To ask what it's like to not have to worry about money?

[dailydreamin]

I was chatting with my dh about winning the lotto (as you do) then it got us to thinking because we don't earn much really. What is it like to just have a really good wage (like 4-5k or more per month) and have no money worries?

I would love to just go food shopping without adding in my head. I would love to just be able to see the DC's shoes are getting tight and go and buy new shoes for them without stressing about what I will have to forgo.

So what is it really like? Is it like I think? Do you just NOT think about money at all? Do you just buy as you need (obviously everyone has their limits though) without thinking?

I grew up very poor. When I was 9 we lived in a house with an outside toilet. This was in the 1980s, not the 1950s.

I’m now comfortably off, but not wealthy. Our mortgage is paid off, we have no dependents and our net income is around £7k per month. The best way I can describe how it feels is that money isn’t a major issue in our lives. I can buy whatever I want at the supermarket without looking at the price. We can go on holiday to wherever we want (within reason, obv), rather than being constrained by a budget. When our boiler died in the middle of winter it was a bloody inconvenience, not a crisis.

Are we lucky? Maybe, but we also worked very hard and prioritised investment over spending on stuff like flashy cars, jewellery, designer labels, the latest gadgets etc etc.

I think you always worry about money. I can do the food shopping or buy my dc shoes without worrying about where the money is coming from. But I still worry about job security, being able to continue to pay the bills and also trying to save money for those eventualities. I think I'll breath a sigh of relief when the mortgage is paid off

@Timeforabiscuit

We are currently comfortable.
I pay my council tax, water bill and all annual bills as soon as they come in as it is one less thing to worry about. i know they are out of they way. i paid the mortgage off last year 9 years early.

I have a good amount of money saved however I always have a feeling of doom around money. We went through a horrendous time about 15 years ago and I am frightened those days will come back so I wont fritter money away.
DH finds it hard to understand why I live so frugally after all we have achieved and wants to treat me all the time.

We earn net something like 3x the OPs amount. My parents scrimped for years till my grand mother's inheritance made them very comfortable suddenly. DHs family would have been considered 'doing well working class'. For how it feels, I love when I'm bored just buying little things on Amazon that make my life nicer or easier, like a nice candle or another good sweeping brush😂 Suddenly we've tipped over the point of DH being early stages of new career, kids being tiny and expensive childcare, house being built etc and now sometimes spend time looking at Art to invest in or discussing what next to invest in. It's hugely privileged and we know it. But mostly our life is pretty focused on the same things as anyone's. Are our kids happy and healthy? How are the doing at school? How much longer will we have our parents around for? What's for dinner? What will we watch on Netflix tonight.

When we were first married we lived paycheque to paycheque, and when our DC were small we lived very frugally, cheap food, coupons, second hand clothes etc etc.
These days we live very comfortably but we are still in the mindset of cheap living, I drive an old car and we go camping for our holidays but I can buy the kids whatever they want when they ask and I never worry about the cost of our food shop. We have no debt except our mortgage and we’ve been saving for our retirement.

Our household income is 5k after deductions and I hate to say, but we are scraping by.

Our mortgage is expensive because our credit histories were poor (from days when we were much poorer) we are locked in for 5 years at 5%. It’s just a starter home in the Midlands, surrounded by deprivation, not and expensive rural house.

Hubby lost his job during the pandemic - 2 weeks after I gave birth and 4 weeks after we moved into our home that we bought with the expensive mortgage. During the time he was out of work we ended up in 20k worth of debt, that’s on top of the 12k of debt we were already in.

We have a toddler and a baby and they aren’t cheap.

3.7k a month is spent on mortgage, debt and insurances. 900 is on bills and council tax and what’s left is food and petrol.

We are lucky that we can get by without missing any payments and affording food, but we are living payday to payday. Clothes and shoes for the kids I use pay in 3 services. Christmas was going to be second hand toys off eBay but fortunately hubby had a tax rebate. We won’t be having a holiday anytime soon and my car is almost 12 years old.

We aren’t all living the dream. Circumstances does play a big part, but my view is more that a higher earner is less likely to lose everything during the shit times, rather than living their best life.

We’re very fortunate to not have to think about money, at least not the day to day.
But I still think about the cost and value of things. Can we afford luxury holidays and first class airfares? Yes. Do we? No because they aren’t a priority for us.

We’ve both grown up with a sensible attitude to saving, neither of us splurge on fashion and I’ll always look for a bargain.

It is freeing emotionally, not having to think about it, and it’s not something I ever, ever take for granted

I think something that isn't talked about is how much cheaper things are if you aren't struggling too. I've also been on both sides of this spectrum and I find it astonishing how much cheaper being wealthier is. I understand that people spend to their incomes but a lot of things are better- cheaper mortgage rates if you have lower ltv, cheap loans if I need them, cheaper to pay for things annually than monthly, cheaper to buy in bulk if you can store, no unexpected fees or punitive bank charges, free money from credit cards if you pay them off etc. Living hand to mouth is very expensive and small bills can tip you over the edge. It's horribly harsh.

We don’t have to worry about money but we still do worry about money (DP in particular). I don’t think having it necessarily makes you worry less, although I appreciate how fortunate we are.

A friend said it took the shine off things. Nothing was special. Going out to a restaurant was just going out to refuel. It didn’t really matter how nice the food was because they could eat there every night of the week.

Do you just NOT think about money at all? Do you just buy as you need (obviously everyone has their limits though) without thinking?

Not at all; I've also been in both camps, and now I'm in the more fortunate one I still want value for money, but it's the security of knowing I don't have to worry about it which makes the difference

Since I'm unlikely to ever spend it all I also use it to make a difference in my local community, etc. As they say, there are no pockets in a shroud, so it works for me to help others too

I earn a lot less than the amount you suggest in your OP. But my mandatory outgoings are small, and thankfully my tastes aren't crazy expensive. That means overall I don't ever have to worry about money: I know I save enough for my pension; I overpay my mortgage; I have enough cash savings to replace my car, boiler, keep me going if I was made redundant; and I have basically all the luxuries I could want (cleaner, gym membership, good food, decent wine, holidays). But it's not like I could just go and buy a Porsche outright, or go on crazy trips every year - feeling those things would destroy my financial stability - but as I have no desire to be that rich really it doesn't cause me to worry about money. I could upgrade my house, run a fancy car, go on bigger holidays. But that's lifestyle inflation and would be a great way to have to worry about money again.

We didn't have money when I was little - and I think that always sticks with you. I still take months deciding if it's "worth" buying things, even practical things. It's completely absurd because I could afford all of them. I think I have a real desire not to end up with too much lifestyle inflation: I already have a cleaner and a fancy gym membership, and I watch my friend wasting money hand over fist and it just makes me feel sick.

That's not to say I don't have nice things: I have lovely coats, nice boots, good bed linen etc. But those things last years and I still remember the surges. I bought 3 bath towels, it would have been 5.5 years ago now, in June or July and they cost £72 in total. They're still going very nicely.

One of things I have had to try really hard to do now I have more money is stop the guilt when things don't go right - losing a set of headphones, breaking some crockery, staining something. I do still feels guilty but it doesn't wake me up at night anymore.

I think about this a lot and I wonder if it's analogous to the way we treat water: there are people who have to walk miles to get dirty water who would probably think that running the tap to get it cold before filling a glass would be the most outrageous waste and profligacy, let alone standing in the shower for an extra few minutes or filling a paddling pool. Whereas even the most water-conscious among us treat it as a given that we will have clean, fresh water whenever we want and probably aren't as appreciative of it as we should be.

I'm not trying to pull a 'be grateful for what you've got - there's folk worse off' thing, just trying to imagine something that we take completely for granted that others might deem an unimaginable luxury. There must be some people for whom worrying about money simply isn't even a concept.

Well I have my dogs booster jab tomorrow and I'm going to put it on credit card 😖. I had a few months once of earning a high salary back about 7 year ago, used it tomorrow's a deposit for our terrace house so would love to have experienced the unrestrained spending of having a healthy income. I'm freelance, asked for a certain amount and they paid a lot more ! I've never been able to get that again, and been off work with the kids having Covid, which I then caught too. Oh well.

I have a couple of friends who (pure coincidence) both recently inherited around £1 million each. Ive had one tell me how difficult it is to fit in all their events and parties, holidays etc and the other say how unfair it is that I can claim benefits and they can't. So I think some people are never happy no matter how much money they have, they don't seem appreciative or event content?

We are as the name implies Finally Fluid.

However, if you ask how much a first class stamp costs, the answer is 70p, two pints of full fat milk in Tesco £1.15.

I have a Tesco delivery, I use soda crystals in the kitchen and dishwasher they are 80pence in Tesco, as I walked past them in Sainsburys I noted they were the same price,and that made me feel like I hadn't lost the run of myself and so whilst we are now comfortable, I still try to keep a handle on things.

Neither of us impulse buy and anything DS borrows coming up to payday has to be paid back, not because we can't afford it, but it is a good life lesson.

I grew up in a family where we always had what we needed, but we were on a tight budget in order to pay the bills. Shopped in the cheaper supermarkets, v. few new clothes, etc. Unexpected bills were difficult to deal with.

DH and I had to be frugal for several years, but we’re comfortable now and I do enjoy being able to treat DD to a couple of new tops, for example, if she sees something she likes. Nothing expensive, just having that bit extra for spontaneous treats. It’s also nice not having to worry about unexpected bills- we’ve had some car issues recently and it’s such a relief to be able to cover the repairs without issue. I’m very grateful to be in this position and I hope you get to that point too, OP. 💐

I think only the truly wealthy ( multi millionaires) never have to think about money.

@StaplesCorner

I have a couple of friends who (pure coincidence) both recently inherited around £1 million each. Ive had one tell me how difficult it is to fit in all their events and parties, holidays etc and the other say how unfair it is that I can claim benefits and they can't. So I think some people are never happy no matter how much money they have, they don't seem appreciative or event content?

Omg... seriously??

This just shows the human minds ability to find fault with literally any situation!

@familychallenge

I think something that isn't talked about is how much cheaper things are if you aren't struggling too. I've also been on both sides of this spectrum and I find it astonishing how much cheaper being wealthier is. I understand that people spend to their incomes but a lot of things are better- cheaper mortgage rates if you have lower ltv, cheap loans if I need them, cheaper to pay for things annually than monthly, cheaper to buy in bulk if you can store, no unexpected fees or punitive bank charges, free money from credit cards if you pay them off etc. Living hand to mouth is very expensive and small bills can tip you over the edge. It's horribly harsh.

This is so true.

As a small example, many people pay high interest charges on their credit cards because they can’t afford to pay off the balance in full every month. I can afford to do that, so those nice people at John Lewis give me points every time I use their credit card which accumulate to earn vouchers for their shops. They end up paying me about £100 per year in Waitrose vouchers, just for using their card. It’s crazy, but I’m obviously not going to turn them down….

I think unless you're massively wealthy, you'll generally always have money worries of some description.

I have a 'good' salary (no way near £4-5k/month take home good!!) but I worry about whether I'm saving enough to ever move out out of my house share, or if I'd be able to afford to rent my own place, or whether I'll have enough in my pension to live - I'm not married and have no children so I have to assume I'm doing it on my own for the rest of my life. I save as much as I can and try to spend as little as possible because I would one day like my own place. I don't want anything grand, just a small flat / house that's mine. I don't have debt or go without basics or worry about paying bills, but if for example I buy myself new clothes or shoes or something else I don't 'need' I feel guilty and anxious if they're expensive. Or sometimes even if it's something I need I feel the same. I get the most basic phone contract etc. I skip haircuts and I don't go on nights out much.

In theory, if I didn't want to save anything and blow the lot every month I could have a very nice life, until I retire. I could cash in my savings right now and get myself quite a flashy car. I have money, enough to live now. But I still worry about the future.

I've been on both sides, and right now, even though we don't have to count pennies in the supermarket, we do still budget for things and justify every purchase.

I think there's a big range in between worrying about basic survival and thinking about what colour Porsche to buy next.

For example this month we've fixed the car£400, bought new shoes for both dc £150 and booked a European flight for dh £400 without going on overdraft. But we make up for it by buying cheaper brand groceries, driving a bit less this month, no coffees out or takeaways..

But yes. I know money-worry first hand and I always, always save something from every salary, even if its just £50,because i know the horror of being very close to queueing up at a food bank.

Its bloody marvellous. We are neither rich nor extravagant but not having to worry when its time to shoe the kids, or if the car breaks down is wonderful. I still cant squander though, or go into debt (mortgage excepted) and control our expenditure more than I strictly speaking need to do. Old habits die hard.

It's all relative, higher income, higher outgoings.

Our income is 9/10K per month but we always want more expensive house, kids in private school, so still kinda skint.