To think if you had this sum of money you’d be pretty relaxed about finances? Or am I out of touch?!

[Uuaner]

75k in savings and 150k mortgage on a 600k valued home.

if I was in this position with no debt I wouldn’t be anxious about so many things like temporarily losing employment, having a boiler breakdown, needing a new car… all sorts of financial stress would evaporate.

would you feel the same?

context is my best friend is in this position (inheritance) and is so so money conscious and always panicking about the next thing that may go wrong… even though she clearly has the money if needed?! Am I missing something?

Your friend needs to learn to keep quiet about money matters.
Quite apart from anything else, it’s frightfully vulgar to talk about such things. dahling.

You’re a miser. How joyless to live this way. Crack into your investments and treat your guests to a lovely time.

I am way older than her, have less than half that in savings and my house is worth fuck all by MN standard, income is my state pension and a small NHS pension. Sometimes I feel like a useless failure, but then I take pause and realise I am still much better off than many. I have paid for my home and have no debts. And I am a boomer so should be rich and selfish too!

This is why you should never share financial information with anyone. It might end up being discussed publicly on the Internet.

This

Yes I was in this position. £450k home, £120k mortgage, £80k in savings in my late 30s.

I felt very relaxed and knew I could lose my job and not work for a couple of years, or DH and I could both lose our jobs and not work for a while. Or we could replace the roof and boiler and our cars, with money to spare.

I used a chunk of it to pay for DH to retrain, and buy him equipment and a van, and paid a large amount off of our mortgage, but I'm back up to £30k again now.

Household income of £280k on a house valued over a million, mortgage of £375k but abroad so fixed for 30 years at a very low rate. £100k in savings, more in investments and robust pensions. I still worry about the boiler breaking. Not because we can’t pay for it… but the reason we’re in the position we’re in for savings is because we carefully consider all spending and try to cover unexpected expenses from cash flow rather than savings.

We are a similar position although our mortgage is more like £200k and our savings slightly less than your friend's. Late 30s too.

You are correct that we don't necessarily worry about the boiler or car breaking down. It would be annoying but we have the money to cover it. But it doesn't mean we don't worry about money because we don't see our savings as a pot to spend from.

The money is there in an emergency but it isn't a pot to dip into unless it's necessary. We wouldn't be using savings to pay for a holiday for example. We see them as retirement savings or in the worst case scenario, money to live off for a while if one of us was made redundant. DH was made redundant when I was on maternity leave with DD1 and it was a really stressful time. Having savings obviously helps with that but because it's for the future or dire emergencies only we almost don't see it as money that's available to us.

Look at it this way, if was unable to work from tomorrow she wouldn't be entitled to benefits with that amount in the bank. And how long would £75k last her? If someone earned 25 k a year that's only 3 years' salary. 3 years would fly by and what are you left with then?

I don't think you'd just be able to put it all into the mortgage and then claim benefits, and anyway, the mortgage would still not be completely paid off so what would happen then?

People don't think too hard about how long a pot of money would actually last if something awful but unlikely were actually to happen. But if you are suddenly in a position like that with an inheritance you then you are forced to think very carefully about the whatifs and how best to make use of the money. If you don't have anywhere near that sort of money in savings you're just putting one foot in front of the other just happy to be able to pay the bills and hoping nothing goes wrong. Because if you thought too deeply about it you'd be in a permanent state of panic about the whatifs and you can't go through your life like that.

I am constantly working out how long I can live on my current financial status! #nojoke

I spoke with an independent financial advisor today. One of the issues I mentioned was feeling much anxiety around finances.

Money was always tight when I was growing up, and I do not have a support network. If all went tits up (ill health, redundancy etc.), there would be no one to help me. For me, the more money I have in the bank, the more reassured I feel.

In the past, friends have criticised my frugal ways but their circumstances are different and they have support networks.

Is she actually panicking - or is she just turning stuff down based on cost, that you think she should spend?

I have a similar amount in savings, which I got by turning down or toning down expenditure that other people thought I should "lighten up" and spend.

MIL thought I should get Sky, FIL thought I should get a new car, this friend had an abroad hen do for £1000, an acquaintance sneered at cheap phones etc...

Some of the above have characterised my "not spending money I don't want to" as "panicking". I can assure you, I'm not panicking, I'm just not you.

No one's more tired than a Labrador who spends the whole day napping. And no one has more money worries then the beneficiary of a big unearned windfall.

Ah yes, the British pastime: distrusting rest and resenting wealth.
So now rest must be earned and wealth must be feared—no wonder people can’t relax even with savings in the bank.
Maybe the Labrador naps because it knows it’s safe.
Maybe the heir panics because they never learned how to feel safe.
It’s not ironic—it’s systemic.
But yes, of course—emotional responses to financial insecurity are always perfectly aligned with spreadsheets.
Clearly, if you’re not living paycheck to paycheck, you must be emotionally bulletproof.
Shall we add ‘calm’ to the list of things one must earn to deserve?

Ah yes, the British pastime
Not British. And I reserve my sympathy for those who have to navigate the death of a parent - the fallout, the grief, the endless admin, the expense - without reward.

I am exactly the same - I took a job in London between 2006 and 2011 that required a daily commute from Ipswich and I completely miscalculated what the season ticket would cost from my net salary and the scale of the increase in my student loan payments. I was working ridiculous hours, whilst relying on credit cards to cover normal living expenses and constantly behind with things like Council Tax.

I am fortunately in a better financial position now - but I still have extreme anxiety about any surprise issues in my house with water, electricity, gas, broadband etc.

Calling it a "reward" implies someone went looking for a prize. But most people I know would trade every penny to have the person back. Inheritance isn’t a trophy—it’s often tangled up with guilt, grief, and complicated emotions. And financial stress doesn’t just disappear because the numbers on a bank statement look reassuring.
It’s a curious way to frame it, isn’t it? A "reward" for enduring a parent’s death? Most would give anything for one more conversation, one more year. The money doesn’t cancel grief—and it certainly doesn’t buy emotional peace. But what it does seem to do is invite judgment.
Of course grief deserves compassion—always. But my original point wasn’t about bereavement. It was about the cultural expectation that financial stability should automatically cancel anxiety. Those are two very different conversations, and conflating them only makes both harder to talk about.
And for what it’s worth, emotional stress isn’t a zero-sum game. We’re allowed to hold space for the pain of losing someone, and still examine how society treats people who come into money—as if they’re no longer allowed to feel afraid, overwhelmed, or human.

At 38 I doubt the OPs friend has to worry about elderly care costs for a while

We have a good amount in savings and no mortgage on a house worth 325k. I still have to go to work every day to provide for my family, I still have to think about what I’m spending and what I’m spending it on. I wouldn’t say we are wealthy by any stretch of the imagination and would probably still panic if a big bill came in.

She still has a pretty high mortgage and the amount of equity she has means nothing unless she sold. The savings is a comfortable cushion and certainly that would be enough for me but until the mortgage was gone I would still be watching my money.

This is the key.

People who have lots of savings and are in a good financial position tend to be the exact people who are “money conscious and always panicking about the next thing that may go wrong”.

Just saying.

It’s not huge honestly, especially if she has kids and an average job.

She’s in a decent position as long as she builds on it, but If she’s the type to be anxious about money then it’s not enough to prevent that.

Yours was a catty and unreasonable post though, British or not.

She’s very privileged to be in that position. Some of us would be happy with £75 left at the end of the month let alone a house worth £600k and £75k in change. The sheer lack of perspective and wasting precious life being ‘anxious’ about wealth that so many people would even dream about is actually offensive.