To think we aren't saving enough...

[prettyinpinkormaybegreen]

We are a family of 4, 2 adults and 2 DCs one at uni one at home. We bring home £100k per year so approx £6k a month so I know we are much better off than many.
By the time we pay mortgage, cars, bills and food I don't know where it all goes every month. We save about £500 every month but I always feel we should be saving more but just don't know how we could. I'm scared about the cost of living and I know I am far from destitute.
What do you all manage to put away every month??

Our household income is a third of yours, and we save £700 a month into various pots, but we do not have pensions. Also have 3DC.

I think being 'scared' is a bit dramatic. We are on £50k a year and our savings account has absolutely zero in it, to give you some perspective.

Having a DC at Uni is expensive. Once both your DC are through that stage you can save more. We never used to save much but now we've paid our mortgage off save a lot more.

The app ‘money dashboard’ is brilliant for budgeting and seeing where your money goes (not affiliated at all haha). It links to all your bank accounts and you categorise all spending and it even gives you a pie chart so per month you can see exactly how much you’ve spent on groceries / bills / eating out etc. any category you want. Takes a while to set up but much easier than manually updating a spreadsheet and a massive eye opener! (Amazing how the little shops / cafe visits etc add up!)

(You can also add in your credit cards and saving accounts so you know exactly how much you have in total across different banks)

I also think you need to separate emergency savings / contingency from general savings for holidays / Xmas etc. If you had a redundancy / major car bill / roof collapse / family emergency etc with little notice, you would need to touch the emergency pot. If it were me it would have enough to cover basic bills for 6 months (or very minimum at least 10k for starters), and it should be in a high interest account and untouched unless there is a serious need

Yes I assumed OP was just talking long term untouched savings, we save nearly £2000 a month in pots for various things like holidays. It's the long term savings we're not prioritising at the moment (apart from pensions obviously).

I would want to be saving more with that income. We have a household income of 125k a year and save between 1-1.5k a month. We want to have a good cushion in case of job loss & we’re saving for early retirement.

Also, just to add we are a 1 income family on less than you are and we try to save approx 1k a month (our mortgage with overpayments is £1600) but it varies hugely depending on Xmas / hols/ bdays / etc and other outgoings such as insurances etc, (x2 children). As well as the money dashboard app to track monthly spending we have a spreadsheet detailing / approximating monthly and yearly spending on everything including small things like hair cuts etc so we know roughly what’s do-able, and can work out what we can aim to save per year, rather than a set amount per month as this can change so much depending on a big insurance / water bill etc. there’s no point aiming to save £1k a month and being hard on yourself if you don’t, if you have a spreadsheet that says it’s totally not doable based on your current situation etc :)

It absolutely surprises me if the children, who no longer require childcare, cost THOUSANDS of pounds a month. They certainly shouldn't.

@MrsJBaptiste how do you save rhat much? Or are you including holidays/Christmas in that?

As others have said you need to track every single penny. It is utterly tedious but it us necessary to know how to manage your cashflow. I started it years ago, DH laughs at my spreadsheets but if anything else, it helps focus your financial goals. I can give you our income and expenditure if it helps.

We save £0 at the moment as have high outgoings, but pre DD we saved 10-15% of net income excluding pensions.

We will be able to go back to that one day but not right now. We have about £20k in savings, income is £75k-ish

I should have also added that I have a BTL and a public sector defined benefits pension so retirement is sorted, it’s the now that is hard!

Background; Family of 4, NW England, 4 bed detached, low mortgage, no childcare, no car costs (company car). We live frugally; no expensive hobbies, few takeaways or meals out, shop at B&M, Lidl, Aldi and Primark, have cheap days out, save up for a big holiday abroad every 4yrs rather than cheaper package deals.

Income £4890 pm
Fixed Outgoings £1122 pm ( inc mortgage of £490 and other fixed bills)
Variable Outgoings £1356 pm
Balance to savings £2412 (around 50%)

So the variable expenditure includes food, going out, health & beauty, fuel, pets, clothing, school stuff and includes gifts for xmas & birthdays.

The savings are for one off household items, decorating, holidays and mortgage overpayments. Currently have a very expensive doer upper so the savings are not actually growing much at the moment but once the works are done then we can focus on our next goal.

You need a big shop every week :-/ something is wrong there. I get a big tesco ship once a month and other than bread and milk each week thats it for the month I spend 180 + the delivery fee and thats for 2 adults, 3 toddlers and a teen oh and a dog and 2 cats.

All hats off to you if this makes you happy, but if I had to feed 5 people and 3 animals on £45 a week, I’d be questioning my life choices.

OP and her family earn a decent salary. I don’t think they quite need to penny pinch yet.

Eh? What about fresh fruit, veg, meat and fish?

I think most people do a large weekly shop so that they have fresh food and some variety/pleasure!

By the time we pay mortgage, cars, bills and food I don't know where it all goes every month. Address this and then you can review.

Only having £10k in savings, half of which is actually not savings but about to be spent on a holiday, is quite low for your earnings. The basic rule of thumb is 6 months bills, so £30k for you?

I'm on £25 k a year, currently saying £0 a month so I think you are doing great!

I don't know where it all goes every month

That needs to be your first port of call. What others save out of context of their circumstances is not really relevant.

FWIW I save over 25% of my salary every month - how does that help you?

Write down all your incomings and outgoings for a couple of months and it will become very clear where it goes, what changes you need to make to save more and then you can decide if you want to make those changes.

Been thinking about this. Maybe we are doing things wrong?

We overpay our (850pcm) mortgage by £450 per month, and I pay 1k into my pension per month.

This isn’t savings as such, but it is kind of savings? We are on track to pay off our 25 year mortgage ten years early to help free us up to pay for kids uni.

And we are currently also paying off some medical treatment on the credit card at £500 per month. In 6 months when that is done, we will divert that £500 per month into savings. We’d need a 24k pot for 6 months expenses - so four years of saving at that rate.

Do pensions and mortgage overpayments count as ‘savings’ for other people?

I'm guessing you don't use a budget? I've been using YNAB for years and the increase in costs has really shown up since the start of the year. We're budgeting 30% more for food than we were this time last year and that's with me actively planning cheap meals, which I didn't before. Our budget for eating out has also gone up but by 50%. A big chunk of that is the price increase but also, we're tipping a bit more than usual because I don't know how anyone on minimum wage is coping.

Not to me.

And surely you need to work out if overpaying your mortgage is actually worth it, keeping in mind erosion by inflation and the potential for growth via investments etc. We could choose to use our investments to pay off some of our mortgage in the future but we wouldn't have the same flexibility if we'd put it all into the house from the outset.

Max pension contributions (if matched by employer) are just a no brainer and I don't give them much thought.