To be absolutely fucking amazed how much money people have?

[HiggsBoson]

I thought we were in a recession.

I thought people were genuinely struggling.

DP and I certainly do as we are on low incomes, but we try to be grateful for what we have.

How is it then, that so many people can afford ipads, clothes from the likes of Joules and Boden, Mercedes and Audis, Hunter wellies for their kids ffs, expensive overseas holidays and huge 10/20/30K weddings?

Honestly I'm quite baffled. Everybody seems to have an ipad - they're £500!!

What's going on?

Yoni will be getting Council Tax Benefit, so she will only have to pay a proportion of her bill (if any). She will also be getting working tax credits, and if she has children, then she will also get child benefit and child tax credit.

I am always gobsmacked by the number of children (pre-teens) who have mobiles that I couldn't afford. They often have parents who claim to be hard up.

We have the gadgets but we economise in lots of other areas. I make my own clothes and those for DD ( clothing costs for DH and DS are negligible). We have an ordinary car and a unit, not a house. We cook at home 95% of the time rather than eating out and we buy a lot of our food in bulk from ethnic grocers rather than from supermarkets which are far more exxy. When we travel overseas, we stay with friends/family. Very few ordinary people have all the nice flashy objects but when you observe the society as a whole, it can seem that way.

As many others have said there are loads of reasons.

We earn more now than we ever have. I don't have a massive mortgage and I hardly ever buy clothes and gadgets. DH and I both have work smart phones (paid for by them) and DH's car is a company car and all his petrol is paid.

My car, I bought with money my mum left me when she died - ditto my expensive pram. My pram was a lot but I was pregnant and had just lost my mum and thought I would buy whatever pram I damn well pleased. As it turns out I have had that one same pram for 2 kids and looking at some threads on here other people buy 4 and more pushchairs! I reckon mine was cheaper in the long run!

I don't claim to be hard up but we are not rolling in money either.

Some of my friends appear 'rich' but I know that they are on interest only mortgages with no back up for paying it off and have many credit cards and loans.

On the whole I just CBA to monitor how others are spending, tbh. We have a lot of family support for our kids. Nothing outlandish, but we are low wage-earners.

My father is nearer to 80 than 70. He flies us out, usually twice a year now but if we asked then however many times as we wished. The journey is easier on us than him now, and he doesn't take cold as well as he did. He wants to enjoy life now, and has the means to do so. He buys our two children lots of gifts, but he had to help us bury one of those grandchildren when they were three, and watch her die. He offers to pay for things for them, activities, and we accept it. He doesn't point score, he says there are no pockets in a shroud, and he would rather we enjoy his means whilst he is here to see it and see his grandchildren every other day on Skype, telling him about Scouts or football or dance.

My mother, who is 72, always says, 'Don't buy me flowers after I am dead. Be my flower now, whilst I am here to see it.' So instead of bought gifts the children make her paintings and drawings or I send her their school photos, all framed, to enjoy. I do the same to FIL and MIL.

Perhaps these people you see have similar parents.

You never know.

Your parents have got it so right, Expat.
I'm glad you've got so much love and support from them.

To me, it is definitely about priorities.

I see lots of clients who claim to be unable to afford basic healthcare for their pets, but then suddenly can afford to get their vaccines etc (£24) because they are going on holiday for 2 weeks (£X??) and putting the dog in kennels (around £200.)

I don't care, is the honest answer. DH works for the armed forces, and hasn't had a pay-rise for 2 years. I started a vet business 2 years ago, and work 6 days a week, 50 weeks a year, and am still taking only a small salary as the business needs time to build.

It's easy to look around at people you know will probably be earning even less, who have flash cars, designer clothes- but none of those things actually matter to me. We don't believe in buying new cars (waste of money, imo) and DH and dad fix the cars we have when there's a problem. I can't be arsed with designer clothes- if you want to pay over the odds for a white t-shirt with some "name" on it, that makes you a muppet in my opinion, but that's your prerogative.

The main spends in our house are mortgage, heating/ electricity and food. I can't do much about the mortgage or the council tax or heating bills, but I do spend money on decent food. We have 3 young children. I am of the opinion (and it IS just my opinion) that they are better served having decent food every day than having expensive clothes, or an ipad. I do shop at my local butchers/ fishmongers, have my veg delivered by a small local firm, because I believe in supporting my local community.

I have noticed our food bills increasing, and I try to be prudent, but I won't compromise on decent food for our kids. They can wear cheap clothes and it won't affect their health/ growth, but crappy food will.

My dad was made redundant in the 90s, and invested the money an got another job. Until then, my parents had no savings, and it was a worrying time. His investments have paid off, and he now has lots of money. But he still drives a Y-reg car, wears clothes from asda. Why- because he doesn't give a shit what other people think of him!

We spend any disposable income on our house, really (we DIY!) because having a nice place to live and decent food is important to us. I don't have an ipad, but I do have a (cheaper) tablet- dad (computer geek) looked into it and found that the specs for the tablet he got me for my 40th were better than those of ipad. I refuse to pay for a "name", but it seems like to many in society that is tantamount. Up to them, of course

I feel a lot of people have these things because they feel it is "expected", and maybe there is an element of appearances. I am not impressed by things at all, and I don't feel any pressure to "keep up". We will get a holiday this year, but its a cheapy, and we'll have a great time and make the best of it if it isn't perfect.

So, OP, ironically we don't have a large disposable income, although we make more than you- we have debts from setting up the business, a mortgage, bills etc. I too sometimes raise an eyebrow at people pleading poverty with designer gear and an i-phone, but hey, that's their call. Happily, I don't want designer gear, an ipad OR an iphone, or even a posh car. I see it as, if I did have lots of money, the only thing I'd want to spend it on is more holidays with the kids, but then I'd have to work more and would be less able to take holidays!!

Maybe everyone HAS won their laptop/ iphone/ipad around here, but all the shops in the high street have gone, and in their place are "we sell gold" "we cash cheques" "we'll lend you money till payday" establishments, which would lkead me to believe that everything is not as rosy as people make out!

My husband's father had only one sibling to survive infancy and childhood out of a total of 5 children. They came from poor stock in the Hutchison area of Edinburgh - his father used to work as a lad pulling horses up Leith Walk with goods and then as a driver. His mother had been a Scottish traveller used to work on farms and became a charwoman, taking the children out of the city in the summer to do agricultural work.

FIL left school at 14 after his father died when he was 13 to work on the docks in Leith, unloading and loading heavy goods from the ships into and out of warehouses. Then he worked as janie for BT. His only sibling, his sister Shelagh, worked as a charwoman all her days till near her death. Her husband worked as doorman at the Old College at Edinburgh University for 25 years, but from the time he was 14 till he was 34 he'd worked the mines in Fife. It was the undoing of him. He died of miner's lung a day before he was 60.

But he had a flat, from his mother, in the Old Town, as his two sisters had gone to Canada in the 60s and fared well and had mostly lost touch.

FIL looked after his sister and when DH was old enough, he did, too.

She left her brother that flat. He sold it, as he owned his own house in Trinity by then.

With some of the proceeds, he bought his son our car, a fully-loaded, diesel, K-reg people carrier he scoured and researched before going up to Coupar Angus to buy for his son. He gave it to him as a gift from his auntie.

I'll never forget it! Both FIL and his wife, a legal secretary, are retired now. They came to stay in a self-catering cottage our friends let out. There was this shiny silver people carrier parked up next to their blue one.

Got in, I put the kettle on. DH never expected anything. FIL was beaming. A friend had come along to drive it through. He said, 'Son, I can't give you a house before I die, but Auntie Shelagh's left you something. The silver outside is yours. Here you go, son,' and gave him the keys.

We sold the car they had given him previously, using the money to pay for the last holiday our daughter was ever to have before her death. It had well over 100,000 miles, but had a Nissan engine.

Still, having the carrier was a boon when our daughter had to be treated so far away.

So now people see a man who works as a mini-bus driver and hotel lackey, in a 'nice' car. Think, 'How does he afford it?'

Why? He knows how it was bought, he takes GREAT care of it and of his licenses.

Why waste your time on such meaningless rubbish? Really? Might be so long as this story behind what you see. And if not, so?

They do, Lady. Both my father's parents lived to 90 and 92, but he is no fool and no one can say my mother is. I have told them both so often, SPEND IT! But they have already locked in care homes if need be, too. The house and its environs were purchased in 1972 for $36,000, a huge sum to him. The land, an acre, is worth is $600,000 now. The house would be razed, to put up what is called a 'McMansion'. They have never borrowed against it. The mortgage was paid in 1997. He always said, 'No property is yours until you hold the deeds. Now, this is mine.'

Today, they are off to Hawaii. Good.

because you only notice when people spend money, not when they don't.

So you'd notice that I do most of my shopping in M&S, and a lot of that on ready meals and salads etc. But you won't notice that I spend next to nothing on alcohol that I don't have a flatscreen telly or a car or that all my electrical appliances are 15 years old. That I buy little in the way of clothes, or that my mortgage is low because I bought 15 years ago just before everything went crazy.

Oh and whoever made the 2nd ? post about having a good job but seeing people in menial jobs with the nerve to have things they don't have, fuck off.

I think a lot of it comes down to perspective, and also you only see one very small snapshot of a person's life. Do you know that the person buying the ipad hasn't been saving up for a year to afford it? Do you know that they didn't get the money for it from someone else as a gift? You can't judge people based on one tiny moment of seeing them across the counter from you in a store.

I've got a "friend" who likes to bemoan the fact that I apparently have a lot more money than her. She was on a single parent pension for 14 years, and then when she chose to go back to work, immediately ordered a new kitchen for her house, bought her kids new computers, phones and ipads, and ordered a brand new $40k (Australian) car, all on credit of course. She's now having to pay back these purchases at a silly interest rate, in addition to her mortgage and things are tough now because she pays two thirds of her wages in debt repayments. Meanwhile, I don't even have a credit card, but when she sees me buying something, she immediately starts on at me for having more money than her. It's actually incredibly draining to be around someone who is so focused on thinking that you have something they don't that I avoid going anywhere with her now.

I saw this ALL THE TIME in Glasgow where a high percentage of the population live in HA/council housing

A high percentage? It's less than in Manchester and Newcastle which are smaller cities! Really tired of the Glasgow bashing by anyone south of the border. Every city - and Glasgow is the the 4th biggest UK city with a strong industrial past which is no more, so therefore has left a legacy - has crap areas. Glasgow's east end is awful, really awful - that is why the rest of Glasgow doesn't go there! God, these comments wind me up. I'm just so tired of ignorant attitudes bashing my lovely home.

My friend lives in Glasgow. She used to work. Now her son has autism and her little girl is life-limited. Despite care in the US, there is no cure for her girl's cancer. She is life-limited. There is no known cure for her brain cancer and no one known to be cured.

Want to swap? I would not, for all the housing association homes in E. Glasgow and parties and what have you before she dies of brain cancer before her mother's eyes. There is no cure.

I wish her all the takeaways in the world. If I could buy them for her, I would. All I can buy her is a pinata. A crappy pinata, for a girl who will not live to be an adult. Same as my own daughter.

So FFS, I don't give a DAMN what clothes she has, or shoes or takeaways, I just know I'd give a whatever-Euro-mill jackpot for that child or mine not to die. But mine did and so will she.

And I can't and no one can stop that and really, GET SOME PERSPECTIVE.

She has this and I don't . . .

Really, is that what you're about? A sofa, an extension, a house, a car, some holidays and clothes?

Gees, and I thought I was a loser . . .

Lots of reasons

-Low mortgage rates mean many people have more disposable income
-Some people, such as myself find ways of saving money, like always making packed lunches for work, walking rather than driving, eating less meat.

I don't have an iPad though as they are expensive and I don't want to waste the money, plus I'd barely use it...

Momsnetcurtains, I was the one who wrote about HAs in Glasgow and this was my observation after living there for 10 years. I did not live in Newcastle or Manchester. I loved living there but it was an observation based on statistical evidence. At one time Glasgow as a %ge of population had more social housing than anywhere in the UK. There is a long culture of HA provision and intervention; of course it was council housing before GCC sold a lot of its housing stock to the HAs.

I saw and worked with people who were on significantly reduced rent and despite now making 40k pa were still in subsidised housing which means more disposable income. Which was the root of the question. And this is people who lived in the north, the west, the south side not just the east.

Its not a Glasgow bash but my experience of living there. Do you know what being 'chippy' is?

expat

you are right, of course

money or no money, some things cannot be borne

that said, reading MN has givewn me an insight that some people really do exist in grinding poverty, and its tough

fuck the ipads

and my condolances for your loss xxxx

I have an iPad, iPhone etc and got them both through haggling deals with my mobile company!

We are going on a weeks holiday this year but its to a friends villa in Spain so vastly less cost than a normal holiday.

And we have just both changed our cars for 4 year old diesels.

Are we rich? No

But we are v careful

And yes I am buying a £700 buggy for our baby this year but I'm saving for it!

I think its great that people spend their cash on fancy stuff at high prices. Bring it on! It means that when they dump their used stuff on eBay and Gumtree, I get uber-bargains. My big fancy car with 15000 on the clock was £35,000 cheaper than new. £790 saving on my top of the range pushchair- thank you very much. And when I finish with these things, they can be sold on for much the same as I bought them for. We live really well for very little. And my daughter's university fund is growing nicely in the meantime.

This thread really shows how people's priorities can be vastly different, doesn't it?

For example, looking at me wandering around in my tatty, ancient Converse and cheap clothes, you'd think I was poor. And I am.
But if you saw me on the bus playing on my handheld console, you'd think "how the hell did she afford that?". And the answer to that question is that I do not smoke, drink, have Sky TV or a smartphone, go out to eat or go on expensive holidays. All the money I save by not doing those things, I can spend on expensive gadgets because I like them. I used up all of my disposable income until December to get it, admittedly. But for me, it was worth it.

Other people want IPhones. Other people still (like fairydogmother) like to have a brand, good quality buggy. Having one or two expensive things does not a rich person make, though I wish it did

Expat, I love the way you post about your family. Some of your stories are heartbreaking of course, but you are so eloquent and informative. Listening to you I feel like I know your parents, you make them sound so real. I love the way you post, you really bring their history to life.

(Sorry for hijack OP)

The low interest rates has really helped us, we currently pay £700 a month on a £150,000 mortgage (we are about 60% LTV), we paid the same £700 on a 1 bed flat 10 years ago when we rented but we earn a lot more now.

My husband works shifts so we are both able to work almost full time jobs (30 hours) but pay very little childcare.

I now live in area of the country where there is low unemployment.

Saying all that we drive old banger cars because we have always prioritiesed our house, we have gadgets and sky but I have always been a bargain hunter, spend a lot of time ensuring I switch my utilities and shop around. Also use credit cards for cash back.

I think it is all a case of luck and priorities, if I lived in a different area of the country, not had lucky breaks in the housing market and accumulated debt before we would not be in this position.

Can I just point out that Yoni cannot only have £200 a month earnings & get WTC. As a single parent you have to work 16 hours so at a minimum wage of £6 that would be £96 a WEEK!

The posted on £200 a month purely listed their salary, obviously very part time work. On top of that will be tax credits, possible working tax credits (although at £200 it doesnt sound like 16 hours work a week) child maintainance and council tax benefit, free prescriptions etc. They will be netting far more in benefits than their salary so not really a true picture.

People have different incomes, it will always be the case. Some choose to to work few hours or not at all whilst others have both aduts working. Everyone makes their own choices in life.

Spending is also different for everyone, some like the latest gadgets and a new pushchair a month (having once stumbled across the pram threads on here) whilst others prefer to save and overpay on their mortgage or gi away on holiday. Nobody has to justify how they spend their earned salary so who cares if they have an ipad they bought rather than a "gift or competition win".

I wear Principles, Wallis, Boden and Karen Millen to work. How? EBay, second hand, sometimes for pennies.
At home I wear Tu and Florence + Fred!
I am naturally frugal, have zero interest in technology, drink little, cook economically, have a simple low maintenance hairstyle, etc. You might see me at work and think I was fairly well-off but I'm not, not by a long chalk.

We are probably what you would consider "well off", OP, and we are. We take four or five holidays a year (including weekend breaks) and eat out about three times a week. Because of the interest rates, I now pay the same on a 220,000 mortgage as I paid on my first 32,000 mortgage 23 years ago. My DC are both teens, and have decent weekend jobs, so I'm not funding them, and I now work FT.

BUT work is harder than ever. I start early and finish late and bring work home. And DH works away most weeks - getting up at 4am on Monday morning to fly off, then not back till late Friday. We have very little family time when we're all together. That's why planned holidays are important. It lets us catch up and regroup. And we go out for dinner because we're all too knackered to cook or wash up.

From September, we will be paying for one (if not two) lots of university accommodation, so we're making the most of having money while we can.

I will add that we plan a few children (fingers xd!) so the buggy will be reused and reused again.

Everyone is different and has different priorities. I can't afford to get my hair done, buy new clothes or beauty treatment etc whereas some consider those essential.

I choose to spend my money on my horse - every last penny at that!