To think this is classed as being wealthy?

I'd say wealthy is income over 100k

The parents are irrelevant.

so 50k in savings, 75k earnings, and a mortgaged house, which you don’t say how heavy the mortgage is at this point.

for me, no this is not wealthy, and depending on the mortgage size, maybe not even comfortable as they are single.

Her parents wealth is not relevant.

Does she own her £500k home outright?

A 75k salary is very good, but if she has a mortgage and childcare then that would take a big chunk.

I don't think she's wealthy but may be comfortable depending on outgoings.

I wouldn't call that wealthy. Maybe her parents are I don't know.. but she's not.

Wealth is a term for holding assets.

Salary is not equal to wealth.

You could be earning £150kpa but blow it all on holidays and partying and you'd not be wealthy.

Her parents have absolutely nothing to do with her personal wealth - not sure why you'd throw them into the mix.

If she has 10% of equity in a £500k house, then she's not wealthy.

Her salary puts her in a position where she could become wealthy, if she can get the mortgage paid off, have a good pension, and somehow, also manage to get some investments etc.

I wouldn't consider owning one house outright to be wealthy. Comfortable, more than likely in combination with her excellent salary, but not wealthy in the way most people think of wealth.

I would say wealthy, considering that only 4% of the UK earn of 100k, an income of 75k is definitely above average. Perhaps it should be framed as family wealth, if including the parents homes for holidays.
It's all relative so your friend may feel poor compared to what her lifestyle was like when married but she's definitely not not wealthy 🙈

Privileged and probably comfortable but not what I’d call wealthy.

Comfortable yes but not wealthy. Also their parents wealth is not their wealth.

Comfortable not wealthy.

No, not wealthy as we don’t know how bug the mortgage is. If you have a £425K mortgage on a £75K salary there won’t be enough left over each month to be considered wealthy. What other family members have is irrelevant.

No. Wealthy is when you have enough assets for multiple generations after you not to worry about money. i e. Richi Sunak, the Kardashians, Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezzos.

"Your example is doing fine and pretty average for a taxpayer in a professional job "normal" "hard working" person !"

To be frank, I find this sort of response quite ridiculous.

For a woman to be earning £75k is not in any way at all "pretty average" or "normal" - and the implication that anybody who doesn't earn that much is not a "hard working" person ! is really quite goady.

Statistics from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that a woman earning £75k outside of London is at the 97th percentile of female full-time employees.

What that means is that she earns more than 97% of all female full-time employees.

For those working in London, the figures are obviously a bit different. In London she would only (only?) be at the 90th percentile - so she earns more than 90% of all female full-time employees in London.

There is a rather sharp divide between private and public employees in London. Is she worked in the public/non-profit sector then £75k would put her at around the 96th percentile but in the private sector she would be at around the 88th percentile.

So here is a woman who, by any measure, is one of the top earning women in this country.

Although, of course, income isn't a measure of "wealth" as such. The ONS did a survey back in 2020 (so figures will have increased somewhat since then with rising house prices) and found that the median net wealth of a household in the UK in 2020 was £302,500.

It varied by region, the highest was the South East at £503k and the lowest median net wealth was in the North East at £168k.

So where do you put the cut off as to what is counted as "wealthy"? Who knows? The top 20% of households? The top 10% of households?

Well, here is the information by percentiles (I've included every 5th one). Pick a percentile that feels right for you.

Household net total wealth by percentile, UK 2020

1st - minus £1,700 (yes, it's a negative figure)
5th - £6,700
10th - £15,400
15th - £27,200
20th - £44,700
25th - £71,000
30th - £107,200
35th - £146,400
40th - £193,800
45th - £246,600
50th - £302,500
55th - £366,300
60th - £436,100
65th - £519,000
70th - £617,900
75th - £733,800
80th - £895,000
85th - £1,105,900
90th - £1,413,700
95th - £1,988,500
96th - £2,197,500
97th - £2,469,200
98th - £2,862,800
99th - £3,668,200

Parental income or assets don’t count.

I’d say comfortable but not wealthy. If the job was lost they could quickly go to uncomfortable.

Not sure what patents wealth has to do with it.
Income £75k and a mortgaged £500k house is not wealthy. It's comfortable depending on the size of the mortgage.

Wealthy in my view.

Definitely wouldn't put someone with a house worth £500,000 in the category of wealthy, and most definitely not if the house is mortgaged.

I suppose it depends on the area but where I live SE £500,000 is a pretty average price for a pretty average family home.

£75k is a decent income, but again it's nowhere near wealthy. And the same for the £50 savings, it a nice amount but far from an indication of wealth.

And as pps have said, what her parents own is irrelevant.

No I wouldn’t say that was wealthy. Obviously not poor either but I imagine your friends are exaggerating to convey the change in her situation. You're taking it far too personally.

There's huge variation in this country. Many people living like you and many living like your friend. I'd say they're very comfortably off. A lot depends on their outgoings, size of mortgage etc but they have very healthy savings.

Comfortable, definitely.
Affluent, possibly.

Id say you are more typical of households with kids.

I wouldn't put her as wealthy, tho her parents might be getting into that category.

100% no

Parents having four houses doesn’t really impact on their daughters situation, is the wealth isn’t passed on.

If she’s just taken out a big mortgage, then a lot of disposable income will be spent on that, so she must nit feel very wealthy at the moment. I’d say comfortable rather than wealthy.

To me that's comfortable not wealthy. Wealthy means being able to spend money without needing to save up, budget, it's when you book business class flights without a special offer, you need to get on at least double more likely triple that to be properly wealthy.

£60-200k depending on where you are to a certain extent is comfortably off, we are in that category but we can't spend without thinking

You haven't 'been made to feel' anything. It's not about you.

Her circumstances have changed, it's a shock, friends are being supportive. To her.

On MN, you're only wealthy if you're a billionaire and own a few small islands.

Wealth is relative OP, some people having running water and electricity are considered wealthy in some parts of the world. In the UK, I wouldn’t say this is wealth, no, but comfortable.