Children are priceless, but it's not a secret that raising a child could be expensive.
New parents will realize, soon enough, that the costs just to furnish a house or apartment for their first baby could accumulate speedily and at a shocking rate. But that's only for starters.
It is estimated that the basic costs when raising a child in the USA approximates $20,000 per year. But this is not constant, and even trending upward. This doesn't even include expenditures for summer camps, sports activities, birthday celebrations and more.
CHILD COSTS DEPENDS ON STATE
The essential costs differ for every state. They could be as high as nearly $29,000 annually in the District of Columbia or as low as more than $13,000 in the state of Mississippi. Parents might want to consider relocating to states which could give them higher incomes combined with lower local prices.
The US Department of Agriculture puts out a report that computes the average cost of raising a child to adulthood (it doesn't include expenses for college). They have not updated their report since 2017, but they have researched that a child born in 2015 would cost approximately more than $230,000 to raise.
This comes with the assumption that the child was born to a middle-income married couple. If the estimated cost would be inflation-adjusted, it would amount to nearly $270,000 in 2022.
If raising a child was applied to single parent metrics in 2015, these households spend $172,200 which is less than $60,000 compared to the married ones. If adjusted for inflation for 2022, the solo parent's expense to raise a child up to 18 would increase to $196,984.
LOWERING COSTS
Some single parents think that paying that much to raise a child is not only daunting but even not possible. What some of them do is aside from their regular job, they take part-time jobs at institutions like the YMCA which offer child care as one of the fringe benefits.
Grandparents can also emerge into the picture by babysitting for free. This scenario all but erases the costs for child care expenses.
The cost of raising a child will also vary depending on where the family lives, with the Northeast region being the most expensive area to give the child a comfortable life.
If the family wants lower monthly mortgage and rental payments, they might want to check out the options in South Dakota and Michigan, which are states with affordable housing programs.
But there are trade-offs to opting to live in areas with a lower cost of living. Parents in Michigan, for instance, have to buy more clothing for the kid that's necessary for all four seasons.
LOANS AND CREDIT THAT HELP
If the going gets too rough, families with children to raise can use credit and loans to their advantage. Just make sure you use an impartial loan comparison site and get the best rate.
Parents who cannot upfront the cash for expenses like sports lessons and other big purchases may consider low-interest personal loans or zero-interest offers from credit cards. This makes it easy for them to manage their expenses.
That new guitar can fit into the monthly budget if the family can create a plan for paying back the borrowed money.
