AIBU to find this depressing rather than inspiring?

[freecuthbert]

I really try my hardest to scrimp and save whilst on a low income. I'm a hard worker too but my industry is massively underpaid.

I keep seeing articles about people and how money savvy they are and how great their money management skills are, buying houses young and retiring early. But they usually have a good/high income to start with, some inheritance or gift from family etc.

Today another article like this has cropped up. A couple has over 5.5k income a month and have about 3k disposable income. They are set to retire early because they're so good at managing money and they would like to share their wisdom with us so we can achieve the same. Except me and my partner earn far far less than them. We'd feel well off on just the 3k, which is what they have leftover.

I am also pissed off that at the bottom of their expenses is "other costs: child support and repaying interest-free loan for a new boiler: £401.18". What a way to disguise the actual pittance the guy pays in child support, meanwhile he gets to hobnob it and retire at age 40? Also very telling that his child is simply just another expense no different to a new boiler.

I honestly haven't read past this because it really got to me. I don't feel inspired at all, I only think "what a knob". And I find it kind of depressing because I feel like no matter how hard I work I won't ever be able to achieve this, which they apparently think is purely down to good money management. I'm sure that is an aspect of course, but definitely a lot more to it than that!

So, AIBU? I'm sure I'll get a few responses telling me I'm just being jealous or to just not read these articles!

Article for those interested:
inews.co.uk/news/uk/how-i-manage-my-money-couple-photographer-royal-navy-plans-to-retire-40-earning-974132

How's that what you took from what I said @ClawedButler

I said often we can't use verbatim quotes due to space issues so we abbreviate, not that we make shit up.

So you've decided to ignore the fact that a journalist's name and picture is at the top of the article then?

Righto.

People like these pop up all over the place as if they have done something special and clever. As if material wealth was the only thing that mattered.

Yep, the world is full of them. Some people are so very poor: all they have is money.

Some of it does seem to be truly bizarre attention-seeking, though. There are so many articles where people have an 'incredible' idea whereby they spend a fortune buying an old van and then another fortune doing it up and converting it to an 'amazing travelling home on wheels!!!!' quite generically - as if the concept of a professionally-designed and constructed, more economically and practically thought-out camper van had never been thought of before!

He sounds a right dick.....

So after the interest free boiler loan actually how much does the tosser contribute to bringing up his child. The ex wife appears to shoulder most of the financial cost...

Smug and a dick

So you've decided to ignore the fact that a journalist's name and picture is at the top of the article then?

Righto.

You must be one of the same journos we're talking about....

I would expect the journalist to interview, ask probing and thought-provoking questions and draw the information out of the subject, before putting it together in a coherent way, removing any waffle, small-talk or irrelevancies. I've no problem with them not reporting everything that the subject said - that's a large part of their job, filtering out tedious detail and getting to the crux of it; I just don't expect somebody to be directly quoted as saying something they didn't say.

Quality journalism will usually use closed brackets to indicate where the journalist has clarified, amended or added something to what the subject actually said, to better set the scene and/or enhance reader comprehension.

@timeisnotaline

Unlikely katewinsome! I think I hope vodka is trolling their Insta. ‘So inspiring. Maybe I too can reduce my children to a small monthly payment and retire early’

This exactly....sperm donor pays as little as possible for child because retiring early with latest woman is so much more important....how latest woman doesn't want children with him

@freecuthbert

Must truly be hard graft abandoning your parental responsibility!

Indeed. I imagine many would have more money if such a tiny amount spent on child

[quote freecuthbert]@Linning I love your well thought out response, but the main issue I'm having here is it seems the guy is a deadbeat dad and was able to save up considerably more because he has been contributing very little financially to his son's upbringing, meanwhile he reaps the rewards of this. In the article it's like he is excited to stop helping his son as soon as he is 18 and to palm his cats onto someone else because they don't fit into his early retirement plan. I find this the opposite of aspirational and don't think this should be flaunted as being money savvy. That's what really irks me about this particular article.[/quote]
I agree this man has nothing to be inspired by BUT it doesn’t mean you can’t take something out of his story.

I think if anything this man really showcases to women the importance of ensuring they remain financially independent AND ideally plan kids around their own ability to fully financially be in charge of them (irrelevant of their partners income) because as shown on here and continuously on Mumsnet and real life, men will easily and happily pay minimal maintenance (or none at all) and discharge themselves of parental and financial responsibilities.

Most women make the mistake of having with no plan to be left to finance them alone. I think it’s normal to expect the dad to do his share but in reality many won’t (including the love of you life you thought was an all around great guy!) and women are more often than not in precarious situations because they put themselves in situations that make them heavily dependent on a partner’s income, whether it’s getting pregnant because they can afford to while with a partner but wouldn’t be able to if the partner was to stop taking his/her responsibilities, or becoming a stay at home mom after birth with no really good job prospects to go back to nor savings in case of a separation as well as the fact that many women now have kids with people they aren’t married to, making them even more precarious.

I think we always assume the deadbeat dad is someone else’s husband/ex but it would be much better if women assumed all men have the ability to be/become deadbeats dad/humans and actually financially prepared for it.

Kids alter women’s ability to save and progress (career-wise) but not so much men (as seen in this article) that’s why it’s paramount for women to make decisive choices and put themselves in as close to the situation (financial and career-wise) they want to be in post-children pre-having children as it becomes much harder to create wealth once having children at charge (potentially fully) and things are tight.

@VodkaSlimline

Is son a mere expense to be ended ASAP on insta too?

If so that is really 😥

YANBU OP. His contribution to his child is pitiful. My finances would look a whole lot better if I got 24/7 care for the DC for £300.

The article and its subjects seem unpleasant.

No one has the same exact opportunities and life situation, I do not get enraged over this though of course it’s unfair. My younger life was incredibly grim. I made some really tough life changing decisions back then.

We end up with a series of choices and then luck, though I don’t like that term it’s more right time right place, just like it can be wrong time wrong place.

Some of the worst choices I have seen friends make is because they choose heart over head. It’s a common theme among my women friends.

Not sure why some people think just paying the amount calculated by CMS is acceptable while planning to fuck off abroad on early retirement. Thought it was well known what a shambles CMS is. Defending someone who quite clearly perceives his son as nothing more than a financial burden is very odd, including inventing scenarios where this sad excuse for a man has saved up for his son's future. Are you actually that naive or simply being wilfully ignorant? As you say, this article is merely about finances, and building up such savings would have been included as another brag about how amazing this couple is at managing their money.

Actually I'm not an MSM journalist, but an industry-specific one.

I can't believe the multiple posts droning on about how the page is laid out.

Let's move on.

@BettysCardigan

Actually I'm not an MSM journalist, but an industry-specific one.

I can't believe the multiple posts droning on about how the page is laid out.

Let's move on.

Well the journalist certainly made him look tight arsed as far as son concerned and reduced son to a mere cost to be ended ASAP... perhaps that was the intention show up the smug for what they are.

A writer puts name to story so assuming chatted to the pair and allowed the pair to read before publication so assuming they thought accurate 🤔

And as other people have said, his insta shows him in the same light

@Alaimo

Money-aside, I wonder how they're planning to travel through Europe full time considering, you know, Brexit.

And if there's another pandemic in the next few years. Lockdown put paid to a lot of these poncy digital nomads, a concept that's overdone now and becoming outdated.

I don't think they would have clutched their pearls because their outgoings were listed in a particular order. It's only on this thread that people have decided that means he is a terrible absent parent, without knowing the very first thing about their lives.

Thanks @KateWinsome - I wasn't overthinking anything. You put uni in quotations which is not grammatically correct, because uni, although slang, does not need quotation marks to identify its meaning. You used quotes in a similar way to visual 'air quotes' which are used negatively to talk about something you are skeptical of. If you dislike the word uni, then don't use it. But it's use doesn't require quotation marks.

So you might want to drop the pseudo innocence, stop being quite so patronising, and then you might come across a bit less sneery. Hope that helps.

Well obviously this couple have plenty of money and financial security at a young age in the form of his navy pension, but if you look at the series of articles, there are plenty from people on much lower incomes, so it seems unfair to pick this one specifically out.

inews.co.uk/topic/how-i-manage-my-money

Features a range of people including a single parent on £1300 wondering how she's going to afford retirement.

I did vote YANBU OP, but having read the article again, it seems like what the couple might have said could have been heavily edited for the word count.
So, the guy might have talked about his son, what he was doing, giving the interviewer an impression of how much he loves his child and how they won’t go travelling until he’s 18, etc. Then it’s shortened to ‘when he’s 18 he’ll no longer be a dependent’.
Of course, he could still be an utter arsehole instead.

£50 a month on water!?

£50 a month on water is a lot where I live, I pay less than half of that for a bigger household. But I'm sure I heard before in some parts of the country it can be quite expensive. And I suppose it's not like energy companies where you can switch to another one!

YANBU

One wonders if his Ex who brought their son up is one of the many women struggling to cope financially and practically whilst the Father protects 'his' assets and pays the minimum. What sort of arsehole Father wouldn't pay more if he could! Didn't have a row for 'money saved for my son's future' then? Arsehole.

Even if they buy water, it's £12.50 a week. I spend more than that on beer.

£50 a month is quite a typically average water bill. Some places charge a lot more, SW Water being the classic example.