still searching!

[Bob W]

First kid at 29 last kid at 48.   I wouldn't suggest it.  In our blended family our children range from 7 to 31. 

One benefit of kids over 40 is that apparently that adds about 5 years to ones lifespan.

I'll be 70 when our son is 21 and probably dead by the time he is 30 or sooner.  That is very sad for me as he really is my best little buddy. 

[11ducks]

First and only, at 20.  He's turning 11 now, fantastic kid, best decision ever (though it didn't feel like that when I was single and accidentally pregnant at 20!). It really was the making of me. I worked part-time and went to uni, got a double degree by the time he was 6, now am earning $70k and have just completed a Masters degree which will (hopefully) increase my income more. Living below the poverty line for the first 5 years taught me a lot about frugal living, making do, and what actually matters in life.

My siblings  (28 and 33) have both just had babies, and though babies are super gorgeous, you couldn't pay me enough to go back to that stage! By the time I'm 40 I will (hopefully) have my kid at uni, a paid off house, and the freedom to do anything I want!!! :)

[falcondisruptor]

YMMV, of course.  I got baby fever also at age 27 and our first was born when I turned 29 (we share a birthday).  Second at 31 and third at 33.  I am glad that I had them "early" relative to my friends.  This way they will also be out of the house when my husband and I are 51/54.

I had our Little Miss when I was 28 and one day.  She was very considerate and let me keep my birthday to myself.  Oh and she was born on her due date too, what a sweetie!

[FIRE Realtor]

I say make sure you're financially able to stay home with the baby, and then GO FOR IT!  Even for healthy women it can take some time to get pregnant - and the statistics of everything bad (birth defects, complications, recovery) just get worse as you get older. 

Also to consider if you want multiple kids, the spacing between them.  I had my first at 28, no baby fever, not really trying, had just gone off the pill.  She was a bit of a difficult baby and I thought there is NO WAY I want another right away.  My dad died when she was 16 mos. old and the shock of that made me even more unable to cope with the thought of more kids for another year or so. 

We got pregnant again a year ago, so lucky again on the first try.  The 3rd trimester of this pregnancy was a lot more difficult in regards to being able to move around, as in, even an afternoon trip to Target sounded impossible.  I was so happy my daughter was already 3 1/2 and could do a lot of things on her own, like I didn't have to chase her around the playground.  If you have two kids under 2 years it is really hard to get around, especially in the winter. 

So now, even though I seemingly got started early by today's standards, I'm just hoping to get in a 3rd before I am 35!  I didn't have baby fever before, but now I have started saying...  if only I was younger and richer, I'd probably have about 6. 

[HP]

I was 19 and he was 21. It wasn't accidental and we were already married, etc.

It was naive in some ways-- we knew we wanted kids at some point, lots of them, and didn't really see the point of waiting-- but we have always been a single income family, making only a few dollars over minimum wage, and we have not lacked for anything in raising our 2yo and 3yo. We both come from extremely large families (9-11 kids) that also lived pleasantly and mustachianly off of one (not large) income so the idea of needing to earn lots to support a family was foreign to us. We expect to be FIRE in our thirties just on his income anyway, when we crunch the numbers, while still giving our children many privileges and memories and experiences and an overall awesome childhood.

My only real regret was that I didn't live a little first. I lived at home until my wedding day, only had a two year college degree from a small local school, never worked anything other than student jobs, wanted to travel but was scared to do so by myself. I regret not having time as just a couple and growing into each other a bit more. I imagine this is different when you've waited until your late twenties or early thirties and have been married/together for several years already. Or perhaps it's worse because you have something concrete to miss, instead of a vague notion of what could have been. I don't know. I figure we're young enough to still enjoy life to the hilt once the kids are grown, though, and even if I were to do a do-over, I still wouldn't have wanted to wait past 25 or so. But the kids lifestyle is what we grew up with and were comfortable around, it was our norm.

[MotherGoose]

I was 22 and DH was 24 when we started our family by getting married.  I had baby feaver then, but I'm so glad we didn't act on it.  Instead, we just had our first baby less than 3 months ago, at ages 32 and 33.

In the mean time, we've had a really wonderful time, spent half a year backpacking through Europe and Asia (when we were your age), saved a bunch of money, and gotten to a place in our careers where we can both work part time (something I thought was a total pipe dream when we started talking about it around 7 years ago).  We should also be financially independent by the time this baby starts high school, though we'll probably work a little longer so we can afford to pay for her college.  People talk about the first few months of parenthood being so hard on a marriage, but we have not found that to be the case at all, I think largely because we've had so much time to work up to it with smaller life challenges tackled together.

Our long term plan for a long time was that I would SAH (didn't really think we'd both find jobs where PT was an option), and to aim to have our second kid (planning on 2) when we were about 18 years from FIRE, under the theory that being retired with high schoolers in the house isn't worth much, trying to get to FIRE much before high school was risking fertility issues, and we wanted to retire as early as otherwise possible.  So we wound up having our first a little later than planned, but that's because we realized we were close to the 2 part time careers thing a few years ago and decided it was worth waiting for.

[gluskap]

I was 34 when we had our daughter and hubby was 36.  We met when I was 28 and got married when I was 33.  At first I wanted to get married earlier and start trying to have children earlier because I wanted 2 kids and I was worried it might take a while to get pregnant.  However, since we got married later, we started trying pretty much after we got married and bought a house.  It only took us 3 months to get pregnant.  Now I'm glad that we waited because we had time to travel together in the 5 years that we dated and I got to have a lot of fun before having kids so there's less of a feeling like I missed out on doing things.  We're still undecided if we want 2 but if we do try again, we will try to have the second one soon and not wait too long.  I think it makes sense to wait a bit if you don't want a lot of kids and you don't think you will have a hard time getting pregnant.  Plus it's nice that we waited until we both had good jobs, we had enough money to get married and buy a house, etc.  Of course my hubby is in grad school now, and I would want to wait until he's done before having a second kid so we will see.  But if for some reason, we have trouble getting pregnant again because I am older, it will be fine because I think we are also okay with only having one kid.

[h2ogal]

I bet I started the youngest!  Married at 18, baby 1 at 19!  Now my baby is over 30!   He is going to retire early (Military).  We will be retired together.

[MustachianMD]

I started my family (had a child with my wife) when I was 35. It was the right time for us. My wife had just finished her training and had her first year of work under the belt so we qualified for our employer's paid maternity leave. I don't think there is ever a perfect time for a kid, but it would have definitely been harder for us to make all the moves we had to make for work if we had a little one.

[zolotiyeruki]

I bet I started the youngest!  Married at 18, baby 1 at 19!  Now my baby is over 30!   He is going to retire early (Military).  We will be retired together.

Well, you got us beat.  My wife was (barely) 20, I was 22, and our first kid was born shortly before I turned 24.

I'm in the "have kids when you're young" camp.  You'll have more energy to keep up with them. :)

[CanuckExpat]

I've been thinking about this topic more lately, and I thought I'd add share a point of view that I'm surprised hasn't been raised here, given the nature of the forum. In fact, I had almost forgotten this article exists: First Retire, Then Have Kids.

If you are young enough to be planning ahead in the future about kids, and able to consider FI/RE in the immediate future, there is something to be said for planning to achieve the latter before the former, assuming you both want kids and to not be working at some point.

I should add the caveat that the above is a bit of an example of do what I say, not what I do, as we just had our first, at what I thought was a relatively early 30/31, and we are not quite FI or RE.

[Kananas]

I'm 29 and wife is 28. We had few things we wanted to do before trying to start a family, so that there would be no regrets. So for example we travelled to Thailand, because we always wanted to go there. We enjoyed the summer together like there is no tomorrow. We travelled more. After that we felt that a baby would be the best thing that could ever happen to us and luckily my wife got pregnant pretty quickly. Our firstborn is now 7 weeks old and there is nothing we would like to do more than to be with her. Hopefully one day she will have a little brother or a sister.

[farmstache]

I've been thinking about this topic more lately, and I thought I'd add share a point of view that I'm surprised hasn't been raised here, given the nature of the forum. In fact, I had almost forgotten this article exists: First Retire, Then Have Kids.

If you are young enough to be planning ahead in the future about kids, and able to consider FI/RE in the immediate future, there is something to be said for planning to achieve the latter before the former, assuming you both want kids and to not be working at some point.

I should add the caveat that the above is a bit of an example of do what I say, not what I do, as we just had our first, at what I thought was a relatively early 30/31, and we are not quite FI or RE.

While I do agree with all of this, you have to really be in an optimal position to be able to wing it.

We're currently 30, baby coming in a month's time. We found MMM 2 years ago, when we realized we should start putting a purpose to our savings (also when we actually started earning big-boy and big-girl money). About a year ago, we also realized our parents are getting older, and we didn't want to risk waiting until we're 40 to have children (our goal FIRE date at the moment). My gift to my dad on his 60th birthday was an ultrassound pic. My SO's parents are a few years older, even. And basically we felt like the MMM lifestyle can be applied to kids - and that's what we'll try to do. We just thought it wasn't worth the wait.

If we had joined this forum at, say, 20 or even 25 years old, we might have made plans to have kids after FI, or at least after some 8-10 years of savings, allowing one of us to work part-time or even quit work, something like that. MMM's strategy was brilliant, and I truly envy the freedom he has on his life. At 30, we're among the earliest of our friends to have kids, and we have been together for 10 years, so we would probably not have had children earlier just because money would be better.

Alas, we were "too old" to wait 10 years after finding MMM, but nonetheless, MMM was what gave us the confidence to even think of having children right now.

[backandforth]

we are both in our mid-30s, expecting in a few months time. I think it comes down to when you want to do the things YOU want and how you see this whole child rearing thing. Unless the kid is a little genius, most of us will be stuck with them for a good 18 years. :)

In our case, we are on the "late bloomer" end, but our child free days were great: during the past almost 10 years together, we led a full and free life, traveled and did what WE want when WE want it, and at the same time saved a bundle...approaching FI in a few years with a large nest egg.

We've know people that had kids earlier, and had them all out of the house to college when turning 45. It's an enviable position, except the parents still don't get to retire early, the kids "sucked up" more of the investable income early on.

From a financial standpoint, I think for people with similar earning power, save early and have kids later does help on the money front, although more money may be spent on hiring help because less possibility of grandparents support.

From an experience point, not that I have it, but I would assume raising a children would be enjoyable and well worth the sacrifice for the vast majority of people. otherwise everybody would stop after having one and mankind would have lasted this long.

So in the end, I think it's just to pick when you want to block out that 18 or 18+ years (if more than 1) of child rearing experience from the rest of the child free years.

If you believe you would also enjoy the child raising experience like most people did, and also want have a nice financial cushion, then wait a little bit, but not too long, because there is such a thing as biological clock. I think this works with most people plan to have 1 or 2 kids (not too far apart), if you plan to have more, or space them out many years in between, that could be whole different plan..

[andystkilda]

We were 25 and 26.
Second one on the way now too - first will be 18 months old when the second arrives.

[nvmama]

When I was in my twenties I wanted to be done having kids by the age of 30.  Fast forward a few years and I didn't get married until I was 28years old and my husband 30. (my husband strongly believes that men should not get married until they are at least 30 years old).  We bought our house later that year, then 2 years later the housing market crashed but we stuck it out and stayed in our house as we can afford the mortgage even though it is now worth much less then we paid for it.  Anyways, our first child was born 2 weeks before I turned 30, husband 32.  After a miscarriage and some random infertility issues, our second child was born when I was 34 and husband 36.  And now, completely out of the blue (birth control fail), I am pregnant with number 3, and I will be 37 a month shy of 38 and my husband will be 40.  We were not prepared for this child, as I was done and got rid of all my baby stuff years ago.  But with anything, this baby is a precious surprise and we will make due.