To wonder how the COL crisis has impacted others?

[Helfs]

I see quite often on here people posting about how ‘not everyone’ is impacted and people need to just get on with it when it comes to dealing with the financial impact of the COL crisis.

Despite being high(ish) earners, DH and I have been severely impacted so I feel a bit odd when reading those comments as surely most, if not everyone is impacted to some degree. Food prices have shot up and everyone needs to eat, lots of people drive and insurance costs are going up etc.

At the start we weren’t majorly impacted, our food bill doubled and our car insurance went up a lot but other than that were fine, that was until December last year when our fixed rate mortgage ended and DD started nursery a month later. All of a sudden we had to find an extra £2500 a month and it’s heavily impacted our day to day lives. Obviously the nursery fees we knew were coming, but I don’t think we quite realised how bad it would be until the first months payment came out at the same time as the highly inflated mortgage payment (that we are now fixed into for another 2 years)

I wanted to ask how the COL crisis was impacting others, as I think sometimes people downplay on here how bad it might be for them atm.

So how has the COL crisis impacted you and your family? Any tips on how you’ve managed to cut back?

Household income 70k ….1 retired….1 partner still in work ( NHS nurse) …..house and 2 cars all paid for) ….generally everything’s gone up but we have adapted…..rarely use heating ….use log burner every day now even though it’s a faff( we get free wood) …..eat out at cheaper places…..buy less clothes…..meal plan at home to avoid waste…..considering running only one car but not yet…..walk more places and use public transport ( we both have free bus passes) to avoid petrol costs……but we still book theatre trips and have not reduced our holiday spending ….. we go abroad x 3 times a year….a couple of festivals…..and U.K. short trips …..sometimes we have had to dip into our savings….but that is what they are there for ….we both public sector so good lump sums for pensions…… renovated bedrooms and lounge last year…..all diy

I had a feeling it wasn't a low low income as such as otherwise it would be a struggle to save that much. To me a low income I am thinking less than £30k.

We had DC2 in 2022 and moved to a house twice the size of our first home in 2023, so costs would have gone up regardless of COL. Expenses have gone up but we have a high income and have had promotions, so it's all evened out. We aren't having to cut back but not much of a social life or eating out since DC1 was born anyway. I'm pulling every trick in the book to be able to continue with days out, Tesco vouchers and rail 2for1 tickets etc, so life doesn't feel too austere.

£60k isn’t a low income.

I'm a pauper by Mumsnet standards and my personal income is under £30k. FT minimum wage salary is almost £20k in the UK now.

That's 2 people on less than the national average income though.

Then you're not a low income household.

Mortgage has gone up few hundred a month and that's it. Slightly dearer food bill but I'm good at economising.

We'd fixed gas and electric yonks ago so didn't get hit with an increase there.

All in all, we haven't really been impacted that much at all. We just overpay the mortgage a bit less.

I'd say we are a lower income household.

Median household income is £35k (ONS)

There are four of us on about £25k. In the North your income is pretty decent.

It is when you consider how far below average it is

We are quite comfortably off so while I can't really complain, the area I've noticed it have the most impact on us is in the inflated cost of grocery and household shopping and of eating out or ordering a takeaway.

However, our small city centre always seems to be heaving. We always struggle to find a parking space in the main multistorey car park, even mid week, and we quite often can't get seated in our first few choices of cafe or restaurant if we decide to stop for lunch when we are out. It's staggering how many people seem to be milling around the retail and leisure outlets seven days a week. My DH and I look around at the swarms of people out shopping and eating and say 'cost of living crisis? What cost of living crisis?'

And this is not a massively affluent part of the country.

You don’t work full time though, and still earn more than full time minimum wage. You’re not on a low income, your household income is not low.

Median gross annual earnings for full-time employees was £34,963 in April 2023 (also ONS). The £60k included a small amount of benefits (not UC). We both earn less than that, hence my assumption we were a relatively low-income household for Mumsnet.

Think the guardian did a bit recently about the 60k earners feeling they were poor despite being in a high pay bracket. Reasons cited were that in pay bracket you may well be 'low earner ' in your social circle and lack of any government help.

It's definitely impacted our family. We earn more than we've ever done (c90k pa before tax) but are watching the pennies. This is mainly due to mortgage and a house renovation which we stuck on the mortgage pre COVID so mainly our fault.

We are very fortunate in being able to maintain a good quality of life and pay bills. However I previously thought at this pay bracket that I'd finally start saving, perhaps affording nice clothes, a yearly holiday etc

Options are to move to a cheaper area or ride the storm and we've chosen the latter.

As I say, I recognise the privilege...

Everyone is affected but the difference is that some are affected to the point they can't afford to feed themselves and some are affected because they can only afford one expensive holiday rather that two
I think when people say not everyone is affected they are talking about the latter

We only go to London for a few gigs a year rather than every few weeks
We go to more local gigs instead
I have found myself not doing recipes that have a lot of high end ingredients
I stock up on some of the cheaper things at Aldi
We don't go to the pub for the sake of it as much as we used to (only the aforementioned gigs)
I think whether I actually need something before clicking on that amazon link.

30k
Its the school lunches and secondary bus of over £700 a year.
And swimming/scouting. £60 a month. All bills going up but so much the food!
Fruit doesnt even last. £300 school trip. £500 for school lunch
No mortgage or childcare costs.

If you think how little CB covers.
Above is up to £3220 for 2 kids . And not even clothes/uniform or general food...

Mortgage has doubled ( interest only)
Energy bills have increased
Income is down 20% due to being self employed in a sector that is massively impacted
Need to sell a house ( we moved for work but held onto the house in case it didn't work out) and nothing is selling. We could obviously sell it for a reduced price, but my feeling is that house prices will even out in the next few years.

And I'm certainly a low earner in my social circle. I do try to ignore that but it's hard.

both DH have SN. We used their DLA to pay for therapy (Salt and OT) as the NHS is a complete shit show. We spent quite a bit esp on the severely disabled child but had to stop it all and use the money to cover higher bills for all sorts.

We’ve been impacted- but only lightly I would say. We don’t have a mortgage which obviously makes a big difference to our monthly outgoings. The rise in food and fuel costs and big hike in council tax has all left us with less to spend each month. We aren’t big spenders anyway- we don’t go to many social events and rarely buy new clothes so haven’t had to change our lifestyle much. We just don’t go to restaurants, cafes or get takeaways as much as we used to and can’t save as much as we used to.

If it hadn’t been for the COL crisis we might have been looking at some home improvements about now- our kitchen could do with updating and we had some other ideas about home renovations but those are all very much off the table now for the foreseeable future.

Disabled house hold on benefits. Every penny is accounted for. There are no random spends. There is no leaving the house (I need taxis) There's no fun anymore. Just drudgery. Certainly no £1k savings per month or holidays in the last 8 years.

It's nearly twice as much as average so how is it below?

That’s for two people

And?

It's £35k per household according to ONS so £60k is well above average.