175k salary and all gone

[175allgone]

This will ruffle some feathers, but after tax, mortgage , childcare, living expenses….there doesn’t seem much left. SE London, commuting, wrap around care. Whilst I appreciate I’m not having to watch my bills I’m hardly living an extravagant lifestyle.

Nothing like a high salary to bring out the envy in some folks.

True

Oh wow! So unless I've got it wrong you still have £1.5k to live off and probably an incredible house for a mortgage that size! Not sure why your childcare costs are so high? Is that private school or nursery! Life is expensive! My salary is 5 x less than yours' and I get by.

We have a similar income and mortgage, more kids but older so less childcare, SW London.

We are in a similar position each month, it's shit. Our cost of living has increased so much over the past couple of years for the basics so we feel less well off than we used to, food costs more, all insurances cost more, mortgage costs more.

Feeling it's shit doesn't mean I don't appreciate how fortunate we are.

We've cancelled sky, gym memberships, don't drink, eat out minimally. We could spend less on food shopping I guess but we are time poor so factoring a weekly shop at Lidl/ Aldi makes me want to cry.

Can you find a cheaper childcare option, where we live there are nurseries that offer childcare for toddlers over 2 years. These are generally a good bit cheaper and the standard of care is amazing as is the staff retention which I think is always an excellent indicator of how good a setting is. These are 1/2 the price of the nurseries that look after tiny babies too. Otherwise a childminder or nanny, again there are some excellent ones and having one before school starts means you'll be sorted for wraparound when that time comes. I think having a child at school opens your mind up a bit more to childminders are you see lots of them around, do you know people in your local area with children in the school you are likely to send your children to so that you can ask for recommendations.

Mainly posting in solidarity, it's not something that can be easily discussed as we are fortunate but sometime it's like WTF, we do nothing exciting and still have nothing left at the end of the month.

We have a similar income but live in a cheap area and our mortgage is only £900. We’re also out of the childcare years (bar some wrap around). You’re at an expensive time of life, most people struggle when paying huge amounts of childcare.

One of you leaves work to be a sahp? Or you move to a cheaper area? The childcare won't last long. When they're in school,. You're.only paying for the wrap around clubs. Then they'll go to secondary school and they'll be independent.

We live in a cheaper, further out area of London (still zone 3) so housing and nursery fees are cheaper (we pay 1.5k for 1 kid fulltime, no free hours). But also were planning to have our second so that we dont have 2 at nursery at the same time.

Not if you don't want to. But this is what it costs to live in Islington 🤷‍♀️

As people have said, the nursery fees are temporary.

I would move to look after your kids for £48k a year! That’s more than I earn in fairly decent public sector role. That’s one insane childcare bill

It's not ridiculous that they have no money for luxuries if they chose to spend all that money on living in one of the most expensive cities, and put two kids into extortionate childcare. Those things are luxuries. They've made those choices, if they made different choices they would have a lot more money sloshing around.

Also what's the point in living in London if you're still having to spend thousands of pounds on commuting? I thought that was meant to be the big benefit of living in such a place?

Hard to feel sorry for op to be honest. Nobody made them live in Islington or choose whichever childcare provider they've chosen.

We're on a higher wage but our mortgages are £9,400 a month (we have a holiday home) but we stuck to one child because of all the costs associated with them, so we have no surprises.

Well done to you then! 🙄

@Sillystrumpet it is not envy! This is a frustrating situation for OP but she has solutions. Move to a cheaper area to decrease mortgage, find different childcare options! Life is shit and hard for all of us, but she just needs to take some time to cut her cloth accordingly

Good advice. This is on 0% for exactly that reason and hence the large repayment to clear balance.

People will be upset with you for saying it, but I get it. It’ll get better once the childcare bill goes!

Are you planning on prep school for the dcs after nursery?

Would be interesting to know what you think ‘scrapping by’ means?

It's not ridiculous that they have no money for luxuries if they chose to spend all that money on living in one of the most expensive cities, and put two kids into extortionate childcare. Those things are luxuries. They've made those choices, if they made different choices they would have a lot more money sloshing around.

Why is it a luxury to have housing & childcare? Should they have not had dc? Many young people aren’t often because of costs? Should they live somewhere cheaper & give up their jobs? London used to be very affordable in many parts when I was growing up there and there was a lot more social housing.

£1000 a month on bills sounds low to me! We’ve got only one child and spend about 7-800 a month on groceries, I go to the office 3 days a week which costs around £160 a month on the tube. Council tax is £200 alone! So I’m at 1200 before any utilities or insurances. Must be more like 1500 in total. Stuff is so expensive 😣

This is a frustrating situation for OP but she has solutions. Move to a cheaper area to decrease mortgage, find different childcare options! Life is shit and hard for all of us, but she just needs to take some time to cut her cloth accordingly

its the race to the bottom isn’t it

YANBU - I feel your pain OP. Money doesn’t get you far these days on London especially with the higher interest rates and high childcare costs which is unavoidable, assuming your children are at nursery. There is just no childcare alternatives in London unless you have family helping to look after. If you go state school then eventually the childcare cost will drop off.

£2.5k is quite normal for mortgage in London with the interest rate increases. Even a place in a less desirable part of Islington like Archway or other places within London cost ridiculous amounts so not sure you would save alot by moving + having to pay stamp duty costs unless you really move out of London itself but then you have to factor in the commuting costs back into London which is exorbitant.

In the grand scheme of things, I think you are doing fine.

This is an anonymous forum covering the breadth of people, incomes and lifestyles. She’s not a celebrity making an apology video so she doesn’t have to watch her step in order to avoid coming across as (your definition) of tasteless? She was quite clear she was interested in hearing from people on similar incomes, of which there are many on Mumsnet.

It's not the high salary. Also you couldn't pay me to live in London. It's pretending that she's somehow hard done by because she's chosen to spend that very high salary on living in a very expensive place and then she's complaining about not feeling rich enough.

Good grief OP - au-air maybe ? You could pay for 2 more houses with the childcare bill! This country is a scam

It's the childcare. Would it be cheaper to get a nanny? How old are your DC?

Depending on your house, I actually think your mortgage and bills at £3.5k in Islington is very good.

Yeah, that's exactly what i said. 🙄

There are a lot of other places to live other than islington.