The income a family needs to live comfortably – and the top 10 most affordable US states for raising kids

No kidding: Homebuyers with kids are becoming less and less common.
In fact, only 27% of recent buyers had a child under age 18 living with them, which was an all-time low, according to the National Association of Realtors® 2024 Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers.
That share is down from 30% last year and 58% in 1985.
“With rising home prices, people might be waiting longer to buy a home, and might be waiting longer to have children, too,” says Brandi Snowden, director of member and consumer survey research at NAR.
The income required to buy a median-priced home in the US is well above the income a typical household brings home, says Hannah Jones, Realtor.com® senior economic research analyst.
“That means that it is challenging at best, and unattainable at worst, for the typical US household to purchase a home. Child care costs and other child-related expenses take away from the amount a household can spend on a monthly mortgage payment, which may deter some families with kids from purchasing a home in today’s market,” she says.
Jones adds that many of today’s buyers could be past their child-rearing years — but it’s also possible that younger households are looking to purchase a home before having kids.
According to a Realtor survey, homebuyers with kids are becoming less common. Vasyl – stock.adobe.com
“Put differently, households may first secure a home, then have kids, which means more buyers would be childless at the point of purchase. However, the climbing age of homebuyers suggests that there are fewer young buyers in the market today due to the high costs to purchase a home.”
The estimated cost of raising two children from birth to age 17 (including the cost of a public, four-year college) is around $832,200, according to Investopedia. The average monthly cost of full-time, center-based child care for two children is an average of $2,182, LendingTree recently found.
“I’ve lost dozens of deals over the last few years because clients were slowly priced out of the market,” says Jameson Tyler Drew, president of Anubis Properties, in the Los Angeles area. “Worse still, I’ve sold houses to former buyers who suddenly realized they could no longer afford to live in our city because they just had a child and cannot afford child care.”
Many parents these days are so riled up about not being able to afford a house and child care, they’ve taken to TikTok to vent their frustrations.
TikToker Howdy_Shannyn says she spends $506 per week for two kids in day care. That’s $2,024 per month.
@howdy_shannyn #stitch with @The Social Beaches who else feels that they have to choose between owning a home and having a family? Between flatlined wages, insanely expensive houses, and childcare costs that are absolutely debilitating, many of us have the hard choice of deciding between starting a family and buying a home. I have heard the sentiment so many times watch my videos. someday after the kids are older we will be able to buy a home but the American dream of getting married and buying a small starter home with a white picket fence and then having two or three kids is gone. Our daycare costs are not even the worst out there, but it still is very expensive. I support people who choose to be child free, but it doesn’t really feel like a choice when so many people are excluded from an equal choice when money is the biggest factor in that decision. I hate that for this generation, and the next, homeownership or child rearing is becoming a privilege of the rich. inflation2inflation2023cinflationcrisisetiredmillennialebrokemillenialetiredmillennialninthiseconomy???g#corporategreed ♬ original sound – howdy_shannyn
“When people ask me when we’re going to buy a house, the answer is not until the kids are out of day care, if ever,” she says. The cost of day care “plus a $2,500 minimum mortgage is absolutely unfeasible for my family.”
Many of her followers are choosing between owning a home or having kids because they believe they can’t do both, she says.
“A close friend of mine’s wife quit her job as a full-time nurse to stay home and raise the kids because it was cheaper than her being employed and sending them to day care every weekday,” says Drew, adding that Los Angeles day cares often run about $2,000 per kid, per month. “For most families, that’s basically a second mortgage.”
Parents, kids, and the real estate market
Are homeowners with young kids becoming extinct? We asked real estate agents from around the country their take on the matter.
“Our brokerage definitely works with fewer people with kids than we used to. When interest rates started to rise in 2022, many small families got priced out of the market,” says Andrew Fortune, who runs the real estate brokerage Great Colorado Homes in Colorado Springs.
And for the parents who did manage to purchase property, they often struggle to afford it.
“In Colorado Springs, being ‘house poor’ is definitely a thing,” says Fortune. “This is becoming such a common conversation with clients that it gets depressing at times.”
“Many parents who are not homeowners are renting,” says real estate broker Samantha Sousa, of Sousa Valley Real Estate in Tulare, CA. “The rent payment is higher than the average mortgage, but they’re not able to save up for closing costs in order to purchase a home. On top of that, they’re unable to afford groceries, medical care, and child care.”
Another reason that fewer homebuyers have kids under 18 could be that they can’t afford to move from their starter homes, says Sam Fitz-Simon, a real estate agent with Compass in Danville, CA.
“People are staying in a home they previously purchased for longer than expected solely to keep payments affordable,” explains Fitz-Simon. “Clients that I’ve worked with in the past year have basically been bursting at the seams — holding off as long as they can before making the decision to move up.”
For this reason, Nikki Beauchamp, an associate broker with Sotheby’s International Realty in New York City, urges her clients to plan ahead.
“When my clients are buying, I often suggest that they think about what life might look like over the coming seven to 10 years,” she says.
If her clients are planning to start or expand their families, Beauchamp says, that changes the way they look at the utilization of spaces. For instance, could a dining room become a bedroom at some point?
Real estate agents in big cities might be seeing fewer clients with young children because families are moving out of state to get more bang for their buck, according to Cara Ameer, a real estate agent with Coldwell Banker in Ponte Vedra Beach, FL.
“Many would-be buyers want to see where their money will go further in places with more affordable homes or a decent supply of new construction,” she says.
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The 10 most expensive states to raise children
In the 10 priciest states to raise kids, parents often have to cut corners, live paycheck to paycheck (even on six-figure salaries), and tread water rather than get ahead.
Drew says young people are the lifeblood of most big cities, but many can simply no longer afford to live there — especially when you add kids to the mix.
SmartAsset recently calculated the income a family of four (two adults and two kids) needs to live comfortably in each state in America.
The results were both eye-opening and mind-boggling. They used the 50/30/20 budget rule, which recommends spending 50% of your income on basic needs such as food and housing, 30% on wants, and 20% on savings or paying off debt.
Median home price: $769,500
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $301,184
Median home price: $798,500
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $294,612
Median home price: $499,994
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $279,885
Median home price: $649,775
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $278,970
Median home price: $759,500
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $276,724
Median home price: $595,000
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $264,992
Median home price: $644,450
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $257,420
Median home price: $569,950
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $257,338
Median home price: $574,500
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $251,180
Median home price: $549,950
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $249,268
The 10 least expensive states to raise children
In the least expensive states, parents typically have a bit of room in their budgets to afford things like dance lessons, braces, and family vacations.
That’s why many parents are fleeing expensive states like California for cheaper places like the Midwest, according to Drew.
Median home price: $294,950
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $177,798
Median home price: $296,854
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $180,794
Median home price: $245,000
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $189,364
Median home price: $276,438
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $189,612
Median home price: $299,950
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $190,112
Median home price: $372,500
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $192,608
Median home price: $329,200
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $193,606
Median home price: $295,000
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $194,106
Median home price: $427,450
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $195,770
Median home price: $295,475
Salary needed by two working adults raising two children: $196,768