Would you consider this to be a small or big amount of disposable income?

[happyfeet5]

£850 per full time working adult left over after all bills have been paid and food shopping has been accounted for.

NOT including saving, savings need to be deducted from this.

Trying to work out if we can afford to take out finance and have no goalpost to go by as to how much most people have left over!

Grateful for thoughts and nobody is obliged to answer, know it’s a sensitive q hence the name change as outing.

What are you proposing to finance? What will the repayments be (and can the interest rate change?)

Then take that off the disposable income.

Then knock off about 5% as an cushion against inflation.

How much do you want for savings? (Pension already allowed for?) And for things like holiday fund and spreading the cost of Christmas.

Now what's left?

I would consider that a fairy large amount!

So you have £850 each left per month so £1700 (assuming there's 2 of you) and you're asking if that's a small or large amount of disposable income?

I have about £50 so yeah, that's a large amount

That’s absolutely shitloads

How is that outing?!

Wow, that’s loads!

@RoseAndRose car finance. Never even thought about Christmas I usually just deal with it when it gets to that time of year. Probably cuts it down to about £400pp with all those things factored in.

Well it’s not bad, but if you aren’t including savings then you need to build that up - a years expenses, plus a rainy day fund for the washing machine breaking. Plus Christmas and holiday savings. So work out what you need for that.

@Luredbyapomegranate yeah, we’ve had lots of house related costs over the past year so have nowhere near worth a year’s worth of expenses. That’s definitely the priority. Saving probably takes at least half of it per person just for those simple things. Thank you!

Save the 1700 for a few months and you'll have plenty without finance.
Why would you take out a loan if you could save & buy outright?

If you desperately need a car, get a cheaper one for a few months while you save for a better one.

Thanks all. Did not mean to be bad taste, I can see why it would come across that way. Reading some of these comments I can see there is a lot I have not factored in, therefore the amount is a lot lower.

Depends what you mean by bills really. It certainly means not living hand to mouth by any stretch of the imagination but does bills mean gas and electric or does it also include thinking how much does home and contents insurance cost annually and have you divided that cost by 12 and put money aside each month? Ditto car insurance and average cost of MOT and service. Then as you say savings are not taken into account so how much would you save monthly into a car replacement fund, holiday fund (how much do you spend annually on a holiday divided by 12). Realistically there won't be a huge amount left.

Of course you may have included insurance and car etc within your bills in which case it is a bet comfortable sum and you could easily save several hundred and still have plenty to spend on social life and clothes. If I had that left over after all bills (and I mean all) then I would have around £200 a month going in to the account that does the kids clothes, birthdays and Christmas (sounds like a lot bit there are 3 of them and when their feet grow......) £100 a month into my clothes, social life and book buying fund (because I apparently don't have a social life other than book buying) and the remainder in a general savings pot.

It depends on your lifestyle and expectations. Husband is paid every 4 weeks and I’m not able to work again until Jan. Every 4 weeks we have the following standing orders and we always feel poor, esp with what we save;

Keepy back £400 for 2 people
SIPP Pension £100 - min amount for me until our daughter starts nursery in Jan
£80 Christmas
£185 Car account
£325 Everday savings
£165 holiday fund
£400 childcare

We do have a little girl that’s constantly growing, shes only and is in age 5 clothes already!

I work it out like a profit and loss statement.

All income
Less fixed outgoings (mortgage, utilities, tv/ broadband, insurance)
Less variable outgoings (groceries, household, fuel, clothing, gifts, entertainment)

= funds left (profit/ loss) this would be available for savings.

Being an accounts nerd means I run our finances like a business and know everything to the penny.

*only 3

I guess it depends if your pensions, and savings have to come from that too. If you take my pension contributions into consideration, I save around £800 a month, so it wouldn't leave me with much to spend on holidays etc

Depends on expectations and what it has to cover. Some people can spend hundreds of pounds a month on food and drink out of the house, clothes and beauty treatments, phone contracts, hobbies, etc etc, so you'd need to think about how much you spend on those things and whether you could cut back if necessary.

Also depends on whether there's any slack in your bills/food costs. If you're currently spending £200 pw on food, you could free up some more if you needed, if you're allowing half that or less, probably not.

If you have a mortgage, have you accounted for it going up substantially if you're about to come off a fixed rate?

But it sounds like you've got a few things to take out of the money, so you might want to look at the budget again, to check what you've really got coming in and going out. If you're not desperate to get a new car now, how about trying to live on the new budget for 3 months, to see how it feels before committing?

If you save up the finance payment, you'll know whether or not you can afford it, and build your savings up at the same time.

It's loads.

Its the second thread tonight where someone hasn't a clue about how much is a lot of disposable income.

Its actually disturbing that people don't recognise how much it is.

I believe it's all relative right? We have around £1500, next year should be closer to £2000-£2500 BUT when you take into account savings for a car, going out, holidays, etc... It doesn't stretch that far. People on higher salaries tend to spend more.