Article: How Soccer Bills Devoured Family's Budget

A pretty interesting article especially for families with multiple kids doing this soccer thing:
http://time.com/money/4037391/soccer-bills-college-family-budget/

Keep those grades up, Kids!

OK, I call BS.  If these boys are so competitive and passionate, what are they doing in $100 soccer cleats?  Also, 4 kids and $675 in total club dues? This sounds like rec soccer to me!

That was 675 pwr month

Blank77 wrote:OK, I call BS.  If these boys are so competitive and passionate, what are they doing in $100 soccer cleats?  Also, 4 kids and $675 in total  club dues?  This sounds like rec soccer to me!

I only called BS on "the special ball-striking coach who gives all four boys private lessons runs $30 a week ($1,500 a year)."

Marvelousmar wrote:That was 675 pwr month

I know, for 4 kids? Isn't $300 a month normal for a club around here, more if you do ECNL? Unless you go independent and find a volunteer coach, no way to do 4 club kids for $675 a month.

The way I read the article, it's $675 monthly for their oldest kid.  And didn't it all top out at $17,000 annual for the family?  I don't know how some people do it.  The amusing part is that probably is the combined cost of our Premier or ECNL players' dues and incidentals.  Doesn't FC Dallas (and most clubs) double the dues at the Premier level?  So that's $6,000.  Then the out of town tournaments, especially Orlando at Thanksgiving/Christmas.  That will set back a family of 4 (unless 1 parent and the rest of the kids make the sacrifice) at least $5,000 during a very peak time.  You easily hit $15,000 per year. Time for a second job, I guess.

I was thinking they had to put down a deposit first so which would have been half the dues.  However the point that soccer was their 2nd highest expensive.  Might be BS.  ( Food utilities, probably should be higher then the soccer expense)  Average club here is 2600 for the big boys (dues) right.   So they were just referencing dues in the article.  After paying about 1/3 of the dues up front your left with 1733 per kid lets say four kids.  /10.  ( Your third covered 2 months.  695 per month.  Pretty close.  give our take.  BTW I like numbers....


Money Magazine could alter the numbers in many ways. Say they decided to pay the dues for one kid over 4 months. They could say that's what it runs monthly.

It's all how they want to spin it. The truth is somewhere in the article. I started reading it yesterday. I am looking at the left leaning spin on the article. First Obmacare. Now we need Soccercare. . Come on Mr. President.

How much college tuition would they have if they just didn't go the premier club route???

"You don’t quite realize how good they are until you see them play against kids at school." Slap yourself if you think like this.

Wildone wrote:The way I read the article, it's $675 monthly for their oldest kid.  And didn't it all top out at $17,000 annual for the family?  I don't know how some people do it.  The amusing part is that probably is the combined cost of our Premier or ECNL players' dues and incidentals.  Doesn't FC Dallas (and most clubs) double the dues at the Premier level?  So that's $6,000.  Then the out of town tournaments, especially Orlando at Thanksgiving/Christmas.  That will set back a family of 4 (unless 1 parent and the rest of the kids make the sacrifice) at least $5,000 during a very peak time.  You easily hit $15,000 per year.  Time for a second job, I guess.

That must be new.

Used to be if your DD was good enough and they really wanted her it was free. Guess it makes sense for the clubs to double the price for the others so the revenue remains the same.

What can we say? Having kids is expensive. Although a title indicating the family's income is being "devoured" by soccer is ridiculous. I could understand if the topic were medical expenses or housing costs, but youth soccer is a choice. For that matter, the couple in the video didn't really seem to be complaining. It's the lifestyle they have chosen.

Despite all of that, people are all too often foolish with their time and money. I can think of numerous ways to cut the costs, but parents like these probably wouldn't be interested because one of the boys might lose his "competitive edge".

The one subject with which I take issue, however, is that of college savings. Sure, this couple is absolutely clueless if they are even contemplating the likelihood of scholarship money. We all know that. But where is it written that to be a good parent, you have to slave away stockpiling money for your child's college costs? As parents, we all want what's best for our children. But about the time they graduate from high school, they are adults. It doesn't hurt a young person to work their way through college, maybe take 5 years instead of 4, and (heaven forbid) even have to take out a small loan. Welcome to being a grownup. For that matter, the kid might not even go to college... and that could be a very good thing. There are a lot of self-employed plumbers, electricians, and welders out there making loads of money. And don't even get me started with the incomes of many of those in sales or employed as master auto mechanics. Yet the message is always the same: Kids have to go to college if they want to amount to anything. I wish I had a dollar for every miserable VP-of-something I've known, stuck in a corporate cubicle with a framed BBA degree hanging on the wall... only to be downsized when the economy shifts or the company fails to meet its forecasted earnings. I find no fault with this couple not putting money away to cover every expense their little Ronaldo's will incur until they are 22 years old.

2_cents_worth wrote:How much college tuition would they have if they just didn't go the premier club route???

I'm not sure how they could be expected to put away a quarter of a million per kid (for four kids!) for college. It just isn't worth that right now unless you are at the far right of the bell curve academically.
However, I think when you're spending three times as much on soccer ($17,400 in the article) as you are on your retirement ($5,600 in the article) then you're doing something wrong.
I think one of the best things you can do for your kids is save enough for yourself so that they don't have to support you later on. This article counsels them to tap into their home equity and also wait until the father is 60 (when the kids are out of college) to increase his retirement savings. That's some of the worst financial advice I've seen in print.

Why are people surprised at the amount they are spending per year?  There are NTX DDs who individually spending at least about $8-10K of their parents' hard earned money on soccer right now for one year of play and travel.  

No big news here.

TatonkaBurger wrote:Why are people surprised at the amount they are spending per year?  There are NTX DDs who individually spending at least about $8-10K of their parents' hard earned money on soccer right now for one year of play and travel.  

No big news here.

And other than travel expenses, the cost does not vary a great deal between ECNL and D3.

For ECNL, at least parents can convince themselves there is some potential for exposure and some college $.

For other levels it is more about spending on your kids for the experience of the journey, life lessons and fun.

Blank77 wrote:OK, I call BS.  If these boys are so competitive and passionate, what are they doing in $100 soccer cleats?  Also, 4 kids and $675 in total  club dues?  This sounds like rec soccer to me!

because $200-300 cleats don't make you run any faster or dribble any better lol. $675 multiplied by 12 months for soccer dues alone is about right.