Is he lying about his salary

[Askabouttheweather]

I have been seeing a guy for a couple of months, very casual. He told me he is a public law and humans rights solicitor, I've checked SRA and he is on there. He claims he makes 130k a year, now tbh I don't care if he does or doesn't but I do care if he is lying.
It is a London based firm, he is 30, not magic/silver circle.
Does this sound likely?

He still lives with his parents, I didn't ask his salary he just told me it and he doesn't seem to have the lifestyle of someone making that much.

If he is lying what's the more likely figure (like has he added 20k or doubled/tripled it.

AIBU to suspect he is lying as his lifestyle doesn't seem to match the salary?

He could well be paid that but the issue is that you don’t believe him and possibly you don’t want to date someone who earns well but lives frugally.

I previously worked for a top 50 firm (1000 staff plus). Their newly qualified solicitors are paid £65k in London and £50k outside London.

Can't you just search the salaries for his firm? It shouldn't be too hard to work out.

Im surprised he’s making only 130k. Newly qualified lawyers in magic circle are now hired on 150K. Must be quite a small firm he is at

MC get paid very differently to other lawyers.

Absolutely yes, 30 year old lawyers can earn that much (and much more) and live with parents. Human rights lawyers : hmm, not so convinced. Public law yes. If you really want to get technical, you can look up the name of the firm on roll on Friday and see the average PEP for the equity partners and extrapolate from there.

call me old fashioned but I think it’s gauche to talk about how much you earn to anyone other than a live-in partner or spouse. Dh and I are lawyers and most of our friends are lawyers but we don’t know what anyone earns (save for when it’s reported in the press!).

As others have said Google the firm.

It's entirely possible in London.

Is it perhaps possible he isn't living "the lifestyle" you expect as he is saving up a deposit.

I only know one person on that salary, he also still lives at home and lives "the lifestyle" you would expect of someone on that salary. However he is now 40 with fuck all savings and no prospect of buying a house.

Think it’s completely plausible

even if it’s a uk national firm then he would be about 6 years PQE by now - and over £100k would be entirely normal - it was close to £100k even ten years ago

if it’s a US firm he could be earning double that! And a magic circle firm close to £200k minimum

he is probably saving to buy a two or three bed somewhere - either a flat in central or a house in the suburbs and honestly sounds like he is being really really sensible!

The people I know in law tend to come from quite a narrow background & had help to get on the ladder at an early age etc. it could be he’s not from this background.

@DodoTired its NOT magic circle…

my company in house lawyers make about 130k with bonus. (This is 6-8 years exp)

I think it is plausible.
the lawyers I know have salaries between 100k ish up to 550k (that one has NO life and travels to America 4 x per month 😵‍💫) none are
magic circle now bar one (not the high earner) but I don’t know any human rights lawyers….

3 of our lawyer friends lived “impoverished” lives until they put down 3/4/500k deposits on places 😅

i “lived at home” when earning 115k pa if that helps 🤷🏻‍♀️

Yeah I was also going to say this

I’ve had friends on salaries like this at a young age who didn’t go out much or on holidays - then just whacked it on a huge deposit for a really nice house

it’s happened quite a few times in my (London) friendship circle

whilst we couldn’t buy anything for years and years due to renting and not being thrifty

Well he's not in the magic circle.

Entirely possible. Also you don’t have to live a particular way if you earn that much… I imagine he’s probably living at home saving up a really good deposit for a house and which in the london area he’ll need quite a big one.

I completely understand why you’re asking this. It’s very important to get prospective partners and to do so via stealth.
But salaries can be misleading.
Something to be mindful of is trust funds. You never know who might have one so you can’t base any assessment on salary alone.

Something that is of massive concern is that he’s still living with his parents at 30.

Salary, bonus, plus shares - very possible. His take home will be much less than you think due to tax

It's definitely possible, it's also possible that he's saving for a house etc. Not everyone earning megabucks make it obvious.

I really don’t think it’s a massive concern at all

why pay £2.5k a month towards someone else’s mortgage when that could go towards his house deposit

Check out the salaries of newly qualified solicitors at his firm on legal cheek, roll on Friday, lawcareers.net and see if his salary makes sense with his level of experience.

I know….it’s surprisingly common!!!!

One is 33 and owns a 2 bed penthouse in zone 1 outright. 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫
She bought for 650k now about 8-9 years back….

It’s all about priorities…
she turned up to a wedding last year wearing a dress she used to wear to end of year bops at uni 😅 and driving a brand new Porsche

just nuts… all my Porsche money is being spent on fucking childcare for my beloved cherubs

I have a feeling that for you, this is more about what he earns than whether or not he is a liar.

YES obviously he is not in magic circle. So I said that he must be in a small firm because magic circle pays more than that to first year lawyers, let alone someone with mid-level experience.

Again, he is not in magic circle OBVIOUSLY. Magic circle pays more than that to people with zero experience; so way
more than that to someone with several years experience. MEANING, his salary is entirely plausible and even a little low for his age.

in-house lawyers are paid less than pp with same number of years of experience.

Maybe I'm not au fait with how the law works but how does a lawyer working in human rights and public law earn that much?

Isn't it all legal aid? That's peanuts surely.

No he must not be in a small firm. There are a lot of firms in between “magic circle” and “small”. As I said in the thread above, the top 50 firm that I used to work for pays its newly qualified solicitors £65k in London. It is not a small firm.

Working out his salary already op you don't waste time. Poor bloke works hard to get to where he is and your eyes have widened at the possibility it's true. What do you do for a living and what do you earn?