To ask how much a cat costs to keep?

Our cat was pretty cheap until the last couple of years of her life (she lived to a ripe old age) when she got very expensive so make sure you factor in that / save for it.

The last couple of years was prob £50 a month food, £25 a month litter, £150 a month vet meds costs (not covered by insurance) and £40 grooming costs as she stopped grooming herself and got easily matted.

Our orange boy is two and costs are:

Insurance - I think it’s about £15
Food - he has Sheba wet and Royal Canin dry. The RC is about £25 a bag which lasts six weeks or so. He prefers cheap GoCat tbh
Flea and work - £60 every three months via our vet
Annual booster and health check - I think this was £60 this year but it was back in March and I really can’t remember
Litter - averages a bag of catsan a week, around £7

He also gets “snacks” which depend on what we pick up but usually Lick-e-Lix, and he’s currently in thrall to Bonkers chicken lollipops. Loves toys, and has a basket of them.

Our previous lovely girl had much lower running costs - didn’t use the litter tray (this boy comes in to do the toilet and goes back out) and wasn’t fussy about food. We did spend over £3k on tests last year to have her diagnosed with cancer aged ten, then pts, private cremation/urn though. Our insurance were great but it’s worth bearing in mind that you might need to pay upfront and claim back. The excess gets higher (or did in our case) the older the cat is.

We are possibly unusual but both our cats have slept in actual cat beds which get replaced sporadically but don’t cost much. We have three identical furry donut beds in different rooms that he sleeps in, plus a big ugly cat tree in the kitchen with a bed “floor” on it. He does also like his Amazon box on top of the fridge though!

I Have always had rescue Persians. They are very expensive little beasts. My five year olds insurance premi has just skyrocketed by £400 a year. So now £58 a month. Plus £15 for vet plan. She also has a savings Account. Probably £30 a month for food and litter.

Liquivite is good stuff for older cats:

www.liquivite.co.uk/

You can also order it from VioVet and Pet Drugs Online etc.

I’m going to go against the grain, and say that I got a girl as they are much less likely to pee on furniture and carpets etc, as they don’t tend to mark their territory. I spent a fortune on a boy cat trying to both clean and prevent the peeing, which stank and ruined soft furnishings like no other.

The day to day costs are around £100 a month for food-she eats Pets at Home premium wet food and Purina One dry food. I used to give her Felix but she would leave quite a bit of it, and much prefers the nicer stuff. £8 a month cat insurance, £10 cat litter, £45 every three months for the flea and worm stuff that actually works. She recently had an operation that was about £1.6k which I claimed back through the insurance but I had to pay upfront. She’s only about 18 months old but got caught by a car.

Ah thanks for the recommendation, didn't think of that. I wonder if it would be too rich though? Some flavours I've tried even within the same brand she brings back up. She's ended up on a mousse type of feed and can seem to tolerate the tuna fine but kept bringing the chicken flavour up. She's only getting one sachet a day as it's quite expensive and she meows all day for more but happily eats the dry stuff when she realises she isn't getting more wet food. She looks to be filling out around her face, the rest of her needs to catch up haha

Ours is still quite young, so insurance is about £25 plus around £25 a month on food. Add in flea/worming plan, cat litter, plus the odd toy, and it’s probably around £60/month all in. But we could get slightly cheaper food and litter to be honest.

Current cat £20 vet plan, £20 insurance, £30 food and litter. So £70 in a typical month.
£12 per day for a cat visitor when we go on holiday.

Our late elderly cat cost a bit more towards the end of her life as she had a couple of ongoing health conditions and then very expensive investigations (which ultimately led to her being PTS) I reckon we spent £3k on vet bills (she was insured so this was just the excess/ percentage/ excluded items) in 2 years. Hopefully you won't incur these costs or at least not for several years but bear in mind you can never guarantee a long and healthy life.

My lovely late tortie point siamese girl Kona I adopted her from a cats protection shelter. I paid £80 this included her KC papers as she was a pedigree and micro chipping and vaccinations. She had been spayed by her previous owner prior to her going in the shelter.

I bought her sheba cat pate and i paid insurance with animal friends to cover vet bills and a emergency out of hours vet service. So around £16 a week.

Agree black cats are awesome. I don't have black cats now but they are good!
Worth considering cost of wet food particularly if getting a boy because of aforementioned urinary issues and because cats don't generally drink much. Mine do luckily although I also spent a load on a fountain which they approve of but cats get most of their fluid from food so wet food important particularly for boys. That said you can give wet food more cheaply than I do. I pay something like £50 a month for two of them. But they'd be just as happy with tesco/aldi own brand. It's not the same in terms of quality but they would be happy with it and fluid wise I'd guess it's no different. That would be more like £12 a month. Dry food is also cheap. Litter can be cheap, depends on rhe needs of the cat. Toys can definitely be cheap and things like FB marketplace, olio etc are really helpful.

What I pay is what's affordable to me. Plus they have me wrapped around their beautiful little paws. It's more than I'd planned but what they give me is immeasurably more than the financial outlay is worth to me.

Kitten food helped my old boy a lot as it’s high calorie, he developed a love for a food that’s meant for mum and very tiny kittens when he lost his teeth!

No-one’s ever mentioned a microchip fee to me. He was chipped when we brought him home and the breeder transferred it to us, then we changed it at the vet’s when we moved house. He’s 9 now - I didn’t know it was a thing.

Mine is now 12
I don't insure
Flea when I remember
Yearly booster jabs
No boarding costs as she goes to family

She eats Hills 7+ dry food which I usually buy 10kg at a time so works out about £50 a bag but lasts her months. However in her old age she is looking quite thin (age related vet not concerned) so we've now started adding in a wet food. She's always stuck her nose up and refused so seems to be going well. I'm happy to spoil her though as she will be our last and she is quite easy to look after in all honesty.

Mine’s expensive enough. I’m not in the UK so exact costs are not really relevant but taking everything into account: food, flea treatment monthly, worming every three months, annual vet check, cattery whenever we go away (probably twice a year) it all adds up. I looked into the cost of insurance and decided it wasn’t worth it. Have bought some things over the years like a scratching post and a carrier but these are only occasional/one-off costs.

My cat is 5 years old so not really had any major health issues yet like an older cat would. But she had to have surgery once after getting bitten and then it got infected. I also spent a fortune once on different treatments, medications and even a specialist appointment when she had a skin problem, none of it worked and just as I was about to say that I was out of money so we couldn’t try anything else, the problem resolved itself.

In that case can I recommend a black cat? 🐈‍⬛ They are mainly boys and they tend to get overlooked, perhaps because they are harder to photograph. When you live with one you realise how beautiful and unique they all are. I’m smitten 🖤

We have 2 cats - insurance is £150 a year for the pair. Annual vet check up and vaccinations £120 each, food £25 monthly, cat litter £20 monthly.

I was working out how much my elderly little furry freeloader has cost me in her 16 years & it came to around (at least) £16000 in total.

Cat food/treats
Collars/toys
Annual jabs & pet insurance
Incidental vet bills not covered by insurance
Flea treatment
Cattery costs for holidays
(No litter tray costs)

She's worth every penny though 😻

It can vary a lot. Our elderly cat will only eat Katkin food now (and this has completely cured some digestive issues she's had) - £60 a month. She also drinks a lot of cat milk at maybe £5-10/month.

She also has a thyroid disorder, and her twice daily medication costs another £80 a month.

Last year she needed to have a few teeth removed - £800.

Insurance and vet plan - similar to what others posted.

Oh and we have a cat sitter when we go on holiday. £12 per day. We're lucky that we found someone who is comfortable giving the medication, so that's totally worth it.

My current cat, a 5 year old ragdoll's costs are:

£80 for a 10kg bag of Royal Canin Ragdoll food every 6 months or so which is around £14 a month.
£24 for cat litter, you could easily spend less though.
£14 insurance with Animal friends.
A pouch of wet food a day, no idea what that costs as I bulk bought the day before my previous cat died in January and still working through that.
£30 for vet plan which covers vax, flea and worm treatment and all consultations and a yearly blood test.
Treats like lik e lix and dreamies about £5 a month.

My 14 year old cat who died earlier this year cost us a small fortune in vet fees in the last few months of his life.
He developed random breathing problems which meant he had to go into an oxygen cage three times. One time was OOH with a £200 charge. He had various tests but they never found a cause for it.

He then started having seizures, it was suggested he have a £3000 scan at the vet hospital which he never had as even with insurance, I couldn't afford.
He then had urinary problems, and he was back and forwards to the vet before they scanned him and found a mass on his bladder, which is what he died from.

His meds were around £100 a month, luckily all vets visits were covered by the vet plan, he had x rays and scans, loads of urine tests (the urine tests were also covered by the plan).

His insurance was £45 a month, but is he had lived the premium would have went up to £100 a month.

I easily spent over £2500 in the last few months of his life and probably got about half of that back from insurance

It's the vet costs that are the killer. I suggest you get good insurance and a credit cad to cover any emergencies.

Two rescue girls, aged 3

Insurance, Many Pets: £46.50
Vet Plan (flea/parasite drops, 2 check ups and vacs) £35
Soft and Hard food - good quality wet - at least 65% meat or fish and Hills dry food - probably about £110 pcm
Cat lady when we are on hols c6 weeks per year: £50pcm
Dental and misc vet - £25 pcm

£275 pcm for two!

My cats aren’t too costly on a monthly basis but getting the cap flap put in was an initial
cost. Getting an OnlyCat cat flap to stop the mice coming in cost a small fortune (but was necessary). The biggest cost is actually the damage they caused to the carpets and furniture in every part of the house- would cost £1000s to replace.
Still wouldn’t send them back!

Oh and my girl sits on my lap more often than my boy. My boy is super friendly also though but just prefers to lie nearby rather than on me!

If getting a kitten I would recommend two OP. They can play together and I somehow don’t feel it costs twice as much as one! But i know
you are on a budget so might not be feasible.

our girl was 5 months old when we got her and that was a lovely age. Still young and super playful but litter trained and less work than a baby.

I pay around £35 for insurance and to be part of the pet health plan which includes all wormer tea and vaccinations from the vet and two health check ups a year. I then spend around £20 a month on food. Don’t be tempted to get cheap food or cheap flea and wormer stuff as it’s not the best for the cat.