How skint are you ?

[Jbrown76]

Inspired by this thread on Reddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskUK/s/iR5TPqfSR7

Absolutely nothing. No savings either. Get paid next week and literally all that money will be on bills and a car repair.
Not worried, life is too short to worry about money. Or lack of it 😅

In my view there's a big difference between being skint and spent up. I am absolutely not skint, but I am 'spent up' for the month. And I think there's a void of how each makes you feel - skint - must be absolutely grinding and underlying with anxiety - I'm hugely fortunate i've never been skint. Spent up is just a bit of a PITA and possibly a couple of weeks of frugality.

I was hoping to save about £250 this month… yeah well that’s looking unlikely 😂😂😂 Next month is dh and DD’s birthday. I really want to treat them both.

Well you'd be wrong. I grew up in a council house, my parents saved hard and had a little to help me but anything I have I have worked hard for and saved hard. DH was left some money by his gran a couple of years ago but our house and main savings are all from our hard work and savings.
We each had a property we bought when we were single, and sold those to buy our first house and bought this one about 7 years ago. It really stretched us for a while. No one helped us buy it.

We both worked hard at school, went to university and have worked our way up into well-paid posts. No leg up there either. We are in our early 40s so not boomers.

We are skint BUT we have two loans that we are repaying costing £900 per month. Unfortunately we will be paying them for another two years but then we will have an extra £900 a month that we have gotten used to not having ( plus salaries will go up) it's been tough but it's allowing us to do some renovations to our home so I'm really counting down the months

I'm a millennial and I don't have far off that in savings, more than if you include a house. I started 2 businesses from scratch (no financial parental help, not even moral support). I made (still make) a lot of sacrifices though. I work about 120 hours a week, constantly cancel plans, sacrifice birthdays, Christmas, things like that. And I don't have kids. Most people would not want my life 😂

Not skint. 70k in joint savings but that's for a house next year.

Maybe 25k in personal ISAs

4k in current account.

Just about 10-15% credit card utilisation but that's paid off each month.

No car loan (drive a 5 year old Honda bought outright). No phone loan (cracked screen Google phone). Buy all my clothes second hand.

No inheritance. Not a chance.

If you asked me a few years ago, I was in significant debt and living paycheck to paycheck. Really poor financial education growing up, parents with a never-save-a-dime mentality. Fortunate as I have a well paid job in the last few years, but it took loads of unlearning to get me financially stable. I'm still unlearning.

200k but only because my dad died suddenly in 2022 and I was his only child. I feel skint however because I can't work until my son starts school in Sept (I have 3 kids, 8 year old being the eldest) so I don't have any money coming in myself and I don't feel like my dad's money is mine 😐

-£105 in arranged overdraft of up to -£250 and that's with taking £500 from savings this month.

Around £2.5k in general savings and another £2k in tax free childcare account, which I could withdraw of needed, but would then lose the top up.

Very fortunate but feel very skint and do at this time of year, every year.

For me, it is 6.5 weeks between paydays but as I am paid hourly I got paid much less in December as the cut off was earlier. DH has pretty much not worked at all since Xmas as site closed for the break and then it has been too cold, and both kids birthdays are in December & January. We are so lucky to have the safety net, but it is very frustrating having to constantly dip in to it for essentials at this time of year.

Lucky you

I’m not going to say we are lucky to be in this position, because that wouldn’t be the truth. It’s not ‘luck’. Nor is it privilege or inheritance. Quite the opposite, in fact. We have both worked hard for many years, earned every penny ourselves & chosen to live well within our means. No credit card consumerism for us. If we couldn’t afford something, we didn’t buy it then we saved up until we could.

I'm not doubting you worked hard - but can you not see, you did have luck.

I was a well-earning professional, married to (I thought) a good man, also with a good job & prospective good career.

In fact, he was immature, abusive, financially irresponsible and it escalated massively when we had DC. I was in a terrible situation for many years, and in retrospect, made poor choices (like continually paying off his debt with my savings); by the time the marriage finally ended, I was a mess in so many ways, broke, trying to work & look after 3 small DC alone. He has kept making life difficult for a decade since & while in som ways I have managed well, I think (professional job, kids doing well etc), I'm still struggling to make necessary decisions to improve my finances.

You had a strong relationship, a spouse who was on the same page as you. It's worth a huge amount in terms of how successful you can be - financially or otherwise.

If id had a different marriage, and the other factors remained the same, I'd have a nicer house, savings in the bank, opportunities for holidays and other activities that many families table for granted.

I’m due back pay for 5 months payroll cock up which means I’ve been under paid. I really needed it last month so now I’m hoping it’ll be sorted and in the account by Friday so I can put something into savings towards our summer holiday.

That's very unfair.
I have been skint, I have been not skint.
I am not a 'boomer' (horrible term), not someone who has grown up in wealth or influence. However, I have always cut my cloth according to my income, if that meant pasta/lentils for EVERY BLOODY MEAL then it was what it was. Yellow stickers didn't exist back in the day, but bin diving did.

My grandad has left ALL his inheritance to my mum (thats his choice). She has a 350k house paid off and lots of savings herself. She said she will grace each of is grandkids with £1k when that day comes and the remaining 120k will go to her.
Surely that is somewhat expected? You pass on to the next generation and, all things being equal, they leave to the next...

Utterly skint. Need to borrow from my DD for groceries next week. It’s utterly humiliating.

Tbh, if you have £4k in savings, that’s not remotely skint. My idea of skint is when you’re down to your last fiver with payday a few days away. But I know peoples’ view of what being skint actually means varies massively.

Very - I have £1.00 to last me until pay day on 29th. Just done a food shop so don't have to worry about food. I can't think of anything I need money for until then so just need to stay at home and live a quiet life until then.

Next month I have four family birthdays and Valentines Day. In March I have two family birthdays and Mother's Day so it will be April before I have any money to spend!

Lucky that her dad died?

@Thatbloodyhedge

Oh come on - she's not 'lucky'! She lost her dad (I'm sorry @Hamsternautss ).

However @Hamsternautss you have got a life changing amount of money, and your dad would like it to make your life better. If you are uncertain how to spend or manage it, seek financial advice.

Depends somewhat on your outgoings tho….

In the red already and 10 days to payday. Has to take money out of our modest emergency fund (of 1.7K) to do a food shop. Haven’t been able to add to it in over a year. January is a brutal month because it’s so long since December payday. I always think in December that Xmas wasn’t as bad financially as I thought but then it shows up in January!

I think you need some perspective. Sounds like you are fine!

£15k CC debt, 12K on a loan, £45k left on mortgage, -£500 in the bank account until a week today (if I don't touch it - I have £60 in cash) - and £10k savings.

I'm RUBBISH with money. I have no idea how to manage it at all. I'm on £45k and usually have nothing left - or overdrawn - at the end of the month. This month was worse due to Christmas and the long January.

We are ok, about 125k in savings between us plus pensions. We also own our house outright so no mortgage, no debt at all actually. I am currently not really earning much as I am changing career and setting up my own business but on DH's wage we have £2000+ a month left after bills.

We used to be skint and in debt but worked out way out of it, none of what we have in from inheritance.

Skint here too, massive mortgage and 3 credit cards after some home improvement works wouldn't have been too bad but had a second child and that has set us back massively.

I did manage to clear the overdraft last year which is a weight off but the rest is going nowhere as only ever able to make the minimum payment. We're in the childcare years with no family support so paying just shy of £2,000 a month for that. Have a couple of years until we are out of that phase as my youngest is a toddler so we're just trying to power through and try not to drown in the meantime. We both earn ok, but the outgoings are horrendous. I worry about an unexpected expense endlessly and this month we haven't paid one of the credit cards as there is nothing left. It's hard, really hard. Zero savings too.

If he'd have lived a longer life I would have received nothing which I would feel even luckier for. Would happily give it all back for one last conversation with him.