Would you class this family as average, comfortable or well off?

[Greyorcream]

Curious what people would class as “well off” these days?

Couple in late 30s with 2 dc (late primary/early secondary age). Not in London.
Partner A earns £52k and Partner B earns £74k. So fairly average wage. Neither majorly stressful roles. Both work full time. Home by 5 each evening. Both can wfh 2 days a week.

Both get annual bonuses of around 8% and usually salary increases of about 4% each year.

Mortgage outstanding is £339k on a house worth around £500k (5-bedroom house).

Pension contributions (employee + employer combined):

• Partner A: 17% (this will be increasing)
• Partner B: 21%

Savings:
usually save a third of income each month.

• £130k joint savings
• £40k saved separately for the dc.

No inheritance or family help received. No loans, car finance, credit card debt or student loans.
No childcare or private school costs.
Lifestyle-wise, usually one big family holiday a year plus a couple of weekends away.

Would you consider this comfortably well off, average, affluent, or something else? Genuinely interested as perceptions seem wildly different depending on area and social circle.

But nobody on here knows who’s around you….

You’d be poor if compared to the people around me. Wealthy if compared to the demographic I grew up with.

Totally subjective.

OP, some of the best advice we ever received was to get income protection insurance, so I'm passing that on to you. While you can cushion it better than most of the population due to your savings, if you don't have it already, you are one serious illness or accident away from losing it all. This is true of everyone. I've seen it happen and a good friend's family was saved when they became permanently ill and had to live off it. They never thought they'd need it.

Yes we have life assurance , income protection, illness protection, mortgage insurance etc. we have everything covered

So do we but you do realise, that by being able to afford all those insurances, you are also very privileged? They are an expensive luxury for many.

Of course I do! I never said I wasn’t lucky at all. Most people with a mortgage will have most of those insurances too. You have to have them.

To my knowledge, most people don't have all those insurances at all. Most have some life insurance (often not enough), most have mortgage insurance. Few have income protection as it's very expensive and they like to eat too.

That’s what I said MOST people have MOST of these insurances…. I did not use the word ALL.

When you boil everything down, you are worth £165,500 as an individual.

£500,000 house minus £339,000 mortgage = £161,000

plus £170,000 savings = £331,000

divided by 2 = £165,500

So basically, if you split up tomorrow, after paying for solicitors and conveyancing, you'd have around £150,000 to put towards a new house, and zero savings.

When I read your Op I thought it all sounded very cushty, you have a more expensive house than me, and you have more savings than me. However, if I sold everything, I would have £528,000 - and that's just me. DH would be worth less (the house is mine), however, he has an inheritance in the pipeline of around £2M. But at first glance at your Op, you definitely look to be richer, what with the big house and huge savings.

You don’t NEED all of these. All you strictly need is term insurance to pay off the mortgage if one of you dies.

Still no hint as to where we can get these cushy low status, low stress, high paying jobs?

No…….A LOT above average

I thought the same as I'm going to apply for it 😆

You must know OP that this is very affluent to not have debt other than mortgage and be bringing that kind of money in? You’re either bizarrely looking for attention from people less fortunate or really, really sadly out of touch and not living in the real world.

I would class that as between comfortable and well off and quite typical of where I live, semi rural area in South Yorkshire.

Do most people have other debts apart from mortgage? Is it that common?

They are not average wages!! National average is about £30k to £35k. Also having massive bonuses and savings and huge equity in a house - I'd say comfortably well off!!!!!!!

No you don’t have to have them, and i think the current figure is 7% of working adults have IP (I work in the industry).

I think you are way richer than average, in every sense of the word, not just financially, but you are literally living the dream in terms of work life balance- and you seem happy too- your dad isn’t “financially oriented”, he’s being a dick. You are doing absolutely brilliantly. Don’t listen to him, and shut him down when he brings up these things.

Op why didn’t you just tell your dad he was being rude and you are doing well for yourselves and better than a lot of people. It sounds odd he cannot see you are very fortunate. Most people would love your circumstances. Your dad is stupid.

Affluent.

Is this a case of, as Harry Enfield used to say, "Excuse me, sport. I hope you don't mind me interrupting, but I couldn't help noticing that we appear to be considerably richer than you."?!

Well off.

This is a joke, right? Nothing average about any of this.

I’m amazed someone can be home by 5pm and be on that salary, unless they start really early in the morning

Way way way above average

Fairly average

Start at 8 and finish at 4:30. 39hour week