Do you all have few month of salary for savings ?

[Gibraltarlady]

I’m on group on Facebook similar to money savings expert. The subject of one thread how many months of salary it is essential to have aside. I have 1500 to my name aside. I try to save but it’s hard being self-employed. I’m feeling completely irrelevant! One guy even say it’s important to aim for 12 months combined salaries in you are married !

I don't really buy into the whole have 6/12 months salary saved as a rule to live by and don't think people should beat themselves up about it if they haven't.

Besides the obvious fact that some people's earnings only cover the necessities and there isn't anything left to save, your life stage has a bearing.

If you're at an earlyish point in your working life and paying a mortgage and childcare costs then there often isn't a lot leftover, at least not enough to have that kind of cushion. There certainly wasn't for us but with both dc now in school and only needing childcare for about 12 hours a week, plus our earnings have increased over time, yes now we have a decent sum in savings. It's not 6/12 months joint salary mind but with some belt tightening it would cover our mortgage, bills, food etc for probably a year.

I've got about 5 months' salary equivalent. I'm self-employed, so sometimes I have a good month and have plenty to put away, other times I don't get enough in to pay the nursery bill, even if I've done lots of work. I collect all the money into one account, pay myself a set amount into my main current account each month, put some aside for tax, and if there's any left over it gets split between the savings account and the tax account. I'm always covered then for a bad month, and have the security of knowing that if disaster struck and I couldn't work, I've got a few months' grace to come up with a new plan.

Nope.

We bounce in and out of the over draft facility each month either side of payday and have zero savings whatsoever.

I'm the main bread winner and if I lost my job we'd be sunk.

My only reassurance is that I have a 3 month notice period and work in an industry where it is fairly easy to find alternative employment.

If I couldn't work through health reasons we'd have to sell the house and use the equity to rent/live off until we ran out of cash and fell into a life of benefits/poverty.

We do have savings that could last us over a year but my employer will pay sick pay for two years, and if I get fired I will get 80% of my last salary for up to 14 months, so I don't really need to worry that much.
Also, boiler and car are still under warranty, so no need to worry about those at the moment.

I did have six months' expenses in the bank but spent it on our wedding (£10k), it's being replenished but I do have >£20k in a stocks and shares ISA so no sleepless nights.

Nothing in “savings” because we still have a mortgage. So everything is going into that to get it cleared. After that I’ll save for kids uni, pensions, retirement etc. It’s pointless paying extra debt at 6% when the best return on savings is 3%.