to think you cannot possibly support a family on 29K?

[AliceBlackwell]

Please please please tell me I AM being unreasonable! My DH has been offered a wonderful job which he would love to take, but the pay is only 29K. Taking the job would mean leaving London, and while I do appreciate that salaries do drop outside London, I really fear that this is just not enough money to support a family.

Back story: we do not have children yet, plan on TTC in a few months. I am self-employed; when we have a baby I will have to stop work (at least for a few months) and will have no income. We have no savings, having recently finished paying off debt (credit cards, old student loans etc.) and do not own a house. This will mean moving to a new city, renting, trying to save for a mortgage, hopefully starting a family - all on 29K!

I have namechanged to prepare for inevitable flaming. I don't mind being told I am being unreasonable/ridiculous - I hope I am! It just seems such a huge drop from what we are earning now, and believe me, it doesn't feel like we are living the high life.
Please tell me money goes much further outside London, and that it would be possible to have a comfortable life on this money. I didn't grow up in the UK, and have only been living here a couple of years, so don't really have any point of reference apart from London. I know that we haemorrhage money just opening the front door here.

Looking forward to being told IABU.

Surviving on less cash will be good practice for when you have a baby.

if the £29k is gross salary and the £19k is net income then the difference is quite a lot less than £10k

Also, as someone who has recently moved 200-odd miles north, from SW London, I am not convinced that the differences in cost of living are anywhere near what people say. tesco prices are the same. as are electricity/gas/phone bills/petrol. and the housing price gap is nowhere near what it used to be. If you wanted to swap like-for-like - in terms of location as well as house-type you'll not find anywhere near as much difference as people expect between London and Manchester or Sheffield

Can AliceBlackwell give us an update on her fortunes or otherwise then please? This thread was in 'Active' after all.

beer's cheaper though.

Are you aware of how much ctc is indigo? Its not 'hefty' even with 4 kids.

Well we ahve an income of £22,500. We have 2 children. We do rent.

We do get child tax credits, child benefit plus I am on incapacity benefit and DLA at lower rate.

We manage fine. We pay full rent and council tax (though they are evaluating that but we do not expect anything). We pay water rates, tv licence, gas and electric, internet, phone etc.

We still manage to eat well, and live fairly comfortably even managing to save a little. But we also make sure we put a little aside each week for car tax, any car repairs, for anything that breaks in house (ie:washing machine etc)

So I would ahve thought on an income of £29,000 even with a child you should be able to live OK

We do not live in london though which I know is very expensive!

Oh I hadn't noticed that the thread was a year old.

Then again we have had a thread asking why it is so terribly hard to manage on £100K what with the cost of flowers and tithing and all but that was a couple of year ago. One of my favourites

29K sounds like luxury to me. We survived on 8K last year.

We are currently "surviving" but only just on DP's £35,000 a year. This however is in London. Our rent is £1300 a month and we have two preschool aged kids. I am desperate to get a job that fits round them or is at weekends but so far little luck. It is very depressing. just been out round the streets trying to flog Avon. No luck there either.

have only read the OP but we certainly couldn't manage on £29k. Dh and I have a combined oncome of around £65k but tbh it doesn't seem like a great deal. We live in London.

Sorry lunafire but bollocks did you live on 8K.

If you did, then either you didn't access any of the benefits you should have or the whole welfare state has collapsed in the last year.

Nope 8K is what is says on DH's p60 from last year. He has an unbelievably shite job :(

And you get CB, TC and Hb, no?

So you're actual income - not what your DH earns, will be very much more than 8K.

Perfectly possible for 2 of you. Not impossible for 3 or more. Especially if you are going to work as well for at least some of the time.

CB & TC yes, HB no.

...but the OP was talking about 29K salary and not the CB, & TC's they would get on top so wanted to make the point that the salary in question was v liveable.

YANBU

I wouldn't like to try doing what you are doing at all and I live 'Up North' where it is cheaper than parts of the south.

We have two children and we have had hard times with that sort of money coming in and I certainly don't want to go back to it

Ok you will manage because you have to but do you really want to watch every penny you get and just getting by.

I wouldn't choose that sort of life.

The majority of Londons population are on way less than 29k. Some people live on another planet.

And most of those don't " live", they exist in quite deprived poverty and circumstance.

That was the point I was trying to make IndigoJohn albeit not very well!!

We manage on way less than this. IMO, YABU. But there again I suppose it depends what you're used to. We have to economise, yes. But we don't starve and we can afford clothes. This is because DP earns not much more than minimum wage and I am at university, doing something I love, so we are prepared to make the sacrifice so I can do this. I suppose it depends on what's important to you really. And FWIW, I survived as a single person in London on a salary of £18k, again it was doing a job I loved, so even in London I don't see why that could not support a family TBH.

So if you live in London on £29k and under. How much was your house and when did you buy it. Or if you rent how much is the rent?

Dh could work in London if he choose too, but there is no way on this earth that we could afford a property in a semi decent area with good state schools for the dc and he earns well in excess of £29k

*chose to

£29k doesn't really mean alot.....What I mean is of course if you have lowish outgoings and no debt and you aren't on some ridiculous tax code then it is possible to live on this and less. However, what you really should look at is what his net pay after tax and national insurance is, what credits ( if any ) you are entitled to and what your essential outgoings are. One persons £29k can be very different to someone elses.

I agree with Indigo, you have people on here saying they earn a pittance, but ignoring the fact that they're getting benefits of the same amount again.

Ppl should say what their total household income is, otherwise it's not a fair comparison against what people who are earning but not receiving any benefits.