To think we CAN live on the mortgage

[JaneEyre40]

Advice please -

Couple - Earn £10,500 a month
Mortgage - 3,700 a month
Nursery - 1,000 a month

Considering all other possible outgoings, do you think we can afford this and not feel pressured each month. What am I not considering? We've done the spreadsheet but I'm still unsure.

We will have about £65,000 in savings at the beginning of this venture.

Thanks in advance. House of a lifetime.

Absolutely no need for the sarcastic arsey comments.

OP yes that’s manageable and you’ll live comfortably. Enjoy!

This is just a humble brag.

What always amazes me about these posts(assuming they are genuine) is that the poster must be reasonably intelligent to be in a high earning job, and yet isn’t capable of doing some pretty basic maths/ budgeting or seeking some independent advice from financial services. I get that this is a discussion forum, but really this is just bragging surely.

How is that Ops fault if people are struggling with the cost of living? If op and her husband have worked hard to get to the position they are in they shouldn’t have to hide that because others aren’t doing as well. Maybe she wanted real life experiences and not a computer to answer.

Or make sure you have watertight and comprehensive protection policies. Which everyone should have but especially those with large commitments.

We had similar take home, but chose for a much smaller mortgage.

I was concerned by one of us loosing our jobs and interest rates going up.

I also wanted to ensure that private education would be possible.

I think what people struggle more with is not that people are on these salaries, but that they are able to earn them while seeming to have a limited grasp on basic budgeting and access to financial advice.

in a few years you will want to go on holidays again for the sake of your child (if not yours), and your expenses will go up again, even though nursery fees will be gone. Just something to keep in mind.

I don't know why people are so het up about this OP, I think it's fine to ask a question!
We earn a similar amount (I appreciate this makes us very privileged etc etc). Our mortgage is 1800 a month, and we have no nursery fees (although we have 2 kids both state school). We wouldn't cope with that level of mortgage, although we do also save 10% of our salaries for the kids, uni fees, maybe house deposit etc and save an additional amount to cover any holidays we want. So if we got rid of all that saving we'd be nearly there.
I think it depends on working through some things. I've always thought we'd state educate forever, our little boy in yr 2 was diagnosed with send, he won't cope mainstream secondary, he also won't get funding or a place at a special school, so we are now saving for private (appreciate we are privileged to be able to do this). This would be untenable with that mortgage.
We also save for unexpected housing issues - boiler cost us 3k, we've had the washing machine and fridge break this month, car trouble, unexpected bill etc.
A larger house will inevitably cost more to heat, light, furnish and more things can go wrong potentially (more bathrooms, more plumbing etc etc)
I suppose what I'm saying is - go through your outgoings, include amounts for unexpected spending/issues, even if you think now that this amazing home is all you need you will end up frustrated working that hard with no holidays, you should probably keep saving for rainy days, what if cost of living goes up, interest rates change etc.
I hate the idea of a house "ruling" life, and not being able to have some of the other things you might want just for the home of your dreams - but maybe you don't mind that.
I'd also suggest making sure state schools locally are good, because you won't have any funds left to supplement or change this if your child needs it.
I'd also suggest looking at uni loans these days, whilst it's a long way off - parents incomes are assessed and at your income your child will not be allowed to borrow enough to live on, so you'll be expected to pay - if you think this might apply later on in life you'll want to save for it too.
Also, whilst it's not ideal, do you have a safety net of any kind. I know I'm very very lucky that parents on both sides wouldn't see us lose our home, they've previously lent money to siblings after a redundancy and a divorce and if we lost our jobs they'd help us out. Obviously you wouldn't want to rely on this, but it's something to factor in.

We bought a reno and the council tax went through the roof so it would be worth checking. My understanding is that if you as the owner, renovate/extend etc. nothing changes for council tax purposes however, once the house is sold it gets revalued/rebanded. Ours went up by a couple of hundred quid a month because the previous owners had done some big extensions to it. Definitely check that!

I would just be careful. In my experience nursery is the cheapest years. After that your child will join clubs, need wraparound care, playdates, parties etc etc. We easily spend £1k a month on clubs and couple days after-school care.

Yes I think most of us agree!

I would say no. You would be taking on a huge debt for many years and couldn't meet your monthly outgoings from one wage alone, leaving you with no flexibility. I presume your salaries will both increase in the near future so I would wait until then.

I had "term assurance" set up until my youngest child was 18, enough to pay for a nanny if anything happened to me. Very inexpensive as insurance companies know that it is unlikely to be claimed, but reassuring for us.

I wouldn't, don't know how your gonna manage on that paltry sum from month to month

Conversely, if you've always been higher earners maybe you've not had to worry about basic budgeting before?

Or clueless when it comes to engaging brain, bothering to calculate one's own income and outgoings or, if needing assistance, to communicate necessary information to make the question answerable.

Hi, I totally get this. Our dc is almost 6 and we didn't spend much on holidays and trips when they were younger (plus also in London so nursery was about £1200pcm), but last few years we've definitely had more itchy feet and now we also want to show them the world! So I would, at some point, calculate for those particularly if you were a keen traveller before

Totally

Why are people so angry at those who have worked their way up and are earning well as a result. Baffling, really.

OP, our numbers are similar to yours, mortgage lower but we are overpaying quite a bit. We also have two DC, they are older and doing a lot of activities (sports, music, etc..) and that costs about 1K a month.

It's perfectly doable but like others said, think of a plan in case one you loses their job (ie enough savings to cover at least 6 months of mortgage and bills etc..)

Does your job require you to problem solve? Don't wanna be too mean but that seems quite a rhetorical question for most people. What makes it not so for you?

Public sector isn’t that safe anymore. Our household net income is a bit more than yours, both at similar levels but it’s highly likely I’ll be made redundant this year due to the current NHS doge frenzy so our income will almost be cut in half. Have you planned for that happening to you?

But you see, infuriatingly, I just don't care.

Depends how much your bills are, cars, insurances etc. It’s easy people saying £5k is plenty to live on but if you’ve got £2k worth of household bills, £1k car cost (might have 2 cars in finance then insurance and fuel), money is soon dwindling down