To have expected more in life from working to reach this salary?

[grethrow]

I’m early forties and earn 75k. I know this isn’t huge money but it’s well above average salaries in the uk. I worked hard to get to this point (I’m not saying people who earn less don’t work hard).

I guess along the way I always thought I would be able to have a really comfortable life on this salary. I have one ds who is 11 but his costs don’t really factor in much as his dad pays for most stuff (ds lives with me so dad pays a decent amount).

I assumed going on holiday would be easy but renting a cottage in Devon in a nice area for a week is around 1,500, then there’s travel costs and food etc when you’re there! Going abroad long haul is extortionate. I guess these things are just about doable for me but it’s not easy.

I am having a privileged whinge. I know that. But I do feel sometimes like maybe at 18 I shouldn’t have bothered. My parents had a similar income (taking into account inflation) and me and my brother both went to independent schools, grew up in a large home and parents had very nice cars. It wouldn’t be possible for me to go and buy a nice car outright. I know people have it much worse but I still feel cheated and like it is a slog for very little, fair of me to feel this? Do others feel this?

I agree that something has gone really wrong.

As a poster said above, with tax and benefits the way they are, there's not much difference in take-home pay between someone with kids on a low salary and top-up benefits compared to being on a professional salary like the OP.

When you combine that with the much higher COL in the SE, you end up with professionals who live in the SE for their job having a worse lifestyle than people earning much less elsewhere.

Having a house that costs more on paper - but you have to live in - doesn't give you a better standard of living. You're pretty unlikely to ever actually be able to cash in that paper value.

You just have to pay more for it each month - which means having to earn more and paying a higher rate of income tax - then paying much more stamp duty when you move house - and paying much more for childcare, repairs and everything because everyone locally is having to pay so much more (and hence also paying more income tax themselves) - then pay IHT. You don’t benefit, you're just gouged for it, again and again.

I'm not sure how we step back from that as a country, but it's really a problem.

It would be really interesting to hear
a) where the OP lives
b) where all the posters saying 'you must be wasting it. I earn less and have all these lovely things' live

Totally get you OP. Most of my older colleagues in law who worked in similar practices to me (not large city firms but smaller outside of london firms) have large homes, kids went to private school, lots of expensive holidays. We are good in the sense we don’t worry about paying our bills but have to budget, nursery fees for two kids were pretty crippling as is the cost of housing.

No it’s called age! I also haven’t been on this salary a long time! I started as a single mum on 23k and it’s taken me 20 years to get to this level. We were only able to buy our house 5 years ago and had to move outside the M25 to actually be able to afford to buy a place. So we were both 40 already. Prior to that we were renting at a cost of £1650 a month. So our mortgage was cheaper. Interest rates have gone up and so has our mortgage. Luckily for us we stoped paying our nursery fees of 1,500 a month before our mortgage increase as our little one started school. Otherwise we would have had to sell the house as we couldnt have paid the increase and the nursery fee.

I understand your position.
Going to independent school and having a good upbringing, you probably had ideas of a well off life when young. Add to that the devaluation of the pound and £75k is enough to have a good life but not a really good life anymore.
You need to either be more careful watching what u spend or increase your salary band.
Or set up on your own.
I had similar dreams when I was young .
Dad died aged 16, life turned upside down and I had no money for a long time.
Hence now, I'm very content on half your salary ( my house is paid off) .
But I do need alot more money if I want a better life for my family , they want nicer things and my kids to have a better future (schooling matters ).
In summary, £75k sounds alot but it can't buy you lifestyle it could.

There’s nothing to explain really, I was trying to provide an example of something that people spend money they don’t have on.

We’ve just not prioritised going on holiday for the last few years because:

• We used to go on ‘nice’ holidays when we were younger, the cost of all holidays has shot up and the places we’ve been in the past, or similar, cost a lot more now.
• We have two young children and are still in the ‘difficult’ stage
• No one wants to spend the same money, or more, to have a worse experience than they are used to.

Once the kids are older we will do them for the memories.

The OP has said where she lives. She has also said how much her mortgage is, what her salary is, from which along with CM which she says covers most of her child's costs it is fairly easy to deduce that she should have at least £1k left after paying essential living costs including things like insurance, a generous grocery budget, utilities etc.

Holidays cost the same wherever you live. Nights out can be a bit of a 'how long is a piece of string' cost but she's given £75 as an example of the cost of dinner with friends, which is affordable a couple of times a month from the £1k+ disposable income along with a holiday, days out with DC, clothes, grooming etc.

What the OP hasn't explained is how she can't use her disposable income to budget for nights out, holidays and all manner of other non essential expenditure.

Given that she says that her CM covers most of the costs of her DC, I do wonder how her thread would have been received if she'd have said 'I'm single, earn £70k, my mortgage is £1200, I do have a car loan that's £220 pm but I feel really skint and can't afford to go on holiday'. In that case, I don't think there would have been endless posters going on about how unfair and expensive life is and it's not worth working. She'd have been quite rightly told how fortunate and well off she is, which she still is in her current situation.

But it's telling that the OP thinks it's normal to buy things like bin bags in Tesco at £4 a time. That's not the way that people who are on a budget do it. They get things like bin bags at Home Bargains or similar at half the cost or they use old carrier bags or other bags/packaging/newspaper, or do without.

I hear what you’re saying, that on that salary you would expect to feel very comfortable, but at the same time you can do the things you say, like go to New York, or travel long haul. People earning less with higher mortgages than you do do these things. You are in a position to save to do these types of holidays. Yes, you can’t just book it on a whim without putting money away, but it is doable for someone earning what you do.

That’s because they bought their property, 20, 30+ year a go, when property prices were so much lower.And as you’ve mentioned nursery fees, are crippling, they weren’t when your older colleagues, were buying their first home and starting a family.It is so much harder for the younger generation, many aren’t going to be as well off as their parents were/are, no matter how hard they work.

I dont know. I just have no time for people on high salaries moaning.

They lose a sense of perspective.

I remember a man went on a tv show and said that he earned an average salary of 80k!
He said that it wasn't a high salary!

Not sure what the hell that poster is talking about I suppose it's another one implying people on 75k are poorer than someone on half that because they get taxed and everyone else gets given benefits from their tax money.

Which is bullshit our income isn't even close to 37k and we're entitled to no benefits except child benefit which everyone gets

I don't understand what you are spending all your money on as we are a family of 3 on less and manage fine. We don't really go abroad but it's not because we can't afford it.

£140 food shopping a week for two seems like a lot to me.

The two main spends in life imo (if you don’t have credit card debt) are mortgage and car payments. The way to have more money a month is to have a smaller house and a second-hand non-flashy car that you can buy outright. We did that and as a result live comfortably. But some people don’t want to do that and want the bigger and flashier house and car - which is fine, of course, but comes at a price.

But she can’t even go to New York booohooo
heartbreaking

What was it that Chandler said on friends once, when someone was complaining.

He said "and my wallet is too big for my jeans, and my diamond shoes are too tight!"

I’ve worked hard all my life..like get up 3 am, bed at midnight. 7 days a week, 365 a year . Minimum wage jobs always. I did have a good education but chose a rural life. Wrong man, single parent. I kept a house, a kid and ran a car and I’ve never ever had more than £200 per week. Even now I have less than that. I don’t know what you are spending your money on but I’d be as rich as Croesus on half that. Holidays would not be a problem. They are possible now. Easy jet flights, hotel deals. Week in Spain £200 hotel plus flights last time I booked. Car hire another £80. I’d love to see your ‘books’ You must be wasting one hell of a lot of money.

Going on a trip to Greece shortly.and paying £50 per night for an AirBNB. I will walk everywhere and eat local, so no major additional costs. Am happy with that.

I get what you mean; I shop at Aldi/Lidl for the majority of my food shop (and usually Asda for the rest) and it still costs a fortune. It’s definitely harder to stretch money now. I’ve noticed the more our wages increase, the more screwed over we are because everything raises its prices- meaning we were better off on the old wage.
That’s why it’s so important not to stress about it too much, because the more you think about the unfairness of it all, the more it will stress you out. Of course I get stressed about money still- but I prefer to only give it a small portion of my time.

As a poster said above, with tax and benefits the way they are, there's not much difference in take-home pay between someone with kids on a low salary and top-up benefits compared to being on a professional salary like the OP.

That’s utter bollocks though. It might apply in the odd handful of cases where a mum with 2 children is living in London so housing benefit is very generous, or the children are disabled, or she’s paying for childcare. Most working people on UC won’t get anywhere near a ‘professional’ salary. I have a friend on UC with two children (one teen and a tween). She gets £1000 a month UC and £800 a month wages, plus CB (she’s a TA so her wages are lower than her working hours because they’re spread evenly across the year). She has no childcare costs. Her monthly take home including benefits is less than £2k a month. This is less than half the income of someone on £75k who would have £4.5k a month after tax.

I should also mention that £12k of her income (50%) goes in rent so she has just under £1000 a month to pay bills, food, stuff for the kids, transport etc. That’s the reality for millions of working people.

God this is so depressing. Well done everyone managing to stretch out their pittance to cover a shoestring holiday. You should be angry with your employers and government for keeping your wages so low and letting the col go through the roof. This isn’t the blitz, it’s late stage capitalism.

Sorry, that was £200 including flights..(50 each way) . I’ve never had credit card debt, never had a car loan.

Will there be a drip feed of the huge pension payments or mortgage overpayments or savings OP won't touch?
Something isn't adding up.
I earn £50k, low mortgage (relative though) currently have 1DD in uni, travel abroad frequently, it's all about choice and managing, no need for £4 bin bags or £40 to make a stew.

My SIL is fuming that’s she’s going to have to pay private school additional fees. She’s looked down on public, Government funded schools the second she could afford private and now she has to have fewer holidays.
I’m doing my teaching degree and will be working in public schools so I find the whole thing hilarious.

@DearDenimEagle
Exactly, lots of wee bargains to be found. But here in MN a week in the sun is a minimum budget of £5000 for 2 adults/2kids.

That sounds fab, we do similar in Spain. Lots to see and do for free or not very much (museums, botanical gardens, hiking, swimming as well as relaxing with a book) and eating out, supermarket, public transport etc generally cheaper than the UK.