To think that life is too expensive?

[Gffbjjgfddbjkkm]

Feel so frustrated.

I work full-time teaching in one of the most expensive schools in the world. DH works full time too. We each earn about £40k.

I'm having to take on a weekend job, just to be able to scrape by to afford to send DS to university next year. Who wants to work seven days a week?!

Would love a really decent holiday, but can't afford that.

I'm sick of working so hard work with nothing but financial stress. Neither of us is likely to inherit much, if anything.

Bills we can do nothing about - apart from voting! Are astronomically high. Council tax for example.

Mortgage has doubled through interest rises. Through no spare cash, you end up with a higher debt ratio then you can't get a 0% credit card deal!

You have to get smarter with your money. I thought I was until I went through money expert a day to go through bills thing and started using Ynab. And using the debt free wannabe forum.

Blimey. We'd been unknowingly throwing it away:)

@MyCyanReaderfamily of 4 (3 adults and one teen I think) for £125 a week?! Where are you shopping?! We spend nearly double that, vegetarians, don’t drink alcohol or buy snacks / processed stuff… I don’t know many people that would be able to spend that little on food anymore without seriously compromising the quality. You also didn’t add in things like insurance, phones, stuff the kids need like sports fees, new shoes, new tyres for the car, MOT etc etc. Our council tax and utilities and £500 a month for a small 3 bed.

OP we are on similar income and there isn’t much left - I’ve taken on more hours to help with uni fees too. While it isn’t solely our responsibility, there is a certain expectation that parents make up the missing 5k or so per year - in most cases this still isn’t enough so DS will still have to work his way through.

@Beesandhoney123 You have to get smarter with your money. I thought I was until I went through money expert a day to go through bills thing and started using Ynab. And using the debt free wannabe forum.

I will have a look at these.

I've started using the envelope budgeting method, which so far seems to work well.

On mn people always say ‘where does the rest go?’ - in real life your child comes home and says we need this book, or we’re going on a school tour, or they’ve lost x, y or z, your car has broken down or run out of oil, you’ve a plumbing incident, you thought you had more heating and then it goes etc etc. Life would be great if it were just mortgage/ rent, bills, food etc

I'm sorry but on 80k combined you have many options available to you which people like me on disability benefits don't.
You could
Downsize/ move to a cheaper area
change cars
meal plan and buy cheaper groceries
Sign up for every discount code/ loyalty scheme available
Buy secondhand wherever possible before looking for sales to buy new
swap broadband/ mobile/ energy providers
Go through bank accounts and see if there's anything you can cut costs for.. eg Netflix or other streaming services
Only fresh air is free nowadays. It's a bit shit but there are still ways to have a decent standard of living.
My DS1 gets a free hot drink at Greggs code from his mobile provider( Voxi) so he sends me one for when I collect my monthly prescription.

You can keep a record of where the ‘rest’ goes. We have a budget for everything: utilities, council tax, Xmas gifts, food, travel, petrol etc. and therefore can see where we are overspending or where prices have increased dramatically. So if we overspend in one area, we need to cut back in another. I do appreciate that not everyone runs their finances in this way..!

We do too. I have the Monzo app. Lifechanging.
It has pots for different spends.

We're a family of 5 (two adults, one teen and two 9 year olds) and we spend about £120 a week on food. All meals cooked from scratch, around 50/50 vegetarian/meat, and that includes breakfast and packed lunches. I shop with Ocado.

I order a large OddBox of fruit/veg every week then base meals around this. A main meal costs around £10 to make, then usually 2 portions left over for adult lunches. We eat really well and good quality food. I'm not sure I could spend more.

Last week was ratatouille with baked spuds (v), chili con carne, home made pizzas (v), omelette (v), roast chicken, pesto pasta with green beans (V) and sausages and mash.

The £3000 leftover is more than enough to cover insurance, phones, car maintenance, petrol etc... There is definitely something that doesn't add up.

I've not really looked tbh, but I can quite believe you're correct.

Maybe not the type of holiday you’re looking for but we are a family of 4 and search for cheap city breaks (not packages, booking through booking.com for hotels and finding cheap deals on SkyScanner) - we always manage to find something for less than 500 for us all in Europe. We also make sure we link our Avios account and go through it for booking.com / get your guide / viator and the points accumulate and we’re hoping to get free long haul reward flights soon.

You need to list all your outgoings and go through bank and credit card statements for the past year. Is your debt on interest free credit cards? If not can you switch? Work out first where your money is going and then you can look at what you can cut out. Holidays might have to be camping if you can borrow the stuff or a youth hostel or house swap.

What subjects do you teach? Would you be open to moving schools - if you are happy with boarding schools, could you look for ones that you can live onsite?

Right?? Absolutely mind baffling and my sons would be absolutely mortified at the thought of me or their dad doing that!
They simply wouldn’t have it and wouldn’t accept a penny.
Any half decent well brought up Kid would do the same surely no??

ShanghaiDiva

We do keep track but it turns into a mess, eg my son was asked to get a drawing tool for graphic studies- 17€, another son asked to go to a day out with a family- 20€, pet got sick- 200€- you can’t cut out/ down on these things, real question- what do you do in these cases?

These types of thread are invariably frustrating - the OP just wants to vent which is OK - but when they have a "decent" household income and isn't willing to disclose their outgoings in comparison, any empathy quickly fades (on my part at least)

We have a category for most things. In your examples - drawing tool for graphic studies comes under education, day out with family is under entertainment and there would be a separate category for pet expenditure (we don’t have any pets). My dh is a retired finance director so setting up the annual budget is one of his little hobbies. We have a financial review at the end of the year and decide how to allocate the following year’s budget. It all sounds a little odd, but works for us.

The £26k includes everything I get, all help after my wages - this includes any housing help in that. I get nothing else. I don't get help with utilities or anything else. I am band B in CT and I pay this in full. Their dad is useless and I don't get any maintenance from him (not for want of trying).

Dh and I earn around 80ktoo. Our mortgage is quite low (£750pm) but after bills, food, petrol, monthly expenses we always have £500-£1000 spare per month. We go on one holiday a year abroard and usually a few weekend breaks.

Two of our children have been to uni so far. They got loans for uni fees and around 4/5k maintenance loan it covered most of the accommodation, we also sent £200 per month. They then worked to cover the rest of their expenses.

£20,000 - £26,000 is at the lower end of the average annual rent for a 1 bed flat where I live. This has an impact on everything you buy. A cup of coffee or a packet of biscuits is often more than double the price of the same product in some other parts of the uk. My take home pay after tax and NI is the same as yours (£26,000) Fortunately my DH’s earnings are better than mine.

Our household has half the income of yours and yet we feel quite well off. Manage to put a few hundred into savings each month and have roughly £20k saved. Have a holiday in Sweden booked for a couple of months time and a 10 day cruise booked for next year. Also bought a new car this year.

You need to look at your expenses and make a plan to reduce them. I really can't imagine struggling with that much money coming in.

If you both examine you'll make enough for a nice holiday abroad. Most examiners make at least £1000 but you can do much more than that if you want to. It usually gets paid at the end of July and again at the end of August 😊 You could also mark for the IB which is usually around October I think from memory.

Yeh my husband and I do this. We make almost £2k between us each year from examining and it pays for a reasonable summer holiday. The work is a bit rubbish but it's useful CPD too.

How is this a massive income?? it's just only above median UK salary each (£40k vs £37k).

So in SE it's really a very low income given property prices.

what is your rent / mortgage? how many kids you have?
do you get any state benefits?
don't you really see how much difference this can make?

If you see a follow up of post of mine I apologised and said it was a "decent" income not "massive".