What would you say roughly was a decent amount to save each month?

[AWiseWomanOnceSaidFuckThisShit]

£50? £500? More less or in between...

10 percent of your net income

I agree, 10%.
Probably rather aspirational for those on minimium wage supporting families. Probably rather easy for the mega earners.

But, if you can't save anything, I started off putting half of any payrise in a savings account. So if a pay rise meant I was £40 a month better off, save £20 and keep £20. It started adding up, especially after a few years.

It totally depends on your income!

I have £1100 spare after bills and mortgage a month and save at least £500 a month.

The answer is going to be completely different for different incomes. And it depends what you're saving for too!

It depends on your circumstances. Some people go by the 50, 30, 20 split - 50% of income on essentials (food, mortgage, bills), 30% on ‘fun’, and 20% on savings (which could be debt repayments if you are in debt).

It's a bit of a how long is a piece of string? question
It depends on income if you earn the minimum wage £50 is great if you earn £50,000 then maybe £500 also depends on whether that salary is supoorting one adult, two adults two adults and three children, where you live etc etc
There is a theory that your income should be 50% on essentials 30% on wants; 20% savings
essentials would be housing basic bills food transport basic clothes
wants includes upgrades to essentials like a bigger house than you need a better car/ phone Waitrose rather than Aldi, more and better clothes than you need; as well as holidays presents eating out clothes sky netflix gym
savings would include pension contributions as well as saving for christmas an emergency fund house deposit etc

Whatever you can afford, it all adds up.

We are under-average earners and save about £200 a month.

If you are eligible for tax credits look at the Help to Save scheme. You can save up to £50 per month for 4 years with a 50% bonus at the 2 and 4 year point.

No one can tell you a figure.

You need to sit down with a pen and paper and work out your income, outgoings and what you have left to save. Then you save it.

I believe if you are in debt it is 50/20/30 so less wants until debt paid off
However I think we have to acknowledge that for minimum wage earners or the unemployed or zero hours with a young family that even 100/0/0 is a struggle and that 90/5/5 might be a bigger achievement

It's impossible to say as everyone has different incomes, cost of basic essentials and priorities for spare money.

Plus different people count what is 'savings' in different ways. Some people might count any money they don't spend in any particular month as 'savings' while others might not count money as savings until it's genuinely spare, ie it won't be needed in the coming weeks/months for Christmas, insurance, car repair/service/MOT or a new washing machine etc.

I've never really thought about percentages, but we save £250 into S&S Isa for long term savings and £300 into premium bonds for short term savings / birthdays / Christmas etc.

If you can save just £10 a month you're doing it right. Some months I can't afford to put anything at all in the savings pot, some months I have to dip into it, some months I can put £500 in it. I aspire to be one of those people who can put away at least £100 every month! So I'd say £100 is the goal.

I would think 10% would be impossible when you are on UC but conversely is far less than I save but I'm in my 50s, on a high income, and in the sweet spot between paying for childcare and paying for Uni, I saved far less when working PT and paying for childcare and suspect I'll save less when I have to pay for the DC at Uni. My savings are 2/3 long term savings (pension and S&S) and 1/3 short term savings (holidays and house).

Obviously your life circumstances are also relevant. If you're a young person who still lives at home, has a decent job and wants to save for a mortgage deposit, you can probably save £1k+ pm and you probably should do so.

If you're 70 years old, own your house outright and have money in the bank, perhaps you should concentrate on spending or giving your money away rather than keeping on saving.

Some people won't be able to afford to save anything, although it's always good to try and save a little bit if you possibly can, hence the existence of schemes like Help to Save which tops small amounts saved by people on certain benefits, to encourage them to save a bit so they can pay for Christmas, a new washing etc without having to borrow money.

Impossible to say as we all differ.

We actually do save 10% at the moment but this is very recent and is more because I'm supposed to be retraining in may and will be a student nurse so will need some savings for when I'm not earning, if we didn't have that coming up would be more like 5%. We never get a big pot of savings mind it seems to hover between £2000-£3000 as things like jobs on the house and cars crop up every now and then and get paid for out of the savings . I think the most we have saved up is about £4000.

Op if you want advice why not give more information as pp said its impossible to say because each person is different!

I save 1.5k a month, but it doesn’t mean you should.

We save 2.5k a month but that's because we have no mortgage or car payments. Our income is approx 6k

Anything is better than nothing, it all adds up.

Saving for what? If you are 21 and trying to buy a house then the answer is "as much as you can". If you are a wealthy pensioner then why save anything, you can't take it with you.

Okay. My current ratio is:

Mortgage and bills (including just over £100 pm overpayment) 37%
Food, household items (fairy liquid, air fresheners etc) and petrol 26%
Savings 26%
Left over 16%

I'm seriously considering going from 5 days per week to 4 (I no longer want to work Fridays). New ratio would be:

Mortgage and bills (still including overpayment) 41%
Food, household, petrol 23%
Savings 17%
Left over 19%

No dependants, just me and I don't live a hugely expensive lifestyle. I know only I can decide how much the extra work / life balance means to me. I love my home and have no intention at the minute of moving for a good while, by which point hopefully my savings and equity will be enough or if not I guess I could always step back up to 5 days. I guess I'm still just a bit nervous of the income drop and want some reassurance that I'm not being financially irresponsible. I'm only late 30s so still young to be dropping days!!

It's something only you can decide. You say you don't live an expensive lifestyle, so you'll know whether you feel happy on what you can spend.

Some people are perfectly content spending little or nothing. Others feel hard done by if they can't go out for cocktails every night in designer gear, have a Range Rover on PCP and travel long haul twice a year.

Don't forget this decision will also impact on your pension and other life changes, eg it might seem unlikely, but are you sure you won't want to have children? There's still time for that.

However due to how tax works and if you save on commuting costs, the drop in income might not be that noticeable. Your breakdown in expenditure makes it look like you are comfortable, easily able to afford the basics, save and have money to live on. And currently you only have to please yourself so are in a good position to drop a day if that's what you want.

Anything saved is good.

Try to avoid any debt.

Slowly increase the savings

Lol. Absolutely no chance of maternal instinct kicking in!

work life balance is important is you can stillafford to save 17% that is fine you will find transport costs might drop but heating from extra day at home might go up, food might come down as can cook more
on the other hand your leisure spending might go up as now effectively a three day weekend on four days pay as opposed to two day weekend on five days pay, you might find that what you do on your day off costs more on the other hand you feel more relaxed and rested so you spend less trying make up for lack of free time
I suspect it will be swings and roundabouts