To struggle on this salary?

new bedding £500

You didn’t get that from Tesco I take it?

I don't understand the weird bragging about sitting in a freezing cold house. It's unhealthy and will cause problems that might cost tens of thousands to repair - e.g. damp, woodworm, black mould, wood rot, etc.

We run our heating 24x7 and our actual gas bill is £790 + standing charge of £110. That works out at an average of £66 a month. It's double what we were paying a few years ago, but it's hardly a crippling cost.

My heating system has a cost simulator and I could, apparently, save £18.50 sitting in a home that's only heated to 15°C. Fuck that shit.

People seem to have a weird understanding of how heating works - e.g. only heating a single room. If you do that, you'll turn the internal walls into cold 'outside' walls and lose heat from all sides. You might as well heat the entire house and only lose heat via the external walls. The cost difference will be negligible.

(3 bedroom 1930's semi with double glazing and 10cm loft insulation)

A good life isn’t not being able to put on the heating on in late November while spending £4.99 on Netflix. Even if it’s temporary, it’s a very interesting choice to make!

Now you're being ridiculous OP. Without a degree you'd likely be stuck in an entry level job. Stuck renting because you wouldn't be able to afford to buy. I'm genuinely confused about why you think you're so hard done by - your salary allows to you pay your mortgage and bills, feed and clothe your child, and drive a (presumably) new car. So you have to think about whether you can afford a new coat? So what? We all do that (well, pretty sure most of us do).

I think it really depends on your house/flat etc. Normal house, I'm paying between 360-400+ per month for gas and electricity, family of 5

Yeah I am aware of that. I didn't have central heating for 30 plus years. We had a gas fire. You live in London don't you? I like in the North of England. It is cold up here.

My kids are fine 😂👍🏼 im not the one complaining I’ve got no money 🤷🏽‍♀️ we have a really good life 👌🏼 I’m on maternity leave, this isn’t our normal circumstances and
after realising how easy it is to
keep people warm without using the heating Willy nilly during the cost
of living crisis, now i do that until it’s too cold to do that. It’s not that cold yet 🤷🏽‍♀️😂
we didn’t even have central heating when I was a kid…it’s not the be all and end all you know 🤦🏽‍♀️

@saffy2 I could suggest that if you can't afford heating and keeping your kids warm you shouldn't have had a third child. You chose another child, OP chooses netflix and heating. 🤷 Maybe give it a rest?

I agree with you, your life should be comfortable on the money you’re on. I do not understand at all how you’re not living comfortably on that amount of money per month with the size of household you have. I believe that’s because you’re mismanaging your money, and I’ve made suggestions of how to manage your money better. Because if we were bringing in the money you are, with our 5 person household we would have a lot of spare money. If we were on that money with only 1 adult and 1 child, I’d be very very well off and living very very well.
so I am agreeing with you, you have a high income and a small household, you should be living very comfortably. That’s the entire point I’m making.

No, it just means it fits your needs, and that's okay. Horses for courses and all that, finances are not a one-solution fit all. What works for you or me, or what we feel is morally correct, will be completely different for someone else.

Now, if she said she was making 1900 a month on a single income, yeah, 300 is a lot on a car from that wage.

And yes we got a mortgage, and yes that does mean we live above our means, with one item in our lives. No we couldn’t afford to buy a house outright, and we still wanted to buy a house so we did and got a mortgage. If that makes me a hypocrite for being frugal elsewhere and living within my means elsewhere so be it 😂🤷🏽‍♀️

I agree, on the money she earns she probably thought it wasn’t a high expense. But she can’t live happily, she is struggling, she struggles to pay Netflix which costs a pittance. Therefore £300 isn’t a reasonable expense on her income the way she lives.

Nursery years are do expensive but they soon pass. You need to cut back on heating if you are out at work and DC is at nursery you shouldn't be using £150 a month.

@saffy2

How do you pay your mortgage? And that's me not trying to be a funny arse about it; I could afford to buy a 150k house, but I wouldn't want to live there, so I have a mortgage to cover the rest on the house somewhere I do want to live.

It's horses for courses, £300 pcm for a car on a 45k salary is not high expense.

I've purchased cars outright, lost thousands on them in no time at all, and had cheap bangers for a few hundred quid that I've loved driving more than something 20x the cost. Sometimes it doesn't make financial sense to go and splash 15k on a car when you could keep that money in your bank, earning interest and have a car on 0% over 3 years and still come out the same or better off after 3 years.

Interestingly if your cooker or fridge broke tomorrow or, in our case boiler needed replacing, would you just go without to save it or use finance. We had to use finance to replace the boiler. I have never used car on finance but I don't think it is easy to get out of the agreement? We will need a new second hand car soon We may have to consider paying it by monthly payments. Sometimes it can't be helped.

most cars are leased in one way or another becuase people live beyond their means. I have never leased or bought a car on finance, if I can’t afford to hand over the money for any item I don’t buy it. So I would say that’s a lesson to learn when taking on a leased car or buying a car on finance, that a monthly fee that high is too much
I agree that it’s not easy to get out of immediately, but it is doable. And if I was op it would be first in my list of attempting to decrease that outgoing. By whatever means necessary.

@saffy2 I know there are cheaper cars out there, but it wasn't really aimed at you. Well done buying a decent car for 1k; there are not many about it; this is coming from someone who has taken a 25-year-old, £300 shite box to corporate events when I have a brand new car sitting on the drive.

£300 is an average new car. Also, if you're doing 20k a year, it does start to wear in a car that's 15+ years old, and depending on where she works, an older car may not even be an option; travelling into London on the regular was costing me £28 a day in low emissions and congestion charges.

Just saying swap your car is not that simple. Most cars are now leased in one way or another, and you can't just get out of them on a whim it's not that simple.

Those of us who calculated that you have £1K left over have already accounted for your heating bill and your water bill in that as you mentioned them in your OP. If you are going to count them/pay them twice, then you will feel poor!

When you have a young child and need to pay nursery fees for them, yes, it's expensive. I think most people agree with that. But it isn't for ever and is an excellent opportunity to rethink your priorities and what really makes your life richer now and in the future.

It is true that you have to search and compromise etc. but there’s a whole world of cars between under £1000 and £300 per month. That’s a saving that absolutely could be had if she wanted to free up her situation a little. As could mobile phone, internet, Netflix to the ads version, Disney to the ads version or get a Lloyds account and get it free, shorter showers, less heating (if people really need the heating on, it
could be lower or less time), all of these things could help her situation. Becuse there are lots of savings to be had here, that would help. Because at the end of the day she is on very good money (even in the area I live, south east which is very affluent, it’s good money) and she shouldn’t be struggling so much with such a small family on such good money. Therefore, if she makes small changes she won’t be struggling as much. £300 a month freed up would be absolutely huge for her.

You can't really buy many second hand cars for under a grand anymore unless it is very run down which obviously costs more in repairs.

I’m not saying it gets a fancy car, I’m saying that she should get rid and buy a car outright for a grand for example and then there is no outgoing per month for it. I’ve never had a car on finance because I can’t afford a monthly outgoing like that. I buy the cheapest car available that meets my needs.
my last car was 17 years old…she’s not paying £300 a month for a 17 year old car is she. Which means, she could be saving in that area.

It’s definitely a luxury though…..it has to be one of the first things to go if you are struggling

Some of the responses on this thread are so unkind! The OP is a single parent with a demanding job, she doesn't necessarily have time to sit down and compare her bills every month. Her CMS is pitiful vs her costs. Yes there are always places expenses can be cut but anyone saying you don't need the heating on needs to check themselves. I lived in a flat a couple of years ago that needed fans running in winter because it was so warm, I now live in a house which needs heating from October onwards. The accommodation someone lives in makes a huge difference as to whether heating is needed: if the OP needs heating on, then she needs it on.

Anyone that thinks £300 gets you a fancy car is living on a cloud. £300 pcm gets you an average family car.

£800 child care is brutal, yes i know lots of people pay that much and more but frankly if we had to pay that it would have been pointless my wife working. We're lucky where we have a very accomodating MIL.

And folks not putting their heating on, FFS, is this any way to live? The UK is the sixth largest economy in the world, we should, as a minimum be able to afford to heat our homes.

My Council tax, gas and electric are between 6-700 per month just for those two bills.

OP, no doubt you could save some money, i think a lot of peple can, but dont let people tread you down because they can do it cheaper.