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?

OP we are with Bulb also. When they suggest you increase your DD it isn't compulsory. I also had the email wanting to increase our DD. I refused to pay more than 200pm as we are >£600 in credit and quite frankly I think they are taking the piss.

After reading all your posts, I'd reiterate that DH should do more evening work (2-4 nights per week), and ideally look to find something higher paying than the pub work he currently does. If his side hustle doesn't bring in much reliable income, I think he may have to forgo that for shift work until your finances are a bit stronger.

Renting out the workshop also seems like a great idea, as does shopping around for energy rates and doing the food shop somewhere cheap like Aldi to cut costs.

Good luck!

Nothing to add but admiration of you OP for pulling yourself up from such a difficult start in life and caring for your SIL. Your DH sounds lovely as well.
Good luck.

I hope some of the nasty posters will take a hard look at themselves for doing their best to make someone feel worse rather than trying to help.

Other suggestions:
Your council tax will be over 10 months as standard, you can request it over 12 months. Spreads it out. Seems high though, mine is £210 for band e

Your car insurance seems incredibly high, I'm paying £190 for the year! I would suggest looking into that urgently. If you own your phones or when contract finishes, look at a sim only deal like giffgaff, £10 a month

Dog food seems high - look at Amazon for bulk deals. Ditto insurance, mine is £95 still expensive but lower than yours (older dog whose cost his insurers £££ too).

This is actually a really big sticking point - when I went to uni under not too different circumstances, there was TONS of help around for me. I actually came out of uni in profit since I'd also worked and a combo of my loan, top up loan and grants covered my costs and then a bit more so my wages were saved up. It felt very much like as a care leaver, the uni and student finance were hurling money at me to help however they could and you can bet i took every single penny I could. There were a lot of £500 here and there type grants I was able to get due to not having parents that added up. I had a wonderful form tutor at 6th form college who used to spend his lunchbreaks with me for a good few weeks sat in the science labs researching absolutely everything he could find on grants. Not kidding when I say we even considered me going vegetarian to qualify for £500 from the vegetarian charity . We're still in touch, thank god for good teachers.

For SIL though it's COMPLETELY different. She's had some access to counselling through the Uni and she gets a grant, but that reduces the amount of loan she can apply for so she's better off long term but not short term. She's also at uni in England so the basic maintenance grant isn't available to her anymore. There's literally nothing else for her, it's maddening and SO different from just 10 years ago when I was at Uni.

The SIL rent situation is a red line for me - DH's parents fed, housed and clothed me for 2 years before uni and a year and a half afterwards and never asked for a penny despite not having much themselves. They didn't even question it - when my foster placement fell through just before I turned 16 I'd been dating DH for 18 months or so and it was never a question where I'd go, they just scooped me up like it was completely normal, never mentioned it and it wasn't until I was about 25 that I realised that's not normal at all and what they actually did was incredible. I then asked them both about it, and it turned out at the time there was a massive battle with the council about where I could be safely housed and whos responsibility I was but basically, they ended up with special guardianship of me because by the time they'd stopped arguing with the council, I was 17 and they could prove I'd spent 3 of the last 5 years effectively living with them and the council no longer cared because I was almost 18 and no longer their problem.

They went through all that for a random kid they knew very little about because I happened to feel safe with their son. Everything in my life I did from that point on was built on the stability they gave me. No way will their youngest child pay for a room in my house. Ever.

No advice, but you sound utterly lovely OP. Your SIL is lucky to have you and DH.
Good luck to you and everyone else struggling at the moment.

If dd is 1.5 she can go to nursery at 3, which is only just over a year away. Then Dh can work much more. He needs to prep now for making a decent salary then. He could take a course, say book keeping, or project management, or similar, and earn near £1000 per money part time, whilst still taking her to nursery, and caring for dd when she isn't in nursery.

Agreed.

Some of the replies have been horrible OP.

I really understand that that feeling of insecurity never really leaves you. I grew up without much/any money and am now pretty well off. But I live massively beneath my means because I fear not being able to continue to support myself fully.

I'm really glad your SIL has your home as somewhere she can call home - losing your parents so young and then having no one to fall back on would be dreadful.

And I don't have a problem with you NEVER charging your sil rent. Makes total sense to me, given the history.

OP, you have this all under control and asking for help and support from an IFA with your finances is the solution in the future.

You seem like you have a lovely family, and once you have all the options from the IFA, you can make a plan which suits your family best.

Your achievements and life story are very inspiring to read. Have you ever thought about motivational speaking? So many people out there would benefit from your insight as I have done reading your posts.

How would that help?

Yes seems odd, was thinking why are they just answering some questions not the massive question on where is most your money going!! How can anyone help with only half the story!!

Good news on being in credit with Bulb. There's been some great advice and some awfully harsh replies to this thread so well done you for taking it on the chin. Think you and PP were right about the psychological response to issues and the fear of it all falling down around you.

Bulb are bastards.

You shouldn't need to raise your dd amount at all. Tell them you will complain if they insist. You are loads in credit! In fact, I think you should lodge a complaint to now with bulb asking them to explain their workings out.

They are still insisting I need to increase my DD to £410 minimum and that's including the discount from the government.

A minor point, but the discount from the government isn't taken off your energy account/dd, for some reason your supplier actually transfers it into your bank account as a separate transaction each month!

Ridiculous that they've increased your dd when you're already so much in credit.

Ours is taken off our direct debit (Eon).

Bulb have been doing this for years. Four years ago I was 600 in credit post winter. Called asked for refund, bloke told me the algorithm decided whether I could be refunded (skint January) I changed energy provider and voila refund much easier than arguing. I don’t know if you’re stuck with bulb these days but pretty sure the energy companies have been told not to build up big surpluses so I would complain.

apparently if you are more than a whole month in credit you can demand a refund they can only refuse if your credit is a small amount or if you have only a tiny bit of credit after the summer , neither of these are true in your case you can ask for at least £500 of that back imediately if your supplier has gone bust your new supplier should refund you also you can stop DD and supply meter readings each month

OP, kudos for getting your life to where you are now and respect for your attitude to your SIL. Ignore the sniping, you're doing a great job.

It's a mammoth thread so I may have missed it but in case it hasn't come up, there's a thread in the Money section about earning £10 a day extra - it might have some ideas that your DH could use to add a bit more to the pot without having to go out to work? It's things like surveys, website testing, audio transcription etc that you can do in short bursts of free time. Some of the folks on there seem to make quite a bit, although I think there are elements of luck and timing involved!
Good luck.

I think you'll find a lot of people do this...I certainly did as did my colleagues. It's gutty and tiring but if you need the extra income it's what you have to do.

Bulb have added it to my account as credit.

Given what you've said about your childhood and your lack of a financial safety net from parents etc I just wanted to say that I think you are doing brilliantly, and your stress about affording to heat your home is unnecessary but totally understandable. People that have grown up in challenging financial circumstances will often continue to worry about money even though they have become financially insecure. You're making good financial decisions that will secure your family's future and give your SIL the best possible start in life, and you have plenty of choices where you can cut back if necessary, which is so important at the moment. I'm glad you managed to have a discussion with bulb and come to an agreement about a more reasonable payment. It is wild that they can attempt to bump up your DD like that!

I’m sorry, but at 35 pages as I type this, I haven’t read anywhere near the whole thread. But from the bits that I have, two sentences (one from your first post, and one from your last), two sentences really stand out to me:

“No way will their youngest child pay for a room in my house. Ever.”

“We do have a dog and his pet insurance is £60 a month but it’s none- negotiable that we keep that going.“

I really admire your attitude and principles. Not only do I hope that it all works out for you ok, but I’m pretty convinced that it will. I know sentiment doesn’t keep the heating on, but I think your commitment and character will see you right.

I’ve never known a SAHP not work as well. It’s not every day eg 2 shifts 6-12pm on days op is wfh. It’s only 1 toddler at home so they will have a nap, can snuggle on sofa and watch CBeebies for a bit. Or work a weekend day instead.
Sounds like he has lots of skills eg a Saturday teaching ukulele or guitar at home or online could bring in a fair amount. It’s pure profit straight into family as he won’t pay tax.

Absolutely good for you, OP. I have nothing but respect both for your own achievements and for your determination to pay forward the help that you were given. You have been given an inexplicably hard time on this thread when it's quite clear that you posted in a panic and have some understandable and deep-seated fears around money and providing for a family from your own childhood.