why are we struggling

[wwoiu]

Just looked at our budgets - yet again....and despite bringing in 6.5k per month, we just seem to be struggling. Our rent is 2000 and childcare is 500 - plus the usual transport 500. But we should have loads left for savings and holidays and stuff and yet we don't. We cant change any of those but need to find ways of cutting down in other areas. Any tips?

Your gonna have your arse handed to you.

You do need to be meticulous. How else would random strangers on the internet give you tips.

I don’t think the silly digs about your income are relevant. But you need to give an item by item breakdown of ALL your spending. You can use the Moneysaving expert tool. Otherwise, you will get unhelpful replies like the ones you already got.

No, this was her response to someone suggesting she 'read the room' - that MN posters are such people.

Lol 😆

"so we have 1700 for stuff like clothes, christmas, savings, holidays etc"

OP, you do realise there are people who can't afford to feed their children, and you say you're struggling, when you have a £1,700 surplus every month - that's over £20K a year you have to spend on whatever you like!

Just think how much even 10% of that money each month would make to the poorest families, then come back and tell us you're struggling.

You sound deluded.

Ah ok.

They definitely aren't struggling though

Yeah that’s fuck loads. You could put £1000 straight into savings and have the £700 as personal spends for whatever you want. It sounds like you’re just terrible at money management.

£600 for food? I don't believe that. Or if it is, what are you spending separately on things like cleaning equipment etc.

You need to properly check your bank account and spending - I bet you havr all kinds of things you aren't accounting for?

£600 a month on Groceries? Yea, halve that.

£1700 left over - that's my entire net income. and yet we aren't struggling (DH net is £2100 for context) having an entire FT wage to play with every month is NOT tight!

Maybe look at it from another angle, after paying rent, travel, bills, you have £1700 leftover for other things - it's a lot more than many. I suspect you've got used to having and living to a higher standard as you've got more income, but on your spends, I suspect some things could be tweaked if you don't have enough for things you really want.

ie, £600 seems a massive amount for food. You might be able to cut back on gas, electric, phone costs. If you need clothes, look at cheaper shops, ie Primark, if you can't get what you want there, somewhere slightly more expensive. Holiday wise, the children will be quite happy with a cheap cottage/holiday let by the sea. If it could be your thing, might be worth investing in a tent and equipment - we did this years ago and we can have a four night break away for £100 plus petrol/a few pounds a day for a treat (cake, icecream), we take food with us. Get the right campsite and you don't need to drive anywhere the whole break.

A mortgage on a three bed house would be less than your rent.

£1700 spare each month…what’s the problem?

But for the OP to have a mortgage on a 3 bed house, she first needs to save tens of thousands of pounds, which she can't do while she's spending £2k pm on rent, and spending the rest of their income each month.

They'd probably need to move somewhere cheaper and only buy the bare essentials for a few years to save a deposit. But it might be a good time to try if we're going into a recession and house prices drop. In 2/3 years time houses might just be more affordable than they are now.

It's true that everybody needs a hefty deposit to buy a house nowadays but paying £2000 a month rent is really a lot.

Sadly, I know a significant number of people who are on this ridiculous spinning wheel of paying insane amounts in rent, making it impossible to save for a deposit and who can't get a mortgage as a result.... even though they can prove that they can pay easily.

It's a HUGE problem and while I understand how banks and building societies handle risk, I think risk algorithms should be adapted to take this into account. eg, SIL is self employed and has very little deposit so she's not able to buy. But she's been forking out over £2000 in rent for over 4 years and less, but still substantial amounts for years before that. She has 10 years of self employed income at a good level. It is ridiculous that she can't raise enough money to buy a house on a smaller mortgage.

It's probably because you're frittering away little amounts of money everyday but they add up very quickly!

For instance today DD1 and I went to a cafe whilst waiting for DD2's lesson to end. We had some drinks and a snack, cost us about £8. I needed a new screen protector for my phone and picked up some keychains for the kids whilst waiting - that's another £18. Before heading home we went to the supermarket for some beef I needed for dinner and invariably picked up some other stuff that cost slightly under £20. That's £46 of 'unexpected' expenses in one day... multiply that by 30 and it's really not hard to see why £1700 is gone.

List of every single outgoing. Most banking app list direct debits/standing orders and subscriptions.