1,5k disposable income a month is enough

[Myglorioushairdo]

AIBU to think that a disposable income of £1,500 a month is enough for a family of four? That is after all living costs, fixed monthly bills and food/household essentials.
DH and I were a bit unfortunate and made a major life change just before the pandemic, and this is what our household income has now been boiled down to.

DH is majorly stressed out and says its not enough, I say it's OK for now. We are able control all the other costs with careful planning and even save a bit! We don't live in a big city and our kids are still primary school age. What do you think?

OP, I'm sorry, but you did get my back up with what seemed to be a very goady stealth boast.
So... for what it's worth, here are a few tips from someone who spent most of last year living on a grand total of £500 a month for me & 2 DC (money was already tight before then, but £500 left me in arrears with rent).
Clothes - you don't need them, or if you do, then charity shops are excellent. School uniform & childrens shoes are obviously something you can't avoid paying extra for, but you can cut corners. I can't actually remember the last time I bought something for myself that still had shop tags in.
New bikes are utterly non-essential. Scratch that. Same for hobbies, phone upgrades, TV subscriptions, toys & books (see charity shops), eating out, handbags, and general treats. It may sound utterly joyless, but I used to limit treats to a bag of sweets from the very oldfashioned newsagent near us after school on a Friday. There was something much more enjoyable about them selecting which jar of sweets they liked, asking for a quarter of aniseed balls, and then taking them home in a paper bag. I don't know why, they just loved it.
It meant more to them than just grabbing a bag of haribo at Tesco.

Christmas... is actually more fun when you do it on the cheap. We have the charity shop challenge, where the DC & I have a total budget of £50 to buy 10 presents for the rest of the family. Rather than just buying a £25 shaving set for grandad from Boots, we actually spend time delving - and actually putting a bit more thought into whether or not a present is right for someone. The kids really enjoy it because they feel more involved - and it means I have a bit more to spend on their presents.

Agree with PPs that you need to work out every single possible outgoing you have, right up to & including a nice coffee every Thursday when you meet up with a friend. Only then can you see where your money is really going, and what you can cut out most easily. Yeah £4 isn't a huge amount, but if it's just a bit here, and a bit there, then not spending it does make a difference, plus you get to feel very virtuous about not spending it when previously you would have done.

The advice I would give to your DH is 'can you afford to buy lightbulbs?' Because last year it got to the point where my house had two working lightbulbs in, because I couldn't afford to replace the ones that had blown. If he can see things in that context, it may stop him panicking a bit.

(and sorry for immediately flying off the handle at you. It is, as you have realised a sensitive subject for me & quite a few others)

Depends how much you coke you sniff. That stuff is expensive.

Honestly, it's fine. We pay a mortgage on a 3 bed house, all Bill's, run a car etc on that (or did, before I went back to work). You cut your cloth - we gave up foreign holidays and some more expensive hobbies for a few years to make it work.

Just curious, what does DH think he needs to spend 1400 a month on (after all regular bills, food and living costs).

@TitsOutForHarambe Hilarious

I think a lot of people will wonder how you have high paid jobs, if you really have the low level of critical thinking and empathy that your post indicates.

I always think this. I mean how can someone be this stupid? But then I remember a lot of people get promoted out of danger so to speak, so they have no impact on the business. In this case it seems like two people managed to achieve that.

@Myglorioushairdo
I don’t think it’s a boastful post, but obviously some people have nothing and survive on benefit/ low income or average incomes - so a post like this will be like a red flag to a bull.

I'd be worried if I were you actually op. You've had your hours reduced. If I'm right and the business doesn't find you necessary even before covid, but had no reason to let you go, they've got a great reason now unfortunately. You might find your leftovers takes a drastic turn downhill. I'd start working harder.

op your allowed to feel worried or anxiety over it, for some it will be loads left for others itl be a horrible amount to have left.
We have similarly, anywhere between 12-1500 left a month after everything, usually more towards 12-1300. not going to lie sometimes it can be hard to save for savings. I budget 400 a month towards spends. the rest goes into savings but then throughout the year will go on a holiday abroad every year, uk holiday, christmases, birthdays, clothes (although hardly buy any for ourselves), household things/ repairs, mots ect. After all this we haven't usually saved much at all. we're very lucky that we can do the things we do but working up savings for emergency's is not so easy.

to add: you should also seriously consider trying to save some money if you possibly can. It's very dangerous not to have some kind of cushion when you need to fix your boiler - even if MN will tell you that children don't need heating or hot water, and you should be lucky to even have running water or some other emergency.

That should be part of your monthly "outgoings" recorded on your spreadsheet or budget.

I'd start working harder.

This is an utterly shitty thing to say to someone who is trying to deal with a massive change in financial circumstances.

@Myglorioushairdo
My comments have not been an ‘attack’ if you think so then you’re not as thick skinned as you claim.
I’ve tried to point out that you are being ridiculous and it is in poor taste given the volume of ppl jobless and facing losing homes. Instead of being negative and your DH being an idiot, think of the positives. You were lucky to have savings and to have low outgoings.

Jesus Christ. I’ve just been sat here sobbing because I’m worried about our money and how we have hardly anything at all left each month. Came on here to distract myself.

1,500 is absolutely plenty Feels like a stealth brag!

What is that supposed to cover though?

Just "discretionary" fun stuff every month?

Or things like annual bills, car running and repairs, annual insurances (house, car, life, travel, health, any others?), buying clothes (for DC and yourselves), cost of afterschool clubs/hobbies etc, sports equipment...which are not necessarily needed every month but are generally part of the annual budget.

What about holidays and gifts? Day trips or outings for yourselves? Birthdays, Christmas, other celebrations (Christenings, Weddings, Hallowe'en, Thanksgiving, Hannukkah (sp?), Eid, ….your own special family days)?

Have you thought ahead for education for DCs - secondary, Uni, etc?

Have you a nest egg for emergencies, of at least 6 months of your annual budgetary needs (preferably a year)?

What about replacing a car in a couple of years, or boiler repairs, or "I feel like redecorating the living room" types of non-typical expenses? Have you money put aside for these things?

The notion of a nice chunk of disposable income on a monthly basis sounds good, but it really does depend on what you both think it is supposed to cover, or how else you are going to cover the various aspects of life.

So you and DH sound like you need to sit down and work out what you think falls within the category of "discretionary", and if you have actually covered off all of the general expenses of your individual household, and also have a safety net of emergency funds available somewhere.

And that should point in a much clearer way towards whether you have enough to live on comfortably or whether you need to rethink your plans following that life-changing circumstance - you may need to have some way to earn a small amount of money on an ongoing basis for security, but a couple of hours a week or something that is a short seasonal thing perhaps rather than 2 FT jobs. Or put some funds into secure investments that will give a guaranteed income, whatever about other investments.

It may even be an opportunity to think about doing something completely different - doing training over a period of time to move into something completely different and less stressful or fits better with family life (see above about potentially PT or seasonal/short blocks type money earning), or may be far lower earnings but enough to cover what you need and much more enjoyable to the person doing it than their current role. But you might have a chance to make changes now that would allow that different earning in a year/few years when needed.

@KeepingPlain I lost my job due to covid. Last one in first one out.. I now have a completely unrelated part-time job as does DH. Lucky to have that at least. The plan is to keep on looking for another job on my field at the same time. Poor DH's sector has been severely affected by travel restrictions. Not sure what's going to happen there..

Our fixed bills are relatively low compared to income, and it can be easy to spend the 'spare' money several times over, if you don't budget (same as on any income).

We have a number of regular savings accounts that come out like other regular bills at the beginning of the month, e.g. £300 towards holiday, £200 towards house costs, £50 long term savings (hopefully car replacement sometime). I also had a spreadsheet with all the annual expenses (car insurance, tax and MOT, house insurance, etc) so that I could at least mentally keep some aside in the months coming up to known large expenses.

It might help your DH to feel less anxious about money if you work on building up some savings, e.g. live off 2/3 of your disposable income for a while and see how you get on.

We haven't built up our savings again, but thinking I might be able to put away a few hundred a month

So instead of coming on here, why don't you just show your husband the simple sums you did to work this out?

If you both understand how to add and subtract, surely you can work this out for yourselves.

This is an utterly shitty thing to say to someone who is trying to deal with a massive change in financial circumstances.

And suggesting that 1500 a month leftover after bills isn't enough is a completely shitty thing to do when many have lost their jobs completely. Have they both never figured out how to use a calculator? It's amazing that two people like this exist.

How much do you spend on petrol?

You could look for one of the many recent threads on this subject for suggestions.

We seem to have had a plethora of posters in the last couple of months whose disposable monthly income has been reduced from squillions to merely the equivalent of national average income. Perhaps they could share tips.

Show him the figures. As I earn less than that I can't comment whether it is enough for you. Cut your cloth accordingly. I think of it like a challenge.See how little you can feed the family on oh no you don't have to feed people! More than enough.

Yes it’s plenty.

It’s been said before /obvious but if you earn £5000 a month and spend £5001 you’ll end up with less than if you earn £1000 and spend £999.

Maybe start the savings account, even if small, if he sees it increasing, might help his worries.

so you roughly £400 a week for 'extras' once the mortgage, bills, fuel for cars etc and food are paid.

what would you normally be spending that on?

I don't see how any of us can give an opinion unless you itemise what you are spending now or were.

It's not always 'luck' to have low outgoings. It sounds like the OP has moved to a cheaper area or chosen a smaller property than she might have.

Ditto for the grocery spend - £280 pm is quite low for a family of 4. Many people spend 2 or 3 times that amount and don't consider that they are being particularly extravagent and often make snidey comments about people who spend this little. Disbelieving about the amount, or that they must be living on junk or buying insufficient fruit and vegetables or low welfare meat and eggs etc.

It sounds to me like the OP is working harder to live a simpler, cheaper life, and has probably made sacrifices that many Mumsnetters would find too unpalatable to go through with. Is she in catchment of the right schools for example? How on earth does she manage when her berry bushes are not producing?