To be fed up of being on a good income but always skint?

[Justonemorecurlywurly]

I know I’m going to get flamed, lots of “boo-hoo, poor you”, and that there are people far worse off but -

Our household income (family of 4) is roughly £110-120k. DH earns about £100k of that, I’m self employed and part time so my income fluctuates. I think that’s pretty good money but it feels like we can never afford to do anything.

No holiday for 2 years.
1 car
Very few clothes
Modest house

If after paying bills, we ever buy something non-essential like a meal out, or maybe one or two items of new clothes, birthday present, that’s it, we’re out of money for the month. And we have no savings. It’s ridiculous!

We did try to move a few years back but couldn’t afford it so remortgaged instead to extend the house a little. We got the best deal we could and borrowed only as much as we were comfortable with (even though it meant we couldn’t do as much work as we needed). But unfortunately we made a mistake fixing the new mortgage for only two years and when that time was up, rates had shot to which has made our repayments considerably more expensive which really hasn’t helped.

I’m so fed up of it. I honestly feel like we felt so much better off about 10 years ago when we were earning A LOT less.

Does anyone else feel like this? Is it just that everything is so expensive now??

I know some people will say I should work full time but for reasons I won’t go into, I need to be available for my DC so me being p/t works much better for the whole family.

I earn 25k , and I go on holiday every year.

@Arianasande with dc?

Rubbish! Even as a higher rate tax payer her DH will be taking home more than £24k! Excluding pension his take home pay is £5713! So after their £2500 approx for essential bills that leaves £3213 before his pension! They both sound financially incompetent if they can’t survive on around £2500 after his pension!

So only hotels are holidays?

Ah I saw your update. I see what you mean now. Apologies.

How long ago? You won't get a loft extension for £25k or anywhere close now. Costs of having this sort of work done have risen exponentially, I have neighbours who paid 30k 10 years ago, neighbours having the same loft extension more recently have been lucky to get it under 70k.

Even as a higher rate tax payer her DH will be taking home more than £24k

Yes. Where did I say he didn't? "Double" means x2.

Op you need to account for every expense for a month literally.
As it makes no sense that you cannot save 300 a month towards a cheap holiday each year etc?

Are you both eating lunches out at 30 £ every day?

I feel the same OP. DH and I both work full time and our income has almost doubled in the last ten years after some careful planning and retraining, but our living costs seem to have risen faster.

For us it’s mostly accommodation - we bought via shared ownership as we couldn’t afford a full mortgage near family and the rent+mortgage has gone up in that time to £2k/mth. We aren’t in a position to move.

I budget very carefully on a spreadsheet that lists literally everything we pay for. We don’t have Netflix/Sky, I don't drink/smoke, we rarely eat out except the odd McDonald’s. I do pay for extracurriculars and outings for the children as they are the priority, but I feel like we should be able to afford a half decent holiday abroad per year and we really can’t. Eurocamp + a long drive using Tesco points has been about our limit. This year we will have to use a credit card if we want a holiday at all.

I always tell myself it would be a lot worse if we hadn’t increased our salaries so much in that time and I do count my blessings but yes I totally understand my frustration of feeling permanently outpaced.

Probably things like car tax, home insurance, car insurance, any work related expenses like doctors have to pay GMC reg, MDU( medical defence in case you get sued), RCP - royal college of physicians etc the list goes on! And these are not reimbursed by employer so you have to pay it to work in the UK! Fuel costs or train/tube travel can also be very expensive.

I really dislike these type of threads when the OP doesn't actually answer any relevant queries as to where they spend/waste their income.

Hard to comment without seeing your outgoings OP. That sounds like a good income. Maybe the renovations were more than you could afford?

@AquaPeer i have booked a 2 week holiday to Cyprus, 4 star half board. I booked via Jet2 in the Black Friday sale. £2400 all in. I can afford that. Often booking ahead can get you a good deal, as can being flexible on where you go. I have no fixed destination in mind and seek the best deal (obviously to a place I’m happy to go to)

The holiday later in the year I booked flights in the easyJet Sale and the hotel direct with the hotel. I’ll use public transport for the transfer as it’s 10 mins on the public bus for €1.50 per person as opposed to the €20pp quoted by Ryanair/ €15 in a taxi.

when you earn less you just have to be more flexible, but to say you can’t go abroad to nice places isn’t true and the OP should be able to afford something nice on that salary

@AquaPeer sorry, you asked how many people, this is for me and 2 children

Ignoring your income completely, take home on 100k would be around £5700 per month.

Take off your £2500 big bills and you still have £3200 to play with each month.

You need to track where this is going. Even if you account for it all, it's a huge amount to get through each month. It must be possible to claw back big chunks of this and putting it aside for holidays etc.

But is £2,400 just for you? That is a more realistic cost for a summer holiday imo but not for 4 people?

Sorry not loading properly! £2,400 for an adult and 2 children is quite a bargain

You aren't skint OP. That is when you are poor.

Absolutely this

yes a high mortgage , council tax similar to mine - a year ago I was paying £275 for gas and elec - but now less and other bills

no childcare costs

this leaving £2.5k + a month

what is this extra couple of thousand being spent on

which again many live off as a total salary to pay all bills

@Justonemorecurlywurly we need your spreadsheet

Think someone's got a coke habit and not owning up if on 120k and a very modest lifestyle you don't have anything to show for it
It's actually very worrying

A note on holidays; it's totally possible to do a nice holiday without spending absolute tons. We have flights to Lanzarote with Ryanair which cost £1050 for 3 people during school hols in October. A hotel with half board cost just over £100 a day when booked directly through the hotel websites. We'll factor in a about 50€ a day for some lunches out and ice-cream etc. and we're not keen on souvenirs etc. We might take some local transport and we'll need to budget a bit of money for airport transfers, but the total for 8 nights is still around £2,300 for our family of 3. We spread the cost too - flights were booked few months ago, hotel deposit paid this month and balance a month before arrival I think.

Have you sat down and actually worked out where all your money is going?

We are on a similar income (although our mortgage is relatively small now at around £150K but it is on interest only). However, we have three kids at private school (with busraries and scholarships we pay around £36K a year in total) and manage to afford a holiday each year and a little bit of savings.

We are not big spenders though - we live fairly frugally, dont smoke, dont drink at home, dont really go out much except the occasional meal out with friends (tend to have gatherings at each other’s houses rather than nights out on the town).

Our hobbies are ones that are free or cheap (walking, singing in community choirs etc), tennis on the local courts).

Each year we sit down and work out our incomings and outgoings and work out how much we can afford to spend on things that are not necessities and how much needs to be put aside. It’s really good to actually sit and look at exactly where your money is disappearing to each month (a bit like when you’re on a diet and have to look at where all your surprise calories are coming from!).

I have just seen a holiday

3 nights in Athens
4 star Hotel with pool
£249 including flights
Per person

What sort of holidays are you looking at ?

@NobodyKnowsTiddlyPom can I ask how much bursary you get?

I've read this thread with great interest. Except for the mortgage, and that's not the same for all of us (Pensioners) done are still paying rent. Maybe some of you can now understand why we are struggling even more even with the triple lock. I'm OK though because we both managed to put money away once the children grew up. There are very many of my friends who are not. She really does need to a)check her actual expenditure. b) check her husbands spending just in case and c) try to pay into a pension of some sort for herself.
The person comparing NMW plus the very rare UC top ups is encouraging the whole idea that people don't deserve help when they are struggling to live. No unemployment, no disability payments etc. Which is a very inhuman (politicians) way of thinking.

The math and mathibg there! 390,000/440 =886.364 payments. So 73 year mortgage??