I think it's all relative to your lifestyle and the things you think are necessary or that you feel like you want to splurge on for your child. No one will twist your arm and make you buy that $10,000 HKD stroller or crib, but some people think that that stuff is important--or it's important to spend a bundle--either for quality or for image.
Personally: We breastfed for 5 months and that was free of charge. We buy our clothes at local shops here in the New Territories--most are factory samples and they are cheap, cheap, cheap (3-5 HKD for Carter's onesies, 35 HKD for a REALLY nice Sunday-going-to-meeting outfit--that sort of thing). Also there is at least one "clothes exchange" it happens twice a year, I believe--once in the Spring and once in the Fall--where mothers bring clothes that their children--birth through teen--outgrow and lay them out and you pick up free clothes for your kids and drop off the ones you don't use. If you're interested, PM me and I'll give you more info. Even those who don't have clothes to donate are always encouraged to come because there is just that much to get rid of--and the quality is quite nice.
For sleeping arrangement--we got our crib for free--and if you look around (Asia Expat Classified Free ads for example) you can often find that stuff--or just ask a friend who might have one. HK homes don't have much storage room so people are often in a hurry to get rid of furniture that isn't being used and is just taking up space.
Our first stroller cost no more than $500 HKD and I just bought a brand new Combi Urban (which I LOVE because the handle is higher which is better for my posture) online at Amazon for about $65 USD ($500 HKD).
Toys--we have great friends who buy our son toys--and he has two sets of grandparents to spoil him so we don't buy toys generally. On our trip to the States I stopped by a posh Good Will and picked up a slew of slightly used toys (Leap Frog, Fisher Price, Little Tikes) for all under $3 USD (batteries included and in full working order!) Also toys are a huge give-away item because they also take up space once the kid as outgrown them. We bought one toy for our son which was a combo lay-sit-stand toy that he still plays with and spent probably $250 HKD--we're more into books actually--and those are relatively inexpensive to come by as well (especially if you buy them used!)
For food--once we started our son on formula we spent about $300-450 HKD/month but that was only probably for about 3 months before he started consuming a lot more solid food. Now we fork out a pretty penny to feed him the type of milk we want but it's one of those splurge items we want to have for him.
I buy a bit of jarred food for when we're traveling for convenience which runs me about $14 HKD/jar but mostly we cook our son's food at home so his eating costs are totally absorbed in our normal family food budget--he doesn't eat as much as an adult, of course. (But, watch out--if you get a boy you have their teen years to look forward to and my brother literally could eat us out of house and home when he went through those! Not to mention his growth spurts which still continue into his 20s--where he would up a shoe size every few months!)
I would say the most expensive part of having a baby is the pre-natal and hospital costs. If you can go with the public system in HK, that's a way to lower the hospital and doctor costs but if you really want to give birth in a private hospital for the comfort and flexibility then you will have to pay for that--around $7,000 USD at least--if you have great insurance that covers it then it's no sweat.
Then you have to concern yourself with the child's education costs. Do you want him to be in a specific school in HK? International school? Private kindergarten? If so, you will also have to pay more--and the government doesn't pick up the bill generally so this will rest with you. Do you want to help pay to send your child to university? That can be a major expense later. All questions you have to ask yourself.
Later when your child needs to go to the doctor that's another concern--adding him/her to your insurance.
So, it's the little things. For example, I had bad teeth and had to have braces or risk looking like a Werewolf--so did my sister--so my parents sacrificed a lot to get this expensive thing done for us. They could have just left it as it was but it was important to them to give us a good smile--especially important to my dad who grew up suffering from speech impairment because of bad teeth until he finally was able to have them fixed.
Here is a neat tool:
Cost of Raising Your Child
According to this (I put Northeast for location) it's going to cost me over $204,000 to raise my child from 0-18 years. I've read estimates that it costs anywhere from $500,000-$1 million in the western world to raise a child on average. It is a pricey investment but probably most parents would say it's worth it.
