To think this is classed as being wealthy?

[hadenougj1]

I genuinely don’t know. I have come from naff all so my judgment could be totally off.

This is for one person and one child… Do you think savings of 50k, income of 75k, own (mortgaged) home worth close to 500k and parents with four homes (one of which used as a holiday home all year round) means you are wealthy? Is this what is meant by ‘he or she is wealthy?’

Agreed. This sounds like 'comfortably off' to me.

It depends on how much their mortgage is. If £450k of the house is mortgaged, no, but if they only owe £50k on it, yes.

Half of people in the UK have no savings at all and (iirc) the average amount in savings is about £10k or something. Having £50k in the bank and an income well above average is a pretty good place to be in, financially speaking.

Wealthy no.
Comfortable yes.

Sounds like comfortable rather than wealthy - their parents sound fairly wealthy but not really enough information to gauge that either. Depends to some extent on age too.
Definitely wealthier than most people though. Maybe top 10% (no idea) but not top 1% or above, which would be more where I would think using the term 'wealthy' would start to be appropriate.

Another one saying comfortable rather than wealthy. I live in an average to low wealth city, in the suburbs which are more wealthy (comfortable). £500k would get you a very decent 4 bedroom house overlooking one of the local lakes. But if you are a single parent, particularly to a young child requiring childcare, and have a big mortgage, £75k is not as much as you think.

very very comfortable

I’d say not wealthy but maybe comfortable. Wealthy is a whole other league. Why compare yourself anyway. Be happy with who you are and what you’ve got or make changes that will make you happy. Others will always have more, others will always have less. It doesn’t matter.

You can't include the parents in her wealth, they're separate people with separate finances. I'd say she is comfortable.

So your friends have upset you but I suspect they were trying to empathise with the newly divorced mum - it's not all about you, other people are allowed to have sympathy - would you rather they excluded you from certain conversations? Do they know you have massive debts and no savings? I know the financial situation of some of my friends but not all. I'm quite sure it isn't foremost in my mind either unless they are going through some financial upheaval.

It depends who your peers are.....

Definitely not wealthy, that would mean not having to worry about money at all and being mortgage free. 500k would just about get a modest 2/3 bed terrace in near me or a nice sized 2 bed flat. 50k in savings although nice is only a couple of years of living expenses, it’s not enough to never work again.

Wealthy for me would be a large 4/5 bed detached house in a nice area and enough in savings/secure income to have a few nice holidays a year, eat out a couple of times a week, run a car, do home maintenance as required etc without worrying about the cost.

However it doesn’t matter what your friends say, like others have said they are trying to sympathise with your friends drop in income / financial security which sounds like it will be significant if she had a higher earning partner pre-divorce.

Yes they're wealthy.

I’d call that ‘comfortably off’ - not ‘wealthy’.