I live on £1100 a month in London - is that 'hand to mouth'?

[kingsolomon]

After housing costs (£700), my take home salary is £1100 - single parent, two young children. I just read a case study from some research about a mother with two teens who gets £277 a week in benefits and subsidised housing, so pays £88 a month. So she gets about a £100 a month less than me in hand (but is not in London so maybe that balances out the same - also probably pays less council tax). They are described as living 'hand to mouth', and the woman says she is 'totally skint' and they frequently have to use candles when they run out of electricity. The case study also mentions debt issues (which I don't have - but I'm not judging anyone for getting in debt when I don't know their situation), and maybe she is not very good at managing money for whatever reason. I'm not trying to make a direct comparison with this particular person, to boast about myself or to put blame on anyone else. I was just shocked to realise that what I earn could be considered 'hand to mouth' when I don't feel that we are doing too badly! Am I way more hard up than I think? Would you consider yourself poor on what I earn?

BTW, this is absolutely not an anti-benefits thread. I believe in the welfare state and even universal basic income, depending on how it is run. And the fact that most people eligible for benefits are in work, so basically subsidising corporations to pay wages so low they can't support a family, is a scandal.

No you're not living hand-to-mouth OP.
You've described your lifestyle & outgoings and I think you're part lucky (inheritance paying for a half share of your property otherwise your rent would be double) and partly sensible with money.

You sound quite happy with your life which is always a good thing. Comparison being the thief and all that.

You've learned something from a previous poster - the suggestion that you can claim housing benefit fir the debt of your rent.

Also if I were you I'd be squirrelling away as much as you can for the teenage years.

Bless you op. Your doing wonderfully.

Some people really are just terrible at budgeting. Debt is another thing, but there is plenty you can do to help yourself like transferring credit card debt to a 0% deal or whatever. Getting a new phone every two years and spending £40 a month? No thanks, just look after your stuff and get a contract for less than £10 and save yourself a whole bunch.

Regarding the food thing, you can so easily spend so little money. In London, everywhere you go there are grocery shops that sell everything and it's really hard to spend even a tenner.

That said, childcare in London will kill you. I never found a nursery that was less than £1400pcm.

NewPanDrawer

By my reckoning it's cheaper to turn on the light than burn a candle ...

(Misses point of thread and exposes horrible ignorance of poverty.)

More like exposes ignorance of where free candles come from.

Do you get tax credits

One thing that hasn't been mentioned already is that poverty and debt can become a vicious circle that it's very very hard to get out of, however thrifty and good at budgeting you are. So for instance having a number of high interest overdraft/loans/store cards which you can only afford minimum payments on leads to spiralling interest costs, if you fail any payments you get CCJs etc against you, leads to even more debt - also you then you will struggle to consolidate debt into more affordable credit and/or get any emergency credit to cover things like appliance failures, or car breakdown, and this can lead people into loan sharks/payday loans which are hideously unaffordable.

Even on things like utility bills where you'd think it would be simple good sense to shop around for the best possible rate, having poor credit history and little no regular/employed income (if you rely on benefits or zero hours work) it's not always that easy to freely shift providers/rates. Some people with a poor payment history end up having to use pre-pay meters or pre-pay cards which are not always the best rate at all.... similarly having no savings cushion whatsoever can make some of the 'obvious' (and perfectly valid) swaps suggested on budgeting threads hard - e.g. buying your car or furniture or appliances outright (second hand and cheap if necessary) rather than taking out finance or hire-purchase - again if you have literally no capital and rely on the car or whatever it's simply not possible.

On the benefits bashing threads you often see criticism of things like having expensive mobile phones - but again if you are tied into a contract and that's your only way of accessing the internet you can't simply 'replace with a cheap brick', or rather it would have a major impact to do so... of course you could fairly say the solution is not to get into debt in the first place but as always there are complicated and varied reasons why people end up in debt, not all of them simple fecklessness including relationship breakdown, job loss, ill health, benefits sanctions/errors etc etc.

Cooking from scratch and meal planning are another really good way for many people to save money and improve health but most meal planning tips/sites/advice tends to assume you start from a place of having a well equipped kitchen, stocked-up cupboards, enough money to top-up the electric/gas metre to run your cooker, the cooking skills, confidence and know-how to cook tasty, nutritious meals your kids will eat, from scratch and the time/energy to do this. If even one part of that house of cards falls down it can be easy to resort to takeaways or frozen food etc (hell, it's easy enough to do that when you're comfortably off) but that can also be part of the downwards cycle financially....

So not saying you are wrong, the headline figures for this particular lady don't seem as though she should be living 'hand to mouth' although her budget may not be that generous, but there could be other things going on of why she ends up living that way?

The title is really misleading

It's dead easy to survive in London on £1100 if your housing costs are paid and you've no childcare costs.

I'm thinking when we retire we would have about that on the state pension - which would be great

It's the cheapest council tax in the country and £1.50 to literally go anywhere on the bus. Masses of free activities. Cheap supermarkets, cheap markets.

So the woman only pays 88 per month for her rent? Really

Well that £88 will be what she pays towards it, the rest of the rent will be paid for by housing benefit

I’m confused so the woman gets 1800 p/m including having her housing paid for except for the 88p/m she has to contribute out of the 1800?

@Taliskerskye

I’m confused so the woman gets 1800 p/m including having her housing paid for except for the 88p/m she has to contribute out of the 1800?

No I think the woman gets £1200 a month and pays £88 rent (and also is in receipt of subsidized housing, but has effectively £1112 to live on).

OP receives £1800 net in salary each month and pays c.£700 in rent/mortgage (also very cheap for London considering it has to house OP and 2 children), leaving £1100 for all other expenses. So Op's point was that leaving aside housing costs they have the same amount for bills/transport/food/all other expenses...

@maxelly
Ah I see.

@LaurieFairyCake indeed. Plus OP doesn't pay gas, water or service charge out of the £1100 and has phenomenally cheap electric.

Outside of London, it's more like £160 in council tax alone for three bedrooms, plus water, gas, electric, transport (eg £12.50 a week here for each teen's bus ticket).

@Hellocatshome

£300 to last 5 days is not living hand to mouth.

I agree, I currently have about £50 to last till Monday and that needs to cover bread, milk, fresh fruit veg etc till I can do a big shop when I get paid. I would class "take home" as gross pay less Tax, NI and Pension if you have a work one. I would say housing housing costs come out of "take home" so that makes OP's take home more like £1,800 which is probably comparable to my £1400 ish take home outside London (but still expensive to live compared to most other areas) .

7/10 maybe even an 8.

AFTER housing costs her take home money is £1100

I misread that too.

£1100 after rent is fine, imo. We survive on that relatively easily.

I would love to have £1100 after housing costs! It's all relative to costs though, my utilities are £150 a month (water, broadband, electricity and gas) others pay a lot more, my kids are adults so no childcare but one isn't working and been turned down for benefits (long story)

I’m feeling jealous of Londoners council tax and subsidised transport.

My council tax on a tiny 2 up 2 down is 1850pa. How does that compare to London?

@SuziQuatrosFatNan

Yes, it's easy to forget the exact amount of one's biggest outgoing after rent. I do it all the time.

We pay CT on DD, coming out quickly once wages go in. I don't need to remember how much it is because it gets paid every month. Why get pissy with op for not being able to recite it?

I'd assume hand to mouth is paying basic bills but no extra re subscriptions, buying food when money comes in but only having enough to last til next pay check so using up the last of the bits out the cupboards, fridge and freezer every week / month, limited money for cigarettes / alcohol, no fun extra clubs for kids. So literally just surviving.

I have no debt and my car, insurance and phone are paid for by my business - I have a really good amount of disposable income although someone on my income with debt and car costs could easily live hand to mouth, it's impossible to compare 2 different scenarios.

I think hand-to-mouth means having no buffer, and being one pay cheque from eviction and starvation. I know people on £5,000 a month who live like that!

I know me and my 16 year old ds could not live on £1100 pcm and my mortgage is only £30. No debts bar £15 a month and our food and weekly cash in purse bill comes to £120 or £130 alone. I do think we eat quite well though.

Op do you have savings? Or is thr three hundred all you have in rhe world?

Hand to mouth is living pay cheque to pay cheque with no savings.

TheHoneyBadger
My CT on crumbling social housing flat (borders of inner and outer) London is £42.50 a week.