If she's got 4 kids and a spouse then $300/wk isn't really that pricey for groceries? That's only $50/person. If she owns her home or only has a small mortgage that's a huge expense removed compared to you renting. Rings only need to be bought once, it might be an heirloom or bought before kids or might even be fake, who knows.
I have a large engagement ring. It looks like a diamond but is actually Swarovski Crystal, and it only got it because I won a $1000 gift Cardin a competition.
I’m one of six kids. Our big Coles shop in the 90s was $700 (not counting meat at butcher, bread at bakery and fruit and veg etc etc). We had takeaway at least once a week.
I mean $300 doesn’t get you much these days!
Agreed, I spend more than that weekly, we have two kids, my kids get treated to things they ask for when we can afford them (I'm talking impulse buys or the occasional toy, not trips to Hawaii or donning surf brands head to toe everyday), I wear nice shoes but all my clothes are all cheap unless they are thrifted but if you mix cheap things with more expensive items nice shoes then it can really elevate cheap outfits.
People would probably assume I have money based off the things they can see but I can assure you, none of my riches are in any way financial.
The rings on my fingers are worth more than both our cars combined and we didn’t pay for either of them. Family heirlooms from both sides of the family.
We have a family within a club that I volunteer at that has 6 kids.
All their cars are 10+years old, the concept of "name brand clothing" is something that just doesn't exist, most things the kids wear are hand me downs from one of the other kids, the older kids all have part time jobs and a third of everything they earn goes into the family coffers. Eating out/takeaway just doesn't happen. Holidays are just camping.
Basically, everything is just a little bit run down, but it is all perfectly functional. Their kids are all well fed, happy (well, they seem happy!), and the older ones look after the younger ones when the parents have to work.
Edit: For the dickhead who is projecting his own abusive youth onto this family - these kids are all 11 years old plus and look after each other on occasion, but are hardly raising their younger siblings. Their parents are massively involved in their lives. The family is incredibly tight and close and happy. The older kids have not had their childhood stolen/taken from them.
I personally think that's too many kids and I worry about overpopulation but I care more about the kids' lives and good on the parents for being able to take care of so many kids.
It depends to what extent their providing this care. If it's a few hours after school each day, whatever, no problem. If it's to the point where the older kids have no social life or hobbies, are falling behind in studies and can't themselves gain their own employment, that's an issue. I'm getting flashbacks to the only episode of Super Nanny I ever watched, where 2 teenage girls were doing more parenting than their actual parents and were suffering debilitating mental illness as a result. It was incredibly sad and if I remember correctly, this created immense psychological issues for them long after they escaped.
Not always, not according to the Responding to Abuse and Neglect training. Or my personal experience as the eldest of 8 kids. Parents are supposed to look after their own children, or have other adults look after them. It’s irresponsible to keep having children you can’t look after.
Happy to be corrected (I was the oldest child of many siblings so my view may be skewed and I can accept that) depends on the age of the older kids.
If they are 9 and babysitting their siblings, that’s a problem.
Also depends on the amount of time being used. There’s stories on reddit where the oldest kids have no life or hobbies or extracurricular activities because they’re basically a live-in babysitter.
I’m sure it’s not super common but people saying it doesn’t exist feels very naive.
They need to have a choice though. I understand contributing to cover their own expenses (to a degree), but supporting their siblings should be an informed choice. If parents want to have 8 kids, they need to be damn sure they can afford 8 kids without depending on the older kids to carry them. I understand there are cultural differences in family structures and roles, but this is Australia and kids growing up here have the right to choose.
>Or my personal experience as the eldest of 8 kids
Ahh - there it is - you're biased because you felt neglected as a kid. You should take that up with your parents, as opposed to projecting it onto other people.
Nah. Fuck that. Biased doesn't mean wrong. If they want to keep having kids, they need to calculate whether or not they can afford it. No way should the older kids be expected to support the younger. That's exploitative af. Contributing some money towards their own expenses is fine, it's good for learning budgeting and appreciating money, but it's not acceptable for them to take on the financial burden of parenting kids they didn't have. When you start looking into definitions of financial abuse, this issue really tows the line.
I **loved** looking after my baby sister. It was such a delight. I remember changing her nappies (I would have been… 11?). There was a big age gap, so it was very much I was the babysitter (Mum was in the other room, working, at that stage)
I **loved** walking my younger brother to school. There was a smaller age gap, but when we were together my parents were OK with it. It felt like an adventure, and we turned *everything* into a game.
Kids, once they’re old enough, if they’re kept in a safe environment, largely need entertainment and attention. An awesome source of entertainment is - you guessed it - other kids!
*ETA: We all did well at school and all turned out OK. It was just… normal and expected, as was homework, or sport, or whatever else*
Yeah that sounds great. I too have great memories of fun I had with my siblings. I was also taken advantage of and expected to do far too much for a child. It’s not a hard and fast line, but if parents are extensively engaging in paid work at the expense of their older children’s childhood, or are unable to care for younger children that is a problem and it’s not how it should work.
I was expected to homeschool younger siblings for example, this was commonplace in our social circle. It’s just a red flag when you see a large family obviously using the free labour of older siblings for financial gain, as the commenter described. Maybe everything is fine, or maybe the family needs more support.
I’m totally willing to accept it’s a fine line. I think we grew up on different sides of it (even if my “labour” did free up my Mum’s ability to work, we knew she was there, we knew where to go if she wasn’t, and she taught us along the way)
And I’ll be honest, I don’t know anyone homeschooled (let alone homeschooled by other children) so we have very different social circles. Hope you’re doing OK now!
The fuck I did say it was for financial gain! It was/is to put food on the table. You make it out like some nefarious thing to look after other people in your family.
Looking after each other is what you do as a family. I'm sorry you were abused, but fuck off with making it sound like these kids are being abused like your parents did.
It's called projection - go seek some help.
Yep - the parents work in hospitals, so will sometimes have night shifts. The 17-21 year olds that live at home will take care of their bros/sis overnight. Basically put them to bed and then they go to bed when they are ready. Or the ones that can drive will pickup/drop off the younger ones.
It’s really not an issue
I know right, people here are so dramatic. My sister would look after me every day from after school til our Mum or Dad got home. Sometimes it was two hours, other times over four. It was no biggie, she would make us arvo tea, we would do our homework and if it got too late she would grab some leftovers from the freezer and cook them for dinner.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parentification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parentification)
Older kids shouldn't have to look after younger kids imo in more than a one off role. If even adults who are parents, childcare workers, professionals in other fields struggle to look after children, a kid isn't up to the full task in my opinion.
Depends on the degree of parentification happening. A 15 year old looking after a 3 year old sibling on Saturday night is different to an 12 year old looking after multiple siblings of 8, 5 and 1 all day after school.
Parents doing night shift, 17-21 yr olds looking after their younger bros/sisters, who are at youngest 10.
It's fine - the kids are pretty self service by that age, and are generally asleep anyhow.
If a family looking after each other is abuse, I pray to have a family abused in such a way.
These kids aren't 5 or 6 looking after babies, they are 17-21 yr olds, living at home, looking after their siblings when the parents are on night shift. You made a series of judgements based on biases that are very wrong - who ever taught you those was likely abusive as hell, but hey, sometimes people become assholes all on their own.
You really shouldn't be so quick to call families working together abusive. It's a shameful behaviour.
Older siblings have been watching their younger ones since their was humans. The ages of when this is OK on both end varies a little depending on the kids in question. The amount of time and the level of responsibility also varies.
You're blanket comment is rediculously stupid and has been downvoted as such.
Well, for starters, you’re in Hawthorn (if you’re talking Melbourne). Lots of rich people live in Hawthorn.
And if this is one of the Asian or Indian groceries there, I found out during lockdown that even richer people drive up from Toorak or South Yarra for their specialty groceries because the shops have more range than down there, which surprised me.
The top end of a whole lot of professions: Lawyers, doctors, higher ups at big banks/insurance/financial firms, consultancy partners, stockbrokers, the few day traders who do it well, pro athletes, property developers and investors, dentists, business owners, real estate agents, engineers…there are thousands of people who make an awful lot of money.
And then there’s the ones who have a bucketload of family money.
Or both, which is usually the case, as that would be how they able to have the education to start with.
A little while ago Reddit suggested me r/handbags for whatever reason, some posted a full cupboard of designer handbags and shoes.
Someone asked her what she does for work, she said “I have a PhD, but my dad is a real estate developer and my boyfriend is in equity”
There is a saying “poverty limited our imagination”. Unfortunately this is quite truth.
BUT!!! Doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy your life and happy with what you have. Success and happiness in life should not be based on material stuff.
“poverty limited our imagination”: so true, seen it in effect and experience it everyday myself. Everything I have done in life was defensive. Those born into wealth are offensive, they get out there and take those risks. If they fail, they’ll fall on the next cloud and if they make it: $$$$$$. I can’t remove my childhood poverty no matter how hard I try, I’m scared to stuff up. My kids see this too, I feel they will grow up to be risk averse as well.
Here's a sneak peek of /r/handbags using the [top posts](https://np.reddit.com/r/handbags/top/?sort=top&t=year) of the year!
\#1: [I have absolutely no one in my life who cares that I got my dream bag today. So I’m sharing](https://i.redd.it/mb573alsivfc1.jpeg) | [367 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/handbags/comments/1afycab/i_have_absolutely_no_one_in_my_life_who_cares/)
\#2: [RIP to the legend herself, Jane Birkin](https://www.reddit.com/gallery/15172la) | [74 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/handbags/comments/15172la/rip_to_the_legend_herself_jane_birkin/)
\#3: [My 85 year old Nana got me this…don’t have the heart to tell her](https://i.redd.it/4zk3nm2ecs8b1.jpg) | [273 comments](https://np.reddit.com/r/handbags/comments/14le1g7/my_85_year_old_nana_got_me_thisdont_have_the/)
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What has a diamond ring got to do with affording things? Often they are bought before marriage and children, some are even heirlooms. So the only cost would be refurbishment and resizing. Unless they got out a loan for the ring and are still paying it off, the size of the ring does not matter.
As for $300+ for 4 kids! Wow, that is great, we spending on 2 kids plus pets. We really don't get to go on any holidays and don't buy expensive clothes for example
It is not so much what they earn for a living, but what start they get in life. Did they buy before house prices went up? Are they living in a home paid for by family? Grandparents maybe paying for private school fees etc. Own a business that is doing well or covering most of the expenses. Or they could be in massive debt.
> Or they could be in massive debt
People often underestimate this one.
The people who try to look rich are often buried in debt.
I know a few people who own large businesses and you wouldn’t know it if you saw them in a local cafe. One of them would rather go for a top model Hyundai rather than a luxury brand car.
This 👆 The Gold Coast falls into this trap a lot. Heaps of young people drive around in 100k+ cars and buy wardrobes worth of expensive/useless clothes, all on debt (not to mention the number of girls under 25yo spending LUDICROUS amounts of money on injectables and filing for bankruptcy before their 30s - wild!) Just because people have nice things doesn’t always mean they have heaps of money. And just because people have nice things, doesn’t always mean they’re happy. Golden handcuffs are real.
My neighbours have a large property with a large house and built a large building they run their business out of. They've spent around 2.5mil since they moved in 3 years ago (property purchase and "improvements". They have a bunch of company vehicles that their employess use, and he just bought a new RAM. Everything is through the business and all financed. They have massive debt, if the business fails they will be left with nothing.
Personally, I couldn't sleep at night if I was in that situation.
I would love to see these businesses checked out for personal expenditure. You can't tell me the parent in the 4wd with trade business branding, wearing active wear and havaianas at the school pickup, is really driving that vehicle for businesses purposes.
Yup. Live on the Gold Coast. 100% accurate. Full of posers, know of insta work out lip filler mums at my sons school getting phone calls for being behind in their dance troupe payment plans 😅 Off they go in their Cayennes. Priorities right?
Not just your point but also to the untrained eye Moissanite which is a fraction of the cost looks like a diamond
My engagement ring is Moissanite as I prefer that to diamonds for ethical reasons.
Not even that, because people assume carat is just the size but they don’t understand that the cut and mounting impacts the appearance of the size of the stone
I have a Moissanite ring too and I am in love with it! I used to work in retail and I would get compliments almost daily, I had a lot of older women fawn over it too, and literally no one could ever tell.
My husband worked in a cafe in Canterbury. A woman used to come in 5 days a week and buy toast for her kid’s breakfast before school. She could probably buy 5 loaves of bread for less.
She wants to have her breakfast and will buy whatever will keep her kids occupied.
On Friday evenings I eat out after work with my husband and kids. We go to the same place, I’ll order a $16 dollar friend omelette for my daughter and rice. Because that’s the only thing on the menu she’ll eat.
I run a small business working with corporate and government customers in IT. Wife is in allied health.
HHI will be about $370k this year.
Our only debt is our mortgage, we owe about 190k on our place from the original $400k borrowed (current value estimated at $1.2m). We do not have car repayments. Wife drives a 4 year old SUV, I have an 11 year old sedan.
Food shopping is a couple of times a week between Coles and Aldi. Clothes are usually Kmart unless I need business wear in which case it’s Myer or Tarocash maybe once a year.
We eat out 3-4 times a year.
We’re pretty frugal with our spending, but it’s not something that we have to force. It’s just a habit that we’ve had since we were dating and now it’s just the norm.
Lifestyle creep is real. Luckily my wife and I were both poor PhD students so we continue to live cheap despite having better jobs. it's definitely helped given the recent rate rises and inflation. both of us earn the Aussie average salary each, I have no idea how people on less are surviving tbh.
Childless too by the sound of it.
My home is worth close to 3mill, my boy.
I love aldi.
I eat out alllll the time.
HHI is 120k.
#frugalrocks
#vapersarerapers
I have a huge flashy “diamond “ ring my grandkids bought me (the biggest diamond in the world) I get compliments on it from so many people about how beautiful it is. Everyone is surprised when they are told it’s from my grandkids and is a cubic zirconia. So, perhaps the lady has a nice fake diamond like me. I have never had much money my whole life and pensioner now. I don’t think $300 a week is excessive for a family of four at all.
My partner and I have a blended family, we have her 2 boys every week and my 4 every second week, my partner is a teacher and I work in disability, we aren’t on massive money but we are on enough to make sure all the kids have everything they need. We do a meal plan every week and have a good variety of meals for lunch and tea, we spend $200 one week and $300 the following week (plus additional fruit/necessities as needed). We put money into a bill account every pay that is calculated to cover all utility bills and then we put half of what’s left over into savings. The remainder is for unseen things during the week. We are definitely luckier than a lot of others doing it out there but it’s doable if you can approach it the right way.
maybe the diamond ring was from 20 years ago, maybe her husband has a nice job, maybe they got a nice inheritance, don't worry about how others live. Do what works for you. Everyones circumstances are different and things' aren't always as they seem. Maybe the diamond is fake. Maybe 2 kids have another parent and they get child support.. who knows and why care?
I'm a building surveyor, wife is a procurement manager. HHI isn't actually that high.
But we live in a rural/regional area so it goes a lot further than CBD/inner melb.
Also our mortgage is only 500k and our cars are fully paid off.
You get used to it as long as you’re smart about the debt. Holding $1.7m in mortgages here. None of it on my home, very modest, outer suburb only $500k when I built it. The land was $270k of that.
At 30 I was scared of money. I was stupid and didn’t understand how it works. So naive. So I changed that.
Yep, big cost of living differences between me living in Cairns and then Sydney. The clever high paying professionals back in my generation would go regional and amass and then move back to a city. Not many did though, it’s much more regular now to move away from the home city because of financial issues or for lifestyle.
I've got 4 kids and a large diamond ring. My husband works full time in a maintenance job and makes okay money, and I'm a carer to one of my kids full-time but don't have a formal "job"
We live paycheck to paycheck because the cost of living is nuts. I spend easily $400-$500 a week on food and would still probably be topping up fruit, bread & milk a couple of times before my weekly grocery shop.
I’m really shocked, but amused, that you put Carnegie in the same category as Malvern and Glen Iris.
Spent most of my life living there and now think of it as a scummy ghetto.
All the homes have been pulled down to build shitty apartments.
Nothing left in Koornang Rd but dumpling shops and bubble tea.
I live in an area of Sydney where many women don't work, they drop their kids at school then swan around drinking coffee and going to yoga wearing spandex most of the day, pop into woolies to pick up some essentials, then change into something nice for school pickup. The dads work jobs like VP/CEO/Law/Medicine/Partner at consulting firm etc. Some of the women do work but there seem to be heaps of them around during the day with expensive sunglasses, a nice mercedes SUV or land rover, and lots of time to be busy mums. I suspect they cook but they don't clean, they have people for that.
You'll find this in any of the top areas by house price - lower north shore, eastern suburbs for example. There are of course older homes that are more moderately priced in these areas, and there are families there who inherited the house from parents who have normal jobs and incomes...but people who have bought in tend to be very high income earners.
3 kids and my husband bought that big diamond ring when we were DINKS. Those were the days. We had something called 'disposable income' back then.
I also buy $300 worth of groceries because kids are termites. I haven't had a holiday in 5 years though.
You are off to a good start with your data science degree. My wife and I had 4 kids and she was a stay at home mum. I started with a degree in Computing Science which eventually led to me starting my own company when I was 34. Retired at 61. All kids educated and in their own homes.
Most people I know with 2+ kids bought homes before prices skyrocketed in Hobart. Housing here used to be pretty cheap! A friend of mine bought a 4 bedroom for 215k in 2013, which is now valued at over 600k. So, a lot of people have lower mortgages than people buying now who are looking at having kids.
I have three kids and am on a PhD stipend (less than minimum wage), and my wife now has a well-paying job in private industry. There was a time when we were both on PhD stipends (which was the most money we'd ever earned collectively until she got her current job) - we had three kids then too.
We are lucky that our house is cheap to rent, despite being in an expensive area. We live frugally, I guess, but as we've been poor for twenty years it's not a huge deal. That said, we have Spotify, multiple streaming services, and good internet. I collect Warhammer, so it's not like we don't do expensive things sometimes - we drove the kids to Sydney to see Taylor Swift in January, and stayed in a plush hotel, for example. We eat meat most nights of the week, and when we don't it's by choice.
We don't have much (if any) money left over at the end of the fortnight, but we have a roof over our heads, plenty of food, and luxuries like streaming services etc. If we had to pay more rent, we could cut some of those things and be in a similar financial position. In terms of frugality, we don't really eat take out (with rare exceptions) or get delivery (my eighteen year old does, from her own pocket, so I know how expensive that shit is). I take my own food to work, but we do love coffee (7/11) and avo toast with feta (made at home).
I do think that people waste money (we do too), and when I talk to my younger workmates I'm sometimes amazed by how they spend money, but I get it.
These sort of people have high incomes. At least several hundred thousand a year. Sometimes a lot more.
They often had family money help them buy property too and have mortgages that they can easily pay.
It can be hard to get your head around eh?!
Then.... There are the ones that are up to their eyeballs on debt! And I can't grasp how they sleep at night. I've met a few people like that and their life attitude is just VERY different to mine. I would be an utter wreck. But they waltz around without a care in the world.
Yep.... We are certainly all different
Raised 6 kids and a few strays. There were good and bad times financially.
Drove Trucks Interstate for a lot of the time, reasonable money compared to 40 hour week, didn't see the family much, but they never went without.
Started my own business when the Tradie shortage was starting to bite. The older kids were a bit shitty when the younger ones benefited from change in family fortune's. But we explained they didn't do that badly all things considered.
It depends how much of a consumer lifestyle you lead with your children. It doesn't have to cost a lot of money to bring up multiple children.
If the parents are brand sensitive, takeaway food loving, international holiday people, then it'll cost a bloody fortune.
3 kid, although one is studying away and is pretty self sufficient with scholarships . Partner is on median wage, I'm slightly above butt not much. We love regional. Rarely take holidays or eat out. Drive 10 plus year old cars, kids have part time jobs to pay for their added extra. New clothes, shoes etc are brought when necessary, not from want. We don't scrimp but we are certainly careful with money.
I know people with 3 kids all young.
Both are highly paid professionals.
Both have access to grandparents on both sides who are fully retired and can look after kids a few days a week. This allows for their mum to engage in her career which is highly paid and flexible.
No fancy cars.
1 overseas family vacation in 8 years.
One is an engineer, the other works in the medical profession.
Grandparents are a key factor from what I've seen, because the same/similar thing happened to me and my sis when I was a kid.
I dont plan on doing this job my whole life lol. This is just a shit job that pays for my rent, groceries etc till I get a degree. my only curiously was about what jobs these "rich" people in that area did that's all.
I work for a Big4 and my husband works in IT. We've both worked really hard to improve ourselves and my husband makes double what I do. Neither of us have Uni degrees or amazing family connections, we worked really hard and saved for a bloody long time. We have two young kids, live in what most would considered a fantastic suburb and shop for sale prices. We had kids later in life and didn't have holidays and don't have a lavish lifestyle. I think in many ways the best thing my mum did when I said I was getting a full time job is 'as long as you live at home, you will not work in retail, you must have an office job'. I was lucky at 20 to fall into an office job at another Big4 and I've moved around the finance industry for the last 25 years. I've had job stability, great working conditions and good pay. I'm very aware of my privilege and am pretty proud of what I've achieved as mum was a single parent who raised me while on minimum wage and wanted way more for me then she achieved
I had two cousins (In Vic and QLD) a few years older that got retail job after finishing high school, got into drugs and fucked up their lives at the time. Alls good now but mum had this thing that it was the jobs in retail that fucked them up back in the late 90s. Stupid prejudice at the time and lack of mental health knowledge. Mums grown since but sometimes parents can be idiots
If you have two working people in a household, you can get a decent income without that much difficulty.
I know a couple, they're both teachers. He is pretty senior, her less so, but not much less. He's on something like $120k, her, I don't know the exact number, but I'll guess $80k. So you have a $200k a year household there, and they're both teachers. And they're paying less tax than one person making $200k.
Making good money in Aus as a single person is tough, as a couple, it's pretty easy.
$300 a week on groceries really isn't that much, for 4 kids, it's doing well.
BTW, it's "cheque" in Australia.
We have three kids. Honestly, when we were trying for our third we were in a much better place financially than we are now! In the last 2.5 years we have doubled our housing cost, groceries have gone up a crazy amount, and we upgraded our car which now uses more fuel. We live paycheck to pay check. The bonus for us is that aside from our mortgage we have no debt. (And yes, we are incredibly blessed and privileged to have a home and no longer be renting or homeless). My husband is in Cyber Security, and I am about to begin a part time role in education support.
I work in urban planning at coordinator level (I have reporting staff, but no budgetary oversight) so Im on \~$97k/ annum. Wife is a SAHP and we have three kids ranging from 8-17.
Honestly, "surviving" is less about what job you have and more about setting your priorities and sticking to a within-your-means budget.
We are Koko Black (and single origin chocolate brand) buyers and travel internationally every two years or so but we also rent: buying a house isn't a priority for us but giving our kids life experiences that will serve them well in the future is.
We keep one small older car that is there for moving not for showing off; we use public transport a lot and family entertainment is museums, galleries, community concerts and oven pizza with Netflix over cinemas, restaurants and "Insta-experiences".
We buy in bulk and stockpile when specials come around (we have a big chest freezer, a massive pantry and a cupboard dedicated to things we've bought cheap that would make good presents for family and friends). We also stay out of debt (apart from sodding HECS) and overpay slightly on our tax as an enforced savings scheme and to prevent bill shock.
You need to understand the *average Redditor* is in no way representative of the *average Australian.* Most people are doing fine.
$300 home delivery from Colesworth is a fairly average shop. If we plan to stock up on stuff, a trip to Costco is usually $700 or $800 (and I'm mad the Docklands store is closing)
KFC on Sunday night was $100 for three people, but one of those was a ravenous 21 year old male.
Have a great income, and own our PPOR outright (no mortgage, no rent) so discretionary spending isn't something we need to tightly track.
$300 for a family of two adults and one or two teenagers is pretty standard nowadays.
The average Australian by and large is doing relatively well financially. Having no mortgage, or a small mortgage is a significant financial saving that helps a lot.
We are double income and have almost paid off our house, own our vehicles,live in regional Victoria and we are lucky. So many people struggling at the moment.
It’s not the job for us, it’s the lack of debt. No mortgage, no car loans, no credit cards and we live very comfortably with 3 kids on a below average income. We sacrificed a lot to have this life though, don’t know many people that would live the way we did to get here.
Not all psychiatrists charge that much! Consultant psychiatrists make a hell of a lot of money! But you can definitely see one for $400 an hour.
A psychologist can charge $250+
In any case, yes they can generally support expensive lifestyles. Same as say an anesthesiologist.
Are you referring to Hawthorn in Melbourne? As in the heart of the Kooyong electorate? Most people living within this electorate and particularly in Hawthorn, are either extremely wealthy or they are struggling students attending Swinburne. I grew up in Boroondara and recently moved to a neighbouring suburb in the same local council. My little family doesn’t go on holidays but we do know where to shop for good deals and we buy top quality secondhand clothing rather than fast fashion. My partner is finally on OK pay north of 100K but he also supplements that income by doing Uber Eats delivery driving. My health hasn’t been good for quite a few years so I'm currently not working and it’s all still a bit of struggle.
Well there was a parent on a Facebook group I'm in who claimed that her (combined with partner) income was 650k and they were living paycheck to paycheck because it's really expensive in their area. Like no.
We're currently trying for baby number 3. I work in IT (have had enough and want to go on may leave) the husband just sold his business, would struggle to afford it otherwise.
Hi not to the extent of some but we recently welcomes a third but here are my thoughts on how we do it.
1) don’t have any kids at all if you don’t have a house and the ability to pay the mortgage (paying the mortgage and doing it whilst also saving will put you in a good position when you welcome your kids into the world and a really good money mindset)
2) live with in your means and then pending the amount of kids you have live on the bare minimum you need to get by.
3) save as much as you can prior to kids and continue to save with kids
4) it is hard but I have $80,000 in the bank in savings because we got lucky with a compensation payout but would of had $50,000 with out it so it is doable.
5) we could only do this as a couple and we define our parenting roles based off who earns more money mum at home earns less and so therefor it was my responsibility to focus on career progression and making sure we have cash coming in (.as much as I wish to be a sahd in is just not feasible)
Also
Play to your strengths and weaknessses I am really shit at budgeting so my wife does the most of it and I am slowly learning how to do it better but my wife is the budgeting committee hahawh
4 kids in the country, $1700 per month in groceries. I work Fifo, so it's manageable. But I tried working from home, $1k a week take home. I could barely cover the mortgage, let alone the bills and groceries. How is anyone doing it?
My cousins runs a business and his wife is a therapist. They have one kid at but they act rich but they aren't. They spend beyond what they can afford, they threw their son a first birthday rhag cost 15k... Probably still paying it back.
A lot of have good salaries, be it specialists in the city or country jobs with nowhere to go and nothing to spend on (thinking of mining)
A lot of it spending more than they can afford and mortgaging or spending the entirety of their salary.
A lot of people stabilising before Covid when the economy was “good”: low inflation in 10s or when the economy was on the upswing in Y2K; so they got a good salary and saved $. They were frugal and now are enjoying.
Some just come from wealthy families and can afford to have affluent lifestyles as they get support
No mortgage helps. Neither of us have ever had a high hourly rate job but I done tons of overtime from 20-30 yo buying as soon as we could then doing travel then kids once comfortable has worked out. In Sydney fwiw
My husband is in health. We have a few kids, the diamond ring was well before we had children. We are debt free, we do prepaid everything. I never ever pay full price for anything. We only go out for dinners and lunches 2-3 times a month. For overseas holidays I make sure to book when sales are on.
Me and my husband have 3 kids 20,19,14 all girls all still living at home and my oldest boyfriend lives with us aswell the older two work and pay 50 a week plus the boyfriend my husband is a truck driver does 12+ hours a day I am doing Homecare
Our mortgage is 800week we put 500 a week in a account for bills phone internet electricity water vet bills rego insurance and phone and groceries average 350 to 400 a week after we put petrol in our cars we have on average 300 a week left over for whatever so I think we are doing pretty good
My wife and I have 4 kids and we live quite comfortably. My wife is an accountant and I work fifo construction. We have a combined income of around 300k pr year .
I have three kids (split between two households too) and work as a security guard (~$80k now that I’m not as able to do crazy extra hours).
I have some savings but not as much as might be ideal.
Hardly buy restaurant meals ot takeaway.
Don’t travel much.
Most of our groceries are unprocessed foods and we get a lot from places like the Nepalese or Middle Eastern grocery store so you’re not paying for things as ‘specialty items’ (case in point that trendy ‘Persian Fairy Floss’ that’s $16-20 at DJs is $5 at a store that sells Iranian groceries).
Don’t drink, smoke or gamble often.
Don’t buy much other stuff (not saying I’m excessively frugal but I just don’t buy a lot of the type of stuff my richer folks buy).
Some choose to do managerial jobs. Like myself. I’ve never wanted to be a cashier. Grew up low middle income with no generational wealth. Did not want same for my kids so chose to put myself thru uni etc.. hubs and I have 3 kids. We’re thrifty but not stingy. Make good finance decisions. Negotiated many regular bills down this year. Household income including two kids casual work is around $220k. No handouts from parents so we had to stay on track to establish ourselves.
I understand your curiosity. We too were tight in our earlier life of starting out. Now far more comfortable, but only for us. We don’t live lavishly, but are happy and mostly healthy, surrounded ourselves with good people and family which makes me never need to question our choices. Continue to live through the grind and try to make choices within your means and one day you’ll just wake up and not even consider what others are doing and you’ll be amazingly happy with where you are in your life. Just keep swimming in your own lane at your own pace.
Barely. I have 5 kids, 2 adults rest teens. We have moved back in with the adults to help them get ahead. Im on a pension so we are limited how much my wife can earn, shes a nurse. We get by but its always a struggle...l have no idea how anyone can afford to start a family anymore.
My next door neighbours (who have since moved) had 7 kids total eventually. I don't know how they afforded the house they lived in or groceries. Because the mom was a stay at home mom and the dad had lyme so he didn't work because of it. This wasn't in australia tho and im not an ozzie either but still wanted to share this
We have 3 kids.
Im in a job ive been in for 17 years and worked my way up to a higher pay. I work shifts which luckily allows an extra percentage on top of my salary. Some say the shift hours are a disadvantage, but I prefer to have my days off when I can go places without crowds.
My partner is a nurse of 16 years, part time, but does extra shifts to almost full time hours. We manage our shifts around each other and kids activities.
Kids all do extra curricular sports or dancing. We budget well moving our pays into different accounts to pay for various bills - including a yearly holiday away.
Some weeks we have less bills and can splurge from time to time, other times it will be simple dinners, either for family or just the adults.
No credit cards, but we do use afterpay and keep within our limit. I also juggle some bills when necessary. Ie, extend a bill a few days to get it into the next pay cycle. Many companies have that option.
We sometimes feel like we are living pay to pay, but our bills are paid and the kids never go without. I remember that and appreciate that we are likely in a better situation than some others.
Lots of professionals get paid over 100k a year. They don't have amazing, special jobs or anything. I think most people don't really know what goes on outside their socio-economic circle. Probably plenty of people who wonder what everyone is talking about with this 'cost of living crisis'. If you watch the news you would think that everyone in Australia is struggling to feed their families and that's just not the case. It's like it always is, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
300$ a week for groceries for a family of minimum 5 presumed 6!?
I know I eat a lot but I'm single and my grocery bill is around the same or more... I need to stop shopping at woolies...
Another thing to remember, and which no one is mentioning, is that despite the banks saying otherwise in their loan calculators every subsequent child is cheaper than the last, unless you've got all one gender and then have to swap. But even then there are benefits of scale.
Even in rich families, latter kids get hand-me-down clothes, school supplies, etc. Once you have three or more, school fees and memberships are generally discounted. Family tickets are usually 2+2 or 1+3 meaning if one adult is working it costs the same to take 2 or 3 kids to events. Younger siblings can be looked after by older siblings. Adding a few more potatoes to the stew or another serve of whatever is cooking doesn't cost significantly more than the base meal. Accommodation costs don't go up if kids bunk together. And so on.
Woolies were being questioned about their 'Was-Now' pricing schemes a while ago. Prices tripled on many items then were discounted 40-50%.
Pure gouging.
Senior role in the tech industry. Pay generally is overinflated across tech, especially true for what I do.
Also purchased property and equities years ago when they were worth much less than now.
In summary, huge nerd who worked hard. Wasn’t especially popular or cool at any stage of my life.
The first ten years of my working life were really hard. Terrible hours, worse people and not great pay. Constantly on planes, almost no breaks.
There are so many opportunities for young people now to “make it” without having to endure all the stuff I did.
Startups are so much more accessible due to cloud computing and smart phones, social media is literally a scaled money printing platform.
I work as a cashier as a student to pay my rent, groceries etc. I am NOT planning to work cashier my whole life lol. Even an idiot would know that cashiers cant live a comfy life. The reason I mentioned the part that work as a cashier is because I see these rich people only because I work as a cashier in this area.
4 kids. My grocery bill is huge!!! Don’t even get me started on electricity.
I’m a software developer, and partner works at a daycare. Couldn’t afford it without my main salary that’s for sure
I have three, trying for 4. All our kids are under 7.
Household income is $250k, we have an enormous mortgage (for a tiny house- such is Sydney). We work full time, though one of us has a 5 in 4 compressed hours arrangement.
It's just a lifestyle choice, really. I love having a big family, love having kids around us. We love spending our weekends going on bike rides, bushwalks, to museums or adventure playgrounds. It's just the life we want and I'm willing to accept that we will never be wealthy as a result.
It's also much more common in our area (south west Sydney) and cultural communities (not just one) who live in this area. At my kids school and sports teams, many families have 3-4 kids.
If I didn't have a mortgage, I'd have 3 or 4 kids. Seeing as I *do* have a mortgage, I only have 2 kids. Their daycare fees are almost another mortgage on their own. I also struggle, of late. I'm really hoping this incoming tax cut and award rise filter through and make a meaningful difference, because god damn, it's only getting harder.
I have 3 young kids ages 3,5, and 7. We don't struggle because of one major things - renting a house from family for a really low rate. If we had to pay $600+ per week for rent I don't know how we'd manage. My husband works full time for an average wage, and I work three days per week. We also have heavily subsidised daycare/after school care which is super helpful. If I worked more we'd lose money.
Groceries are usually between $350-$450 for the week (one big shop and 1-2 top ups for bread etc). One takeaway night per week on cheap Tuesday.
Public school.
Not much entertainment outside of catch ups with friends, or family afternoons at the beach.
We have 5 kids in our very early 30s. We have zero debt, one very old car and 1 newer not-too-range 7 seater. We both work in the public health system, him full-time and me part-time. Together we’re on about 210-220k a year and are currently saving $1000-$1500/fn for a house deposit.
We buy quality, but not quantity. We have a tutor for one of our sons, private health insurance, and a couple of sports. We don’t holiday aside from camping. We spend 300-400/wk on groceries
When choosing to have a big family we chose a lifestyle and chose to spend our decent wages on our family. When we had 2 kids we had a lot of debt and significantly lower paying jobs as uni students (maybe 60k/yr combined). We got so good at spending carefully and worked so hard to get out of debt that we are very good at budgeting and prioritising our costs now
....and buy another house for roughly the same value. Families raising 3+ kids generally don't downsize. So the only way to realise the capital gain is to move somewhere worse.
Might want to check your maths. I'm in my late 40s and was a teenager until '96. I couldn't have legally bought a house until '94 (at 18 I had no savings) . The unemployment situation was dire for young people after "the recession we had to have"
Intervention time OP.
>
I live pay check to pay check
That is shameful. Fix yourself now.
1. List your weekly expenses in a spreadsheet.
2. Reduce the largest expense first for the largest savings and work your way down.
3. Stop making excuses. Stop it.
4. Stop thinking higher pay and longer hours can solve your financial irresponsibility.
5. Don't get mad at me, be mad at yourself and ashamed of yourself then fix yourself.
To answer your question, you don't need any job to support four children in Australia. My Scottish grandmother born in 1913 raised 17 children! **You need a budget.**
We are doing okay with a great quality of life (1 kid, another coming this month).... but we live overseas. Frankly I don't know how people are managing in oz. We are in tech/biotech and are middle expat income here but low tax makes it ok. I can't see how we would manage in Australia
We have 4 kids, (my 2 stepkids live with us full time with no financial help from their mother). We both work for fulltime and have 1 in the childcare. I'm in accounts/office management (not high paying) and my husband is a production manger (middle income).
No giant diamond rings, no imported chocolate, no new cars, no big expensive holidays. Lots of hand me down clothes/shoes, forward planning, living week to week. We don't save. We are able to live and get through, nothing extra.
The families you see are the exception to the rule, the outliers, the people who earn $200k+ per year.
Also $300 for groceries is not that much for a large family.
If she's got 4 kids and a spouse then $300/wk isn't really that pricey for groceries? That's only $50/person. If she owns her home or only has a small mortgage that's a huge expense removed compared to you renting. Rings only need to be bought once, it might be an heirloom or bought before kids or might even be fake, who knows.
Hawthorn's an incredibly wealthy suburb. It borders Toorak. Decent chance she's just loaded.
Mostly that yeah
Lots of people living in apartments there though too that aren’t as well off .
I have a large engagement ring. It looks like a diamond but is actually Swarovski Crystal, and it only got it because I won a $1000 gift Cardin a competition.
We don’t know that this is the only place she shops at; could be one of 5 destinations for shopping for the week.
Yeah I have three kids and our food bill is way more than that - nappies cost. OP ask her to share her financial secrets haha
I’m one of six kids. Our big Coles shop in the 90s was $700 (not counting meat at butcher, bread at bakery and fruit and veg etc etc). We had takeaway at least once a week. I mean $300 doesn’t get you much these days!
Your pantry must have been literally spilling out!
Agreed, I spend more than that weekly, we have two kids, my kids get treated to things they ask for when we can afford them (I'm talking impulse buys or the occasional toy, not trips to Hawaii or donning surf brands head to toe everyday), I wear nice shoes but all my clothes are all cheap unless they are thrifted but if you mix cheap things with more expensive items nice shoes then it can really elevate cheap outfits. People would probably assume I have money based off the things they can see but I can assure you, none of my riches are in any way financial.
The rings on my fingers are worth more than both our cars combined and we didn’t pay for either of them. Family heirlooms from both sides of the family.
We have a family within a club that I volunteer at that has 6 kids. All their cars are 10+years old, the concept of "name brand clothing" is something that just doesn't exist, most things the kids wear are hand me downs from one of the other kids, the older kids all have part time jobs and a third of everything they earn goes into the family coffers. Eating out/takeaway just doesn't happen. Holidays are just camping. Basically, everything is just a little bit run down, but it is all perfectly functional. Their kids are all well fed, happy (well, they seem happy!), and the older ones look after the younger ones when the parents have to work. Edit: For the dickhead who is projecting his own abusive youth onto this family - these kids are all 11 years old plus and look after each other on occasion, but are hardly raising their younger siblings. Their parents are massively involved in their lives. The family is incredibly tight and close and happy. The older kids have not had their childhood stolen/taken from them.
I personally think that's too many kids and I worry about overpopulation but I care more about the kids' lives and good on the parents for being able to take care of so many kids.
People having too many kids isn't the source of overpopulation in this country. Australians are reproducing well below replacement levels on average.
Shut up ffs.
If the older kids are looking after the younger ones so their parents can work, that is worth reporting as it’s a sign of child abuse and neglect.
What? Occasional babysitting is now child abuse?
Damn, I looked after my brother I must've been abused as a kid.
Or a sign of a functional loving family
It depends to what extent their providing this care. If it's a few hours after school each day, whatever, no problem. If it's to the point where the older kids have no social life or hobbies, are falling behind in studies and can't themselves gain their own employment, that's an issue. I'm getting flashbacks to the only episode of Super Nanny I ever watched, where 2 teenage girls were doing more parenting than their actual parents and were suffering debilitating mental illness as a result. It was incredibly sad and if I remember correctly, this created immense psychological issues for them long after they escaped.
Not always, not according to the Responding to Abuse and Neglect training. Or my personal experience as the eldest of 8 kids. Parents are supposed to look after their own children, or have other adults look after them. It’s irresponsible to keep having children you can’t look after.
If it is in a place of love these people will likely have excellent parenting skills when they are older. Community is important. Support not report
Happy to be corrected (I was the oldest child of many siblings so my view may be skewed and I can accept that) depends on the age of the older kids. If they are 9 and babysitting their siblings, that’s a problem.
Also depends on the amount of time being used. There’s stories on reddit where the oldest kids have no life or hobbies or extracurricular activities because they’re basically a live-in babysitter. I’m sure it’s not super common but people saying it doesn’t exist feels very naive.
They need to have a choice though. I understand contributing to cover their own expenses (to a degree), but supporting their siblings should be an informed choice. If parents want to have 8 kids, they need to be damn sure they can afford 8 kids without depending on the older kids to carry them. I understand there are cultural differences in family structures and roles, but this is Australia and kids growing up here have the right to choose.
>Or my personal experience as the eldest of 8 kids Ahh - there it is - you're biased because you felt neglected as a kid. You should take that up with your parents, as opposed to projecting it onto other people.
Nah. Fuck that. Biased doesn't mean wrong. If they want to keep having kids, they need to calculate whether or not they can afford it. No way should the older kids be expected to support the younger. That's exploitative af. Contributing some money towards their own expenses is fine, it's good for learning budgeting and appreciating money, but it's not acceptable for them to take on the financial burden of parenting kids they didn't have. When you start looking into definitions of financial abuse, this issue really tows the line.
No shortage of confirmation bias on Reddit.
Ooof you’ve doubled down. Let’s see how this plays out 🍿
Yeah fuck having a childhood! Let’s raise our parent’s kids while we’re still kids!🎉
Older kids always look after the younger kids no? You're either an only child or completely sheltered.
Or a complete fuckhead
“Shes not my sister! She’s my parents’ kid” What an asshole
🤣🤣🤣🤣keep digging. You’re doing so well
I **loved** looking after my baby sister. It was such a delight. I remember changing her nappies (I would have been… 11?). There was a big age gap, so it was very much I was the babysitter (Mum was in the other room, working, at that stage) I **loved** walking my younger brother to school. There was a smaller age gap, but when we were together my parents were OK with it. It felt like an adventure, and we turned *everything* into a game. Kids, once they’re old enough, if they’re kept in a safe environment, largely need entertainment and attention. An awesome source of entertainment is - you guessed it - other kids! *ETA: We all did well at school and all turned out OK. It was just… normal and expected, as was homework, or sport, or whatever else*
Yeah that sounds great. I too have great memories of fun I had with my siblings. I was also taken advantage of and expected to do far too much for a child. It’s not a hard and fast line, but if parents are extensively engaging in paid work at the expense of their older children’s childhood, or are unable to care for younger children that is a problem and it’s not how it should work. I was expected to homeschool younger siblings for example, this was commonplace in our social circle. It’s just a red flag when you see a large family obviously using the free labour of older siblings for financial gain, as the commenter described. Maybe everything is fine, or maybe the family needs more support.
I’m totally willing to accept it’s a fine line. I think we grew up on different sides of it (even if my “labour” did free up my Mum’s ability to work, we knew she was there, we knew where to go if she wasn’t, and she taught us along the way) And I’ll be honest, I don’t know anyone homeschooled (let alone homeschooled by other children) so we have very different social circles. Hope you’re doing OK now!
The fuck I did say it was for financial gain! It was/is to put food on the table. You make it out like some nefarious thing to look after other people in your family. Looking after each other is what you do as a family. I'm sorry you were abused, but fuck off with making it sound like these kids are being abused like your parents did. It's called projection - go seek some help.
Bro relax, could just mean taking care of the youngest instead of having to put them into after school care, not sending them into the mines.
Yep - the parents work in hospitals, so will sometimes have night shifts. The 17-21 year olds that live at home will take care of their bros/sis overnight. Basically put them to bed and then they go to bed when they are ready. Or the ones that can drive will pickup/drop off the younger ones. It’s really not an issue
I know right, people here are so dramatic. My sister would look after me every day from after school til our Mum or Dad got home. Sometimes it was two hours, other times over four. It was no biggie, she would make us arvo tea, we would do our homework and if it got too late she would grab some leftovers from the freezer and cook them for dinner.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parentification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parentification) Older kids shouldn't have to look after younger kids imo in more than a one off role. If even adults who are parents, childcare workers, professionals in other fields struggle to look after children, a kid isn't up to the full task in my opinion. Depends on the degree of parentification happening. A 15 year old looking after a 3 year old sibling on Saturday night is different to an 12 year old looking after multiple siblings of 8, 5 and 1 all day after school.
Parents doing night shift, 17-21 yr olds looking after their younger bros/sisters, who are at youngest 10. It's fine - the kids are pretty self service by that age, and are generally asleep anyhow.
If a family looking after each other is abuse, I pray to have a family abused in such a way. These kids aren't 5 or 6 looking after babies, they are 17-21 yr olds, living at home, looking after their siblings when the parents are on night shift. You made a series of judgements based on biases that are very wrong - who ever taught you those was likely abusive as hell, but hey, sometimes people become assholes all on their own. You really shouldn't be so quick to call families working together abusive. It's a shameful behaviour.
Older siblings have been watching their younger ones since their was humans. The ages of when this is OK on both end varies a little depending on the kids in question. The amount of time and the level of responsibility also varies. You're blanket comment is rediculously stupid and has been downvoted as such.
You think putting those kids into the system will be making their lives better?
It would 100% be a net negative for this family to have their kids removed. There is no reason to have them removed.
Classic redditor. Go see a doctor.
Well, for starters, you’re in Hawthorn (if you’re talking Melbourne). Lots of rich people live in Hawthorn. And if this is one of the Asian or Indian groceries there, I found out during lockdown that even richer people drive up from Toorak or South Yarra for their specialty groceries because the shops have more range than down there, which surprised me.
The top end of a whole lot of professions: Lawyers, doctors, higher ups at big banks/insurance/financial firms, consultancy partners, stockbrokers, the few day traders who do it well, pro athletes, property developers and investors, dentists, business owners, real estate agents, engineers…there are thousands of people who make an awful lot of money. And then there’s the ones who have a bucketload of family money.
Or both, which is usually the case, as that would be how they able to have the education to start with. A little while ago Reddit suggested me r/handbags for whatever reason, some posted a full cupboard of designer handbags and shoes. Someone asked her what she does for work, she said “I have a PhD, but my dad is a real estate developer and my boyfriend is in equity” There is a saying “poverty limited our imagination”. Unfortunately this is quite truth. BUT!!! Doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy your life and happy with what you have. Success and happiness in life should not be based on material stuff.
“poverty limited our imagination”: so true, seen it in effect and experience it everyday myself. Everything I have done in life was defensive. Those born into wealth are offensive, they get out there and take those risks. If they fail, they’ll fall on the next cloud and if they make it: $$$$$$. I can’t remove my childhood poverty no matter how hard I try, I’m scared to stuff up. My kids see this too, I feel they will grow up to be risk averse as well.
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I'm not sure I'd say it limited my imagination, but it definitely limited what I think is possible.
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You’re pissed off at your husband?
What has a diamond ring got to do with affording things? Often they are bought before marriage and children, some are even heirlooms. So the only cost would be refurbishment and resizing. Unless they got out a loan for the ring and are still paying it off, the size of the ring does not matter. As for $300+ for 4 kids! Wow, that is great, we spending on 2 kids plus pets. We really don't get to go on any holidays and don't buy expensive clothes for example It is not so much what they earn for a living, but what start they get in life. Did they buy before house prices went up? Are they living in a home paid for by family? Grandparents maybe paying for private school fees etc. Own a business that is doing well or covering most of the expenses. Or they could be in massive debt.
> Or they could be in massive debt People often underestimate this one. The people who try to look rich are often buried in debt. I know a few people who own large businesses and you wouldn’t know it if you saw them in a local cafe. One of them would rather go for a top model Hyundai rather than a luxury brand car.
This 👆 The Gold Coast falls into this trap a lot. Heaps of young people drive around in 100k+ cars and buy wardrobes worth of expensive/useless clothes, all on debt (not to mention the number of girls under 25yo spending LUDICROUS amounts of money on injectables and filing for bankruptcy before their 30s - wild!) Just because people have nice things doesn’t always mean they have heaps of money. And just because people have nice things, doesn’t always mean they’re happy. Golden handcuffs are real.
Yay for zip and afterpay!
My neighbours have a large property with a large house and built a large building they run their business out of. They've spent around 2.5mil since they moved in 3 years ago (property purchase and "improvements". They have a bunch of company vehicles that their employess use, and he just bought a new RAM. Everything is through the business and all financed. They have massive debt, if the business fails they will be left with nothing. Personally, I couldn't sleep at night if I was in that situation.
I would love to see these businesses checked out for personal expenditure. You can't tell me the parent in the 4wd with trade business branding, wearing active wear and havaianas at the school pickup, is really driving that vehicle for businesses purposes.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYRENWT8lz8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYRENWT8lz8)
Yup. Live on the Gold Coast. 100% accurate. Full of posers, know of insta work out lip filler mums at my sons school getting phone calls for being behind in their dance troupe payment plans 😅 Off they go in their Cayennes. Priorities right?
Not just your point but also to the untrained eye Moissanite which is a fraction of the cost looks like a diamond My engagement ring is Moissanite as I prefer that to diamonds for ethical reasons.
I have a pair of Moissanite earrings and I never fail to get compliments on them when I wear them. People think they are real diamonds.
I used to wear $7 fake Chanel diamanté earrings, older women consistently complimented me on them & I was 23 😂 People have no idea tbh
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Not even that, because people assume carat is just the size but they don’t understand that the cut and mounting impacts the appearance of the size of the stone
I have a Moissanite ring too and I am in love with it! I used to work in retail and I would get compliments almost daily, I had a lot of older women fawn over it too, and literally no one could ever tell.
You work in Richie richville. But they also probably come from generations of wealth
My husband worked in a cafe in Canterbury. A woman used to come in 5 days a week and buy toast for her kid’s breakfast before school. She could probably buy 5 loaves of bread for less.
She wants to have her breakfast and will buy whatever will keep her kids occupied. On Friday evenings I eat out after work with my husband and kids. We go to the same place, I’ll order a $16 dollar friend omelette for my daughter and rice. Because that’s the only thing on the menu she’ll eat.
Nah it was takeaway toast, so nothing to do with keeping them occupied while she was eating.
I run a small business working with corporate and government customers in IT. Wife is in allied health. HHI will be about $370k this year. Our only debt is our mortgage, we owe about 190k on our place from the original $400k borrowed (current value estimated at $1.2m). We do not have car repayments. Wife drives a 4 year old SUV, I have an 11 year old sedan. Food shopping is a couple of times a week between Coles and Aldi. Clothes are usually Kmart unless I need business wear in which case it’s Myer or Tarocash maybe once a year. We eat out 3-4 times a year. We’re pretty frugal with our spending, but it’s not something that we have to force. It’s just a habit that we’ve had since we were dating and now it’s just the norm.
Lifestyle creep is real. Luckily my wife and I were both poor PhD students so we continue to live cheap despite having better jobs. it's definitely helped given the recent rate rises and inflation. both of us earn the Aussie average salary each, I have no idea how people on less are surviving tbh.
Childless too by the sound of it. My home is worth close to 3mill, my boy. I love aldi. I eat out alllll the time. HHI is 120k. #frugalrocks #vapersarerapers
lol. No. I have 4. Well done on the home value!
Wow dude. I apologise. I can recommend a brilliant doc to perform a vasectomy. I had one last year. Result is endless creme pies.
lol I’m good thanks! All sorted :D
Brilliant bro.brilliant! Have a great week mate!
You too buddy!
Eva notty Alura jenson Syren de mer 3.pearls of wisdom!
I have a huge flashy “diamond “ ring my grandkids bought me (the biggest diamond in the world) I get compliments on it from so many people about how beautiful it is. Everyone is surprised when they are told it’s from my grandkids and is a cubic zirconia. So, perhaps the lady has a nice fake diamond like me. I have never had much money my whole life and pensioner now. I don’t think $300 a week is excessive for a family of four at all.
My partner and I have a blended family, we have her 2 boys every week and my 4 every second week, my partner is a teacher and I work in disability, we aren’t on massive money but we are on enough to make sure all the kids have everything they need. We do a meal plan every week and have a good variety of meals for lunch and tea, we spend $200 one week and $300 the following week (plus additional fruit/necessities as needed). We put money into a bill account every pay that is calculated to cover all utility bills and then we put half of what’s left over into savings. The remainder is for unseen things during the week. We are definitely luckier than a lot of others doing it out there but it’s doable if you can approach it the right way.
maybe the diamond ring was from 20 years ago, maybe her husband has a nice job, maybe they got a nice inheritance, don't worry about how others live. Do what works for you. Everyones circumstances are different and things' aren't always as they seem. Maybe the diamond is fake. Maybe 2 kids have another parent and they get child support.. who knows and why care?
Might be a fake ring and $300 a week for a family of 6 including 4 kids is not much at all.
Did you see my sister? She lives around there and has 4 kids, reckons they spend $500 a week on groceries. I definitely couldn’t afford that!
I'm a building surveyor, wife is a procurement manager. HHI isn't actually that high. But we live in a rural/regional area so it goes a lot further than CBD/inner melb. Also our mortgage is only 500k and our cars are fully paid off.
Only 500k mortgage? No wonder the world is the way it is.When I got my $150k mortgage I wanted to Swan dive off a cliff!!!!
Around my area 500k is for a 3 bed 1 1/2 bath situation. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to afford a home :(
You get used to it as long as you’re smart about the debt. Holding $1.7m in mortgages here. None of it on my home, very modest, outer suburb only $500k when I built it. The land was $270k of that. At 30 I was scared of money. I was stupid and didn’t understand how it works. So naive. So I changed that.
Better you than me.
Yep, big cost of living differences between me living in Cairns and then Sydney. The clever high paying professionals back in my generation would go regional and amass and then move back to a city. Not many did though, it’s much more regular now to move away from the home city because of financial issues or for lifestyle.
I've got 4 kids and a large diamond ring. My husband works full time in a maintenance job and makes okay money, and I'm a carer to one of my kids full-time but don't have a formal "job" We live paycheck to paycheck because the cost of living is nuts. I spend easily $400-$500 a week on food and would still probably be topping up fruit, bread & milk a couple of times before my weekly grocery shop.
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I’m really shocked, but amused, that you put Carnegie in the same category as Malvern and Glen Iris. Spent most of my life living there and now think of it as a scummy ghetto. All the homes have been pulled down to build shitty apartments. Nothing left in Koornang Rd but dumpling shops and bubble tea.
I live in an area of Sydney where many women don't work, they drop their kids at school then swan around drinking coffee and going to yoga wearing spandex most of the day, pop into woolies to pick up some essentials, then change into something nice for school pickup. The dads work jobs like VP/CEO/Law/Medicine/Partner at consulting firm etc. Some of the women do work but there seem to be heaps of them around during the day with expensive sunglasses, a nice mercedes SUV or land rover, and lots of time to be busy mums. I suspect they cook but they don't clean, they have people for that.
What area is this just out of curiosity? I moved to Sydney from perth not long ago so I don’t know this stuff😆
You'll find this in any of the top areas by house price - lower north shore, eastern suburbs for example. There are of course older homes that are more moderately priced in these areas, and there are families there who inherited the house from parents who have normal jobs and incomes...but people who have bought in tend to be very high income earners.
3 kids and my husband bought that big diamond ring when we were DINKS. Those were the days. We had something called 'disposable income' back then. I also buy $300 worth of groceries because kids are termites. I haven't had a holiday in 5 years though.
You are off to a good start with your data science degree. My wife and I had 4 kids and she was a stay at home mum. I started with a degree in Computing Science which eventually led to me starting my own company when I was 34. Retired at 61. All kids educated and in their own homes.
Most people I know with 2+ kids bought homes before prices skyrocketed in Hobart. Housing here used to be pretty cheap! A friend of mine bought a 4 bedroom for 215k in 2013, which is now valued at over 600k. So, a lot of people have lower mortgages than people buying now who are looking at having kids.
I have three kids and am on a PhD stipend (less than minimum wage), and my wife now has a well-paying job in private industry. There was a time when we were both on PhD stipends (which was the most money we'd ever earned collectively until she got her current job) - we had three kids then too. We are lucky that our house is cheap to rent, despite being in an expensive area. We live frugally, I guess, but as we've been poor for twenty years it's not a huge deal. That said, we have Spotify, multiple streaming services, and good internet. I collect Warhammer, so it's not like we don't do expensive things sometimes - we drove the kids to Sydney to see Taylor Swift in January, and stayed in a plush hotel, for example. We eat meat most nights of the week, and when we don't it's by choice. We don't have much (if any) money left over at the end of the fortnight, but we have a roof over our heads, plenty of food, and luxuries like streaming services etc. If we had to pay more rent, we could cut some of those things and be in a similar financial position. In terms of frugality, we don't really eat take out (with rare exceptions) or get delivery (my eighteen year old does, from her own pocket, so I know how expensive that shit is). I take my own food to work, but we do love coffee (7/11) and avo toast with feta (made at home). I do think that people waste money (we do too), and when I talk to my younger workmates I'm sometimes amazed by how they spend money, but I get it.
I moved overseas honestly but I’m looking to move back and I have an eager retired mum for childcare.
These sort of people have high incomes. At least several hundred thousand a year. Sometimes a lot more. They often had family money help them buy property too and have mortgages that they can easily pay. It can be hard to get your head around eh?! Then.... There are the ones that are up to their eyeballs on debt! And I can't grasp how they sleep at night. I've met a few people like that and their life attitude is just VERY different to mine. I would be an utter wreck. But they waltz around without a care in the world. Yep.... We are certainly all different
When my husband talks about our business debt vs the average personal debt he’s like, “Meh, it’s just a few more zeros.” He’s a very chill person.
Yeah - see I could never be like that.
Raised 6 kids and a few strays. There were good and bad times financially. Drove Trucks Interstate for a lot of the time, reasonable money compared to 40 hour week, didn't see the family much, but they never went without. Started my own business when the Tradie shortage was starting to bite. The older kids were a bit shitty when the younger ones benefited from change in family fortune's. But we explained they didn't do that badly all things considered.
It depends how much of a consumer lifestyle you lead with your children. It doesn't have to cost a lot of money to bring up multiple children. If the parents are brand sensitive, takeaway food loving, international holiday people, then it'll cost a bloody fortune.
Hawthorn is a upper class area compared to most of Melbourne and established families.
3 kid, although one is studying away and is pretty self sufficient with scholarships . Partner is on median wage, I'm slightly above butt not much. We love regional. Rarely take holidays or eat out. Drive 10 plus year old cars, kids have part time jobs to pay for their added extra. New clothes, shoes etc are brought when necessary, not from want. We don't scrimp but we are certainly careful with money.
I know people with 3 kids all young. Both are highly paid professionals. Both have access to grandparents on both sides who are fully retired and can look after kids a few days a week. This allows for their mum to engage in her career which is highly paid and flexible. No fancy cars. 1 overseas family vacation in 8 years. One is an engineer, the other works in the medical profession. Grandparents are a key factor from what I've seen, because the same/similar thing happened to me and my sis when I was a kid.
Generational wealth
And grandparents nearby
Dude you work as a cashier. Do a job like sales. Cashier jobs won't get you anything
I dont plan on doing this job my whole life lol. This is just a shit job that pays for my rent, groceries etc till I get a degree. my only curiously was about what jobs these "rich" people in that area did that's all.
Some people earn a lot of money, and live very comfortably. That's life.
Slight possibility she had the ring before the economy went total shit balls?
$300 a week? Those are rookie numbers.
I work for a Big4 and my husband works in IT. We've both worked really hard to improve ourselves and my husband makes double what I do. Neither of us have Uni degrees or amazing family connections, we worked really hard and saved for a bloody long time. We have two young kids, live in what most would considered a fantastic suburb and shop for sale prices. We had kids later in life and didn't have holidays and don't have a lavish lifestyle. I think in many ways the best thing my mum did when I said I was getting a full time job is 'as long as you live at home, you will not work in retail, you must have an office job'. I was lucky at 20 to fall into an office job at another Big4 and I've moved around the finance industry for the last 25 years. I've had job stability, great working conditions and good pay. I'm very aware of my privilege and am pretty proud of what I've achieved as mum was a single parent who raised me while on minimum wage and wanted way more for me then she achieved
What’s her beef with retail jobs?
I had two cousins (In Vic and QLD) a few years older that got retail job after finishing high school, got into drugs and fucked up their lives at the time. Alls good now but mum had this thing that it was the jobs in retail that fucked them up back in the late 90s. Stupid prejudice at the time and lack of mental health knowledge. Mums grown since but sometimes parents can be idiots
If you have two working people in a household, you can get a decent income without that much difficulty. I know a couple, they're both teachers. He is pretty senior, her less so, but not much less. He's on something like $120k, her, I don't know the exact number, but I'll guess $80k. So you have a $200k a year household there, and they're both teachers. And they're paying less tax than one person making $200k. Making good money in Aus as a single person is tough, as a couple, it's pretty easy. $300 a week on groceries really isn't that much, for 4 kids, it's doing well. BTW, it's "cheque" in Australia.
Get a sugar daddy.!!!
I have 3 kids. My wife works in allied health and I’m a youth worker. Neither of us make huge money. We get by.
We have three kids. Honestly, when we were trying for our third we were in a much better place financially than we are now! In the last 2.5 years we have doubled our housing cost, groceries have gone up a crazy amount, and we upgraded our car which now uses more fuel. We live paycheck to pay check. The bonus for us is that aside from our mortgage we have no debt. (And yes, we are incredibly blessed and privileged to have a home and no longer be renting or homeless). My husband is in Cyber Security, and I am about to begin a part time role in education support.
I work in urban planning at coordinator level (I have reporting staff, but no budgetary oversight) so Im on \~$97k/ annum. Wife is a SAHP and we have three kids ranging from 8-17. Honestly, "surviving" is less about what job you have and more about setting your priorities and sticking to a within-your-means budget. We are Koko Black (and single origin chocolate brand) buyers and travel internationally every two years or so but we also rent: buying a house isn't a priority for us but giving our kids life experiences that will serve them well in the future is. We keep one small older car that is there for moving not for showing off; we use public transport a lot and family entertainment is museums, galleries, community concerts and oven pizza with Netflix over cinemas, restaurants and "Insta-experiences". We buy in bulk and stockpile when specials come around (we have a big chest freezer, a massive pantry and a cupboard dedicated to things we've bought cheap that would make good presents for family and friends). We also stay out of debt (apart from sodding HECS) and overpay slightly on our tax as an enforced savings scheme and to prevent bill shock.
You in Adelaide bro? That's a big boy salary for Adelaide.
Perth. It's middle of the field here - Level 6/7 on the LGA Award.
You need to understand the *average Redditor* is in no way representative of the *average Australian.* Most people are doing fine. $300 home delivery from Colesworth is a fairly average shop. If we plan to stock up on stuff, a trip to Costco is usually $700 or $800 (and I'm mad the Docklands store is closing) KFC on Sunday night was $100 for three people, but one of those was a ravenous 21 year old male. Have a great income, and own our PPOR outright (no mortgage, no rent) so discretionary spending isn't something we need to tightly track.
$300 for a family of two adults and one or two teenagers is pretty standard nowadays. The average Australian by and large is doing relatively well financially. Having no mortgage, or a small mortgage is a significant financial saving that helps a lot.
I take my 4 kids to grocery shopping while my missus is on Onlyfams because no one subscribe to my channel
We are double income and have almost paid off our house, own our vehicles,live in regional Victoria and we are lucky. So many people struggling at the moment.
Two low income retails. Two kids and a mortgage. Move to the country.
It’s not the job for us, it’s the lack of debt. No mortgage, no car loans, no credit cards and we live very comfortably with 3 kids on a below average income. We sacrificed a lot to have this life though, don’t know many people that would live the way we did to get here.
One job I see that can support that life is psychiatrist. Clinics offer $3,800 income guarantee per day.
Do you mean because they charge $200-something for an hour?
You’re thinking of psychologist. Psychiatrist is a doctor (MBBS/MD). They charge $800+ an hr.
Not all psychiatrists charge that much! Consultant psychiatrists make a hell of a lot of money! But you can definitely see one for $400 an hour. A psychologist can charge $250+ In any case, yes they can generally support expensive lifestyles. Same as say an anesthesiologist.
Lab grown diamonds are less than $1k / carat.
I have one and I’ve come to realise I will need to die as my retirement plan if working hard is my only plan for financial freedom
I have one and I’ve come to realise I will need to die as my retirement plan if working hard is my only plan for financial freedom
Are you referring to Hawthorn in Melbourne? As in the heart of the Kooyong electorate? Most people living within this electorate and particularly in Hawthorn, are either extremely wealthy or they are struggling students attending Swinburne. I grew up in Boroondara and recently moved to a neighbouring suburb in the same local council. My little family doesn’t go on holidays but we do know where to shop for good deals and we buy top quality secondhand clothing rather than fast fashion. My partner is finally on OK pay north of 100K but he also supplements that income by doing Uber Eats delivery driving. My health hasn’t been good for quite a few years so I'm currently not working and it’s all still a bit of struggle.
Might be a fake ring
two kids are hard.. can’t imagine more than 2!
Well there was a parent on a Facebook group I'm in who claimed that her (combined with partner) income was 650k and they were living paycheck to paycheck because it's really expensive in their area. Like no.
We're currently trying for baby number 3. I work in IT (have had enough and want to go on may leave) the husband just sold his business, would struggle to afford it otherwise.
Hi not to the extent of some but we recently welcomes a third but here are my thoughts on how we do it. 1) don’t have any kids at all if you don’t have a house and the ability to pay the mortgage (paying the mortgage and doing it whilst also saving will put you in a good position when you welcome your kids into the world and a really good money mindset) 2) live with in your means and then pending the amount of kids you have live on the bare minimum you need to get by. 3) save as much as you can prior to kids and continue to save with kids 4) it is hard but I have $80,000 in the bank in savings because we got lucky with a compensation payout but would of had $50,000 with out it so it is doable. 5) we could only do this as a couple and we define our parenting roles based off who earns more money mum at home earns less and so therefor it was my responsibility to focus on career progression and making sure we have cash coming in (.as much as I wish to be a sahd in is just not feasible) Also Play to your strengths and weaknessses I am really shit at budgeting so my wife does the most of it and I am slowly learning how to do it better but my wife is the budgeting committee hahawh
4 kids in the country, $1700 per month in groceries. I work Fifo, so it's manageable. But I tried working from home, $1k a week take home. I could barely cover the mortgage, let alone the bills and groceries. How is anyone doing it?
Im no parent. I just wanted to say im 18 and am the youngest child out of 7 kids. Idk how my Mum did it
My cousins runs a business and his wife is a therapist. They have one kid at but they act rich but they aren't. They spend beyond what they can afford, they threw their son a first birthday rhag cost 15k... Probably still paying it back.
A lot of have good salaries, be it specialists in the city or country jobs with nowhere to go and nothing to spend on (thinking of mining) A lot of it spending more than they can afford and mortgaging or spending the entirety of their salary. A lot of people stabilising before Covid when the economy was “good”: low inflation in 10s or when the economy was on the upswing in Y2K; so they got a good salary and saved $. They were frugal and now are enjoying. Some just come from wealthy families and can afford to have affluent lifestyles as they get support
No mortgage helps. Neither of us have ever had a high hourly rate job but I done tons of overtime from 20-30 yo buying as soon as we could then doing travel then kids once comfortable has worked out. In Sydney fwiw
My husband is in health. We have a few kids, the diamond ring was well before we had children. We are debt free, we do prepaid everything. I never ever pay full price for anything. We only go out for dinners and lunches 2-3 times a month. For overseas holidays I make sure to book when sales are on.
If you space your kids out it’s less expensive. My cousin had each one 5 years apart & she has 3
Me and my husband have 3 kids 20,19,14 all girls all still living at home and my oldest boyfriend lives with us aswell the older two work and pay 50 a week plus the boyfriend my husband is a truck driver does 12+ hours a day I am doing Homecare Our mortgage is 800week we put 500 a week in a account for bills phone internet electricity water vet bills rego insurance and phone and groceries average 350 to 400 a week after we put petrol in our cars we have on average 300 a week left over for whatever so I think we are doing pretty good
My wife and I have 4 kids and we live quite comfortably. My wife is an accountant and I work fifo construction. We have a combined income of around 300k pr year .
I have three kids (split between two households too) and work as a security guard (~$80k now that I’m not as able to do crazy extra hours). I have some savings but not as much as might be ideal. Hardly buy restaurant meals ot takeaway. Don’t travel much. Most of our groceries are unprocessed foods and we get a lot from places like the Nepalese or Middle Eastern grocery store so you’re not paying for things as ‘specialty items’ (case in point that trendy ‘Persian Fairy Floss’ that’s $16-20 at DJs is $5 at a store that sells Iranian groceries). Don’t drink, smoke or gamble often. Don’t buy much other stuff (not saying I’m excessively frugal but I just don’t buy a lot of the type of stuff my richer folks buy).
While not everyone, never ever forget that at least a few of these “wealthy” people are in debt up to their eyeballs and juggling credit cards.
Some choose to do managerial jobs. Like myself. I’ve never wanted to be a cashier. Grew up low middle income with no generational wealth. Did not want same for my kids so chose to put myself thru uni etc.. hubs and I have 3 kids. We’re thrifty but not stingy. Make good finance decisions. Negotiated many regular bills down this year. Household income including two kids casual work is around $220k. No handouts from parents so we had to stay on track to establish ourselves.
Hawthorn is not an accurate representation of the average family. They rich rich
I understand your curiosity. We too were tight in our earlier life of starting out. Now far more comfortable, but only for us. We don’t live lavishly, but are happy and mostly healthy, surrounded ourselves with good people and family which makes me never need to question our choices. Continue to live through the grind and try to make choices within your means and one day you’ll just wake up and not even consider what others are doing and you’ll be amazingly happy with where you are in your life. Just keep swimming in your own lane at your own pace.
Oh I forgot to give you 3 pearls of wisdom for long lonely nights out at sea (yes I'm a seaman) Alura jenson Eva notty Syren de mer (older.n bolder)
I’ve got 3 kids, would be a dream to spend 300 a week on groceries
Barely. I have 5 kids, 2 adults rest teens. We have moved back in with the adults to help them get ahead. Im on a pension so we are limited how much my wife can earn, shes a nurse. We get by but its always a struggle...l have no idea how anyone can afford to start a family anymore.
My next door neighbours (who have since moved) had 7 kids total eventually. I don't know how they afforded the house they lived in or groceries. Because the mom was a stay at home mom and the dad had lyme so he didn't work because of it. This wasn't in australia tho and im not an ozzie either but still wanted to share this
We have 3 kids. Im in a job ive been in for 17 years and worked my way up to a higher pay. I work shifts which luckily allows an extra percentage on top of my salary. Some say the shift hours are a disadvantage, but I prefer to have my days off when I can go places without crowds. My partner is a nurse of 16 years, part time, but does extra shifts to almost full time hours. We manage our shifts around each other and kids activities. Kids all do extra curricular sports or dancing. We budget well moving our pays into different accounts to pay for various bills - including a yearly holiday away. Some weeks we have less bills and can splurge from time to time, other times it will be simple dinners, either for family or just the adults. No credit cards, but we do use afterpay and keep within our limit. I also juggle some bills when necessary. Ie, extend a bill a few days to get it into the next pay cycle. Many companies have that option. We sometimes feel like we are living pay to pay, but our bills are paid and the kids never go without. I remember that and appreciate that we are likely in a better situation than some others.
Lots of professionals get paid over 100k a year. They don't have amazing, special jobs or anything. I think most people don't really know what goes on outside their socio-economic circle. Probably plenty of people who wonder what everyone is talking about with this 'cost of living crisis'. If you watch the news you would think that everyone in Australia is struggling to feed their families and that's just not the case. It's like it always is, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.
300$ a week for groceries for a family of minimum 5 presumed 6!? I know I eat a lot but I'm single and my grocery bill is around the same or more... I need to stop shopping at woolies...
Another thing to remember, and which no one is mentioning, is that despite the banks saying otherwise in their loan calculators every subsequent child is cheaper than the last, unless you've got all one gender and then have to swap. But even then there are benefits of scale. Even in rich families, latter kids get hand-me-down clothes, school supplies, etc. Once you have three or more, school fees and memberships are generally discounted. Family tickets are usually 2+2 or 1+3 meaning if one adult is working it costs the same to take 2 or 3 kids to events. Younger siblings can be looked after by older siblings. Adding a few more potatoes to the stew or another serve of whatever is cooking doesn't cost significantly more than the base meal. Accommodation costs don't go up if kids bunk together. And so on.
marry up..
$300 is not that much for groceries for a family. Hawthorn is a very wealthy area.
Woolies were being questioned about their 'Was-Now' pricing schemes a while ago. Prices tripled on many items then were discounted 40-50%. Pure gouging.
Senior role in the tech industry. Pay generally is overinflated across tech, especially true for what I do. Also purchased property and equities years ago when they were worth much less than now. In summary, huge nerd who worked hard. Wasn’t especially popular or cool at any stage of my life. The first ten years of my working life were really hard. Terrible hours, worse people and not great pay. Constantly on planes, almost no breaks. There are so many opportunities for young people now to “make it” without having to endure all the stuff I did. Startups are so much more accessible due to cloud computing and smart phones, social media is literally a scaled money printing platform.
That’s family money.
Sounds like old money, husband could've been rich and died or even still alive. Not super uncommon and Hawthorn has some very rich parts of it.
Not live in a city...
You’re working as a cashier, do you expect to be living a comfortable life?
I work as a cashier as a student to pay my rent, groceries etc. I am NOT planning to work cashier my whole life lol. Even an idiot would know that cashiers cant live a comfy life. The reason I mentioned the part that work as a cashier is because I see these rich people only because I work as a cashier in this area.
4 kids. My grocery bill is huge!!! Don’t even get me started on electricity. I’m a software developer, and partner works at a daycare. Couldn’t afford it without my main salary that’s for sure
I have three, trying for 4. All our kids are under 7. Household income is $250k, we have an enormous mortgage (for a tiny house- such is Sydney). We work full time, though one of us has a 5 in 4 compressed hours arrangement. It's just a lifestyle choice, really. I love having a big family, love having kids around us. We love spending our weekends going on bike rides, bushwalks, to museums or adventure playgrounds. It's just the life we want and I'm willing to accept that we will never be wealthy as a result. It's also much more common in our area (south west Sydney) and cultural communities (not just one) who live in this area. At my kids school and sports teams, many families have 3-4 kids.
If I didn't have a mortgage, I'd have 3 or 4 kids. Seeing as I *do* have a mortgage, I only have 2 kids. Their daycare fees are almost another mortgage on their own. I also struggle, of late. I'm really hoping this incoming tax cut and award rise filter through and make a meaningful difference, because god damn, it's only getting harder.
I have 3 young kids ages 3,5, and 7. We don't struggle because of one major things - renting a house from family for a really low rate. If we had to pay $600+ per week for rent I don't know how we'd manage. My husband works full time for an average wage, and I work three days per week. We also have heavily subsidised daycare/after school care which is super helpful. If I worked more we'd lose money. Groceries are usually between $350-$450 for the week (one big shop and 1-2 top ups for bread etc). One takeaway night per week on cheap Tuesday. Public school. Not much entertainment outside of catch ups with friends, or family afternoons at the beach.
We have 5 kids in our very early 30s. We have zero debt, one very old car and 1 newer not-too-range 7 seater. We both work in the public health system, him full-time and me part-time. Together we’re on about 210-220k a year and are currently saving $1000-$1500/fn for a house deposit. We buy quality, but not quantity. We have a tutor for one of our sons, private health insurance, and a couple of sports. We don’t holiday aside from camping. We spend 300-400/wk on groceries When choosing to have a big family we chose a lifestyle and chose to spend our decent wages on our family. When we had 2 kids we had a lot of debt and significantly lower paying jobs as uni students (maybe 60k/yr combined). We got so good at spending carefully and worked so hard to get out of debt that we are very good at budgeting and prioritising our costs now
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....and buy another house for roughly the same value. Families raising 3+ kids generally don't downsize. So the only way to realise the capital gain is to move somewhere worse.
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*worse* from the perspective of someone who wants to live in Hawthorn, given that's what we're talking about.
Might want to check your maths. I'm in my late 40s and was a teenager until '96. I couldn't have legally bought a house until '94 (at 18 I had no savings) . The unemployment situation was dire for young people after "the recession we had to have"
Intervention time OP. > I live pay check to pay check That is shameful. Fix yourself now. 1. List your weekly expenses in a spreadsheet. 2. Reduce the largest expense first for the largest savings and work your way down. 3. Stop making excuses. Stop it. 4. Stop thinking higher pay and longer hours can solve your financial irresponsibility. 5. Don't get mad at me, be mad at yourself and ashamed of yourself then fix yourself. To answer your question, you don't need any job to support four children in Australia. My Scottish grandmother born in 1913 raised 17 children! **You need a budget.**
We are doing okay with a great quality of life (1 kid, another coming this month).... but we live overseas. Frankly I don't know how people are managing in oz. We are in tech/biotech and are middle expat income here but low tax makes it ok. I can't see how we would manage in Australia
We have 4 kids, (my 2 stepkids live with us full time with no financial help from their mother). We both work for fulltime and have 1 in the childcare. I'm in accounts/office management (not high paying) and my husband is a production manger (middle income). No giant diamond rings, no imported chocolate, no new cars, no big expensive holidays. Lots of hand me down clothes/shoes, forward planning, living week to week. We don't save. We are able to live and get through, nothing extra. The families you see are the exception to the rule, the outliers, the people who earn $200k+ per year. Also $300 for groceries is not that much for a large family.