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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To switch off when my friend now complains about being broke

142 replies

speedymama · 01/08/2007 13:16

My friend and her DH both work and have two children with one at nursery.

She complains about the large mortgage on their large 4 bed detached with double garage, the nursery fees, not being able to afford a holiday, can't afford to go out in the evening with her DH and that they can't afford to repay family members money loaned to them.

I was sympathetic, listened attentively, suggested ideas for cheap holidays like 4 nights at Haven (mistake - she prefers Center Parcs) or camping (even bigger mistake)............

They have just bought a brand new car with private number plates.

AIBU to switch off when she starts complaining in future?

OP posts:
Quattrocento · 01/08/2007 16:03

Personalised number plates are often used to disguise the real age of the car ... maybe your friend is actually trying to economise? In a very pseudo way?

fedupwasherwoman · 01/08/2007 16:03

P.S. personalised number plates do make you think differently about folks don't they.

friends of ours suddenly got them to put on their existing cars (for both the husband and wife's cars) and dh said, "isn't it funny, I thought we knew them really well but it just goes to show what strange things make some people happy".

expatinscotland · 01/08/2007 16:03

I had a dream our old banger spoke to us! It thanked us .

Oblomov · 01/08/2007 16:04

fedupwasherwoman is far too optimistic. Speedymamas comments will have zero effect on her long term. Thats my prediction.

fedupwasherwoman · 01/08/2007 16:06

Ha Ha, maybe you're right.

Maybe it'll take a couple more interest rate rises to make her stop and think.

nogoes · 01/08/2007 16:07

Lol fedupwasherwomaan. I found it hard to take someone at work seriously when I saw the personalised number plate on their Audi TT. [vomit emoticon]

Oblomov · 01/08/2007 16:08

Ha, ha, then she'll just moan more about Bank of England. And still won't cut back.

TheQueenOfQuotes · 01/08/2007 16:09

"They have just bought a brand new car with private number plates"

well don't know about the private number plates - but when we were very nearly bankrupt 2yrs ago we also bought a brand new car......as the repayments were cheaper than on our 2nd hand car!!!! (and we HAD to have a car for DH's work)

Original poster
speedymama · 01/08/2007 16:10

Quattrocento, it is a new car. I had to listen to the details of how they got it on credit loan for 4 years, the fact that it is a new model so not many of them around, went for leather seats option blah, blah, blah. She did tell me the model and make but can't remember what it is.

OP posts:
duchesse · 01/08/2007 16:16

My sister lives for convenience in a very expensive town very near London, commutes into London full-time, earns £36000 per year, pays a mortgage, bills etc, pre- and after-school club fees for her son, nursery fees for her daughter (at cheapest local nursery) and nothing else except for food and car...and makes a £250 loss -every single month. She is beginning to think it is not worth it and is trying to move away. London is a bloody expensive place to live, but the logical solution to the problem is not just to advise people to "just move away" when the discrepancy between top and low earners is so huge.

As to your friend, Speedymama, I'd say you did the right thing there. Hope she doesn't write you any rude letters or leave rude messages on your answerphone.

expatinscotland · 01/08/2007 16:22

Exactly, duchesse, especially as commuting costs are not neglible in this country AND, as I pointed out, in many of these so-called 'cheap' places to live, jobs can be scarce and/or quite low-paying.

UnquietDad · 01/08/2007 16:22

Can't believe how ridiculously expensive personalised number-plates are.

You may as well be driving round with one that says 14M 4 TW4T.

MrLSG · 01/08/2007 16:44

Unquietdad, you can get personalized number plates for £250.
Given the alternative of buying a new car for work (because car appears too "old"), or a hiding the age using a personalized reg plate, then the later is far more economical.

expatinscotland · 01/08/2007 16:47

Buying a new car for work because the old one 'looks' too old?

JudgeyMcJudgeson · 01/08/2007 16:51

ROFLing at personalised number plates being cheaper than new car cos other one looks to old

Please tell me there aren't actually people who replace their car cos the other one looks too old.

lizziemun · 01/08/2007 17:25

JudgeyMcJudgeson

my SIL & BIL change their car because it looked old, they had had it for about 18mths.

They also claim to be broke then go and spend lots on something which isn't necessary (hottub).

I have come to the conclusion that their idea of being broke and mine are vastly different.

To me being broke is not being able to pay bills and buy food etc. To them it's not being able to go on holiday for thr 4th time this year.

JudgeyMcJudgeson · 01/08/2007 17:32

you're right some people's ideas of being broke are very different to others.

berolina · 01/08/2007 17:37

Subjective 'broke' thresholds are about what people feel they need, I think. I suppose a lot of people would think we're pretty poor (and we would be, at least temporarily, a bit stuffed if anything happened to me so that I permanently couldn't work) but I think we both feel 'comfortable'. My mother definitely felt she 'needed' more than she could afford, although we were definitely comfortably off.

twinsetandpearls · 01/08/2007 18:58

quiveutmabonnebaguette I just don't see how you can afford to live in london on that income, ours is higher than that and we are priced out of the south east - I know because we tried to move and had to pull out.

We are also considering emigrating but we may wait until dd has finished school

twinsetandpearls · 01/08/2007 19:01

tarantula where abouts in Londond are you, I am genuinely interested as I am still convinced that London is out of our price bracket.

Anna8888 · 01/08/2007 19:11

Duchesse - your sister's story is extraordinary . How can you make a £250 loss every month? Who subsidises this ludicrous situation? Or is she just running up debt?

twinsetandpearls · 01/08/2007 19:15

I was watching spendaholics last night and there was a man on there overspending by about £2K a month and he was earning about £2700 a month to start with.

morningglory · 01/08/2007 20:01

I agree with what someone said earlier...broke is a relative term. I'm not sure who the social set of your (ex)friend is, speedymamma, but do they all have more money than she does? Her lifestyle sounds aspirational, and maybe she b*tched to you about lack of money because you were the one person she felt she didn't need to cover-up her living-beyond-her-means to....that, and wanting to feel superior to you, because she feels just a bit inferior to the people she is aspiring to be. Just a thought. Anyways, better off without her.

TheQueenOfQuotes · 01/08/2007 20:03

perhaps the car was cheaper than what they were currently paying for their old one???

I'm glad I didn't meet a lot of the people on this thread two years ago when we got our brand new car...........

quiveutmabonnebaguette · 01/08/2007 20:33

twinsetandpearls - well it's not easy everyday, our rent is 1100 pounds and our childcare is going to be 1000 pounds for 2 children starting from january, plus different loans to pay back..why we manage ? well it's all a question of budget...everything is budgeted. DH and I dont lead an excentric life, we never go out, if we go shopping it's for the dds, we go to France for our holidays but it's really cheap cause my parents have a flat by the seaside that they lend us, at the end of the month we have 200 quids left which is not too bad...yep reading this, you can say we are not rich but we are not brock...beside that we are leaving in a nice residential aera which looks like a village, we are 15 minutes walk from wimbledon park, dd1 has a lot of friends here, I get on very well with the friends mum, dd is going to one of the best school of the borrow, I work in Putney in a gorgeous posh building by the river thames AND next to the park and 10 minutes from my dds....This why we are able to manage, we have put our priorities right, for now we are happy but I 'm not saying I'm going to stay forever in London !