To think you are not skint on £70k, even in Central London??

[LottaLou]

Just had a ridiculous conversation with a friend who lives and works in Central London. She is in digital marketing, which is a field where salaries can vary significantly, so until now I had no idea what kind of salary she might be on. She is single and childfree, so no dependants.

She always complains that she does not have enough money to do this and do that, how skint she is at the end of the month, they should pay her more for her job and so on. I usually listen to her and sympathize, as I have had money problems in the past, and I know how tough it can be.

Well today she (accidentally) revealed to me that she is on bloody £70k, which is more than twice my salary!! I am stunned as I genuiney thought she was on some "barely above NMW" money, given how often she complains about being skint!

I love her dearly and I will always be her friend, but AIBU to tell her to STFU the next time she starts complaining about being skint?

Of course you don't need a car in London. But needing and wanting are two very different things.

You can have financial difficulties on any income but it is about your choices in the long term. You can have a bit of bad luck but if you are always struggling to get by on £70k, your outgoings are too high. I would only have so much sympathy.

Then @poobum she would be "skint" because she is living beyond her means, and has made bad, unsustainable decisions about where to live.

If she lives in Kensington in a nice bit then of course she's paying through the nose. That's her first mistake.

For those asking, no I don't have a partner, I rent a flat with one friend and we pay £460 each. My tax code is slightly different because I was self employed for a while. So I put £1000 in savings as soon as I get paid, last month I took home just over £2500 net, paid rent out of the £500 and our gas and electric is on a meter so we top up as and when. That leaves £1000 for food, travel, treats etc - travel roughly £120 a month, £50 a week on food, council tax is quarterly so the rest in whatever I fancy

You're not allowed to moan about money if you've bought a car that you don't need Witty. That's the law.

''I remember when the newspapers revealed that Cherie Blair thought they were skint because they were mixing socially with multi millionaires.

Skint is having to think about whether you can afford to put the heating on, or plan what food you buy from the supermarket.''

This. i remember vanessa feltz when she was married to a surgeon and bringing in a bumper salary back in the 90s doing her show said she and her husband wanted a 3rd child but couldn't afford it....

Council tax in London is lower than many places outside due to the central government subsidiaries London councils got when it replaced poll tax.

The OP's friend might not have a car - that was just my choice. But then, I didn't moan about money, I just spunked it until I grew up.

I still have a fancy car that I don't strictly need, though. it's my vice/weakness/pleasure.

As long as you're not moaning about money spunked then you're all good Witty

A single person in London can live quite well on £70k.

Did she move to London from the regions, by any chance? A lot of people come to London and expect to have a comparable living setup - if not a house, then a nice big flat with at least one spare room. You need to adjust to less space in London - someone who doesn't do that can end up paying a silly amount of rent/mortgage.

Of course, some people are just hopeless with money. Doesn't matter how much they have, they fritter it all away.

Ugh reading through the comments make me wish I could afford to save, run a car, add to a pension pot, go on holidays etc. Of course, even those on a high salary can struggle with money in central London, but as someone who’s never had enough money for much “luxury” spending I wouldn’t have the patience for her complaints. She must be doing very well for herself to be on that salary. That sort of salary gives you options in life, she doesn’t have to live in that area she could commute. She may not want to but then perhaps she should just accept the choices she’s made. Even when I’ve had to make £10 last a week (thank god for tinned food!) I haven’t complained about my finances other than the odd groan.

Single and £70k is a lot of money

Even with London rents

She must have quite a lifestyle to keep up

happypoobum but why would she be renting a property alone that costs £2k a month? There is no need at all for that. That’s comfortably a 2 bed in most parts of Kensington

''Rent in London can easily cost 1.5-2k then you have your travel costs plus everything is more expensive in general so I think yabu''

yes if you live in a 1 bed flat overlooking the Thames, I spent 2 years in London at uni and lived in house shares around 20 minutes on train from central London costing 500 a month inc bills in a nice quiet house. Nobody needs to rent a 1 bed. If you can afford that, you can afford a mortgage.

Maybe you can’t Boiler house. A £2k mortgage payment is a mortgage of about £500k. Add on a 15% deposit and that’s a purchase price of £575k. A person on £70k wouldn’t be able to borrow that much. It’s not that simple.

''If you own outright, living in London is no more expensive than any other uk city''

This. I have always said the same- you can get a much cheaper shop in a city than in a small town too as small towns rarely have Tesco, Aldi etc. Things that bump up costs in London is if you go out at weekends as taxi costs can be high as is costs of alcohol.

Boiler - which is one reason why people pay to live centrally. I often finished work at 3 or 4am, so had to be able to get home reasonably and reasonably quickly. Prob much less of an issue now that you can work from home so easily though - that wasn't an option for me #old

Of course if it's a bar you're finishing in at 3am then living centrally enough for a cheap taxi or nightbus is another first world financial swing/roundabout

Sprinklesinmyelbow Yes but I personally believe paying 2k a month on rent is just ludicrous and such a waste of money. Even if i earned 80k a year i wouldn't be paying that. You can buy a studio flat in canary wharf for 350k. Not saying it is easy but to throw away 2k a month on rent will ensure it is alot harder to save for a mortgage.

Skint is having no money, regardless of what you have spent it on.
70k is 3.5x our household income, but I know of people earning this much who struggle much more than we do.
I know one family with an income 0f 200K who can't afford the 32K school fees, for one child. Obviously they prioritise other things with their money.
It doesn't matter what standard of life/ lifestyle the person has, if you've spent up, you are skint.

SweetSummerchild

''He’s in his mid-forties, and most of his colleagues are in their twenties and thirties.They all moan about how skint they are and how they will never be able to afford to buy a house. On the other hand, they then take the p*ss out of DH for taking his sandwiches into work with him.''

Yes but yo see this is sadly what happens when housing prices become ridiculously overpriced like in London and surrounding counties- people just give up and don't even try to save as they don't see any hope. It's sad really for today's young generation of 20/30 somethings who don't have the chance s to get on the property ladder than the earlier generations had.

@boiler you are right, and I wouldn't live on my own even though I could afford to for precisely that reason. However, it's not as simple as saying if you can afford £2k rent you can afford a mortgage. You may be able to afford the repayments but the deposit is what would catch you out. Even a modest property in London is 500k. Generally people can only borrow about 3-4 times their salary so even earning 70k and with a huge 20% deposit of 100k she'd still need to borrow 400, which wouldn't happen. She'd get lent between 210-280k meaning she'd have to have a deposit of almost 300k and even on 70 grand that would take an age to save. She still isn't skint though.

70k is loads! What on earth is she spending it all on? We're on less than 1/4 of that.

Her perception will also depend on her background. If she’d grown up properly skint then she would feel flush now but if she grew up in the lap of luxury in a cheaper part of the country, and had expected to maintain that lifestyle then of course she would feel comparatively skint.
It’s a bit like telling someone who is having a bad time of things emotionally that there is always someone having a worse time. That may be true but it doesn’t FEEL like it and actually make them feel any better.

Tell her to get a grip!

I know one family with an income 0f 200K who can't afford the 32K school fees, for one child.
Sorry, private school fees are a luxury, not a necessity in this country. They are not skint, and if they are struggling on 200k they, like OP's friend claims to be, they are just bad at understanding the difference between need-to-haves and nice-to-haves.