to think this should be more than enough to live of?

[Jennyscarkey]

I am feeling really shit at the moment. I never seem to have any money and I work long hours and thought I had a decent income. I’m one of the lowest paid in my team but I came from a poor background and I’m just grateful to have had the opportunity to earn more than minimum wage. Yet even though I earn more than I ever thought possible for someone like me and where I grew up, I don’t think I can manage my money at all? My take home pay is 3,600. I am a single parent and also get 300 on top of this for maintenance. My rent is 900 and my little girl goes to nursery full time and that costs 1,400 a month. I claim the tax free part. I don’t have other outgoings expect 200 a month on a loan and usual utilities. Don’t have sky or Netflix etc.

I have gone through my cards to see what I’m spending and honestly it is just food, petrol, entry to soft play or a lunch here and there. I don’t buy clothes or make up or go on holiday. I was paid again yesterday and I had 2 pounds left before the money came in. I just don’t know where I am going wrong? I will never be able to afford a mortgage at the way this is going.

Depending on your local housing allowance you will be eligible for UC.for example If the housing element is around £650/m in your area you would get around £470/m UC.

Worth calling help to claim and checking your entitlement.

www.citizensadvice.org.uk/about-us/contact-us/contact-us/help-to-claim/

It's definitely the nursery. You earn the same as one of my children and although his salary sounds high he is spending an astronomical amount on rent in London, has student loan repayments, commuting, bills etc, it doesn't go as far as you think. It will be a lot better when you don't need the nursery anymore?

I think gross is more like 57k.
I earn more than OP but pay rent to support an adult child so excluding the extra rent my income is similar.
My rent is the same as you OP.
I don’t have any debt for example a car loan - do you have one of these?
I am supporting 3 children off my salary but no childcare costs. It’s still not easy.

180 a week in the supermarket for one adult and child is astounding. There's 2 adults 5 children and the dog in my house and that's my weekly shopping budget. 😬 surely the little one is being fed by nursery also. What are you buying?

Tbh based on the figures you’ve provided you should be fine.

Yes nursery fees are a killer but they are only temporary. But based on your figures even after nursery fees and rent you have £1600 left over for food, bills etc. which is more than enough for the two of you.

Your good bill seems high and £300 for heating (I assume monthly???) is mad we pay £88 a month for gas and electric and are in credit.

£3600 is a very good income. It'd be the high cost of nursery I bet that's crippling you.

Your math is mathing. Life is so ridiculously expensive. This is why there's population decline in places like Japan, they just can't afford it. Childcare is so expensive in the US even a full paycheck doesn't cover it so many women stay home and try to do home based businesses or just rely on DH if they are partnered. It's not you it's the system we're in, those guys on top are living large at our expense.

It is completely unrealistic to expect that a single person with a dependent could buy a house on just their income; it's hard enough for 2 income HHs.

Really harsh, but very true. There are other solutions, such as pairing up for property purchase with other women/people in similar situations. Not ideal, but then no worse than being stuck in a house/mortgage with a DP you hugely dislike.

Just "popping to the shop" is a killer on the purse, a quick trip for essential bits soon becomes a £££ trip. You need to meal plan so you can stick to it. As a single parent I found having a rice cooker and a slow cooker an absolute game changer, it's tricky to cook just for 1.5 people and a slow cooker makes it easier to keep portions for later in the wee or to freeze them. If you reheat them in the morning you can take them to work in a food flask for lunch

Once your childcare fees decrease you'll be able to save for your own place. If you don't already have one open a LISA (costs £1) and you can set up round up from your normal bank account. You can only open them up to age 39 but can continue putting into them for much longer, using the money and 25% bonus for either pension age or the purchase of your first house.

There are spreadsheets you can get for budgeting on the internet..get one and track everything you spend in a month. You can then work out where the money is dripping away!

Congratulations on your promotion too! Good for you It might be worth googling the high income child benefit charge if your gross pay is over 50k. You are probably ok if you’re paying via tax free childcare for now but you have to pay some child benefit back over a certain salary, and not everyone is aware of that.

Are you throwing out food at end of week? This is literally money in the bin.

Do a click & collect or food delivery once a week and stay out of the shops. Milk freezes & thaws overnight. If you're not in the shop getting bread/milk you won't be spending the ten or twenty.

Do you smoke? If so cut back or cut out if possible

I wanted to be debt free, started with a spreadsheet in 2016, got YNAB the year after, achieved it in 2020. Divorced in 2021 & bought my own house following this, I did have deposit from my half of sale of family home. I wouldn't have managed it otherwise.

Childcare has reduced this year with dd being in secondary school. It's a big help.

So income is

3600 + 300 = £3900 ( very good salary)

outgoings
£1400 + £200 + 900 = £2500

Difference = £ £1400

That should be plenty.

= £300 + a week

Have a look at the moneysavingexpert budget planner and work out where all your money is going. Don’t guess your expenditure but be honest with yourself.

£300 a week sounds a lot, but I know it's not.

£120 for the food shop, £70 for fuel, that leaves £110. By the time you've bought the kids new clothes, paid for swimming lessons, sent over money into school for the school trip etc etc it's disappeared.

I'm constantly saying I have NO idea at all how we have no money. Ours just disappears. Just stopping at the local Spar with two kids is £10 for 2 drinks and 2 snacks.

To be perfectly honest, I left the house yesterday and spent £60 (couple of xmas presents and quick trip to McDonalds becase we were running late, also some cat food and cat litter)

I'm also determined 2024 is the year I figure out how to stop it all disappearing as we also don't have new clothes or go on holidays.

I think you're doing so well. Life is hard and look at what you've accomplished in the face of adversity. Aim high, believe in yourself, keep your chin up and keep going.

My gross income is only slightly more than yours. I don't know what you do for a living but you're much better paid than the vast majority of people in the country - especially people your age. You're doing well.
The nursery fees are wiping out almost a third of your take home pay - a huge amount. Once that's over and done with you'll be in a position to put away a really significant amount of money each month (easily getting to 14k a year), plus that £200 loan repayment will have gone soon, I presume. Get a lifetime ISA as soon as possible and that'll help contribute too.
In the interim, you may also be able to claim some child benefit (though as a higher rate tax payer you'll not get the full amount and you may not get any at all, depending on your gross income). You may be able to claim some Universal Credit towards your housing costs, depending on where you live.
You can also radically slash the grocery bill. For one adult and one small child (who presumably is eating a significant amount of their food at nursery) you really don't need to spend a huge amount of money. My weekly bill for two adults rarely exceeds £90 and that includes booze. You could easily spend less - even without going to the discounters and without cutting out convenience foods like pasta sauces or the bung-it-in-the-oven type foods that make life a little easier.
I swear by getting an online delivery as I'm not tempted to buy shit I haven't budgeted for. And then, if I do need a couple of bits in between, I only go to the tiny shops where there's much less temptation.
It might take a little bit of planning initially but once you get into a routine of properly meal planning, only buying what you need, and batch cooking, you'll wonder how you ever spent so much.

Oh also £300 maintenance doesn't sound like a huge amount, especially given the astronomical nursery fees. Obviously I have no idea about your ex's financial position and that may be all they can afford (or have been told to pay) but if you're on good terms and if you think they may be able to contribute a little more then you could always ask - or see if they can help with more of the one-off costs like shoes, winter coats, trips etc.

I work full time and do not earn near that, you need to budget.

Seems like you are spending too much on food. Meal plan, save leftovers and once a month we have a kind of leftovers of previous meals week. So I'll make a massive vat of Bolognese - total cost £6 or so using mince from Aldi and tinned tomatoes and an onion - freeze into portions using Chinese takeaway tubs - but that will feed 4 of us for 4 meals (spaghetti extra). We probably spend (including allergy special bread etc) £100 per week for food for all 4 of us, 3 meals a day.

I get lunch out maybe once a month with a friend. I'd never dream of spending £20 a week and likewise, the idea of spending a fiver on a coffee just brings me out in a sweat.

Your electricity costs are also high. Ours are £220 per month for a 5 bed.

Our household income is significant (approx £10k a month) but we were both raised in working class families and i think we both probably have ingrained habits 😂

I'm a single parent and budget for everything, I literally write everything I spend in a spreadsheet. My biggest expense is also food. I like nice food, I rarely eat out but I cook a lot.

I reduced my food spend by opening a Starling account and transferring £500 a month into it. This covers food and the odd meal/sandwich out with DC. If it is heading towards the end of the month and the Starling balance is getting low we eat from the freezer.

Honestly, just that simple step on food budgeting makes a huge difference to my monthly spend. Before then I'd pop into M&S and emerge having spent £45 on one meal and not much else proper food wise.

Planning your meals and doing a weekly online shop will save you cash. I have a food delivery on Sundays and buy food for the week. I've had to change my thinking on shopping, for instance, if my DC decides to eat two yoghurts a day and they are gone on day 4 then they have to wait until the next delivery. Prior to going back to a food delivery I'd be popping to the shop. I don't top up the nice to haves mid week.

We both take lunch from home. DC is a permanently hungry teen so I'm happy spending £100-£120 ish a week on food.

We don't eat meat every day either which probably helps, two meat/fish free days a week. Tonight we ate this with a salad. Still probably cost £2.50 a head with nuts and parmesan but not the £5+ a head that eating fish or meat costs.

£1400, presumably this is before council tax, utilities, petrol, food and general life? It is easily blown if you don't keep tabs on it.

Don't cut out your lunch out each week, you deserve a bit of fun. Just make the saving elsewhere.

Get a freezer if you haven't already got one, it will save you money.

The mental burden of doing/paying for everything on your own and holding down a job that pays £50k+ a year isn't light and so you need to do everything you can to relieve stress. Organising your life to save cash and budgeting will really help you.

Get rid of the loan as soon as you can, I don't have any debt. I don't want the worry of paying for it/having my monthly available income reduced by it.

I don't believe your bills are only 200 a month.
Gas
Electric
Water
Council tax
Mobile
Internet
Those are surely the basics? You might not have gas, but I can't see how you would avoid the others. And I can't see how they are only 200. You must be missing some.

Oh and car insurance. And you should have contents insurance (but maybe you don't)

Surely as Op is on about £55-£60k she won’t be eligible for UC though?

170 a week on food is ridiculous soorry

i spend a 100 usually for 2 and i think thats too much

I second those who have suggested putting together and maintaining a detailed spreadsheet where you put EVERY PENNY of spending. It’s what I do and it helps so much. It also helps longer term. Eg, I know roughly what I spend each year on memberships and gifts, and so I set aside a monthly amount to cover that, rather than suddenly being caught out and going overdrawn, with the associated charges. You may well be surprised at the areas where you can make savings, and it lets you identify the things that really matter. Also, whatever you currently spend on nursery, when no longer needed make sure it all goes into savings so that you put a deposit together for your own place. Seeing it all in back white can be shocking though! Oh, and shopping lists. Always meal plan and make shopping lists, don’t just go and buy stuff, it’s lethal!

This - nobody would bat an eyelid if a mum was saying that her and her partner were struggling with 2 minimum wage jobs on 19k ish.

It also depends where you live how expensive things are. When you’ve worked your ass off while being a single parent to get into a position where you earn a decent salary, I can completely understand why it feels shit to still have to begrudge yourself a a decent daily coffee or a nice lunch.

Don’t worry OP nursery fees are a killer and soon you’ll be living it up on that extra £1400 x

You should be eligible for Universal Credit even on a high income. They add all the elements you're entitled to together to get your total monthly award amount. In your case that would be the single person over 25 element (368.74), child element (£269.58), childcare (your childcare element would be £950.92 for one child) so that's £1589.24. Then there would also be your rent added to that too. They pay rent in full if it's local authority/housing association or if it's private they'll pay whatever the Local Housing Authority rate is for your area and your circumstances. You can find this amount by googling it.

The first £379 of your monthly earnings is disregarded then they start deducting 55p in every pound from your award. On a take home of £3600 per month there would be a deduction of £1771 from your award which sounds a lot but judging by the fact you would get £1589 before rent is added on, you would end up being entitled to at least a few hundred extra a month from UC.

Many people think UC is just for low incomes but that's not the case at all. Oh and you can't claim tax free childcare at the same time but you would be better off financially on UC anyway.