To think a family can't live on this...

[verydoubtful]

40K? I've done the sums and it just doesn't work. I know it's relative and a lot of families make do with a lot less but I can't see how I can make it work. No car finance in sums and no debt. Just basic expenses.

PS have namechanged for this

What's the point in posting on threads where you don't read the OP fully? They live abroad and are trying to see if it's feasible.

On transport costs, we have the delightful stagecoach bus service which charges £4.60 for a 2mile journey. Our car works out cheaper than using the bus exclusively.

If my children had school dinners, I would still feed them a hot dinner at home.

I suppose a lot are from the south east but really, you must have been outside Surrey at some time?

But that's the point, southerners don't travel much outside the Southeast. My wife is a southerner and before she met me, the furthest north she'd been in England was Oxford. Her dad went all around the world with the Navy but has never vistted northern England. Some of her school friends gave never made it outside the M25.

At first I was incredulous, but she pointed out 'why would you go to Manchester to shop/visit a museum or art gallery when London is on your doorstep. '

I can see her point, but it doesn't half make people insular andi can easily see how they can't imagine how people live outside the south east.

Eye rolls at all the people who live on fifteen pence and their own spit. Of course it's possible to live on that amount, the real question is whether it's worth the adjustment to your life style. Would you live in a two bed flat and manage your shopping budget and have a cheap phone for example? If not, hold out for a job with a better salary or location.

How does living in the SE make people insular? It's just a simple fact that living costs are higher in the SE than some other.counties. I can see from MN that our mortgage is about twice what that of the same house would be up north. So that's maybe getting near 10k a year more. It's not insular to say you.couldn't survive on 20k a year if the same house would require 30k a year to pay the mortgage on.

No, not living in yhe south per se, but never travelling beyond the confines of the M25 and having no interest or or understanding in live beyond it is insular.

The grocery bill is approx £135 a week for 3. I could EASILY spend that if I didn't have to worry about money.
Lovely free range chicken. Venison from Waitrose. organic yogurts, smoked salmon, decent wine.
I think people's perspectives in the UK have been quite skewed from most people having to really scrimp, for years.
Someone upthread thought that only the super rich might spend £60 a month on hair. Well, there are many many people (and not all of them super rich!) who could do that easily, because lets face it, home colouring is never that great.
When I was single and earning a bit, I spent easily £50 a week on eating out. Probably £20 a week on cabs too. I knew many people who might get their hair blow dried professionally every week, which adds up.
Not everyone has had to be ultra frugal, all the time.
I think that many on here have no idea how the other half (the REAL other half, as in Gideon and Co) actually live. Perhaps if you knew the extent of the profligate spending by the real rich you might not think £60 a month on hair, or £600 on groceries so insane!
I think the OP's quandry is about having to go from NOT having to meal plan, and count pennies, to having to do so.
And all the outrage because some posters feel that 40k is a fortune is just silly. It isn't, and if you think it is, then maybe that's why I despair of ever closing the MASSIVE gap between rich and poor in the UK, starting with a living wage. People here just seem to believe it's their lot to not be able to afford the heating bills, and try and make a magical chicken last a week. It IS depressing. I live on fuck all now, but I certainly wouldn't recommend it.
I do agree that quality of life/work life balance has to be factored into the equation though.

I think QuintessentialShadows is correct. We moved back to the UK about 9 years ago now (or rather, I moved back, DP moved here for the first time) and the expense of the UK and comparatively low salaries was a surprise in comparison with the country we moved from - which has a reputation of being expensive!

We could not get cheap car insurance and therefore I had a Ford Ka which cost me £600 per year for third party insurance, I was bringing back considerable savings, but even so, the bank would not allow me to have a debit card for a year due to having no credit history in the UK. Further, salaries have not kept up with cost of living in the time that we have returned so whilst we are not poor by any means, our money does not go nearly as far as it once did.

As far as I can see, this is not about the OP bemoaning how "little" money £40k is, or whether others can live on significantly less, but about expecting a certain quality of life without penny pinching and belt tightening constantly. Many, many people live in this country with significant levels of debt (I believe the average level is £8k per household not including mortgage?) and like it or not, salaries are very low in this country in comparison to cost of living.

Rent 650-750
Electric / gas 120
Water 36
Council tax 120
Home insurance 25
Tv license 13 (146 per year)
Broadband / landline 25
Sky 40. Freeview is fine
Mobile (x2) 40. you can reduce this
Food & other household groceries 600. this seems high
Vehicle insurance 80 (500 per car per year). do you have no claims? It seems VERY high
Petrol 280 (2 tanks of petrol per car per month)
Vehicle tax 22 (2 vehicles)
School lunches 84. make sandwiches?
Sons haircuts 10. buzz cuts at home - free
Husbands haircut 15
Wife's cut & colour 60. student nights are practically free. £720 a year on hair is a bit OTT
Christmas presents 34 (4 people - 100 each). just do the kids
Birthday presents 34 you can reduce this
Dry cleaning 45 (husband suits -3 suits each month). You can buy nice machine wash suits at Marks

Do you have to buy new appliences and furniture when you return to the UK?

If my children had school dinners, I would still feed them a hot dinner at home. But would you pay £80+ a month for school dinners and then feed them a hot meal at home, or would you just send them with sandwiches that would cost a fraction of the price of school meals?

I spend about 400 on groceries a month but that includes nappies for 2 dcs, baby milk and tobacco. I would love to be able to buy nicer groceries and better cuts of meat etc. For someone to be able to live on 70 groceris a MONTH baffles me, what do you wash with and wipe your arse on? And launder your clothes with?!

Canthey if you only have £70 a month then thats what you have to manage with. My budget is £100 a week total for 8 people, and we manage. Yes its tight and we dont eat much meat but we do ok, lots of veg, lorry loads of fruit, etc. Aldi has been a saviour for us, I wouldnt manage without the super six!

We are on a lot less than that and Im booking my fourth holiday for next year on monday so we are going abroad again. We also have sky,the latest phones each, 2/3 meals out a week etc and not a pennys debt.

I feed my eldest a hot meal when he's had hot school dinners, why shouldn't I? I'm not going to make DH, DS2 and I have sandwiches every night nor am I going to the bother of making several meals per day.

Some of these suggestions are seriously depressing.

I live, with my 2 kids, on around £18K a year, and thats INCLUDING HB CB tax credits, etc. and given my child gets DLA, thats high rate tax credits. And yes, we manage OK. Not much left over at the end of the week, lots of reselling stuff on ebay to get money for new presents, but not getting further into debt.
So those who suggest a low income is boosted up to something comparable to even the £26K that has been toted around are very much wrong. I would suspect the biggest proportion of the high figures are to do with housing benefits. I am in a HA home so my HB costs are quite low (around £400pm for a 3 bed house) AND I am in the expensive South East

The poster who spent 70 on groceries per month helpfully broke it down to meat, veg and milk.

So that's breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks, desserts and cleaning/ washing products.

I don't believe anyone lives like this!

Do you have to buy new appliences and furniture when you return to the UK?

That is a good question.

Also then if you move on from your rented accommodation - ( not unusual as 6 month contract norm - even when given longer you can be given just 2 months notice to move) - do you have saving for moving costs and next places month and half deposit and first months rent or if you buy saving for all those additional costs?

I don't know why I clicked this thread as it is exactly what I expected; full of people saying "My DH and our 5 DC comfortably manage on £5 a week, budgeting more than 10p a day for food is excessive..." etc, etc.

I think the OP could clearly manage on 40k..... whether or not it would be the type lifestyle she would want to live is the real question.

I can believe it HeGrewWhiskersOnHisChin - if it a case of having to.

These figures that INCLUDE hb and ctc, are you working them out as if it were pre- tax income?

When I earned 25k I was entitled to approx 80pw tax credits and 33 cb. I also could have got about 70pw hb. That would have brought my income up to the equivalent of earning around 36k (These are very rough estimates).

If you cant afford sky on 40k your doing something wrong practically every council house in the uk has sky for gods sake. I really think your worrying about nothing and nothing wrong with the hair price either on that income.

On transport costs, we have the delightful stagecoach bus service which charges £4.60 for a 2mile journey. Our car works out cheaper than using the bus exclusively.

I think a lot depends on where you're going. If you're talking about a trip to a supermarket with free parking, then yes the car may be cheaper. If you're talking going in to the High Street or somewhere where you'll be paying for parking, then the bus may well be cheaper. It varies according to the destination and purpose (including time period) of travel.

Of course it's possible to live on that amount, the real question is whether it's worth the adjustment to your life style. Would you live in a two bed flat and manage your shopping budget and have a cheap phone for example? If not, hold out for a job with a better salary or location.

Exactly. It's all down to priorities for the OP, IMO. If she's willing to make certain cuts to live in the UK, then she should be fine, provided she makes those cuts. If she isn't, she may need a rethink. Not really rocket science.

I think that title should be "can a family live comfortably on 40k.

Obviously they can live on 40k but some of the budget suggestions on here are quite depressing.