Can´t survive on salary without benefits. Doesn´t seem right.

[Fashionesta]

Just wondered if anyone else was in the same boat as feeling a bit miserable. Recently started new job, 31K a year, felt happy with that, potential to grow. Having done all my calculations and bills, if it were not for getting some money towards housing, I would be 300 pounds a month short :(

After pension I get around 1800 per month. Rent is 950 and I have one of the cheaper properties in my area so no ability to find anything cheaper - its me and DD in a 2 bed. No luxuries at all. Basic mobile phone on giff gaff 8 per month, no SKY etc, old car although paying off car loan of 150 month which bumps outgoings up. By the time I have paid all my bills, council tax, loan, after school club for DD and swimming lessons for her which I feel is essential, if it weren´t for the fact that I get some help towards rent, I would be -300 per month.

I generally feel like I earn a decent wage and panicking a bit about the situation. Not asking for a solution really as I think I am quite frugal, also sensible so pay for life insurance, car insurance, pet insurance and house insurance. Pay TV licence and so on. Shop at Tesco.

Anyone else don´t feel like they are getting by on what I actually consider a decent wage (although I realise in MN terms I am probably not earning much at all).'

Argh I just hate feeling poor all the time and I shouldn´t have to rely on benefits when on 31K surely!

No one needs to 'fail' for another to 'succeed

This is the foundation of capitalism though.

I’d agree that it’s far from ideal, but no other system has ever worked.

All those saying they earn less and get no help and rent is the same/ similar , have you looked on the universal credit calculator
To see if entitled
My dh has what I consider a good salary and I lost my job due to covid and after struggling a bit found out we were entitled to some uc , covers couple weeks shopping so helps a lot.
Why shouldn't we claim , I have always paid tax and dh still does and we are entitled until I find another job at least , I don't feel guilty .
Ever since tax credits was introduced top ups have been all that helps people get by.
House prices and rents have gone up massively
20 odd years ago i worked in london on £19000 a year and could rent a 2 bed flat for around £550 a month in area I lived.
That same job pays around 26-30000 a year now and a 2 bed flat would be £1000- £1200 a month so double nearly , yet wages haven't doubled .

You are absolutely right @Fashionesta, it’s not right at all.
I’m sorry that you are struggling.

@GoodnightOwl she said after pension so may pay a large amount into pension

Just to remind anyone, this is NOT about being careful with your money.

OP is earning fairly decent money and feels she should be able to live a fairly decent 2021 life on that money. Her problem is NOTHING to do with her choices, and 100% to do with the fact the labour's share of economic growth over four decades have been stolen by the 1%, or rather conned out of it by lying papers and politicians who deliberately set out to increase inequality with neo-liberalism. Capitalism literally designed to benefit those who need help the least.

[Tony Blair didn't change the system, but he did a much better job of making the country feel richer and better than anyone else since the late 80s - new labour was not the solution, but the tories are the problem]

Since when is rent at £950 a bargain??!!! You need to move to the northern counties, beautiful countryside great cities and far more reasonable rent.

@BrightYellowDaffodils You are hilarious. Why would you rent out your place for more than the mortgage! Because your agent will take 10% plus Vat plus several hundreds of pounds to deal with the paperwork. That’s on top of costs for gas safety certificates, EPCs, electrical installation condition reports, legionella risk assessments, landlords insurance and any repairs, maintenance and void periods.
No, your mortgage company do not tell you what to charge but if they don’t think the rent you can achieve will at least cover 145% of your interest payments at a rate which will be stressed at least +2% of the actual rate they offer you, they know you are likely to make a loss and are therefore not a good credit risk.

Apart from that, you should absolutely be able live on the average wage. The problem with housing supply is largely down to politics.

@sugarlost

Maybe before people are intimate the man has to sign a contract that he will pay for any children that may be produced...he could be microchipped and traced anywhere in the world.....

Well it sounds like we need something like that. Lots of feckless men around and as I said, they bugger off into the sunset but don't get prosecuted for neglect, never mind actually coughing up half the maintenance costs of the kids.

@JediGnot all this happened under labour as well , in fact they created tax credits to top up wages and built hardly any council/ social housing and allowed house prices to soar as well and buy to let mortgages were easier to get.
They are all as bad as one anothwr

As a result it is now possible, as a landlord, to make a pre-tax loss over the year and still owe the government tax!

Which is why I said it's not a level playing field for the young as it was much easier to be a landlord & make money from it in the past although I agree with the tax changes.

The problem is voters voting for the tory party, a party who believe in free markets aka markets where the very richest people and biggest companies can do what they want, make a fortune and even get their staff's wages subsidized by government.

Yep, the rich get richer & the more & more people fall into the poor category.

@felulageller no sorry disagree uc is better as less risk of overpayment and if you get a better job etc you still likely to get help and its adjusted there and then
I ended up with a £1000 overpayment on tax credits as dh got a new job about 5 months after we put on figures , it was a good increase in salary and I advised then before he started , but as its worked out on yearly income they decided we had earned too much for the year already , we didn't know he would get a job earning more and when we had the tax credit top ups we needed the money.
In fact today I have just had a letter from tax credits saying I owe £150 from 2016 they have just noticed
Uc is so much better in my opinion the wait is worse bit but they now offer a loan for that

Many women have children with men they know are useless/feckless/not likely to be around or pay up? Therefore a certain amount of responsibility has to be born by the woman surely?

Many women do know do they?
You honestly think a significant number of women are purposely getting pregnant by someone who they know won't support them? Why would they do that? So they can be "benefit scroungers"? The OP works

All those just blaming the tories
Who introduced tax credits , easy buy to let mortgages freely available , etc
Built hardly any council/ social housing houses in the many years they were in term.
Labour are just as bad thats the problem we are stUck with no one decent to vote for

@XingMing

I think I woud be inclined to ditch the pet insurance, frankly. It is vastly overpriced and in any serious pet health crisis, your best and cheapest decision is PTS. Vet meds are expensive, and while I adore my dog, there's really no way on earth that I would put veterinary care ahead of rent and food for my family, especially if it was a long-drawn-out chronic condition. I would be very hard-hearted about it. But I grew up in the country, and to a degree, you do have to make a choice between the animal's quality of life and what it will cost to provide the quality of life the animal deserves.

You would put your pet to sleep because it's the cheapest option rather than pay for pet insurance ?. Bloody hell this thread is getting worse by the minute. I have had friends whose dog has swallowed a peach stone and had an intestinal obstruction which the insurance paid 4k for but that is not a chronic condition, he recovered and lived another 13 years !!

[quote worriedatthemoment]@felulageller no sorry disagree uc is better as less risk of overpayment and if you get a better job etc you still likely to get help and its adjusted there and then
I ended up with a £1000 overpayment on tax credits as dh got a new job about 5 months after we put on figures , it was a good increase in salary and I advised then before he started , but as its worked out on yearly income they decided we had earned too much for the year already , we didn't know he would get a job earning more and when we had the tax credit top ups we needed the money.
In fact today I have just had a letter from tax credits saying I owe £150 from 2016 they have just noticed
Uc is so much better in my opinion the wait is worse bit but they now offer a loan for that [/quote]
I agree Uc so much better , simpler and on the whole fairer.

@ForensicAccountant

No, your mortgage company do not tell you what to charge but if they don’t think the rent you can achieve will at least cover 145% of your interest payments at a rate which will be stressed at least +2% of the actual rate they offer you, they know you are likely to make a loss and are therefore not a good credit risk.

They literally DO say what I can charge. It says it there, in black and white, that the minimum I can charge in rent is 145% of my mortgage payment. Not 145% of the interest, 145% of the total monthly repayment. I’m not on a buy to let mortgage, I have a residential mortgage because I live in the property, so this provision covers me letting out the property if I was to be elsewhere for some reason. So credit risks don’t come into it because I already have the mortgage.

I would, as it happens, expect to charge slightly more than the mortgage in order to cover insurance, maintenance etc but you are mistaken if you think everyone uses an agent who creams off a fee. Most I’ve ever known use an agent to find a tenant then manage the rest themselves.

So yes, I stand by my statement that for mortgage companies to demand a minimum rent of 145% of the monthly repayment is wrong.

Yep, totally not non-plussed. Faced with a really expensive, no good outcome veterinary issue, I would absolutely PTS. I would be there, and blub my eyes out all the way home too. I have done it; got the T shirt, twice.

[quote worriedatthemoment]@JediGnot all this happened under labour as well , in fact they created tax credits to top up wages and built hardly any council/ social housing and allowed house prices to soar as well and buy to let mortgages were easier to get.
They are all as bad as one anothwr [/quote]
They are not as bad as one another. Blair put loads into renovating hospitals and council homes and schools. And labours share of national income has pretty much fallen since 1980 apart from twice -

(1) Late 80s when neo-liberalism was in relatively early years. Benefits were arising as a result of closure of some inefficient 1970s industry.

(2) Late 90s early 00s under blair

Tories have been consistenly bad at helping ordinary people since the late 1980s. Labour have been in power once and reverse the trend for quite few years.

Obviously a labour government that adopts a progressive, caring, for the people version of capitalism would be MUCH MUCH more beneficial for the UK than a tory-lite blair new labour government. But murdoch and other billionaire press barons won't let their forelock tugging sheep vote for labour, even nor when they're barely a centrist party, let alone a left wing one.

I am so angry and I'm pretty well off - the bottom 66% of the population by income and wealth are much more fucked than me and half of them voted to lose their jobs and get even more screwed via brexit and tories.

That absolutely sucks. I'm so sorry. It's really hard. Having a pet and taking your child for swimming lessons is so NOT a luxury.

@Fashionesta

Yes technically dog, car etc are luxuries. But are we honestly saying that those earning an average UK wage should not be able to have a decent life? Surely there is something wrong with that. I can afford my life

No you cannot afford your life if you are getting top up .

It is the last kind thing you can do for a loved and valued pet.

@Mum2Boys15

That absolutely sucks. I'm so sorry. It's really hard. Having a pet and taking your child for swimming lessons is so NOT a luxury.

@Fashionesta how much would you say it costs to keep your pet a month and how much are the swimming lessons ?

No you cannot afford your life if you are getting top up .

So what do you suggest we do with all those in receipt of top ups @MrsMaizel?

@XingMing

It is the last kind thing you can do for a loved and valued pet.

Yes of course if they are old and suffering but pet insurance covers all sorts of things like your dog having an accident, needing an operation or causing an accident ??

@doomonic

No you cannot afford your life if you are getting top up .

So what do you suggest we do with all those in receipt of top ups @MrsMaizel?

The topic here is this person who has listed her outgoings ( somewhat ) and she does not earn enough to keep a pet and have private swimming lessons for her child without a top up so how can she say she can ? It doesn't make sense .