I earn £60k and I can’t keep my family warm

[Theyarellthesame]

Exactly that and I’m so, so frightened.

im 31 and I’ve done everything ‘right’ - went to uni, got myself a job and in 8 years increased my wage from £16k to £60k. We waited 13 years to have a baby until we’d saved up £20k so I could afford maternity leave, had £6k-ish left over after mat leave.

I live rurally in one of the cheapest areas in the country in a 4 bed Victorian semi, it’s not grand in any way. Lovely, but a basic 4 bed, 3 storey family home. When we moved in I had the loft insulated but we can’t have a smart meter because of something to do with where the meter is located.

My DH is a SAHP so no childcare costs for my 18 month old and he’d only be able to earn minimum wage so his take home pay per hour would be less than the cost of childcare, hence why he’s a SAHP.

Yesterday I got an email from bulb putting my direct debit up again from £290
to £470. It was £120 2 years ago. On top of everything else going up I just categorically cannot afford to pay that. There isn’t enough money by £149 a month to cover the bills for the household.

I think my options are to cancel paying in to my pension to free up that money or stop paying my student loan? Can you do student loan holidays?

mortgage is on a 5 year fix with 2 years left at 1.99% so that’s as low as it can go, we don’t have Netflix, sky or Prime anymore, we just have a TV license. We do have a Spotify subscription. Both our phones are on £20 a month contracts, we don’t have any debt other than student loans and the mortgage. We do have a dog and his pet insurance is £60 a month but it’s none- negotiable that we keep that going.

We batch cook using the instant pot to avoid putting the oven on, we do use the washing machine a lot because we use reusable nappies. I drive a plug in hybrid so the electric is high because of that.

We have 1 or 2 U.K. holidays a year, usually a static caravan or holiday cottage for a few days. Total cost of holidays per year is around £1k so I’ve already knocked saving for those on the head.

No chance of my wage increasing again any time soon, I’ve pushed very hard for the last 8 years to climb a very greasy ladder and there’s no where else to go from here.

WTF do I do?! There’s news all the time how this is going to get worse again in January and the only advice coming out seems to be ‘go and get a better paid job’ but I HAVE a well paid job! we want another baby but I’m currently telling DH no because we can’t afford it and need to save like crazy.

Im very very frightened, how much worse is it likely to get from here?

You can easily reduce your pension contributions. You don't even need to reduce by very much and it will cover the heating bills.

And sort out the insurance on the car. Do you have endorsements on your licence? If not, it sounds very high. Shop around and reduce your premiums.

Hi OP

Looking at your outgoings, your monthly food bill of £500 seems a heck of a lot for three people plus toddler, especially if you are not buying nappies all the time as you use reusable, and dog food is not included.

There’s two adults and a toddler in our house and we spend maximum £360 a month on food. We usually shop at Tesco but find it cheaper at places like Asda and Aldi. Where do you shop? Can you try cheaper supermarkets to cut that down?

The most obvious things to cut back on there are student loan & pension

Why are you paying so much towards your student loan? Are you paying an additional amount on top of the minimum?

A friend heats a Victorian 3 story with coal fires no central heating. It’s obviously how these houses were designed to be heated so the chimney warms up through the house. He buys coal in bulk and has a bunker. Costs like chimney sweep but still much much cheaper.

The cost of fuel is outrageously high, I feel your pain. But, some practical suggestions.

Your partner gets a job on a Saturday, that would make up the shortfall.
Your partner works towards a qualification and getting some experience which would get him a better paid job once your child is in nursery or at school.
You rent out some of your spare rooms, you don't need them now and you can earn up to £7500 per year net (tax free).
Make sure partner is claiming child benefit (even if reduced level due to your higher pay).

This post makes absolutely no sense at all. 4k a month combined income in one of the cheapest areas with a mortgage of only 800....where is the rest of the money going?

It's probably been suggested as the thread is moving so fast, but can he get an additional full shift for a weekend? I have a friend who worked two evenings a week and took on a saturday too in a pub.

Your car insurance is mad, as is, IMO, your pet insurance but if he has issues and that's the quote then what can you do. Are you paying monthly for both instead of yearly? Personally I would dip into the savings if I didn't have the cash to save the money on yearly premiums.

And that pension. FGS you have a house worth over 300k. By the time you retire you can work with that if the worst came to the worst, but these cutbacks would hopefully be only temporary so you don't even need to worry about the future at only 31.

The things that stood out for me were your food bill, pension, rainy day savings, car insurance and student loan.

We spend £500 per month and we are 4 adults. Not 2 adults and one child. I think there are cuts to be made there.

Whilst it is great putting £750 per month into your pension, atm you can’t afford it.

You don’t need to save for a holiday or rainy day savings at the moment.

Car insurance is super high. It is more than my Dd pays and she has 6 points on her licence and quite young and we live in London

I don’t know how student loans work but I always thought the repayments weren’t that high. £400 per month was my mortgage payments last year

I would look at what you are actually using each month as opposed to what Bulb want to take off you each month Then offer them that as you direct debit

I had to argue with British Gs years ago as 4 months direct debits covered my whole years fuel usage and they threatened me with court if I didn’t pay my direct debit.

I cancelled the direct debit and payed monthly what I owed. Then switched to Shell who were definitely a much more realistic company to be with.

12 x £140 car insurance? That’s phenomenal.

Get rid of Spotify and the playgroup.

What happened to your PIL house that they owned?

OP There is an old saying 'Cut your coat according to your cloth' ..meaning you have to do as well as possible with the limited money you have.
Reduce your pension for the time your little one is at home (another 18months) and then when he starts school - ramp it back up. By then your husband will be able to work and contribute more as well

I think if you had chosen a different title, you would have got better responses.

Instead of "I earn £60k and I can’t keep my family warm", maybe
"I have a good salary, can I have some help with financial management".

Of course you can keep your family warm. You are choosing to divert your very good income in other directions.

This is very different to "I am on a minimal wage salary and I can't keep my family warm", or

Pet insurance £160! - you said earlier it was about half of that
Your car insurance is out of control...£1680 per annum
Your council tax is wrong...no way are you paying £3720 per annum

Sorry but yabu

your DP could get a job, yes you’d temporarily pay a lot of that on childcare, but long term it is a no brainer

you pay a lot into your pension, that can be temporarily changed

for reference, when I was your age and had 2 small kids, and wanted one of us to be a sahp, the consequence was we lived in a 2 bed flat

and that was fine, we were happy.

you want everything, the pension, the charming (but energy inefficient) detached house with extra space, a sahp

i don’t blame you for wanting it all (don’t we all 😁)

…but there is a lot of stuff you can change in your life

I'm presuming the £150/month fuel costs is petrol, as OP's car is a plug in hybrid. Yes, she needs to plug car in to charge the battery in it, but she'd still need to put petrol into it. It seems like quite a large petrol bill though. But then if she has a long commute, then that would explain it. I'm guessing that OP's car will only do 20-30miles electric only.

I don't know what her weekly mileage is with her car, but I do know that my (fully) electric car would cost me approx £21 to fully charge now, i.e. from 0% to 100% (if I was charging it during the day at home). It was much cheaper last year of course! It does 280 miles on a single charge (more in the warmer months). I charge my car every 3-4 weeks (luckily, a 15mile round trip for work and school run per day), or we cycle if the weather's nice (and I'm not running late!). Charging it during the cheaper time at night would mean paying just £4.56 to charge it fully.

PS apologies for any cross posting!

Blimey
Call Bulb immediately and say that it is an unfeasible increase in direct debit. Either negotiate down or stop DD.
Check you're using energy efficiently.
Your food shop is very high. Brand down, eat less meat, take a packed lunch.
Use an old smartphone and get a cheap payg bundle.

I would reduce the pension contribution. I realise that generally that's to be avoided but you are paying in at a v high rate and then struggling to heat your home. Don't stop paying in, just cut it enough to make ends meet.

Dog costs are very high- you say that's necessary and I will take your word for it but it may be worth shopping around for both insurance and food.

Car insurance- I have 6 points, drive a Range Rover and leave my car overnight on the street and pay less than that (realise this is a big mea culpa on MN but just trying to make sure OP understands that she's paying a huge amount). Have you shopped around?

You can easily get your costs down. I also think there are things here that don't really add up- maybe OP is adjusting some details to avoid anything identifying. Did strike me it might be a journalist.

OP our joint net income is the same as yours - but we both have to work FT for the privilege so have £900 a month nursery fees atm, a couple of things which jump out - Nursery you've said is £8.50 an hour, how about a childminder locally (sorry If I've missed this) we are in the North East, in a V cheap housing area (our 4 bed was £220k 2.5 years ago)

Energy: £470
Life insurance: £30
Car Insurance: £140 this is £100 a month more then we pay! are you a new driver?
Home insurance: £14
Mortgage: £849
TV: £15
Phones: £40
Fuel: £150 why is this so high when you have a hybrid car?
Pet Insurance: £160
Dog Food: £70
Food: £500 this can be hugely cut, I budget £80 a week or us 2 and 2 kids (6 and 2 including everything)
Pension: £750 I'd knock this down for a year or so until DH can be earning again, even £100 a month , unless salary sacrifice then may make hardly a difference anyway)
Spotify: £12
Playgroup: £30
Income Insurance, boiler insurance, appliances insurance: £44
Rainy Day savings: £100
Council Tax: £310
Broadband: £22
Student Loan: £400 if you're salary sacrificing £9k a year into pension then these repayments are HIGH

Whereas I knew SAHPs who actively chose to work evenings as a relief from the chaos of running around after toddlers all day.

The double shift was the norm for parents when I grew up and if the OP doesn't want to reduce her savings then this is the choice.

Bottom line - OP is a high earner in a "cheap" and "rural" area in a four bedroom house with considerable capital (because they had a deposit from savings in early 20s).
She has a fully paid off hybrid car (from savings) and an astonishingly expensive dog, plus a SAHP with a hobby business.
She is still able to put nearly a third of her income and all of DH's into savings every month.

She has choices. She is not hard up. If she wants to maintain her current savings and lifestyle then DH needs to earn more or she needs to reduce monthly savings and investments.

Wonder if the OP will be back?

So many of us have Pointed out that the figures just do not add up.

Loads of us have also pointed out that if the OP is true, and even if the figures were accurate, there are practical steps the family can take such as upping the Dh's evening work, paying for childcare (hard to believe a childminder costs more than £9:50 an hour when the OP claims to live in a cheapish area) or reduce pension payments for the moment.

I fully expect that if the OP does reappear, there'll be some massive new drip feeds like every childminder in a 20 mile radius is fully booked, or there are absolutely zero extra bar shifts available for dh...

Perhaps have a look at transferring some of your husbands tax allowance to you - if your husband is earning less than £12570 and yours is less than £50,270 - (I'm not sure what figure they mean by income - before or after deductions) - but 12 x £3600 is well under £50k. You can also backdate this claim. I've done this in the past - it was simple and I received a backdated cheque for £6-700 from memory. Just fill it in here📧
www.gov.uk/apply-marriage-allowance

We also paid extra into my wife's pension through AVC's - it worked out for us as we stayed together (I have some private pension funds - some I have cashed in - others we can afford to sit on for as long as it takes for them to get back up to somewhere near their highest values) but you could reduce payments in for a short time.

I don't understand why people pay so much for mobiles - is this because you bought a contract that includes a very new handset? I bought a Redmi Note 10 Pro - about £280 off Amazon (5020mAhr battery life!, 128Gb memory, 108MP quad camera, Gorilla glass, dual SIM, slot for microSD card to expand memory, stereo speakers) and have a £7pcm SIM from ID mobile - 8Gb data per month - I barely use 1-2Gb - I could halve the data to 4Gb for £6pcm but when we are away in the campervan I hotspot my phone for my wife who has a £4.90pcm Lebara deal.

I do all the shopping and cooking (for us and I always cook a bit extra for my MIL who is blind and lives alone) and £500 seems high - it is high - I batch cook so I almost never cook a meal that's all eaten in one night - what I cooked last night will give us meals for another 3 plates (me, wife and MIL). I make bread in the bread maker twice a week.

Your heating bills - you really need to have a look at how you "manage" your gas and electric - really investigate what is using a lot and when you are using energy.

I adjust my thermostat several times a day - I drop it to 16C overnight so it rarely comes on - anyone who just has their heating on at the same temp all the time is throwing money away. I found it cheaper overall to leave my heating on overnight rather than let the house cook too much overnight only to have to heat it up again in the morning - I had to take readings on my meter and look at usage to find out what was really going on - it took weeks to get a feel for the figures.

I have 2 bedrooms and a bathroom upstairs that we no longer use since our DD's left home - we keep the doors closed and the heating is off - the truth is the house is too big for us now but we love where we live and the house - which is well insulated. We don't put radiators on if we are not using the space where they are located - the radiator gets turned on in our bedroom in the morning if we are going to have a lazy lie in or get up late otherwise it's off overnight.

I rarely put the oven and never use the grill - if the oven goes on I make sure it gets used for cooking more than one thing - e.g. I threw baking potatoes in and a crumble a I made when cooking sausages. These days I cook things that don't need the oven - I bake cakes and roast a chicken now and again but I'm doing my next chicken in the slow cooker.

I had a 30 year old fridge freezer than I found was using about 1/3 of our electricity - I noticed it was frequently noisy because the compressor was turning on regularly (that hum) - basically all the refrigerant leaks out even through welds over a long period of time and it was working hard running the electric pump/compressor to try and keep things cool - I bought the cheapest Bosch FF from John Lewis and it's paid for itself very quickly.

I had a small music system that was using as much power on standby as it was when turned on - 50W.

You just have to go round and pay attention to what's going on in your home and think about how you live in it. It seems to me that most people experience a great mental inertia that immediately makes them think that they can't live or spend differently - well - you can - you can make decisions about doing things differently, you can change what you choose to spend your money on, you can change your priorities and your plans, e.g. you don't have to have expensive mobile contracts, you don't have to live in a house that's warmer than you really need, you don't have to always buy the best/favourite/preferred products/food items, etc.

I had a huge old Victorian mid-terrace - lovely place but OMG - high bills and lots of maintenance costs over the years. When I moved in 2005 I spent about £7k on dropping all the ceilings upstairs and in the flat roof extension and having Kingspan insulation inserted and then had the whole thing re-plaster-boarded - I'd do it again now if I had to - even Kingspan has a lifespan. You should have a look at where you can better insulate - better double (or triple) glazing, heavy curtains, draught excluders. Even simple things like have you got furniture pushed up against radiators - all you are doing is putting heat into the furniture and it is not being re-radiated or conducted efficiently from the furniture into the room. Is the garage/workshop heated or well insulated? Is anything using electric in there that doesn't need to be on?

I wouldn't move but I would think about insulating your place better if you can.

Sorry, I included student loan and pension on my outgoings because i know both are more than average and wanted to avoid all the 'why is your take home pay so low?' questions. £3,600 is my take home after tax, then the pension and loans are on top.

My student loan also includes an additional loan to cover the cost of my accommodation. It was a scheme available via the university to people from certain backgrounds which I qualified for and is paid back on the same terms as my actual student loan (although not from my wages directly obviously). That's why my repayments are slightly higher than normal.

Car insurance: DH is a newly qualified driver and I have no no claims discount due to an accident last year, hence why we changed the car at that point. It's up for renewal in March so I'll shop around then for sure.

The car is a plug in hybrid, not a full electric so I also have fuel costs. I commute to the office 3 days a week, my commute is 48 miles each way. I used to take the train, but that's now WAY too expensive. It's cheaper to drive and park post-pandemic.

The inheritance available to DH and SIL after we'd paid of MIL and FIL's debts was about £17k each. SIL used £5k of hers to pay for her first couple of terms at uni to top up her accommodation etc, then she's got the other £12k in an ISA she's going to use to help buy a house when she finishes. SHe's choosing to work alongside her studies so she can keep as much of that cash as possible for a deposit which I think is very sensible. We feed her when she's at home, but in return she does look after DS for us when she's not working which allows DH to pick up some extra shifts/ commissions. She houses, clothes and feeds herself with what she earns from doing night shifts over the holidays and working twilights and early mornings around her lectures when she's at uni. She is in no way sponging off us, she's awesome.

We used our £17k for a couple of things: we paid off a long standing debt with £7k of it, then £5k set up the garage as DH's workshop and the other £5k went into savings where it's gradually getting eaten by unexpected expenses like dishwashers, the boiler (hence we now have boiler insurance) and replacing the kitchen after we had a burst pipe last winter. I have about 2 months of wages in savings.

(She’s only commuting three days a week)

Can you take a meter reading every week? Then you’ll see it going up in ‘real time’.

Are you heating the house or the room you are all in?

I feel for you OP, you've worked hard to get where you are and struggling.

It would only be short-term but is there any chance DH could get some more bar shifts over the next couple of months? With xmas coming up, they're sure to be busy.

Your energy bills seem excessive. Can you have the heating on slightly lower and less? Unless it's literally freezing all day, you could get away with 1-2 hours in the morning and 3-4 hours in evening. DH might get a bit nippy in the day, but I always found going out for a walk/playtime in the park, plus an extra layer at home meant I could cope.

Also, your food bill seems excessive. I set myself a limit and stick to it, I roughly count up cost of my purchases as I shop - if I think I'm getting near my limit I do a few swaps, ie cheap packet of biscuits for cake, sausages instead of chicken fillets. Also buy shops own brands. Pulses are great for splitting with meat in the recipe and as a total substitute. Always look out for fruit/veg offers in supermarket each week - that pack of fruit will probably be cheaper than the bunch of bananas you were going to buy.

I guess you need fuel for work, but otherwise limit it to absolute essentials. We do a lot of local walks, sometimes take a sandwich with us which - might only be out for an hour or two, but free and does you an world of good getting out.

The car costs seem unnecessarily high but then you've not factored anything in for maintenance so may well even out.

In the morning when he gets home and before his wife leaves for work? So 1-3 hours in the early morning and the same in the evening? How sustainable is that?
I agree with @ZekeZeke