To be so annoyed at this woman's financial incompetence

[LovingLimePeer]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/mailplus/article-14476595/six-figure-salary-rich-comfortable-heres-why.html?ico=mol_mobile_home&login&signinStatus=registered&signinMethod=google&dataCaptured=true&flowVariant=social_registration_nosubscribe#

For 1 person:
£500 on food
£750 on car expenses
£650 on cost of dog ownership
'a few holidays per year'
£250 cleaner

£200 pension (not enough!)

I'm just so fed up of all these well-paid financially illiterate people writing sob stories for the telegraph/daily mail about how they can't survive on their salaries.

This woman complaining about her £100000 salary not being enough could save £2100 per month if she bought a sensible car, didn't have dogs/a cleaner and took in a lodger.

With £2100 she could pay off her 23 year mortgage in just over 5 years OR
Retire at 68 with a pension pot in today's money of ~£1460000 (i.e. retirement income of £58000 per year in today's money). Not including money already saved in a pension.

If I assume she has saved £200/month into a pension for her whole career, she would have ~£427000 at retirement, enough for £17000 a year private pension, which given her extremely high expenditure.is simply not enough.

She thinks earning £20000-£40000 more would be enough but this is an expenditure, rather than income issue.

I'm just fed up of these people complaining. I suspect they'll end up poor in retirement, having never learned to live within their means with the rest of us paying for their stupidity.

It's clickbait, and quite likely made up. They do them because people respond like you are!

Having read the article, anyone else jealous that she has a cleaner, someone to mow the lawn and another to iron her clothes for circa £250 per month - bargain!

I mean you don't know how the story was sold to this solicitor - she could've been asked to talk about expenses now that she is single. I think it is common knowledge that it's more expensive when you live on your own. The Fail could've completely twisted it to make out she's a spendthrift - they've got form for this.

Well said!

OP - I notice this is your first post on Mumsnet. I'm quite interested in why you chose Mumsnet as a good place to vent about her?

Typical British attitude at the moment - tall poppy syndrome.

She works and makes loads of sacrifices, sounds like her job involves a huge contribution to the community. She deserves to be remunerated well.

Many decide to have kids before having an established career amongst other things and these are the same people moaning on this thread.

High earners are leaving in droves, then who will prop the rest up ?

I earn slightly less, live in a 3 bed semi in the NW and also single. I have a cleaner, hair, nails etc regularly done but there needs to be some benefits to the level of work I do, qualifications, constant need to research and develop up with trends etc.

Also don’t spend nowhere near as much as she does. I think she wanted to make a point around the reality of disadvantages of being a single person household. I’d also assume that was probably her intention and it’s been turned into click bait.

However I do think she’s overspending. What the hell is she getting for £500 a month for food?

basically this, thats the thing different parts of the country yes i agree, but at the same time its like if you were eg a millionaire but all other costs and expenses were inflated then it some ways it still costs

High earners are leaving in droves

Citation needed.

I would do anything I could avoid taking a lodger. I am a sociable person but do not want a stranger in my personal space at this stage of life. I’m surprised at how many people suggest lodgers to a single parent with kids. It feels like a very risky situation potentially.

Indeed. And honestly, off they fuck. The kind of people who make decisions solely on the basis of maximising money vs human connection, being in a place that you know, tradition, culture etc. are probably the same people who minimise their taxation burden and are not terribly community minded in the first instance. This ceaseless pandering to rich people is just nauseating.

My human child costs less than her dog 😂

It's just publishing nonsense to wind people up.

They look for these ridiculous people and then stick them on the front page.

I'm really sorry for her if she's been manipulated and I can very much imagine that happening now you mention it.

I do understand her comments that it is much more expensive to run a household as a single person. I just think it's tone deaf to say that you need loads of extra money to even be comfortable when the problem is you're frittering your salary away.

She's a solicitor but thick as shit, with no common sense, nor financial sense.

If you google her, she's sold handfuls of these sorts of stories to the fail and torygraph. This isn't her first rodeo.

It's ragebait, and an advert for her business. Attention seeking nonsense.

I would never take a lodger now I have young children for reasons of safety, but we did for some time before our first was born and would probably do so in the future once they move on so we can use the money to support their education.

We wanted to use the money to minimise our outstanding mortgage before I went on mat leave and it worked really well for us at that stage of life.

Stories like this are just clickbait to goad people into responding

I read the article. It doesn’t really seem like she’s saying being a millionaire isn’t enough; rather that there’s a hidden cost of being single vs in a relationship. She lives in an affluent area after all, her neighbours are also going to be millionaires.

She should take in some ironing

100k/yr isn't the paradise many think it is. This woman hasn't cut her cloth, but credit to her for setting up her own business and it sounds like she doesn't actually have a salary because of that. This comes with a different layer of risk and I can see how she feels uneasy. I wouldn't go from employed to self employed if it meant the same income.

100k make you comfortable in many parts of the UK, but not in London. I'm frugal myself and made some good financial decisions (one unknowingly but turned out to be brilliant years later). I don't have to worry about eating or heating, but I'm not throwing money around either. I think that if I had a car AND wanted to go on hols twice a year I would hardly save anything. People still think that on 100k you live like a king. You really don't.

Though I'm not that persuaded by her on that, really. Some of her costs (particularly the food, probably also the cost of travel) would presumably go up considerably for two. I have never actually personally seen a holiday with a single occupancy supplement, so they definitely aren't unavoidable. The biggest issue is having only one person paying for the mortgage, but she did make the choice to live in a three bed house alone.

Two years ago I finalised my divorce and moved from Kingston upon Hull with my two golden retrievers to a three-bedroom semi-detached house with an enormous garden, right by the sea, in Hartlepool.

Why though? A single woman doesn't need a 3 bed semi.

Im shocked though that it's only costing her £1K a month in this supposedly desirable area - you would get a one bed flat for that near me. Sounds like a bargain!

She also looks like it would benefit her to cut back on her food bill. Sorry, just saying.

You can't be serious? Yes, the food for two people costs more than for one person. You genius!

Two people share the same mortgage, heating, wifi, maybe even car, care for dogs etc.

Regarding holiday, it is not about an obvious single supplement. As a single person you just won't pay half of what a couple pays.

Re the holidays, often there's no "single room" supplement anymore because it's no longer relevant unless you're doing a package holiday where prices are based/averaged on two people.

If, as most people do these days, you buy different parts of your holiday separately, you buy "a room" which is usually for two people as few hotels have cheaper single rooms, so there's no "added supplement" as such, you're just buying a room, but paying entirely yourself instead of two people sharing the cost. Same with other aspects such as a hire car, - there are no cheaper "single" person cars. Same with airport taxis. You don't physically pay more, you pay the same, but don't have someone to share the cost with.

You’ll wait a long time. The flow is currently in the opposite direction between the US and the UK.