First-year baby costs run $15,000-$20,000 in irregular bursts — Cash Compass turns them into clean categories the chart actually shows.
Apple-native · No bank logins · iCloud sync
Childcare, diapers and feeding, gear, doctor copays, formula, daycare deposits — set them up once and they roll across every month. The Brookings and USDA child-rearing estimates put first-year costs at $15,000-$20,000 for most US families, but the timing is jagged. Voice input handles the $14 pharmacy run and the $1,400 daycare deposit with the same speed.
Hospital bills, pediatrician copays, FSA-eligible items, prescription totals — scan the receipt and the amount, merchant, and date are logged immediately. Premium ($2.99/wk or $29.99/yr) unlocks unlimited scans, which matters because the first 12 months produce more medical paperwork than the previous 5 years combined. CSV export at year-end makes FSA reconciliation a 20-minute task instead of an evening.
Apple Family Sharing on premium covers both parents from one subscription — 5 members total, so grandparents can see select categories if they're contributing too. Each adult logs from their own iPhone, the data syncs through iCloud, and there's no shared bank login involved. The category roll-up shows whose card paid for what without anyone needing to ask.
Voice, photo of a receipt, or 3-tap manual entry — every method takes under 5 seconds.
Cash Compass picks the category automatically. Override once and it learns your pattern.
Weekly chart shows where money went. Adjust caps before the month is over, not after.
Brookings and USDA-based estimates put the first-year cost at roughly $15,000-$20,000 for a middle-income US family, though the spread is wide. The biggest variable is childcare: full-time daycare averages $11,000-$24,000 per year depending on the city, while a stay-at-home parent shifts that cost to lost income instead. Beyond childcare, expect roughly $1,000-$1,500 in one-time gear (crib, stroller, car seat, monitor), $1,200-$2,000 in diapers and feeding supplies, $500-$1,500 in medical copays beyond what insurance covers, and another $1,000-$1,500 in clothing as the baby grows through three sizes. The USDA's full birth-to-17 estimate runs around $310,000 in 2024 dollars — but year one is front-loaded with gear and back-loaded with daycare.
Ideally during pregnancy, around month 4-5 when you have a sense of insurance coverage and timeline. The first major spending wave hits in the third trimester (gear, hospital pre-pay, nursery setup) and you want categories in place before the receipts start arriving. The second wave is the hospital bill, which typically lands 30-60 days after delivery — start a 'medical pending' category to hold the expected amount even before the bill arrives, so it doesn't surprise you. The third wave is daycare or childcare, which usually starts 8-16 weeks postpartum and becomes the dominant line item from month 4 onward. Setting up categories early makes it obvious where parental leave income, FSA funds, and Dependent Care benefits should flow.
Most US households see income drop during parental leave even when employers pay some portion. Federal FMLA is unpaid; state programs vary (California, Washington, and a handful of others pay 60-90% of wages for 6-12 weeks). The honest budgeting move is to plan for the leave gap before the baby arrives: total expected income for the leave period, minus expected expenses, equals the savings buffer you need by month 8 of pregnancy. Use Cash Compass to build a 'leave fund' category and transfer to it monthly. Coming back to work doesn't mean income recovers immediately either — daycare often costs 50-80% of one parent's take-home pay, which is when families re-evaluate whether two incomes makes sense versus one income with one full-time caregiver.
Five recurring blind spots: 529 plan contributions (start small, even $50/month compounds), increased life and disability insurance premiums (most couples upgrade after a baby — figure $50-$200/month combined), health insurance changes (adding a dependent typically raises the premium by 30-100%), photo and milestone spending ($300-$800/year on prints, frames, professional photos), and the slow creep of subscription services (baby tracking apps, music subscriptions, photo storage). None are huge individually, but they reshape the monthly baseline. Adding them as categories from month one makes the recurring cost visible instead of hidden. Also worth tracking: cash gifts received — they often cover specific expenses (gear, college fund) and lose meaning if they merge into general savings.
Built native for iPhone, iPad, and Mac with iCloud sync. Works offline.
No bank logins, no Plaid, no data sales. All data lives in your iCloud.
Manual entry, charts, category tracking — all free, forever. Premium is optional.
Voice input for pharmacy runs, receipt scan for medical bills, and shared categories for both parents on one subscription.
Download Cash Compass on the App Store