Advice on adult spending money

[LGY1]

I’d like some advice on what is a reasonable amount of adult spending money a month please!

The back story is that my husband and I have very different attitudes to money. As you can imagine it’s been a big cause of arguments over the years. In the end we introduced a set amount, no questions asked, spend on what you like.
This covers anything that is ours personally = clothes, make up, going out individually with friends, sports equipment, nails, hair. Things like that.
All salaries & income goes into the joint account and all treated as “ours”
We have 2 dc (5 & 2)

Over the years of the relationship we have worked our way up the salary ladder, whilst always investing / renovating properties, so salaries weren’t always great, plus 2 x maternity pay. There has always been loans of some sort & after the current house renovation money was very tight.

We are hopefully moving house in a couple of weeks & putting all that equity to use. We won’t have any loans anymore & just the usual bills. It will be the first time in 10 years we have disposable income at the end of the month.

I know that I am naturally frugal, although at this point need to have some back up savings / investments is a reality!

After mortgage & direct debit bills I estimate that we will have around £4k a month left.

People of Mumsnet - what’s is a reasonable amount of spending money each per month?

Personally I’d be saving 3k and having £500 each spending

First can I ask if your pensions are worth equal amounts ?

£500 each I would say

how much would you usually spend? Compared to your husband

I do think you have to strike a balance

for example I wouldn’t like to live frugally if it wasn’t necessary and I don’t think your husband should be pressured into living frugally especially if you have that much disposable income

In my house we save half of all spare money, then the rest gets equally divided 3 ways between me, DH and ‘house’.

house money is for anything that doesn’t come into regular budget so recently plants for the garden, a vase, and a family meal out. It’s treats really.

We have separate budgets for food, petrol and presents already. Car and house maintenance comes from savings.

No one can answer this for you, it totally depends on your priorities and whether you want to spend more money now, or more money later....

Personally wih 4k to play with I'd aim to put 2k into joint savings, 1k for food/drinks/meals out for the family and £500 each for adult spending.
We have £500 each a month of no guilt spending and it's absolutely fine. DH is a spender and his all goes. I tend to put away £200 a month in private savings for rainy days, but obviously it depends on your lifestyle. If you're spending £150-200 a month in beauty treatments for example you might find that isn't enough, or you have an expensive hobby like horses.

What are your savings and pensions like? Have you got a savings pot for your DC? I’d want to build those up and have a smaller amount of spending, but if they are already decent then I’d save £2k and have £2k split between family fun money and adult spends.

I had the same thing with my DH. In theory we had the same amount of spending money each from the joint account but he would buy things online paying with the credit card (for the points, it was always paid off in full each month) or via PayPal and ‘forget’ how much he’d spent and go waaay over his allowance.

In the end I opened separate current accounts for us both and set up a standing order from the joint account for the spending money.

In terms of ‘how much’, my experience was that there as much moaning about it not being enough from him when I tried to influence what I thought was reasonable (I was in charge of all the household finances), so I suggest that you ask him to decide the amount (with him having the knowledge of how much is in the budget for other things).

We settled on £500 each and I have a fat savings account now and he took to funding his hobby by selling his hobby equipment stuff on eBay when he wanted an upgrade when the penny (pound?) finally dropped that he was spending more than £500 a month. Previously the old kit would have festered in the garage while shiny new stuff arrived so this was a bonus win.

With a £4k disposable income (is this genuinely disposable or does it still need to cover irregular essentials like insurance, white goods replacement, car repairs and replacement etc) and 'nice to haves' like Christmas, holidays?

But even if it's after the above, I assume you have a mortgage you could overpay with some of that money, and pensions that could be topped up? Surely you'd want to use the majority of it on those things, plus saving a decent emergency fund for loss of income, rather than just spending for the sake of it?

It sounds like you have a good income now, but that might not continue in the future if either of you get made redundant or are too ill to work. Saving/investing will make life easier should any of those things happen, and you could regret not saving when you can afford to if it does. I'd definitely be looking to spend no more than about £500 or so each on your own personal spends each month then save the majority.

What amounts are you both wanting to spend and on what?

Are you saving for your DC? If you're still earning well when they are 18 and they want to go to university, you'll be expected to contribute hundreds a month in living expenses, so it's good to save in preparation for this.

Thank you so much for the reasoned replies!

to answer a few:

@KangarooKenny Probably not. I’ve paid in since day one & now work for local government so it’s hard to compete with that!

@Olivetreebutter you sound like me. If I had £500 a month I would spend all of that & would naturally save. DH would spend it all!

@BoxOfCats I would have very little spending money & invest / save. My husband has different priorities and I’m trying to find a balance where both feelings are taken into account (whilst still being a adult about this!)

@Whatevergetsyouthroughthenight very similar experience! This consistent £500 suggestion has really helped as I will now ask him what he thinks is reasonable, I doubt he will go that high & I won’t be squirming at anything over my figure of £200 which he suggests!
trying to keep a lid on things without going to far….

@BarbaraofSeville I would over pay, save, invest, prioritise those things (whilst still having a little spending money) but I don’t want this to be an ongoing tension between us. So I need to recognise where I go too far!
My personal aim is to see if we can save for private high school & so really that needs to start now.

OP just remember, like me, if you want to save you still can! You won't have to spend the alloted amount just because he does. Just keep your savings separate. It's meant I can buy a real treat now and then with no guilt, or just feel comfortable knowing I've got a little pot building up.

Go and see a financial advisor and find out if your pensions, emergency savings, kids college fund etc are all in order..

you might also want to up your holiday fund

Then once you have a rough idea of what you could have, jot down what you both might really want, and work out if all the surplus should be spending money or if you’d like to also have a do up the house fund or whatever

@Luredbyapomegranate sounds like a step up from me & my spreadsheet 😃

We have £500 each; started with £750 when I was still a very high earner. DH saves a lot of his but likes to put some of “his” savings towards holidays/flight upgrades. I spend more of mine but still save most months. As a non-saver I’ve become quite addicted to saving.

I very much like the idea of a ‘house’ spending lump - this is a weak area for me (garden especially) and setting a budget would be a great idea to curb that.

How much do you spend per month on family activities and eating out? And how much on children's clothes? I'd say a quarter of that. Adults need to buy clothes less often and when you have children most of your free time is spent with them so you don't need loads for going out alone.

I think your dh probably needs to boost his pension, so earmark some of the £3k for that, and then have £500 pm pocket money.