To ask how you would spend a salary of £300k?

[iwishiwasafish]

In a similar vein to “what would you do if you won the lottery” … how would you spend an ongoing salary of £300k per year?

That’s £25k per month before tax.
£14,180 per month after tax.

i always assume we are going to be eating cold beans straight from the tin in retirement

Eh? You own property, have further pensions and investments and the state pension to look forward to. You'll be quite comfortable in retirement, especially If there's scope to release money by downsizing and/or moving to a cheaper area.

As you've now clarified it's a real dilemma, I'd give serious consideration to taking the job for a few years, saving most of the extra earnings and planning for early retirement or downsizing your career, eg just doing a bit of consulting as and when.

As I said earlier, this is made much easier if you don't choose to tie up a large proportion of your assets by living in an expensive house.

@Bushkin
Hmmmmm. Yes you’re right. It was late and I was thinking 300k after tax.

Oh dear. Even imagination threads don’t deliver satisfaction these days

Well. 160k take home would be nice too. I certainly wouldn’t complain. And if I add it to husbands current salary… I certainly would be more than comfortable. First things first would be to pay off house. All luxury purchases or expenditure would be after that.

contributions to Shelter would go up…. But maybe I need to marry Jeff Bezos before I can start buying a housing estate of houses to give to the homeless.

Sorry @Whatamess582 didn’t mean to piss on your imaginary chips! Just important to point out the tax burden at that level.

@iwishiwasafish do you have a financial advisor? Could you sit down and work out how much that salary would accelerate your plans so you can decide is more stress worth retiring X years earlier?

Privately educate the children. Save for their futures. Make sure I had enough to live on for my twilight years. Getting help for things like diet and exercise which I’m shit at. A cleaner.

The DCs love swimming and horses so a nice big house with stables and a pool. A housekeeper.

Our take home is about £12k a month. We budget to live on £7k per month max, not including holidays or large purchases.

Both kids will go to private school and if they want to go we’ll cover uni fees. Eldest starts reception next September. We generally live comfortably, have a nice house but not huge, eat nice food, go out to eat regularly, have 2 nice cars etc but not a flashy lifestyle.

We have a financial advisor, who is guiding us so that long term we have a comfortable retirement and plenty of assets. Money goes into pensions, investments and we are buying property to let, as well as a holiday let or two in the next few years.

I would say take the job and get a wealth manager/ financial advisor so that you have plans for a comfortable future.

I absolutely feel so privileged not to have to worry about money, having had many low paid jobs in the past, literally having to plan for every £1 each month.

I'd save to buy my house outright and possibly hire a cleaner .
Nothing extravagant, I was brought up pretty poor so I appreciate the money I do earn .

I'd have a housekeeper for a couple of hours a day to organise meals, sort washing etc.

My house would be in tip top condition because I'd get it decorated and repaired regularly.

I'd go on holiday two or three times a year and travel in luxury.

I would drink much nicer wine and wear much nicer clothes

I'd probably still get a thrill out of collecting my Boots Advantage points though!

I'd probably still get a thrill out of collecting my Boots Advantage points though!

Rewards points never get boring, even when your income is large.

@bushkin - I know, I was on a far lower salary than £300k & had to drop considerably in seniority and remuneration to get a three day week role - but worth it.
Now dropped to two days - and I do count myself fortunate that I still earn more than many people working full time - but even my old salary pro rata would be nice.

I wish it was, I’d love to drop even to 4 days

Lovely house, up to £700 K with great guest accommodation, maybe some self contained. Well located eg beach or rural close to city. Great outside space for dining etc.
If poss greater pension contributions. Plan would be to use any out buildings/ en suite rooms as Air B and B.
V happy where I am but guests have tiny bedroom or sofa bed. Would love for friends to see staying with me as more of a holiday!

I can't see the point of earning that much as it seems likely you wouldn't have the time to enjoy it. I take home £3K a month and have plenty of time to enjoy my earnings (though I don't, because I am always very conscious that I could lose my job at any time, so I save £1k a month).

However, if I did earn that much I would have a personal chef. I don't need a housekeeper because I don't get hung up on "life admin" - it takes me minutes to sort and doesn't invade my "head space" - and I am too working class to have a cleaner.

Hmm poss more like a mill on property! Ideal would include a granny flat/ small cottage on grounds. Good to dream lol

Out household income is around this and we don’t have a particularly lavish lifestyle. Nice (but not enormous) house with a mortgage and our 3dc are privately educated. We used to travel quite a bit pre-covid. I don’t budget for food, just buy whatever we fancy.

It brings choice (for example, we chose to privately educate our dc, which is a huge chunk of our income - we could have chosen a larger house or fancier cars - we can’t afford all of these things) and we don’t have to worry about where the money is coming from if the washing machine breaks, etc. It’s allowed me to progress my career in a way that I couldn’t have if we’d been reliant on income from me. But it is not a clad in designer clothes, Range Rover, palatial home sort of lifestyle - that requires a much higher income.

@berlinbabylon it's not just about having time to "enjoy" it though, as in having leisure time and using the money for leisure activities. I actually spend a very small proportion of my income on leisure, none at all day to day (I do have a month-long holiday every year, not a luxurious one though, modest self-catering apartment in a place I love, but I do pay for other people whose company I love to be there with me).

There is a whole other "point" to having money that has nothing to do with having "time to enoy it". It makes a difference to the whole family. As I have said upthread, much of it is spent on education, insurances including medical insurance (which has been life-saving to both my parents) and supporting members of the family.

BTW, the idea that with a gross of about £300k (so a net of probably less than half that) you would have multiple houses, horses all over the place, "staff" to do everything, housekeepers, chauffeurs, personal chefs etc etc is not really realistic. That would be a whole nother level of income up! Our "staff" consists of a cleaning lady for four hours a week and a guy who cuts the grass every couple of weeks. And we take a tutor on holiday with us.

Exactly @littlepeas, no lavish lifestyle, we have probably spent the majority of our money on education (and also a great deal on providing the right support for a special needs child) over the years and have no regrets.

We have normal, not very new cars, and my most expensive clothes and shoes are generally from M&S (I like a White Stuff or Lands End cardigan occasionally, have no interest in "designer" clothes etc). We currently live in a house which we rent for under £1000 a month, but are building our own house, at our own pace so whenever we have money for some materials we buy them (my income is high overall but erratic and unpredictable, some months I have three or four times what I have in other months).

I don't think we'd change our lives too much except for buying a nice house! And saving more. DH would love buying the odd v fancy bottle of wine!

@Bushkin I would be a hell of a lot more disappointed if you DID piss on my chips….

@SleepingStandingUp

I'd buy a bigger house and have my fourth child. For the purposes of this I'm assuming DH is the one with the fancy job .

Some tutoring for DS. Part time nappy for two toddlers. a car. Nice holidays

On that kind of money, I definitely think you should consider splashing out on sufficient nappies that the toddlers can wear them all the time.

I am naive, I didn't realise people earned this much! What kind of job do you have for this salary?

Not a salary, a freelance/self-employed professional in a very niche field (with postgrad and professional qualifications in two different fields, which intersect in my job).

@Catawaul

I am naive, I didn't realise people earned this much! What kind of job do you have for this salary?

I've worked with a lot of contractors who do, but once tax is taken out and bearing in mind you don't get pension contributions, sick pay, annual leave pay in the same way as you do on payroll, it isn't as high in many cases as it sounds- but still a nice amount!

Clear the mortgage quicker and look to put aside more for a pension to retire a lot earlier. If any spare nice holidays could times a year god I've missed travelling this last couple years !