Do you know why you are struggling

Interesting post.

It sounds like your DIL works about 16hrs a week on the days you provide childcare with a wage like that she would pay no tax or NI and still get her NI stamps from child benefit so essentially they would have just over 800pcm from that alone.

Your sons wage would bring in about 2.2k pcm so together that's 3kpcm

We earn slightly more than that. I work 3 days a week and pay for childcare for those days. Not having 'free' childcare is a big factor in not having more than 1 child for us. We try and put money aside for emergency situations and a holiday (eventually) we have had to cancel the last 2yr of holidays as can't justify the money.

So for us
Mortgage
Childcare
Putting aside for savings and emergencies

I buy 90% of my child's clothes second hand but do admit our grocery shopping could be less but that's another chapter!

You make £13,000 as a GP Receptionist on 10 hours per week?

We were okay a couple of years ago but have gradually been having to watch the pennies more and more. Thee last couple of months we have struggled. All the bills have gone up. Mortgage gone up by over £200. All the insurances (car, house, vet etc.) have gone up. Food costs gone up - now shop in Aldi and Lidl. Nursery costs have gone up. As a couple with one child in a fairly comfortable financial position a couple of years ago we are now keeping an eye on everything. This will be relieved quite a bit when our child starts school in September but until then we will have to be careful.

I'm confused how on 43k income your son and parter gets UC? Social housing makes a huge difference too. In many places private rent is more than twice the amount of social housing. Your family are very fortunate.

Both you and your son are lucky, financially.

You have clearly been able to benefit from times when housing was much cheaper to come by, cheap ineterest rates and rose a lot in value. This now makes you mortgage free, able to release a lot of equity when you downsized. You are also lucky you have a partner.

By contrast, all I could afford was a £160k doer-upper house at nowadays rates, which means decades of paying out more than you probably did for a better quality, larger house, on something basic that is falling apart everywhere, so has associated repair costs. I also don't have a partner to share bills with.

Your son, on the other hand, not only was lucky to have been able to get a HA house (something I was offered 3 months after being made homelsss as a pregnant woman, so I had to find dodgy accommodation elsewhere and was then bound by my rental contract at the time, so had to refuse), but also still have childcare provided for by you 3/5 days a week.

My childcare alone is a significant percentage of my outgoings. I have no family help. I will never inherit.

Therefore, my bills are much larger than both yours and your son's. It doesn't take much of a genius to work out just how lucky you are compared to many, many people out there, which is why some on here have reacted the way they do, because your post can come across as incredibly smug in the process.

Mortgage around £900, nursery £600, debt for car £600... credit card debt £150, gas and electricity £200, council tax £140, water £90, that's all a month... food and entertainment around £500.. our issue we spend everything on the above and whenever something comes up like a boiler that needs fixing or our roof we have to go into credit.. both high earners with no family around to help with childcare or inheritance or anything like that

I’d say at the moment two of our biggest spends is the food shop and fuel. It is never ending! We are a large family of 6 though so I’m aware our outgoings will probably be higher.

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What i used to be able to buy in aldi for £35 is now £60. You do the math.

Perhaps the family making similar money to your son are having to pay childcare for three children and that accounts for the significant hit on their income?

@Georginana I used to be better off but then rent went up, shopping went up, petrol went up and gas and electricity went up. Also spend a lot of money on tyres due to pot holes everywhere

Exactly.
I don’t agree that she’s out of touch and I don’t get why someone would say that to her, unless she had said something insensitive to them.
She and her DH have worked for what they have, they live in a modest home, they are not high earners, they don’t have an extravagant lifestyle. There’s nothing “out of touch” about going on holiday. Millions of people do it every year, including people on very modest incomes.
Some people on the same income as OP and her husband would claim that they struggle, because their expectations are high. The fact that OP can have holidays and has paid off the mortgage doesn’t mean she’s massively privileged.

I struggled alot more when my children were smaller but i always made it work.
But now they have their own lifes i dont struggle as its just me now.

Only time i was struggling was when i had a partner got rid of him no more struggle.

Why am I struggling... It could be because I work 12 hour shifts for a company that is a joke to support my family or it could be any of the below ...

• My 5 year old is autistic and non verbal

• I need a double knee replacement which the NHS have told me they won't do until I'm 60 (I'm 28 currently) and it's £12'000 to get it done privately so I just spend every waking minute in pain and cry myself to sleep multiple nights a week from being in agony

• My rent is going up for the 3rd year in a row, it's impossible to save for a mortgage deposit these days so my family has no hope of ever owning our own home unless a close family member dies

• I have a health condition that there's no cure for so again, constant pain, constant surgeries, constant worry that I could leave my children without a mother

I think that covers it.

We don't struggle but we would on your salary, we take home 60k after tax/NI/Pension/Student loan.

We have an adult daughter at uni, we pay towards - her rents 1025 a month, she gets 800 bursary and we pay the top up, her mobile 50 a month and for all her other costs, so far shes had 320 in the last two weeks for food, travel to placement and socialising. A son whos hobby costs 180 a month, not including fuel to travel the country and pay to get in the games. Another high maintenance teenage daughter.

Having said that we are very fortunate that my mil did a couple of years of childcare and saved us alot of money for those few years. We bought our first house off family member who gifted the equity and this means we now have a low mortgage compared to income. I realise how lucky we are and now have no childcare costs as all older. Childcare is crippling and your son wouldn't necessarily get 85% of the costs on his income.

Your son doesn't need to worry about interest rates rising on his rent compared to a mortgage. He's not got childcare outgoings, he gets top ups of universal credit - which I'm surprised at on a 44k income (we weren't entitled with three children who were all born before the two rule came in) hel get over 200 a month child benefit. Obviously you're older mortgage free, no dependants etc. Peoples lives are just different.

I mean more how does anyone, not necessarily just him. If £34k is an average wage and the adults aren't disabled, why are they entitled to benefits?

Not saying it should be a race to the bottom, just I am on a similar wage to just him and I never conceived that I might be eligible. Why would I be when I am earning a middleish wage? It is a pretty poor reflection on society if average earners can't afford to live without support.

Housing and childcare costs are the two main outgoings for people with younger children. It should be obvious that your son and his wife have lower housing costs (because they are in a HA property) and no childcare costs for their three children (because you provide childcare for three days a week) plus some benefits.

Imagine them paying a higher rent (£1,250 per month for a three bed house where I live) and say £70 per day nursery fees plus wraparound care for the older children (£20 per day each here), then bills and food. Even with benefits, they probably wouldn’t have as much disposable income as they have now.

My mortgage is 2200 (3 bed semi in the south, nothing fancy), childcare (childminder 3.5 days a week) is 350-400 a month ish. That's about what your husband earns before tax.

My mortgage is £1085 a month that I pay on my own.
My son needs tutors for school week for various reasons so that is £140 a week. I don't have childcare.
I'm paying for my other son to have driving lessons.
I owe about £20,000 because of house renovations. I have about £200 thousand pounds equity on my house but still owe £175 thousand on it. So I don't have any spare cash left to buy anything. Things are broken in my house and they just have to stay broken as I can't pay to replace them (broken beyond repair fences) It doesn't bother me as it's not forever and it's my choice to be paying for the things for my sons.
Mortgage free and no child care means you are going to be in a good financial position usually.

How do they get universal credit on a joint wage of £44k?

Housing costs, food and utilities.
These take the majority of income and there's not much left after other bills such as phone, internet, insurance etc.

It's actually sickening how expensive is it live these days

I think we are getting guilty about being OK and not having to worry about everyday purchases.
If not in sackcloth and eating the cheapest possible food - privileged.