It’s been a big week for baby purchases for me, the nesting is real. I’ve been trying really hard to be frugal where I can and also confirm safety and cleanliness across the board. It is so easy to splurge on everything … just search “newborn must-haves” on YouTube and you’ll fall down the rabbit hole of purchase suggestions from lists and lists of vloggers. It’s easy to get sucked into spending on everything and I’ve found that there were a few things I felt strongly about spending full price on and buying new but even more that I felt like I could save on.

5 Big Baby Purchase Splurges

1. New Upgraded Apartment (70% increase) – This was by far our biggest financial splurge once we found out we were pregnant. We’d been living in the same rent-controlled apartment for 7.5 years. Our old place left a lot to be desired but it was working fine for us as a young married couple. But having a baby on the way bumped up the importance of things like central air, in-unit washer/dryer, a dishwasher, second bedroom, parking spot, and safer neighborhood. The increase in our rent was quite drastic in comparison to what we’d been paying. But we recognized the fact that we were making a one-year commitment to this new place while we navigate new parenthood and figure out what’s next. We’ve been using Personal Capital (free expense tracking tool) to track our expenses and save in other areas to justify the increase in this line item. We’ve already gotten so much joy out of our new place and feel incredibly lucky to live there and have so much better of a place to raise our little one. Our families will be able to save money and visit more often to help with care because of the second bedroom. I’ll be safer during pregnancy with the central air in the summer and we will save a lot of time having our own washer, dryer, and dishwasher. Our happiness level has increased exponentially in our new place.
2. New Car Seat + Second Base (~$300) – This is really an item you just can’t skimp on and buy used. Even if someone says it’s a new item, you never know if it’s been in an accident or what the history is and safety in the car has to be a top priority. There are certainly less expensive options than the one we went with but we specifically wanted one that would plug into our stroller and decided this would be a splurge item for us. We also decided to buy a second base since we own two cars for easy installation no matter who was driving. I did make sure that we bought one that will install without a base for travel, just in case.
3. GB Pockit Plus Stroller ($230) – This was another item that I really wanted and try as I might, I just couldn’t find a used one in good condition. This amazing stroller folds up to be able to be carried onto a plane with you and is the ultimate compact travel stroller. Travel is a huge part of our lives and something we really want to do with our little one so this was a splurge item that we really wanted. We were very lucky to get this highly desired item as a gift from my husband’s bosses.
4. Holiday Outfits – Our little guy should be arriving around Halloween and thus we’ll be having our first Thanksgiving and Christmas with him very soon after meeting him. It will also likely be the first time he meets a lot of family and friends. I have spent money on a few little outfits for him for those big moments. I thought baby girls had all the cute clothes but there are some great ones for little boys too. I love the Burt’s Bees Baby line of sleeper PJs and the little top knot hats. I only bought a few of these holiday-specific items but it still felt like a bit of a splurge since so many of the things will only be worn once or twice and even just a few holiday-specific outfits adds up quickly!
5. Modern Baby Furniture – I was so excited about moving into our new place and having a home that we really loved that I felt strongly about buying nice-looking baby items. I quickly realized that you will pay a premium to have things made out of good materials vs. plastic. We did a lot of second-hand shopping (see the saving section below) but we also bought a few items new and spent more on them so that they would fit our home design. An easy example is that we put a more expensive high chair on our registry that very well matched the dining chairs that we “adults” use.

5 Big Baby Purchase Saves

1. Halo Bassinest (typical: $259, my used price find: $80) – we have the huge advantage of living in a major city and my apartment is very close to very affluent neighborhoods. The Halo Bassinest was high up on my list of desires but I just couldn’t justify the ~$300 price tag to buy it new. I quickly found that many people were selling them second hand on craigslist and there were a lot of listings for people that had barely used theirs. I watched the listings for several weeks, most of them had been used for a few months and were $100 – $150, but my husband found one that had been used for a few nights (before the couple was gifted a Snoo) and listed it for $80. We jumped on it and were thrilled with the price and are fairly confident that we’ll be able to re-sell it at the $100 price once our little guy gets too big for it. It’s an item that you only use for the first few months anyway and even though the mattress is spot clean only, you can buy a replacement mattress or use a combo of new sheets and a waterproof mattress pad which is the route I decided to go down.
2. Crib, Dresser & Changing Table (typical: ~$1000, my used price find: $170) – I decided to buy these items used as well and found a great deal on craigslist for used items. We washed and sanitized the whole thing and then bought a new mattress and sheets set. One unexpected cost here was that we ended up needing to rent a U-Haul truck to bring it home because the items were too big for our small cars. It was lovely though to not have to put the furniture together and I saw it as a huge advantage that we didn’t have to spend all that assembly time.
3. Hand-me-down Clothes (typical $xxxx, our price: FREE!) – we have the huge advantage of being exactly 6 months behind Laura on the baby journey and she very generously has gifted us all of Ernie’s clothes as he grows out of them. I also have been wearing a lot of her hand-me-down maternity clothes during pregnancy. We have a storage plan for once my little one is finished with them so that either of us will be able to use for a second kid down the road if we so choose. She received a lot of clothes as hand-me-downs during her own pregnancy so some of these have already had multiple uses. I registered for a few clothing items that were specific things we wanted or specific to the season (see splurges above!) but we were very lucky to not have a crazy large clothes budget for our guy. I am sure he will grow quickly and eliminating this line item for the budget was a huge saver for us!
4. Snuggle Me Organic Infant Lounger (typical $156, our price $60) – this was a would-be-splurge item for us for sure. You do not need an infant lounger and there are certainly knock-off versions and/or cheaper alternatives that you can use for the same purchase. But I’d heard great things about the Dock a Tot (retails for $175) from other mom friends and this was something I really wanted to have. The Snuggle Me and Dock a Tot would have been a big splurge, but I was very lucky to learn that Snuggle Me does a weekly “imperfects” sale on Thursday mornings where they sell their imperfect pillows for just $60 each. These are slightly flawed and/or like-new (professionally cleaned) returns that the company sells directly.
5. FSA Account Purchases – Around this time last year, I wrote a post all about flexible spending accounts and utilizing tax-free money for purchases. At the time, my husband and I were talking about getting pregnant and trying to figure out the health costs we would have ahead of us if we did begin the journey. I could write a whole post about the many ways we used this account to use tax-free dollars to save on pregnancy purchases but I’ll just put the highlights here. We used the funds in my FSA account to cover all of my medical co-pays, reimburse mileage to far away appointments, buy items for getting pregnant (pregnancy tests, ovulation trackers, etc) items for pregnancy (breast pump and breastfeeding supplies, nursing pads, sunscreen, etc) and items for baby (nasal aspirator, thermometer, etc). If you have one of these magical accounts, I highly recommend getting on the phone with the company that facilitates the account to see what’s covered and check out the Amazon FSA store.

What did you spend or save on with your big baby purchases? Let us know in the comments!