How little can you live on?

[Drabarni]

When all basic essential living costs have been paid, how much could you manage to live on.
I think lots of people could live on far less than they earn, friend thinks I'm mad.
So AIBU to think that some could live on far less.
I'm not suggesting they do, though, all have different choices.

Biscuit

My friend, is in denial about how much she can live on/ not the brightest, but somebody who really needs my help, nobody else can help her, too dangerous. Can't/won't seek help from agencies.
Can't say anymore.
You are all being very helpful.

I have £86 a week before bills and food. It's not easy or fun but it's doable. Just.

Money spent on Your non essential items prob less than £100 a month. But I spend £70-£100 a wk on food, if I was absolutely skint I could get that down to far less and live off stodge. I’d cut my soft play membership etc. But then next month my car insurance is due- it I was skint I’d scrap my car. Get my hair done 1 every 8 wks c £160- if I was skint I wouldn’t get it done. Get my brows done 1 x a month- if I was skint I’d pluck em myself. That’s why it’s hard to put a figure on it.

Dp pays the rent and most other bills so about £250 a month for council tax, bus pass, meals at work etc.

I’m currently learning to drive so spending a bit more .

I end up overspending every month though!

My rent is actually more than my take home wage, which is pretty shit. I'm currently living off savings (from selling my house) no way can I afford a mortgage on my own.
Considering moving 200+ miles to reduce rent costs by 30%.

Ive got 25 quid to last 8 days at the moment. Our of that i need to buy petrol and food. fun times

SouthernFreez

I'm so sorry you have so little. Your post will really help my friend to see.
Thank you so much and I pray things improve for you.

Did you just call your friend "not the brightest" 😂

You know what one person says, doesn't necessarily apply to other person, so this is like asking how long is the string.

Surely it's variable depending on wage ,how much your essential bills come to and wether it's just 1 person or a family ?

Not including rent, unemployment is £73 a week for adult
State pension is approx £8k per year
To pay all bills, food, transport

Approx

What about costs such as travel ?

Does depend how long for - I could survive a week, or a fortnight, or even a month or a year without buying somethings, but there comes a time when you do have to replace things - lets just use clothes as an example. Yes, I could go a year without having to replace anything, but I probably couldn't do 5 years.
Same with food - could I survive on £10 for a week's food? Yes, easily - for one week but that is different from only having £10 a week for 52 weeks of the year. etc. etc. etc.

Then what about a phone ? In 2020, I would consider some way of communicating with the outside world pretty essential.

Then you haven't included insurances.

After all that, it depends just how desperate you are. What you could "survive on" isn't what any of us would want to survive on.

We could manage on one salary instead of both if we had to if no holidays, treats, luxuries, days out, socialising, activities etc. But it would be a fairly miserable existence.

Aside from basic bills to run the house and car and feed the five of us and the animals, our only outgoings are swimming/music lessons/orchestras and two gym memberships as we don't really go 'out out' - just the odd meal as a family, and neither of us drinks or smokes. So 'luxuries' that I mentioned would be around £200 a month plus maybe £100 a month to cover a meal out and birthday/christmas/kids party gifts etc. That could probably be cut down a fair bit if we didn't do orchestras and went for school music lessons instead, and got rid of our gym memberships. I think that music and exercise are pretty good things to spend your money on though.
We have quite a bit of savings as our mortgage is fairly low and because we don't go out much. We do have holidays too but I'd say they are luxuries that you could go without if you were on a very tight budget.
We probably spend about £2000 a month on absolutely everything without penny pinching but I think if we absolutely had to, we could live on about half that. Would be fairly miserable though!