How do people afford to buy so much?

[Ilovexmastime35]

Aibu to be confused about where I'm going wrong?! Of course everyone's financial situation is different and for those earning well it is no problem paying out for clothes/shoes etc.
But for low - mid earners, how do you afford things? I see people on social media going out regularly, days out, holidays, clothes, city breaks, seaside trips, buying new technology etc. I know what jobs they do and they are not high earners. How are they doing this?

I want to treat my kids to a day out over half term. I've just looked at booking tickets to a local safari park for 2 adults 2 children. It comes to £145!!
I was looking at a local meet Santa on a train event, £80! We can't do it because if I bought those tickets I wouldn't have any money left for anything else for a month.
I think these prices are extortionate and for low-mid earners most people cannot afford these prices.

I need new clothes, boots and a coat desperately. I'm plus size so cannot shop at Primark. The cheapest I can find is a cardigan is priced £34.99. A coat over £59. I just cannot afford these things! My clothes have holes in and my shoes leak!

Im unable to work at the moment ,but my husband earns just over 50k. After all bills, food, fuel, we have about £200 disposal income to last a month. We don't drink, smoke, we don't eat out or socialise. Our money goes on the children and the house. There is never a penny left over for us.

I think in comparison to wages, most things are priced too high. I'm grateful we have a roof over our heads and can afford food but everthing else seems out of reach!. My husband is senior management, he can't earn any more than he does now. We are not frivolous at all. Any advice on how to afford these things apart from getting into debt?

Where do you do your food shop OP? How much do you spend each week?

Have you got a big mortgage?

Can you post your monthly budget OP? People can help more if there's some concrete figures.....

You need to write a list of your incomings and outgoings because on the face of it I can’t see how you are only left with £200 . Take home pay after tax on 50k is £3100 ish .

We have a year's season ticket for our local zoo, which was around the same as you would be paying for one day! So a lot to pay out in one go, but works out at only £12 per month!

We paid £40 for our santa train! We have about three different ones within about 40 mile radius though and some were more expensive - we just shopped around.

Definitely would look into your outgoings.. Our income is around £60k per annum (in the SE) and we're paying out £500/month im childcare and we still managed to save £700 last month..

50k is alot of money, is your mortgage very high? We have just over half this coming in and we've more to spend than 200 a month. We holiday every year in florida. Although we have a low mortgage as we're ancient.

I’ve often wondered! I assume they have much lower mortgages!

Try Vinted OP. I've just done a search . Primark coat, size 2, £3. Size 24, red Mac, £5.50. so does and kids clothes too. Pm me if you want and I'll send you a link

Simply Be for clothes, their sale is usually good and there are voucher codes floating about. Also, there are some good preloved plus size clothing groups on FB.

Credit cards
Saving up- £15 a month throughout the year could pay for the Christmas trip. If this is your priority, it could be an affordable way of doing it.

Or prioritising and optimising what you do have coming in:
I buy a lot second hand. I sell a lot of outgrown/not longer used stuff on eBay/FB, and buy bigger stuff with the proceeds. The DC’s winter clothes this year are cost neutral.
My phone is getting on a bit.
Our holidays are largely in the UK.
I cook from scratch 80% of the time, we eat very little meat, and drink very little alcohol.
DH and I don’t go out very often - once or twice a year. More to do with a lack of babysitters more than anything !

Must have a very nice house because if we earned £50k between us, we would have a very good life. Are you in London? Maybe try selling clothes on Depop, car booty etc There are lots of things to do with children that are free such as museums etc

“my husband earns just over 50k” - I don’t mean to be rude but I’m very surprised you’re struggling that much with that income
Are you SE/London based?

My household income is significantly less, and I can still afford to socialise, pay for TV subscriptions etc

A lot of it is credit or smoke and mirrors, however when you see it on social media, how many people actually have all of those things? So they may always be out on trips, but you never see a picture of their home decor as that’s not something they spend money on, or they have fancy clothes but don’t eat out, or they post a holiday pic but you don’t see that they stayed somewhere grotty and basic.
But I know what you mean, I see someone with a high end designer handbag and think how can they afford that, knowing they earn a low wage and have three kids, that’s not what I’d spend my money on in that scenario... or maybe they just went to Turkey last year and got a realistic fake, you just don’t know.

Some of your outgoings must be crazy high OP.

Do you pay a lot for childcare? Commuting? A huge mortgage? Is it an crazy expensive house to heat?

If you post your outgoings here we might be able to tell you what seems high.

Most people have two partners that work. The average UK salary is £29k which means on average a couple with two kids earn £58k. So you're a little below average as only your partner is working.

A lot of people can't afford all their expenses so you are doing fairly well having any disposable income.

what's the breakdown of your mortgage and spending. Money savings expert has a great budget calculator.

I am plus size and love marisota. You can get some pretty decently priced stuff in the sales. Also find primark, M&S and tesco do some really good plus sized stuff

I know what you mean op.
Things seem to have shot up in the past few years as well. I really wonder how people manage it, even getting a Costa out shopping.

I do ebay clothes shopping although postage can be a killer on that one.
Jumpers I try to buy new though due to being out of shape or little holes. So I do sainsburys for those, I get plain ones so they go with everything.

I currently need new tights so am hoping lidl might come up trumps with them soon

I would assume their mortgage is less. Mine is over £1k a month so once you add on another £1k in bills and cars there isn’t loads left over.

My point is tho that even if we could afford it I think things are far too expensive!! 35 pounds for a cardigan

Supermarkets and many high street shops will sell cardigans for far less than £35 and have a good range of sizes.

£17.50 from M&S in a range of colours up to size 24

I don’t really understand how you have so little left over to be honest unless you have a huge mortgage. We have a similar household income and we don’t live beyond our means or live flash lives (no debts, no credit cards) but do some nice things and put away between £500 and £1000 in savings a month.
Not trying to boast or judge just trying to figure out where all you’re money is going. I suspect you are like we have been in the past. See expensive things like £40 jumpers as too much but probably spend more over the year on several cheap jumpers. A day out is too much at £150 but a take away here or a few treats in the trolley there each week seems more bearable to spend? Might be wrong be we used to be fritterers with small amounts of money that added up to a lot. Now we take the kids out for a nice meal or day out once a term rather than a take away once a week, plus a macdonalds trip, plus a tenner here and there on tat they don’t need.

I earn a similar figure and I'm a single parent. Admittedly I do get some child maintenance as well. My mortgage is roughly 30% of my earnings and I have all the usual bills, plus a decent car which is on HP. I think you need to take a good look at your budget because we definitely have money left over for treats (although I do think those days out are really expensive and I'd be hunting down any available vouchers!)

Best thing to do is sit down, look at your bank statements and work out what you're spending your money on, and where you could make efficiencies. A £50k salary is plenty to keep a family on unless you have a very large mortgage or extremely high childcare costs

Look online for clothes, places like Simply Be always have sales on and they do plus size.

Is the loan for car and furniture quite big? Our household income is double yours and we drive small cars and bought most of our furniture second hand for pennies

Things can be expensive but I buy lots of stuff from charity shops and use supermarkets/centre aisle at Lidl for clothes and household items
Lots of ppl who post amazing things on social media are doing those things every now and again but have beans on toast or something similar for tea most days - but of course they don't post about that

I feel like this is going to be one of those threads where people with good intentions post ideas to cut back and save , and the op won't listen to any of them.

Why are you looking at £39 for a plus size cardigan?
Asda and Tesco ranges do plus size and you won’t pay more than £20.

You need to look at what you are buying as unless you have really high housing costs and loads of children on an income of £50k you should be able to buy a cardigan when needed.