Great 'pregnancy MoneySaving' Hunt

A question about : Great 'pregnancy MoneySaving' Hunt

Great 'Pregnancy MoneySaving' Hunt

From tips on what to buy and what to wait to buy, to cheap maternity clothes, we want MoneySavers' collective wisdom on saving money when you're expecting a little one.

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Best answers:

• Don't spend a fortune on clothes - for you or baby.
  You really only need around 8-10 each of basic vests and sleepsuits/babygros to start with, and nothing else! Buy from tesco/asda/primark - they are just as good as anywhere else and less pricy to replace when they get covered in the inevitable stains! There is no need for fancy outfits to start with, baby is more comfortable in sleep suits, and they are far easier to deal with when you are constantly changing nappies! Let friends and family buy everything else...! We had so many clothes given to us, including bags full of second hand stuff, theres really no need to buy a lot.
  Buy maternity clothes as you need them rather than rushing out to buy a whole new wardrobe - I got over excited and bought lots early on in my first pregnancy, but the maternity jeans and trousers that felt comfy early on were awful towards the end! Buy one or two pairs to start and then more in a different shape if and when you need them. I also found lots of tops that I already had were stretchy enough to fit round bump, so didn't need to buy too many extras, just a few roomy shirts for the last couple of months, or some breastfeeding tops that stretched round bump and were also good for afterwards. Don't scrimp on bras though - comfort is essential!
  And don't go mad with baby equipment either - there is a massive market of 'essential' items, mostly gadgets that you can live without! There isn't much you need in the first month or so so wait until baby arrives and you have thought about what you really need - when you will probably have been given gifts or mothercare vouchers anyway!
  Finally - I could go on all day! - Try and borrow or buy second hand. There are a lot of local 'kidstuff' groups or similar on facebook where people sell on good condition used items for a fraction of the cost. Put bits through the dishwasher or washing machine and they are often good as new! And sell your old bits on when done (unless you're saving them for bump no.2!) and get back some of your cash!!!
• I agree with the above. We got all of our big baby purchases 2nd hand from ebay or friends who no longer needed it.
  Mothercare cot with matress and bedding along with a set of shelves and change mat Ј100 from ebay
  Moses basket, baby bouncer + other toys Ј20 from a work colleage
  Quinny Speedy buggy plus new born car seat that doubles as 0-6month carrier in buggy Ј120.
  There are regular NCT nearly new sales all over the place. Generally good for 0-12 month clothes. Pickings get a little thin after that.
  I was always told though that you shouldnt buy car seats second hand from people you dont know, as they may have been involved in a crash.
  Elsewhere, South west trains season ticket holders can get a free 1st class upgrade from 4 months:
  https://www.southwesttrains.co.uk/Mumstobe.aspx
  Get a baby on board badge for the tube:
  https://www.tfl.gov.uk/gettingaround/...n-board-badges
• I agree with mrs s on pretty much everything, I am currently 29weeks with my first, but from the beginning have been keen not to waste money, when my clothes started getting tight I bought one pair of jeans from mothercare, a bump band from eBay (which has been great for wearing over my non Preg jeans and work trousers) and a couple of tops this low cost budget wardrobe has taken me thro most of my Preg, and I have been surprised at the amount of friends who have offered me there old maternity clothes, I've accepted the majority but have only worn a few items tbh.
• Re maternity clothes. I bought a smartish pair of jersey trousers. I bought larger sized vests from primarni (18) and wore them under an unbuttoned shirt to work. I think people dont expect you to look fantastic especially when you get huge. With twins I second the belly belt. I am convinced it stopped my stretch marks. Once on maternity leave, I admit to lounging in joggers and xxxxxl t-shirts and crocs.
  Most of my baby stuff was given to me except the double buggy and the matresses for the cot.
  Clothing was second hand or supermarket sleepsuits. If you have a winter baby buy a fleece onsie to go over a cotton sleepsuit instead of a coat which gets rucked up at the back. Also tights for boys are great rather than socks as there is no exposed leg.
• I have saved a fortune on baby clothes, simply by watching places like Netmums and Gumtree for well priced good looking bundles of clothes for the different ages of my little girl. I buy a bundle that looks good has good variety in it, then I treat myself/her to one or two brand new extras as needed. Because I am looking in advance of really needing I have found real bargains, and always have clothes that fit in the cupboard even after a rapid 'overnight' growth spurt.
  This has also put me off cruising the shops looking at baby clothes and impulse buying
• It's not strictly money saving but, if you add a bag of nappies/wipes to your weekly shop whilst pregnant(mix of sizes!) it isn't such a major expense whilst managing on maternity benefit.
  Always buy new cot mattress even if cot is 2nd hand. And always buy new car seat. Safety of your little one should always come before cost.
• Hi there,
  As I love to save money I have kept a list of larger money savings I have made and it adds up to over Ј700
  Granted I have brought most things new as its our first baby but utilising comparison websites and vouchers sent when signing up for websites has saved us lots of money
  I would highly recommend the price match offer for Kiddicare - this saved me almost Ј200 on the Maxi Cosi travel system I wanted
  But spend the time trawling websites when you know what you are looking for
  Enjoy!
• I agree with the sleep suits thing. I was seriously upset when my son had to start wearing 'proper' clothes! We had bought jeans and things for him too when he was little, he wriggled so much we were almost guarenteed nappy failure if he wore them until he was nearly a year.
  Sterilising stuff. I spent a fortune on bottles, sterilising equiptment. My son never drank from a bottle with a teat, regardless of what make I tried (having already invested in one brand). He was breast fed and when he went to nursery would only drink when fed from a sippy cup. My advice would be do not buy a huge amount from any one manufacturer. If possible borrow a couple of types from a friend and try them out. Your little one may prefer one to another. Also a microwave steriliser is cheaper and will fit most bottles, so not so big an investment.
  On that subject, breast feeding is very moneysaving if you are happy to and able to. If you want to but experience difficulties La Leche League offer great phone support (I never went to a group, I'm sure they're lovely, but had to ring when I had a problem wiht a blocked duct) and my local health authority ran a breast feeding clinic every day to help. That said I took to it like a duck to water and was very lucky to never have problems, other than the duct.
  You need no where near as many toys and equiptment as you think you do.
  Second hand buggy/pram everytime. I know one girl who ended up buying four buggies as she didn't get on with any of them. New each time. I bought my first pram/buggy from a friend and then a second one from ebay after my back had gone and I needed an easier one to put up/put down as the boy grew. Sold the old one, ended up Ј100 in profit.
• It's a long time my boys were babies (youngest is nearly 6) but the biggest saving I made was by using washable/reusable nappies. I have 3 children and spent about Ј200 in total on nappies for all of them. Compare this to the thousands I would have spent on disposables and it was a huge saving. You can buy them second hand and you can sell them on again when you have finished with them
  Don't forget Freecycle for baby items/clothes/maternity clothes
  Oh and instead of an expensive pram/pushchair you might want to consider baby slings. Find a local SlingMeet in your area to find out more
• I have a 10 month old now and some things I would recomend to buy again others now so.
  I would recomend buying maternity clothes as you need them. and seeing waht in your pre pregnancy wardrobe will fit/be ok early and late pregnancy. I found that lots of cardies especially the ones with long tail fronts were breat as I could wear them with little pregnancy vests (not a lot to buy either) and they are GREAT for covering up with that post pregnancy belly plus when breastfeeding in public. Also don't scrimp on maternity bras (the only non money saving piece of advice I would give).
  Only need about 5-6 vests and babygrows to start with. The shops do not close when you give birth, and people will want to buy nice clothes for baby, the may even ask what you need and saying babygows etc is simple. Plus you don't really know how big baby will be. I bought some newborn stuff which never fitted my daughter.
  To buy a pram etc, go to a local stockist as they may be cheaper (ours in Leith were 10% cheaper than Mothercare for my Oyster travel system including a pram and carseat with isofix base). Consider a sling if you live in an area where buggies are not simple to use (I even like mines for the buses in the city as I am never not allowed on due to space as I would be with the buggy). Never buy a sling from a high street store though, go to someone who will show you a variety of slings. A comfy one can last for ages and although abour Ј70 or so ae very much cheaper than a buggy. I have a Meikaj from a specialist company I found at a baby show, and love it, costing Ј69. I also bought a Ј40 black straps a clips one from Jojo and find it very uncomfortable (although I have friends who love the baby bjorn but I find it can't take babies over 22lbs or so).
  I would buy a tummy tub instead of a baby bath again, can be used as a bucket after baby is done with it.
  I would not buy a moses basket again as I found the cracking noise woke my LO up. I would buy a swinging small crib for beside the bed instead.
  I would advocate using your boobs for milk if they work as that has saved me so much money, and if you are planning on expressing milk to just fork out and buy a medela swing breast pump (I bought a new one for Ј120, but loads of people buy second hand as often only used once) as I bought others first and found them terrible. With bottles buy them one at a time to see what your baby prefers, don't spend loads on expensive bottes to find they don't work with your baby.
  Finally the thing I am most proud of is using reusable nappies. These have saved me SOOOOOO much money. I recon it costs Ј10 a week in disposable nappies, and even though my lady is very big for her age she grew out of her size one nappies ( you can get napies that gorw with baby) at 14 weeks adn it cost us Ј140 for the nappies and all the paraphenalia. The size two's cost us around Ј90 and we are still using them 30 weeks later. I reckon we could have saved even more if we had bought nappies that grow with the baby. They are so easy to wash, and nothing like terry towel nappies my mum used to use. Even she is very impressed. Check then out.
  Hope that helps. Having a baby is more expensive than you think but it is so rewading.
• For pregnancy moneysaving, my ultimate advice is don't waste your money on expensive stretch mark cream. Unfortunately getting stretch marks is entirely genetic therefore if you're going to get them no cream can help! If you get itchy skin rub on olive oil at night which really helps.
  eBay is great for maternity clothes - I buy bundles from people which usually covers you for several eventualities.
• Re-usable nappies worked fantastically well for us, bought second hand off ebay, saved us a fortune compared to disposables, and sold on when we finished with them. As an added bonus our daughter was potty trained well before she was 2 and dry through the night not long after.
• I would second freecycle / freegle. There are often baby / maternity clothes etc as well as equipment, toys etc on ours. Start looking as early as you can and build up a stash of free / cheap things so that when baby arrives you only need to buy the bits you need as you need them.
• For baby equipment, nct nearly new sales have been amazing & I've started to sell items I've now finished with. So much second hand stuff, a fraction of the price & in the main great quality. Also, a lot of items get very little use so see if you can justify the spend.
  Mothercare app currently offers Ј10 off a Ј50 spend, so see if you can get friends & family to get an app and buy on your behalf, 20% saving for each person who wants to help out.
• If you can't handle the idea of re-usable nappies, you can still save money by using washable wipes. They are much easier to get out of the box than disposable wipes, and you usually only need one per nappy change!
  Most cloth nappy websites will stock them.
  Check out group 0+/1 'combination' car seats - they can last from birth until your little one is approx 4 years old. You can't put them on stroller bases like the group 0, but I only did that a handful of times with mine anyway. And don't rush to turn them forward facing either. They don't know any different and are much safer rear facing.
  Join the baby clubs - Bounty, Emma's Diary, Boots, Pampers, Huggies, supermarket clubs, etc. Just don't use your main email address to do it as you will get spam, especially from Emma's Diary. The vouchers and free gifts you can get are worth it though. We ended up with about 4 packs of free newborn nappies, and several packets of wipes, washing powder, cream, even a towel.
  Check out the own brand nappies. We have been using own brand since the free packs ran out, and they have been great. Just as good as the name brands for cheaper.
  HTH
• start adding small things to the shopping trolley, packet of wipes, some baby shampoo.
  I found Argos to be good value - I brought, moses basket, and cot from there,
  Maternity clothes, I didnt really bother, just got a few bigger sizes.
  Agree re the baby grows / vests / there so much easier to change than trying to get jeans etc.
  As others have said try and join all baby clubs - get free samples.
  Nappies - I personally ended up using Huggies I couldn't get on with store brands, but times change,
  When I had DD
  Cot, (sold on)moses basket (kept)new
  Furniture and 1 pram - brought from a friend - resold on when she needed more room
  travel system - brought from another friend
  I had a travel cot for the front room, but that lasted 2 hrs - DD started crying the dog run up to the cot - pawed the net trying to make sure she was ok.
  Shop sales -
  1st Xmas, 1st bday - ur be surpirsed at how many presents turn up
  xx
• I joined Boots parenting club & got a voucher for Ј10 eye test & half price glasses.
  Should have paid Ј230 for the glasses & they were Ј115 - half price on thin lenses as well.