High earners - how do you spend your salary?

[Citygirly]

DH and I earn just under £140k combined.

We do maximum pension payments (his is 9% as NHS) and we also give about 10% a month to charity.

Other than that, we plan to start overpaying the mortgage. We invest £1k a month (so £500 each) and save £1k for holidays. We of course do general/specific savings but then have a good chunk left over for disposable income.

AIBU to ask other high earning households how they tend to allocate their money? Just want to see if we could be using it better or this is about right for comparables.

Only on MN do you see people declaring that £150k a year isn't a high earning income.

@Howmuchwood you also said feeling wealthy was relative

Thank you, this is helpful and what I was looking for. Do you both work full time? If so, how do you find it with kids?

@citygirly we both work full time. Its hard going keeping all the plates constantly spinning at work and at home. Sometimes I wonder about trading off an easier job for some income.

@topgub feeling wealthy is relative. As the old Dickens quote said.

I have done a January note every year since 1989 of outgoings, income and capital (and my other records go back to 1979 t university accounts where I accounted for every penny including on chocolate bars). In general if you have more coming in than you need to spend on housing, childcare, food etc you feel okay. If not you don't.

Most of us would say no matter what you earn it is never hard to find things on which to spend the money even if just school fees for those who can afford it and helping children with university and house purchase costs.

We both always worked full time even with tiny babies (and still do) so had full time childcare to pay which has always been very expensive the younger the child is. LIke the poster quoted above we chose a big house. At 35 I had paid off our mortgage on a 4 bed detached and thought what else do I really want in life- a much bigger house and more children so we moved house took on a big mortgage equivalent of over £1m today and used every penny of savings for it and then conceived (naturally) twins - children 4 and 5 - best things I ever did -buy this house and have that last child/children (along with the first 3 children too and my legal career)

Ha, my DH keeps exactly the same log of income and expenditure @Xenia.

Some years I do it better than others for the annual thing but I do look at costs of power, council tax, all kinds of things. Even so every year the expenses end up much lower than they must be so the more interesting figure is really what sum is left over after the spending to be used for savings or mortgage repayment as that is the true money spare in my view.

I earn £80k and am single - so that is the household income. Not a high earner by the standards of this thread.

about a quarter goes on mortgage and other housing costs, and a quarter in savings. The rest goes on eating out, household bills, home improvements, cleaner, gardener and clothes.

i would suggest thinking ahead to what the knock on of kids might be on income and planning for that.

You might have noticed that there isn’t an abundance of female partners with significant caring responsibilities- depending on what area you practice in it tends to be hard to combine kids and full time work and it can be tough to do part time.

options are striking gold with a brilliant employer (rare), outsourcing lots of it or husband doing quite a bit.

all of these have financial consequences and the more you plan ahead the better.

I left my career after dc1 as I wanted a better life/work balance, as a result I now earn 50% less.

What an odd thread 😬

£150k is a huge salary/household income!

However, if you live in the S/SE, pay for full time childcare, pay for private schools, go on lots of holidays, cleaner, gardener etc it may not feel like it goes far...

But to say youre not a high earner? Give your head a wobble!

What a strange thread.

OP, what possible difference does it make to you how other people spend their money?

Its all relative. Where I live in this part of London, you would not be considered a "high income family" at all. You would be average - low.

But anyway - since when did "high income families" come on MN for financial advice?

So someone tells you, "Well I spend £x on the mortgage and £y on this and £z on that...." Well, what are you going to do with that info exactly? What is the relevance of it to you?

I left my career after dc1 as I wanted a better life/work balance, as a result I now earn 100% more.

In this order:

• Mortgage
• Child
• Car
• Gym (Personal Trainer)
• Personal Chef, food
• Physio/Massages
• Clothes (mainly shoes and jackets)
• Gadgets

What is the top 5% nationally? I've no idea where we stand with all that.

My favourite post.

I always read these threads and wonder if people are totally oblivious that people earn less than £100k and live in London? The “it won’t go far in London” comments referring to £150k are mad… goes a darn sight further than £40k!

dh and I earn £100k between us and live very comfortably. Are we millionaires? No, but we’re not poor. What an odd thread. Nhs pensions are also set so not sure how you’re “over paying” and none of the bands are 9% so that’s bs. What do people get from lying on mnet?

Technically high earning but with 2 under 3 it all goes on mortgage, childcare and the weekly shop, we're running out of money by the end of the month and jointly earn 120kish but live in Kebt

So I earn roughly 140K in USD…DH earns about 3 times that.
We live in a VERY expensive US city.
We now pay school fees (kids were in public school till the pandemic). Roughly 70K a year for 2 kids.
Mortgage mostly paid off.

Dh has also paid off his student loans.
DH’s parents moved in from the MidWest to live with us so there are 4 adults and 2 kids in our house. I also send money home to my family in India.
Pensions.
The big one: gold plated health insurance for all of us (including my in laws).

We invest a little bit more.
We have two bog standard cars.
We have a cleaner twice a week (it was once a week before the in laws moved in).

No mega holidays- lots of road trips/hiking/national parks etc.

We buy a lot of books. That is basically our sole indulgence. And we buy good quality produce to cook with.

I’m single and live alone and I’d really struggle to get by on £140k a year, I don’t know how you’re managing that as a couple. But you’re doing the right thing by asking for advice given the current climate, you must be struggling. Have you tried Martin’s money tips? Good banks?

Not really reading the room is it?🤔

@Sizzer40

I assume that's sarcasm!? I can't tell. 😂

Sizzer40 · Today 18:27
I’m single and live alone and I’d really struggle to get by on £140k a year, I don’t know how you’re managing that as a couple. But you’re doing the right thing by asking for advice given the current climate, you must be struggling. Have you tried Martin’s money tips? Good banks?

haha good try! 😊 another embarrassing post!

Sizzer40 · Today 18:27
I apologise if your taking the pi**

Nice cars, high end makeup and skincare, pensions, investments, good food, eat out regularly in nice restaurants, regular days out, nice clothes for the whole family (we have 3 kids). Also saving towards buying another property for rental purposes.