Would you be comfortable with this monthly expenditure

[Gardener85]

Take home after deductions - £2900
Bills (house related and Mortgage) - £1200
Bills (personal-petrol, phone, hair etc) - £200
Food (budget £15 a day so based on 30 day month) - £450
-Social (weekends, new clothes etc) - £250
-Savings/investments - £800

Any critiques welcome - Mortgage is to rise by £200 in August so savings pot will be £600. I feel like I may be being stingy on the social pot…

If you know those are your costs, and you genuinely have £800 to save every month, then there's no problem. £800 a month will give you a good buffer for new washing machine, holiday etc quickly.

Pension?
Childcare ?

You’re right I changed around a few numbers after our new insurance quotes came in…forgot to save it. It’s €160 for education/kids
savings/misc is €3000 and entertainment/lifestyle is €310

we actually take home €200 more than 7k so there’s a bit more floating around there that is misc/not assigned which bugs me as I try to account for everything…but as you know with col and prices etc it’s constantly changing.

This also doesn’t account for child benefit of €280 per month. It’s a run down of all major expenses. Child benefit is saved for the dc college etc and some months spent on clothing etc if they need a restock

Pension contributions are deducted before and employer contribution is quite generous so c1k going into that every month.

Child costs more or less absorbed by CB as it stands.

You only pay £26 a week for child care ???

It may just be after school club etc

Me either. I spend a fortune on food but if I massively economised I can’t imagine getting lower than £600

In my experience unhealthy options (junk, ready meals, stuff in boxes etc) is a more expensive existence than eating healthily - ie I think cooking fresh fruit and veg from scratch is cheaper! Possibly because Im vegetarian.

Yes we tend to have one vegetarian meal per week. A veg curry or veggie pasta bake.
other meals we have are
meatballs with pasta
chicken curries - Thai red, green or yellow or Indian butter chicken etc
roast chicken
boiled ham
homemade burgers
lasagne
shepards pie
I use turkey mince and pork mince also which is cheaper.
chicken fillets wrapped in bacon,
homemade pizzas
i grow herbs so I have fresh herbs available.
I don’t pay for eggs as a relative has lots of chickens so gives me at least 6 a week.

Do you consistently have £800 at the end if each month?

I ask as this doesnt seem to account for lots of stuff.

Unless you’re very young 1k per month into a pension isn’t really enough.

I’m mid 30’s and realistically have many years of work ahead of me, based on current value of my pension and projections that monthly amount is ample to get me where I want to be, and contribution will increase with any pay rises too.

Most people probably can't afford to put that much in!

I’d have more fun spend - 250 normal and then 150 towards holidays say

This privilege is insane.

Im close to 40, my government auto enrolment basic pension currently sees around £200 a month. And with over 1000 a month in childcare fees and a 1000 a month mortgage it’ll be a long time before my pension sees any more than that.

nmw full time post tax earnings are around 1750 a month - most of the population can’t afford to put more than the basic 5% into a pension they may never even see

Not everyone wants to eat shit food at Aldi

Most people are going to be working until they are very old and/or skint in retirement.

I think 1k per month is pushing it tbh I put in ~650 and dp ~900 we’re mid-late 30’s

Aldi isn’t shit food though

ut sells fresh fruit and veg . It uses the same meat suppliers as M&S in some cases , it’s preserves had fewer nasties in than anything I could get at sainsburies

It's a relative.
We eat fairly well, but spend not much more than that for 3 adults.

You'll be shocked at how much that amount seems to some of us then. 🫣

And back in the real world.....

FFS you don't need to be putting in £1k pm to not be skint in retirement. State pension replaces around half of most people's incomes for a start plus you won't have any housing costs (either mortgage paid off or entitled to help if renting).

Also won't have DC to support or costs of going to work.

i don’t know how people manage to spend so little on food.
Admittedly we shop at Tesco rather than Lidl because it’s our closest but still.
chicken 1 or 2 days
sausages or gammon 1 day
eggs one day (ie with lentils or massive omelette etc)
fish 2 days
meat 1 day
no alcohol, no puddings, lots of fruit and vegetables
treat ourselves to one ice cream pot
no canned stuff
lots of natural yogurt
no ready made stuff
buy large bags of dried beans, chickpeas, from Asian shop, those last very long
with top ups here and there I just can’t spend less than between 350 and 400 per week, there’s 4 of us.

I just can’t spend less than between 350 and 400 per week, there’s 4 of us

Oh, give over. Unless you're all Olympic weight lifters of course you could spend less than that.

Or did you mean per month?