to ask how do people afford all these things ?

[kermitspants]

Me & DH have a fairly good/decent income between us. What with the cost of living increases etc and general costs to run a house for 5 of us, we don't/cant afford to have many luxuries. I see FB posts with friends (acquaintances) who:

Were celebrating the coronation at home with Fortnum & Mason champagne & hamper

Purchased a brand new landrover as a gift for their wife for Christmas

Brought their DC a brand new car for their 18th

Pop up marquees in the garden with the biggest TV screen for friends to come over and watch England playing

Christmas and the gifts are ££££££ with some people taking the DC to lapland (in addition of the summer holiday they had) and buying top of the range gifts/food/hampers

Have the biggest Christmas trees (ours is usually around 5 foot and costs around £50 (real tree) which I thought was a hell of a lot of money for a tree). Goodness knows how much the bigger trees cost

New York trips for Christmas

My 'luxury' for Christmas food was a posh bottle of M&S prosecco for the table along side Tesco food. I splashed out on a £14 posh bottle of fizz for the coronation, and that was pushing the boat out.

Am I missing something here ????

NB - those who think I am jealous, need not reply.

You don't even have to be successful high earning person to have nice pricey stuff sometimes even!

Try reading my post again. I didn’t include those with high paid jobs. We’re on 6 figures and I still drive a £500 banger because I wouldn’t put my money into an expensive car. Where I live is not far from London and prices, salaries are the same. I know people who earn less then half we do but spend twice as much. What I’m trying to say is that what someone buys isn’t always an indication that they’re better off, it’s sometimes an indication that they have higher debt.
I work In property and get to see how people spend their money. Some people are willing to take out a huge mortgage for that luxury home, others won’t. Doesn’t mean the one with the huge home is more financially successful.

It bewilders me too. On paper we should have a very good life. For a long time we could pay the bills and clothe and feed us and do a couple kids activities. No savings, no weekends away or holidays. In the last year it’s got a bit better, we actually had some savings and last year got a cost of living bonus so took a holiday. Can’t complain really but life was very dull and a bit stressful for almost a decade. Improving now as we are back to both of us working (me PT) and we’re able to save and take a holiday and not feel as much stress

Get off social media and stop comparing your life to theirs.
I choose to live a very simple way of life, l work part time, it suits me. Time for myself is more important to me than being stuck at work full time and wasting my money on crap. None of the things you've listed matter a jot to me. My passion is growing lots of plants and making my garden beautiful. Each to their own, live and let live.

Actually, inequality in Britain has become so stark that people in the lowest income brackets are now worse off than their equivalents in Slovenia. The average Slovenian household is due to be better off than the average British one by 2024.

But that's austerity, quantitative easing and Brexit for you I guess!

People haven’t got a clue what most jobs pay, unless it’s public information, like state school teachers, junior doctors etc.
One of the wealthiest people I know is ‘only’ a dentist to most people who know her, but she actually runs multiple private surgeries so is more of a businesswoman. Most people don’t know this so are probably confused, rather like the OP is about her friends, about the dentist’s second home, flash car, holidays etc.

Because it’s designed to incentivise/enable people to work? A person earning 70k pays the same tax whether they have a partner or not, why should they get a tax break simply for having a partner? Of course two working adults should have more income after tax than one working adult.

Any other system would seriously disadvantage women and discourage them from the workforce.

Some people have a lot of debt, which is how they afford all these things. Other people prefer to save and don’t spend as much. Also some people just earn a lot of money, have inherited wealth etc. My financial situation is very fortunate, I could lease a fancy new Range Rover if I wanted one. But that’s because I’m a widow. So I have no mortgage as the life insurance paid it and I get a lot in pensions every month for myself and the kids. The price I paid for that is being left alone with two kids age 36 though! I don’t have a fancy car though, as I don’t want one. And I never post on Facebook.

Some people are better at dodging tax than others too.

Some people made good decisions.
I know a couple who both bought flats when single and young, they sold one to buy a house together and kept the other for rental income.
They now seem like they have lots more money than you'd expect.

Some people get good bonuses or have family money.

We were able to go on amazing dream holiday because I had an isa for years that I put a small amount in regularly. I then set up another to put a small amount regularly.

One of my friends always has spare money, LOADS of nights out, holidays and her kids get loads too.
She told me that they bought their house outright years ago as she got some inheritance at 20 so they've never had a mortgage. Jammy bugger.

Lots of different scenarios potentially for the people you mention in your post. Could be anything. They could have savings, loans, inheritance, work lots of hours or just plain rich!

@BetterFuture1985 I was thinking of developing countries. Slovenia is bloody lovely, I'd be happy to live there! I agree with you about inequality and Brexit. But seething at your neighbours doesn't help.

Yes I agree with this. People always say credit cards, but surely they’d only get to say a £20,000 or £30,000 limit or something (couple of inclusives and a room reno), then they wouldn’t be able to borrow anymore. It’s much more feasible that someone would earn £30,000 more than you think, than they’re able to borrow £30,000 a year indefinitely.

This keeps coming up.

some people will have more than you, some people less. Some people will LOOK like they have more than you, some people look like they have less (but maybe have more saved away).

you have no idea what these people earn, whats been gifted, maybe they have money from family, a bonus, no debt, savings etc etc. You will never know.

focus on your life and what brings you joy rather than taking note of things that others have!

Yes.

Sometimes it's credit or some other dubious thing, but it's also true that some people do just earn a lot and it's not a stretch for them.

I am going to sound picky but the way people always put it wounds like it's some super extreme dip below levels of some underdeveloped country. Slovenia is actually quite rich, well educated country with lots of investment happening for last few decades so will get even better. So it's not surprise it's nearly on par with uk.

From the other side of the fence, we are that family whom friends and family would always passive aggressively comment on, when we would go on yet another holiday, how we manage to pay school fees etc, yet they are unaware that we managed to pay our mortgage off with a few years work bonus’s. We don’t have the latest gadgets, our car is ancient and the house needs a bit of love. Different families prioritise different things. Most of our friends earn way more than us and own second properties, but they are always pleading poverty, I really can’t understand why they whinge that they can’t afford to “replace the dishwasher” when they change their cars once every 2 years for top of the range new models.
Different strokes for different folks.

As others have said, variants of this topic come up all the time and the answer is always a combination of the following two factors.

One, they've got access to more money than you'd assume. This can include credit and/or family help, but certainly doesn't have to. Two, the luxuries cost less than you think. In your case, you have listed some pretty expensive stuff, but people aren't necessarily paying full price themselves for it.

Why would it disadvantage women? Men are quite capable of being SAHPs too. Surely it would give families the choice as to whether to be dual or single income without being penalised?

Even if there should be an incentive, the difference at the moment is obscene and single income households are being forced to give up their hard earned income seemingly to pay for other people's childcare.

But this is silly. We have a slightly lower combined income but I would buy more expensive wine because that's something I choose to spend money on...

Yes but it's also a former Communist country that has managed to catch up with the UK remarkably quickly from having very weak infrastructure only about 30 years ago.

Also, I'm not able to make the same comparison between Slovenia and France, Germany or the USA for example, because they haven't been utterly trashed by incompetent Tories with sticky fingers for the last 13 years.

maybe you don't have quite the good salary you think you have ? we bring in just under 200k and have 1 child. can't afford the big cars and would only have 2 reasonably priced holidays a year, but can do most of the other stuff. if you have 3 kids then that would wipe out our fancy holidays probably too.

More debt / inheritance than you'd expect IME.
I've known low earners who are terrifyingly chilled about several K of debt.

It's a silly post really, some people earn way way more than you imagine, some people have access to money you don't realise they have eg inheritance, some are up to their eyeballs in debt. Some people will have 0 in savings as they "live for today" and spend every penny. It doesn't really matter does it? What difference does it make to you? Why else write a post about it if you aren't bothered/jealous?

A big part of it will be number of kids.

The OP seems to have 3. People who only have 1 or 2 to split their resources between can often afford a lot more. I'd have a lower standard of living financially speaking if we added another DC to the mix.