What would our lifestyle be like in U.K.

[Isitsconeorscown]

On this wage-£37 grand a year-Dh
Me-possibly-£18/19 grand a year

We’d be in Cornwall and would have a mortgage of around a grand a month.

We have one primary aged dc

British, but living abroad and wishing to return.

Also, lifestyle on just Dh’s wage (I intend to work, but chronic illness and may not be immediately)

Yes, I think you definitely could.

I'd be cautious about jumping on one person who has said it will be fine.

I am the only breadwinner in our family. I make just over what you'd both make on those salaries. Our mortgage is £650 a month because we had loads of equity, and we only have 2 days a week of childcare, but we are not rolling in it. For the quality of life you say you want, you need to analyse your figures really carefully.

I work in Europe often for work, and have found life is cheaper there. You get a better quality of life for much less. We often talk about moving, but DH has some family responsibilities for the time being, and I'd want to take more savings than we currently have.

I think it would be very tight on just your partners salary. I think you need to try and reduce the mortgage payment.

Based on those figures you would be screwed if you needed to replace your car or boiler.

What does your partner do? Can he earn more?

Would you actually be able to get a mortgage straight away if you’ve been abroad for a while? Mortgage affordability checks are much stricter than they used to be, even with a good deposit. What are your plans until that is sorted out - will you rent or stay with family?

I don't think there is any substitute for crunching the numbers, having first refreshed your knowledge about how much things actually cost. Rightmove will give you some idea about house prices, but Cornwall is not known for its plethora of affordable housing.

I honestly think even with you working it would feel tight. I'm not totally sure on Cornwall but know areas Dorset which has similar housing issues. So this puts your whole lifestyle cost up because if your house is say 500k rather than 300k your mortgage is bigger.

I'm Al not totally convinced on things not costing more. Depending on where you live and my experience of other rural areas you can be further away from cheaper shops, eg only have a Sainsbury's not an Aldi. Or similar for eating out. Which is wonderful as a tourist but I suppose sometimes a cheap burger fits the bill.

Sorry to be so pessimistic.

Could you survive ? Yes.

Would you be looking at a life of luxury ? No.

Just because it’s above the average, it doesn’t mean it’s enough. Sadly the average wage doesn’t increase as the cost of living increases.

37k gives you £2,472 a month (with no pension contribution)

£1k for mortgage plus
electricity
gas
water
council tax
mobile phones
broadband
insurances
car/fuel/mot etc
food

it soon goes. People do survive on less but it depends what lifestyle expectations you have.

Very tight on just your DH's salary.

Doable but a little bit tight with both.

We have similar joint income and mortgage and get by ok but with all our other bills rarely have spare money often and often end up overdrawn if there's something big like a school trip or machine repair. Don't underestimate the other bills - ours are nearly the same as our mortgage!

Essential Bills
council tax £230
4 x cheap mobiles £60
gas & electricity £160
Water £55
TV License £13
Basic 2 x life assurance £60
Household insurance: £35
2 Car insurance cars £45
Internet/phone/TV £40
Total: £698

Non essential bills
2 x Teenagers allowance £30
Pet insurance £15
Presents & Holiday savings £50
Additional life & critical illness cover: £35
Contact lens subscription £12
Total: £142
DH & I spends £100
Total £1,860

Mortgage £920

Food we budget £450 for family if 4 & 2 pets which is increasingly tricky even buying bulk/shopping at Lidl.
Total £2,310.

Eating out, entertaining, haircuts, going for a swim/coffee etc can only happen if there's no other expenditure in the month.

How large is the mortgage you'd be looking for? Based on a monthly payment of around £1,000 and taking into account current interest rates, I'd be concerned that you might struggle to hit the affordability checks if only using your husband's salary (based on a 4.5x multiplier).

Cornwall has a variety of places. Torpoint I know from the past. Very handy for the beach or for Plymouth. Buses across the Tamar on the ferry, not too bad a drive to the bridge. Saltash - hmmmm. Both places are not hideous expensive. Of course if it simply MUST be Padstow, yah? Because Jocasta and Rupert are there......

Our household income is similar and we feel fairly comfortable, as in we can go to the supermarket whenever we want and don't freak out if the boiler breaks, although holidays are usually a wet week in Wales and abroad is a big treat. But we're in the North with extremely good public transport links and that makes a huge difference. We also have a tiny mortgage. We're also both at a point in our career where we can earn OK (by our standards) working from home/self-employed. A lot depends on your job situation. Are you sure about the salaries - minimum wage is around £19k these days. Could they be a bit more than you think?

We live on around that in Cornwall, although we don't have a child. I don't feel I'm struggling particularly!

My sister earns double what we do but feels she struggles. She has 2 cars on finance, goes out a lot, has a few takeaways a week,constantly buys her daughter gifts/ clothes, has all the TV subscriptions, Sky, Disney etc. For her those things are bare minimum needs, for me they would be extravagant.

My car is 12 years old, we just have Neflix on subscription, we don't go out to eat much though we eat lovely food at home. However, we do go away 2 or 3 times a year as that's what we like to spend money on.

In Cornwall we are lucky that so many beautiful 'holiday' places are easily reachable for the day. I live in one, but often go to St Ives, Padstow, St Agnes etc for the day.

I live on around 40k plus child benefit for two kids in Cornwall and do fine, but my mortgage is around half what yours would be. I think you could do it if you cut back on fun things. I have enough spare to put a few hundred in savings and go out places most months.

There are places you can live in Cornwall without needing a car, if you don't have a long commute to work and choose one of the few areas with ok public transport.

I would say not very comfortable.
Mortgage £1000
Council tax £ 250 (average)
Internet £30
2 phone contracts £100
Gas and electric £300
Food, toiletries and cleaning prod.£450

That's the bare minimum then add life insurance, car insurance,car payments, school meals or uniforms, petrol, home or car repairs ... you'll probably manage barely if both working.

Personally I think that would be tight

I don't know where you live currently but despite rise in food prices UK food prices are still low for Western Europe. also it depends what you buy some think 400 a month is ample for a family of four others won't. I think the Op said they already had a car and presumably they already have phones so could swap to SIM only deal which start at £5 for £15 you can get huge amounts of data. It depends whether you consider the latest iPhone necessary or whether a two year old Samsung is fine. In Cornwall you probably will spend more on car fuel. Everything is so dependent on your choices

Water bills in the SW are the highest in the country.

£100 for 2 phone contracts!

o/p we relocated to the uk 6 years ago. Initially I had a 25k job, dh had no employment.

we bought within our means, so the mortgage was affordable. Another option would have been an interest only mortgage until we were stable financially.

our sim only phone contracts are £10 and £7 a month.

council tax £180
energy £200 (for 4)
water £50
broadband £24.
mortgage £500
travel we chose somewhere we can commute by bike/school bus/train. So low cost.

we were fine, after a few years I got promotion, dh’ set up a business which brings in about £25k.

because we were used to budgeting our absolute costs are still low so our disposable income increases.

honestly I think Mn is so out of touch for people on a real budget. You don’t need huge mortgage’s, phone contracts etc. shop around and get a deal for your financial capabilities.

i lived in London for ages on less than 40k. Mn would say that’s impossible but it clearly isn’t.

40k is fine if you cut your cloth accordingly.

Derailing slightly - a £7 phone contract - is that a smart phone? What happens when it’s stops working / runs out of storage etc? Do you then have to spend £££ on a new handset? Genuine question as my 4 year old smartphone costs £25 a month with EE even though I have paid off the handset! I’m being ripped off…

OP where in Cornwall? Your mortgage will be the biggest factor. Inland is cheap, coastal areas you’ll struggle with a 150k deposit and ‘only’ paying 1k a month in repayments (even though it’s a good deposit) A lot of people on this thread say they’re fine on that income but in the next paragraph say ‘but we have a tiny mortgage’ - if you’re not forking out over 1k a month on a mortgage then of course you’ll be fine 🙄 but houses aren’t cheap, rates have gone up loads in the last 18 months so unless you are happy to live somewhere horrible like Roche or Par then the house is going to be the big problem.

I agree
£575 a week sounds more than enough for a lovely life.

Unless you have a 4 year contract yes you are being ripped off.

my £10 sim is unlimited calls/texts, 50gb data with eu roaming.

it would cost me £700 for a new phone. My current one of 4 years old and works fine.

when I get a new one I simply need to find a two year contract under £39. - £29 for phone, £10 for sim. If I can’t it’s cheaper to buy the phone outright- i put away about £10 a month and that will buy me a new phone every 5 years.

Mine are a tenner but most people I k ow are paying £50-60 per contract. It's madness....

You did it with £40k but with a £500 mortgage, she is saying mortgage would be £1000 , if this indicates a bigger house then maintenance and general running of the household will be higher too....she also mentions she has health issues and they might need to live on one salary,I dont think it's that easy to live on £37k with such a high mortgage 🤷‍♀️