DH thinks we shouldn’t save this much but I’m anxious

[Cokefirst]

I’m a mum of twin toddlers, right now I am a SAHM but I will be returning to work part time in 3-4 months.
We have luckily got a good savings pot and when I go back to work I worked out we could save around £1300 each month (me £350 on part time and DH the rest).

We would also have spending fun money of around £300 each which is around what we usually need. DH thinks we should save less and spend more on the now. I admit there are a few things I’d like to buy etc but don’t want to be reckless especially with 2 young kids but now I don’t know if I’m being too harsh.

Our bills are covered and I will also be contributing to my SIPP.

Should I be more relaxed about it

What are you saving for?

Do you have accounts for the twins for the future

what are the things you want to buy but don’t?

it is a balance between future proofing and living in the now! I think perhaps you are too anxious but it is hard to know

What do you count as 'fun' money. Is that meals out, day trips, holidays... or wider things like makeup, kids classes, alcohol/treat food etc?

Id give myself a higher allowance for fun stuff yeah

£300 each spending money. £1000 savings. £350 a month into a fun pot for holidays or trips out

It's hard for anyone to advise as we don't know your current savings pot, job security, whether your planning more DC etc.

If you don't have much savings already I don't think it's unreasonable to focus on that. I wouldn't want to compromise too much on day to day living and holidays if I didn't have to though.

We usually have different savings pots, so holiday, schooling, emergency and another pot to dip in and out. We built up our emergency before adding too much to the others. I'd also say if saving leaves you feeling tight, that can be quite disheartening unless it's for a particular goal.

You need to differentiate between short term savings (eg saving for holidays, new car etc) verses long term savings eg pension, investments, saving to help kids with uni, buying houses etc

Are you not doing/buying something you want because you are saving? What does fun money entail? Are you saving for something specific or just rainy day? If you were to 'only' save £1000 would your (you, husband,family) life become more enjoyable? What are savings in this context? Does this include pension, kids, investments etc. Or just a rainyday fund and pension and stuff is separate and not included?

I would save it because it sounds like you have a decent amount each for fun money.

But I’d put a portion in a separate account for ‘imminent savings’ rather than long term. So you can go to that for an expensive month, a holiday etc.

We are planning on saving the same amount when my work hours go up soon. But we differentiate between short and long term savings. Roughly we are saving each month:

£300 for annual holidays

£100 towards a tentative trip to Australia in 2027 (if we do this then we’d add this pot to our usual annual holiday budget above that year)

£400 for kids future - approx £100 into account they can access at 18 and the rest into an account in our name to help them with house deposit or uni etc

£300 towards retirement, we are not quite 40 so may open LISAs but haven’t looked into it enough. We could top up our pensions but for now we will also try to save some extra cash.

£150 emergency fund that I anticipate will get spent at some point in the short/medium term eg if the boiler breaks or need a new roof. We aim to have 3 months expenses in the emergency fund and when it goes over this any extra will go into a separate pot

£100 towards new cars which will hopefully be years off yet

£200 for bathroom Reno which I hope to do in 2027

I also save £120 a month towards Christmas and birthdays and £180 a month for car expenses as we pay our insurance and tax annually, these pots are then dipped into throughout the year as and when needed. This leaves us with around £150 fun money each per month for going out etc plus £150 family fun money. We pay for kids classes/hobbies separately.

@UpUpAwayz I’m curious how you keep track of all the individual pots. Do you have various savings accounts or just keep it in a separate spreadsheet and all the money goes into the same pot?

I’m with NatWest and have wished they had a “pot” function within the accounts.

Right now we have different accounts for the kids (savings & ISAs) and two different savings accounts where our short term/long term savings go (in addition to our current accounts & joint account).

If I were you OP I’d be saving the max that you can do while maintaining a balance of fun.

What is your 1/5/10 year plan? Will you be extending your family? Will you require a new home/new car etc.

We’re in a “scurrying away” phase atm because we’re moving and want to do a lot to the new house, so pretty much everything is saved.

You could compromise and save 1k and add 150 each to the fun pots.
Will holidays come out of Savings and birthdays/xmas? It could be argued the savings are also for fun stuff.

We have a spreadsheet for bills/savings and then we just spend /do as we want (within reason) and pay the credit card at the end of the month. But we always save around £500 a month first.

Oh and if you are going back part time are you topping your pension up?

I do the long term kids and retirement savings in ISAs and then I use Chase for the rest. They let you have up to 10 pots!

Bloody hell would love your income if you can save £1800 a month!

I thought we were doing well to save about £600!

This is the crucial question. What is the £300/month supposed to cover? It’s really not a lot. That can easily go in one week on a couple of meals out, a haircut and a family trip to the cinema. Are holidays paid for out of your savings?

I think you are very wise. There have been times when ive had to give up work for various surgeries so you need a years salary in savings at the very least. The last time I was off for a year and a half.
I suppose you could compromise, save more in winter and a bit less during the summer.

I save £1000 a month on a top band 6 nhs salary and Im on my own. Mind you I've almost paid off my mortgage.

I don’t count the £300 holidays, £120 birthday/xmas or £180 car pots as proper savings though because they are spent every year. They’re actually sinking funds. So that’s £600 that a lot of people would just count as day to day spending rather than savings.

We are definitely fortunate with our income and a big part of it is that we have flexible working and we found a childminder who takes all 30 hours fundings and only charges £10 top up a week. Therefore during term time our childcare bill is only £40-50 a month. I have friends with similar aged DC who even with the 30 hours funding are paying £800 a month for 4 days at nursery.

However as well as being lucky with our income we do make certain choices to allow us to save this much. £150 fun money each doesn’t go far and I only budget £120 a month for clothes for our family of 5. Therefore most of my clothes are charity shop or Vinted and I choose not to get my nails or brows done and I dye my own hair to save money. £3500 also doesn’t really buy you an all inclusive holiday in the summer for a family of 5 but we go camping 2 or 3 times a year and then do one bigger trip, this year to France on the ferry with an Airbnb. I’m not pleading poverty I’m just saying that we choose to cut expenses in other areas to enable us to save this much.