How much disposable income do you have a month (including what you might put aside to save)?

Your disposable income is €1900, not €500

It's your choice to save and invest and it's within your control to spend it (dispose) on anything else, so it's disposable.

I’d say 1.9k spare cash a week is very rich, that’s almost 8k a month spare cash, that’s insane. Obviously the real wealthy people aren’t going to apply to this show so you’ll get the normal rich & that’s what’s being represented. Theres wealth in this world that average joe couldn’t even comprehend but they hide from us normal folk lol. Ultimately having 1.9k a week just to spend on miscellaneous stuff is bloody rich.

I work for myself so it varies every week & month. Some months I have £4k spare cash/fun money, Some months I have £1k spare or I break even & can only cover bills & petrol.

Im not sure tbh
Dh 'gives me 2.5k a month and along with 1.k from me I divide that into our savings, some stocks and shares some instant acess.
The remainder of my wage is just in the joint account and I dont spend that much really. If course dh has access to this account but I cant tell you the last time he used it and wouldn't know how much is in it
I could tell you to the penny everyday! 😆
Dh pays for meals out, puts extra money in for holidays, pays for everyone's phone, pays for my fuel, pays the major bills etc I pick odd bits of groceries up but dh pays for the big shop.
It might sound one sided but I have saved up a couple of hundred thousand for both of us as I am better at savi mng and im not a spend thrift. That said once in a while I'll buy myself a big ticket item and dh isnt bothered.
He likes spending money on cars for fun and I have my hobbies.
We've been together 36 years, although we had some extremely difficult money times about 25 years ago, we have never fallen out over money.
We have no mortgage and no loans.

Take home is €3000
Rent including all utilities and insurances (my half) €600
Join account for food & mic. €500
Investments €400
Savings €1000

So "disposable" income is about €500, I save whatever's left of that. Partner is unemployed right now on about €1600 but he'd usually take home about the same.

No cars, no credit cars, modest holidays. Increased savings lately bigger house deposit. Feel comfortable because not squeezed but probably live too frugally for some.

100

Right! £98.8K a year as disposable income is wealthy to me.

I don't understand people who think that's not an amazing amount of money to do what you like with. 🤔

I agree. They never mention the rich people’s income. They always disclose their company’s turnover, which bears no relation to how much money they make.

The gap between rich and poor is developing. With far fewer in the middle.

What you have left after paying for essentials.

I bet there is a lot of fudging on that show, it’s TV. There’s a reason the definitions organisations who are properly quantifying this stuff use look very different to what you’re stating.

Well for the purposes of the TV show it’s about how easy it is to live on what’s left. Even amongst the ‘rich’ component on the show, some might have 4 DCs in an exclusive private school, some will be childless. Some have 12 holidays, others are more grounded.

But the common denominator is that after their obligations have been met (however extravagant), they all have around £2K a week left.

We have more since we paid off mortgage. We did this end of March so getting used to the extra money has been strange in a good way. We haven't discussed investments but we have good DB pensions and have extra savings pot via self employed work that generates income that we don't spend (except to pay employees and equipment). I have omitted numbers intentionally. Our situation will likely change if DC goes to private secondary. And the family that have £1900 disposable are loaded.

But how can you possibly compare people with those parameters? Gym memberships, Sky subscriptions and the like are entirely discretionary, they can also be cancelled at any time (well ok you might have to wait a year for the contracts!) so you have more purchasing power than someone who has the same disposable income as you, but has fewer bills.

About 5k a month.

Anything that comes out of the bank regularly each month. Council tax, mortgage or rent, insurance, utilities, school fees, car payments, gym, travel pass, subscriptions etc.

Anything that varies week to week comes out of the ‘disposable’ pot - food, fun, clothes, etc.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/uksectoraccounts/articles/understandingrealhouseholddisposableincomeperhead/2025-11-07

it’s about purchasing power, this is why I say it’s a pointless discussion unless it’s defined. It’s why people get pissed off when someone says they’re poor on a £10,000 income because they have a £4,000 mortgage and £3,000 school fees. They’ve made choices. Someone on £1,000 a month has less choice.

People keep saying “bills” but a lot of my bills are discretionary; Sky, school tutors, school clubs, a cleaner. What I deem as necessary will be different to yours.

around 5k between me and dp

It may well be. But when discussing disposable income, I don't think it's what the average person on the street would think that you were referring to.

What bills?

It’s literally the definition the IFS use…

Agreed.

This makes sense because you can exert some sort of control over other expenses- food, hobbies etc.
Not sure if nursery fees to enable working is flexible enough to count as disposable income

I'm forever amazed at how folks get to such earning power, with scarily limited reasoning ability 🤦🏾‍♀️.

Fuck all
Have two teenagers pending university in a year or so which we are trying to see if we can get them through minimum debt/debt free.

So £60k x 2 over 5 years

It’s our privilege to do this but by god it’s costly.

I've never heard that definition in my life. That's simply your post tax income in my book. It's a meaningless term if there is so much confusion about the definition.