To think I should be able to be a SAHM when dh earns 65k

[wishiwas21again]

How much do other sahm's partner's earn?

Not defensive just suggesting that it can be done in SE on a lower (ahem) wage and saying how we do it. For most people charity shops and dented tins are a step too far but it's what works for each individual family that matters.

Sorry if I have offended anyone

I asked this on an anonymous forum as I know it is personal

I have given up work but I feel guilty. Not sure why really. We cope, we live in Scotland and not in a city. We don't have foreign holidays or lots of clothes.

I am interested in money saving ideas. I know my dh wage is pretty good, I am not moaning about our lifestyle. I was just genuinely interested (and maybe a little bit nosey as well) in what other people live on.

I would like to earn some money. At the moment I am writing a children's book, but of course it may never get published. I am a qualified nurse, any ideas?

Do some nursing shifts?

It's great you're trained and can go back to a profession.

I do sympathise, but really you're in a position many would envy.

Depends on outgoings as others have said and if your DH is ok with being the sole earner.

Also, what kind of job do you do? Can you get back into it after a break if you want? It's not just about affording it now, but also the future. Do you need to consider 2 salaries for school fees, uni etc?

It's a difficult decision and one we are wrestling with atm. Just need to weigh it all up I guess...

Im a SAHM in the SE,we have 3 Dc, we have a 3 bed semi, mortgage is £800 pm, DH owns a brickwork company with his brother he works 8-6 mon-fri.
We manage to live quite comfortably, we holiday each year, have a 5 yo car, go out quite often, but we have no other debts aside from the mortgage.

It is possible, you live to your means.

My DH earns circa £80K and I still need to work albeit part time to cover not our outgoings, but the clubs/activities for the children and a decent family holiday each year. We think these things are important, not all would agree.

I'm a sahm and DH earns 40K. We have a mortgage and run 2 cars......no holidays though or meals out etc.

Sorry, meant to add DH earns approx 50k and I earn 30k part time, so quite a lot to drop if I stay at home. Suppose you need to factor in childcare costs too though.

stop feeling guilty, enjoy being off the treadmill for a while.

I think most people could learn to live on lower salaroes if they have to. A few years ago , i earned much less than i do now and to be honest i find that there is very little difference in the way i live now. When ypou have more money , you just buy more things that you don't really need.
If your dh is working such long hours , at least one of you should be at home with the dc's

I'm not a SAHM (I work part-time), my DH earns more than that - approx double.

I have always worked part-time since the children and I get the distinct impression from DH that he would NOT be happy being the sole breadwinner. We organise our finances around, if we really needed to, being able to survive on my full-time wage (approx £35 - £40K). I like the peace of mind that if pushed we could manage on my full-time wage (DH has been unemployed before), so I consider it essential that I keep myself up-to-date and employed.

Anyway, of course you can manage on £65K a year. We could manage now, with no change in lifestyle on it, but I personally like to pay as much of the mortgage off as possible each month and 'keep my hand in' at work.

I don't want sympathy! I am in a very fortunate position, I know that.

My dh does work long hours. He is out of the house from 7am until 6.30pm mon-fri. Sometimes he has to work later than that. I love being here for the kids and when I did do part time shifts (nights) I was tired.

It would be good to keep my hand in but I am not sure I want to go back to nursing. How could I earn a little bit of money and keep my mind active though?

I think it depends totally on your husband, financially you should be ok but is he happy to be the sole earner.

It is very hard to take a drop. Before I had my baby I was living abroad and on 120k, husband earning about 100. Free accommodation.

Now we're back in the UK both working part-time (husband works two nights) and on a fraction of that. And it's hard. All my savings being used up, constant bills, can't move right now. Had to sell our lovely expensive car just the other week. But still have cheapo holidays in France (well, not that cheap), buy clothes on eBay and just basically stay in all the time. We still eat well and have money for the odd treat.

Thing is, if I upped my days I'd only be spending that money on childcare. I didn't want to do outside childcare if I could help it before pre-school so I just suck it up.

We are doing it on less than that. It is tough, but it is our choice for a few years. Eventually when I do return to work we will really notice the difference and will have holidays etc again!

I do remember when I had lots of disposable it all got frittered away on meals and shoes, holidays and sportsbikes.

Thought you were writing a book.

Two points that haven't been mentioned so far - are you comfortable with your level of savings? And what would you do if something happened to your DH? If you have the sort of job where a 10 year break would not prevent you from working again then that's not a problem, but one of the reasons I kept working (PT) is because my career couldn't survive that kind of break, and I wanted to retain my earning ability just in case the worst happened. To my mind, the combined risks of divorce, physical or mental ill health, death or redundancy were too worrying, I needed to know that if disaster struck I was in a position to increase my hours and support my family. Now I'm paranoid about financial security I know (upbringing) so some other people might be happy to live with those risks or buy insurance perhaps where available.

I think some dh's dont mind being the sole earner. DH never cared what I did (despite his low income) as long as he could go out to work and not be left with the children

That is about what DH earns. We used to live in London and there was no way we could have afforded me not to work, we needed my salary (more than DH's) just for our mortgage and childcare.

We decided it would be better for us if I stopped working. We therefore had to move out of London (DH doesn't need to be in London for his job). We now live in the rural south east, about an hour and a half's commute into London. We have a 4 bed house with a lovely garden and we can afford it on just DH"s salary, just. We will have to make sacrifices but its worth it. Before, we could afford mostly what we wanted in terms of material things but had no time for ourselves at all. I felt I was working ridiculously hard (city lawyer) just to pay for childcare for our children and for a house in an expensive area of the country.

So I definitely think its doable if you choose the right area, for us it was all about mortgage costs really. Also, in terms of the house we are in now, we are lucky that we made some equity on the house we were in which meant we could buy something a bit bigger than we would otherwise have afforded. However, we can still afford a holiday if we are careful and I can afford to buy the DCs what I want to get them for Christmas. I do think we are lucky, but I also definitely think it is possible to be a SAHM on a 65k household income.

Also really agree with MrsVincentPrice. When we moved, I made sure we allowed back enough cash to have a savings pot of 4 months' of DH's salary in case anything happened to his job and I also kept back about the same for emergencies and holidays for 2 years (the time I plan to not work for). My biggest worry was being dependant on one salary and something going wrong. I also did a very detailed careful monthly budget to make sure we definitely could afford it.

Crikey, my ex worked 80 hours a week and earnt 16k - admittedly that was 8 years ago and he had a rubbish business that he was committed to, but at anyone who thinks 65k salary is an average 9 - 5 job!

dh earns alot,even when i did work,45k,my earning were used for holidays etc.
im a sahm now as theres no way he could support me going back to work,taking kids to school etc.

We do it on DH's salary of about £38k. But we do have a relatively small mortgage, around £100k (used to be smaller, but we've just extended it to have a loft conversion). I do think it's possible if you make some sacrifices. We live in an expensive part of the South East, and I still manage to keep my Waitrose habit (my one remaining luxury) and DS1 has two mornings at pre-school. But we haven't had a 'proper' holiday since DS1 was born, and we don't go out much (hard with a 3 year old and a 9 week old anyway ). We do the occasional day trip out with DS1, but we do very few paid-for activities otherwise. It's about adjusting, I think - I earned about £60k before I gave up work 3 years ago, so it was a big change. How long have you been doing it so far OP?

DP earns around half of what the OP's husband does. I gave up a significantly better paid job earlier this year to be a SAHM as we both had SAHMs growing up. However, we have moved out of central London where we were renting just 20 minutes' walk from work and DP now has at least a 4 hour round trip every day, leaving at 6.30 and back at 8pm earliest. He doesn't see DS at all during the week other than asleep in his cot. We are now feeling the effects of my wage missing, but we moved as far out of London as DP could tolerate to commute in order to afford a mortgage that is less than half of our former rent (and we even have an outside washing line, which gives me no end of joy!). We paid off all our debts before moving and are trying to save as much as possible before my SMP runs out, sort of as a trial to make sure we can survive once it's gone.

It involved sitting down one evening with the bank statements and a spreadsheet to see what was going in and coming out - including lump sums like one off insurance payments/road tax through the year (as I will not be stung on the monthly direct debit charges) - and making sure we had sufficient cash flow to afford luxuries like gym membership (though I am starting freelance working from home in the evenings to cover that and other treats).

We wanted to be parents more than anything and made sharp changes in our lives even before the LO arrived to make my being a SAHM a possibility. As DP progresses in his career, things will get easier financially, but he will likely increasingly have to travel for work and work longer hours, a sacrifice which both our dads made when we were growing up, which is why I think we are both so determined that I will SAH until DS is at least at school full time.