Recent thread about disposable income

[Clappingforjoy]

Okay taat but the recent one made me feel quite shitty due to the large amounts people on mumsnett seem to have.
Now I'm asking do we have anybody on here who really struggles.

I have £6 to last until the second week of September. After bills and rent we have £350 to feed a family of 5 and pay for any extras like clothes/cleaning products/days out etc. There are no funds for saving.

Oh..I hate that you are feeling bad over that thread.....But just stop feeling bad about it. There is not a person in this world who hasn't experienced money problems at some form in their life. Including me. Your time will come.

Used to be skint and had to sell my stuff. Now im quite comfortable and never have to check my bank account. You will get there.

See, what you need to remember is that when people can be anonymous - they can lie and nobody will know.

The other thing is that some people like an "I'm richer than you" thread and can't wait to pile on and boast how rich they are.

The other 99% of us click on the thread, read a bit and then move on without commenting.

Yes, we struggle. We both work for the NHS, and the wages are shit. Luckily we only have one child we couldn't afford another to be honest. Once all our bills are paid, we are lucky if we have around £500 per month for food, fuel, etc.

MN has made me realise we are actually quite "poor". Like I know we aren't high earners, but we live in a cheap part of the country and do ok.

We don't struggle now but we have in the past and it's only really got better with time. Free nursery hours, now school.

Dp in ordinary times does a lot of overtime and with the pandemic that was withdrawn immediately so that was hard. But we are still ok, we don't have loads of disposable income but we aren't people who go out every weekend either so, I don't feel like we need it tbh. Ds is four and his favourite thing is feeding the ducks which costs me a little in duck food and that's it.

I think most people have hard times, I don't really know anyone that hasn't. Looking back we were really poor when I was a kid, though, I had absolutely no idea.

Try not to let it get you down OP, there are plenty of us with no disposable income.
I for one haven't had a holiday for over 10 years, have 5 part time minimum wage jobs to keep me away from the food bank.. but you know as long as your head is above water, its ok!
Try to focus on what you have got in your life, not what you haven't

People who posted on the first thread are likely to be higher earners and so it gives you a skewed picture.

That said, apart from a few fantasists, there is no reason to doubt that people have the disposable income they say they do. Living in London, I am very aware of how much people must earn to afford the properties and lifestyles here. There's loads of well off people!

OK I'm gonna tell you a story.
When I was pregnant with DD, I joined one of those pregnancy threads.
And then someone suggested we have a Facebook group for people on the thread so I joined that as well.
Well: judging by how people carry on on mumsnet I was expecting to be the skintest person by some distance. I was prepared for everyone to be super super posh.
Was I right?
I was not.
Everyone had completely normal working class jobs. Hairdressers, shop assistants..some people were on benefits.
Thats a completely random sample of mumsnet. Nothing in common except our due date.
People lie on here OP. They make stuff up. Its not real.

People fantasize and this forum has enough of them I bet!
When we had small kids and a big mortgage we had nothing left over and were overdrawn some months before we even started. It's better now years on , but those years were very grim and everyone else seemed so well off.
It's tough for you just now , but things will get better I'm sure.

I wouldn’t believe half off what I read on this site. Especially when in their next breath they will say they only spend 50 quid each per child at Christmas lol

I’m sad that the thread made you feel that way. I posted on it because I find the diversity interesting. We’re luckily now really high earners but it’s not always been the case. About 7 years ago I left my gambling ex with 10s of thousands in debt he’d run up in my name. I remember panicking my card would be declined every time I used it. Just because life now is so very different doesn’t mean we haven’t also felt the frustration of payday not even getting you out of your overdraft. I hope things get better for you but ultimately being healthy and happy is way more important

There used to be a time when at the end of each month, I had a grand total of £2 left after paying for essentials. It got better

We struggle. I'm a supply teacher so only work on an ad-hoc basis. Dh was earning about £1400 pcm after stoppages, more if he earned commission, but has been given notice of redundancy this week. In a way it's good because we don't have to pay for childcare and I don't have to keep turning work down because one child or the other is poorly. The thing is though that my wage is very hit and miss: in good months I earn double dh's wage but in bad months it's only a few hundred quid. We have a lot of debt (but it has reduced a lot in the last year due to help from our parents) and despite living quite frugally our outgoings take up almost all of our money. We have very little to spare and no buffer for emergencies.

We both put £750 a month into the joint account. This usually gives us a surplus of around £200-£300, which we leave in to cover any big expenses, replace stuff that breaks or to pay for holidays. This month, we had to have 2 new tyres and a CV joint on the car, plus MOT and re-gas the aircon, so that accounted for £450 and we'll probably have spent a bit more than we've put in.

After that £750 comes out of my account, I'm left with around £400 my (part-time) wages and tiny pension for personal spends. I'm pretty frugal, and most months my savings go up a little. My biggest spend is probably books.

DP had around £800 personal spending, but he's jacked his job in and will be living on his savings until he gets another one. He smokes a lot though, and is adamant that he's going to stop while he's between jobs, because he can never stop while he's working. He wants to work shorter hours so we can spend more time together.

We're in our 60s though, so no dependants and we've paid off our mortgage. If we had kids and a mortgage, we'd be skint.

What is true is that people who earn more than say the minimum wage are not allowed to be struggling on MN, and they will get mercilessly abused because some very narrow-minded people can't comprehend that your income in itself means absolutely nothing.

Your kids are still young, OP. Wait until your little one has the 30 hours free childcare.

Just remember this; it's a flipping sad day, the day your children no longer want or need you to take them to the park. Mine are 12 and 17 now.
You maybe short of money (currently) but your life does not sound poor .
You can always earn more money, but you will never get the time back. Enjoy x

When you are just starting out as an adult most of us are skint and that includes university educated, time passes and hopefully with each new job or opportunity your salary increases and once you stop having to pay for nappies and childcare you will have more disposable income.
How you use that income is what will make the difference.
Do you need a state of the art surround system and a massive TV, exotic holidays on credit because you can now get credit. Designer bags, shoes sunglasses. No.
Be happy that you have a little extra each month and use it wisely.

I think disposable income means different things to different people. So people always need to make it clear what they're talking about.

I for example count essentials as things I'm committed to, and can't not pay without getting in "trouble" so mortgage, utility bills and car. I always have lots left over, but I the amount will then depend what I do in the rest of the month

Savings, groceries and "fun" is not essential (I know food is essential but I don't include it because there is always wiggle room for what food you have)

Some people include savings, groceries and I've seen some people include beauty treatments, holidays and children's birthdays as essentials.

If you establish what people mean as "essential" you might start not to feel as bad!

I also think people should use % when talking about money. Saying "I have 10% left over" means a lot more than "I have £xxx left over"

Also. Please remember people are not telling you their age. And that can make a difference. 12 years ago I didn’t have a penny left over. Just starting out with a young son.

Fast forward to now. I’m 44. I don’t need child care as my son is 16. We both work full time. I’m about to get some inheritance to pay off half of my mortgage. So will have lots more.

But as I said 12 years ago. I was so worried about money as we had nothing left and got into lots of debt.
Also remember. Lots of people lie on here about what they have left. Also. Lots of people like to boast. The average person doesn’t have hundreds left over after everything.
If u have a roof over ur head and food on ur plate your doing better than most of the rest of the world so your doing okay

@LakieLady

Sorry - brief detail...

Do you know how much you paid for your aircon regas?

A friend keeps telling me I don't need to pay more than x, but I can only find it for y (both for the cheaper type gas which I'm hoping mine will be, not the new very exp one).

Random detail, sorry!

On paper we sound quite well off as we have about £3000 a month disposable income BUT this is because we have accommodation provided with our job and so no household bills to pay.
However, we are living very precariously as we have no property of our own so if we lost our job (we are employed as a couple) we would lose everything.
We don't have much of a pension either and are already in our fifties.

Call me naïve, but I tend to assume most people aren't out-and-out lying about what they post on MN. But obviously the nature of individual threads attracts posters from particular ends of various spectrums, which can completely skew your view of what the norm is. Threads about income, diet and alcohol are especially like that imo.

I didn't see the other thread but I wouldn't believe everything you read. Some people like to exaggerate and some like to pretend to be something they are not. It's like on social media when people post all nice photos of their kids being loving and well behaved. It makes me feel like I'm doing a crap job as a mum as I start to compare myself to them. Just take a step back from it and if you do read just take it with a pinch of salt.

Same here @user5656 but we are a little younger with DC. We've always been in this situation but it's only now I'm getting older (and more boring and worried!) that I have some moments of panic!