To ask how much savings you have

[mrsshears]

nosey old bag emoction

absolutely nothing. save enough each year to have a weeks holiday (somewhere unluxurious).

DH and I earn about £25k jointly, we save for £100 per month each for house repairs/improvements (and other yearly expenses i.e road tax), xmas and holiday (xmas not extravagant and holiday is always UK and as cheap as I can get it). We've just started saving £200 per month for an emergency fund (now that DS has finished nursery!!) which can then be used to buy another chunk of our shared ownership house if the money hasn't been used.

Currently 'own' 25% of our house (mortgaged) (we did this so we could move into the area we wanted), HA own the remaining 75%. We also have £10k savings but this is only the equity from the last house we sold and will be used to install new bathroom and kitchen etc.

No debt apart from small outstanding amount on credit card. No other debts and I would say we are reasonably frugal but we do have takeaways, go to cinema every so often, have cable tv, nice clothes and shoes for kids etc but no fancy gym memberships, kids clubs/activities, rarely drink, don't smoke, don't spend a lot on xmas and birthdays, don't spend a lot on electrical stuff (tv's, phones, laptops - always cheap/second hand) etc. We are 30 and 37yo.

We're not brilliant at saving, there's always something needed that seems to pop up but we're going to try our best with this as our jobs aren't as secure as they have previously been and it feels good to try have something there for peace of mind even if it's not a lot by most people's standards.

Fuck all.

6 months gross salary

Nothing. We're constantly saving for something specific (house buy, wedding, honeymoon, renovations, baby things) so no 'future' savings pot. We're happy doing the present at the mo.

Fuck me this is a depressing thread - I thought I was quite good at saving. DH is officially Shite At Saving, and has massive debts which I only discovered a couple of years back, so we have spent the last couple of years desperately trying to sort him out, and I was pleased with myself that we have (just this month) started to save £500 a month towards a big project we have in the future. We should finish paying his debts by Feb/Mar next year, then we can start saving more (although I've had to give up my job now we have 3 young DCs).

Our mortgage is also shite - interest only, on something like 90% of the value of the house. :(

Any tips from those of you big savers out there? I am über-careful with our current spending except when Phish Food is on offer and we can't get a better mortgage atm. We don't go on holiday (that is to say, we don't pay to go on holiday (we stay with family elsewhere)), we buy basic range of food, we don't do family outings that cost money, we don't buy clothes unless we're naked, we don't buy other things. We make our own food (not The Good Life stylee, but we bake bread, everything from scratch if cheaper etc).

What else can we do to not spend and therefore be able to save money?

None and the recession put paid to the children's savings account too - another debt to be paid!!!

We have about £500 at the moment, but this is savings to go towards our wedding next year. Previous to arranging the wedding, any savings were spent on reducing any other bills.

We have about £60k, both in our early thirties and joint annual income of around £50. DH gets low basic salary but gets a fairly reasonable bonus twice a year which we use for a big holiday and then save the rest.

Flubba - you are doing better than a lot of people - live your lives a bit eh!? Buy a bit of stuff - something from the finest range

We have about 5k and some string

upahill, sorry to be nosey but why so much cash at home?

We have about 75% of our joint gross income saved in pensions, shares and cash plus a mortgage free home. Dh is very anal about saving.

geekcool - I have a terramundi. You dont have to smash it, just use a dinner/butter knife. Tip it upside down and use the knife to wangle the coins out. I have done this twice without having to smash it.

Ooh, DoMeDon, the Finest Range you say?! Only on birthdays and Christmas

Seriously though, haven't a clue how most people with kids save (we're both teachers and live in London, so maybe that has something to do with it too?)

1.12 in our savings account.

The children have more in savings and bonds than DH and I do.

We had a bit of a safety net then DD2 was born 7.5 years ago and I couldn't return to work as planned due to her medical needs and genetic disorder. We'd bought our house 4 months previously whilst I was pregnant, and whilst not mortgaged to the hilt we'd bought it based on 2 incomes.

Living on 1 income for 4 years was really tough, especially as we needed to do work to the house. We've scraped by for 7.5 years and have never defaulted on the mortgage, but it has been tight and we have no savings and a lot of debt - luckily there is lots of equity in the house which is to be released shortly as we're moving into naval housing to save some money and allow us to save prior to DH leaving the Forces.

About £15k.

About £20 in my penny jar.

It's got 5ps and 10ps and 20ps in it too!

I have £20k.

My job pays peanuts compared to some salaries mentioned on here, but it's a fortune compared to what I grew up with, so I got good at saving quite a bit each month. I earn between £20k and £30k per year, but it varies very much depending on whether I do overtime (I probably won't do much in the way of OT this year, as now have two DCs). I had more, but it's been ploughed into the house, though I will probably save about half this year's salary, so we can try to build up the savings pot again!

DP probably has about the same, but is shit with money, and will readily admit that. Therefore, I am in charge of the finances! He earns more than me, nearer to £40k, but will probably save a similar amount to me, as the mortgage comes out of his salary. Therefore, we have a joint pot of maybe just over £40k. We have a mortgage of about £170k, so I think we're doing okay. :)

Nothing thanks to the recession, burglary, shitty landlords and shitty insurance.

Btw, we are only able to save the way we do because we have no CC costs (GPs falling over themselves to have the horrors, thank the Lord!).

We have about 8 grand in bonds and about 1000 in a separate account. Only reason we have any of this is because dp was made redundant and this was what was left over from his pay out, so we lumped most of it into bonds. If it wasn't for that I think dp has another 2000 squirrelled away in a savings account somewhere.

None, kids have about £1.25 each in their piggy banks.

-£5000. Bugger.

£1k in my savings account. I like to have at least £1000 in there so I have some kind of emergency buffer.

As a proportion of my income I think that is pretty good as my income has only been student loans/bursaries and the odd PT job for the past 4 years now.

no mortgage no debts no savings to speak of [about £5k]