To wonder how people are coping?

[CobbleWobble]

We are very lucky, I know this.

We are "Mumsnet rich" both have professional jobs with good salaries (£170k household income) and yet this last 12 months:

• removed children from private school
• changed how we do the weekly shop to reduce costs
• cut subscriptions (like Disney+ etc)
• reduced what I bought in the back to school shop
• decided against a holiday in October half term
• concerned about our usual Christmas food order

What is going on? I just don't understand why or how prices are rising as they are or how people on less than us are coping!

I'm extremely grateful we have the things to cut that we have but we've also had to remortgage this year which has doubled our mortgage payments and then our utilities have increased and the food shop has just got insane.

We have other things we can cut - a holiday in the UK, Netflix, the monthly takeaway but its just miserable to think we may need to do that just not to be living.

Happy to post spending particulars if people are finding it hard to see where I'm coming from.

So AIBU to think that as a country we cannot go on with prices rising like this? How are others coping?

No council tax in Ireland. But it’s much the same otherwise. We pay property tax once a year (about 400) we just pull that out of savings

You are spending well out of your means. Maybe consider downsizing if you cannot afford your mortgage or it requires cutting your expenses to the point where you are miserable

@Lbet but plenty of people on lower incomes make threads saying they are struggling with the COL etc.

@Statsquestion1 child benefit is universal and more generous in Ireland. I assumed you were in the UK.

We pay property tax once a year (about 400) we just pull that out of savings

I wish CT was £400 a year! 😆

We’re on less than half of that. And we live a very good life!
will have been to abroad 3 times this year with two Uk breaks as well.
I don’t work.
we run one car that we own outright.
we don’t have Netflix (it’s shit)
i just bought the majority of my kids uniform preowned. You can’t tell the difference. I could have spend 200 odd for all the kids but I spent less than 40.
we go out to eat semi regularly and have a takeaway when we fancy them. I don’t feel badly off but we don’t spend money where we don’t need to

@DoAWheelie Apologies if someone has already mentioned this to you (I can't work out how to highlight anyone's comments except the OP's) but have you contacted CAP? They should be able to help you with the utilities debts in particular, usually you can give them permission to communicate with companies on your behalf so you can just hand everything over to them and they will organise a repayment plan for you and then support you in actioning it. They can also help you make sure there aren't any specific schemes for extra financial help that you'd be eligible for with utilities due to your disability. I would really recommend them, one of my husband's friends has worked for them for years 🙂

@Statsquestion1 do you not pay for private health insurance?

Going to leave it there as you seem to be not quite getting what I mean.

@Lbet yes, it isn't clear.

Ffs 🤦‍♀️

It is but to be fair we pay more for insurances and things so it balances out I imagine

It does not matter how much you earn. If your outgoings each month are close to your income each month then any small prices increases are going to be noticed.

The trick is make sure you have a good buffer between what comes in vs what goes out irrespective of being a high earner.

No that is paid by my employer

Your take home pay is around £8400 per month and you can’t afford a £5.99 Disney subscription? The mind boggles.

@Statsquestion1 that's good, I know a fair few people who have to contribute

For some reason this has cheered me right up.

Up until Autumn 2022 mortgage rates were less than 2%. They were only ever going to go one way. Large mortgages were only ever going to be serviceable with 5 or 10yr fixes to give some time to reduce the capital.

Unlike things like food inflation, mortgage rate responsibility sits far more with the homeowner

No it doesn't, Charlie. And it's "strikes a cHord".

Reported.

Christ, I wish I had your money problems.

It's rude of the OP not to comment on their own thread.

Wow! As a single parent of 2, working, no mortgage as I rent, what you earn a month takes me around 6 months to earn and I manage, its tight at times if an unexpected expense comes up but the bills are covered, we always have food, I run a car, we manage a little treat and usually a holiday abroad. I'm so careful with money as I have to be but my subscriptions to Netflix etc are my luxury as always at home, don't go out. I can't imagine what life must be like when 15k hits the bank every month.

How is everyone coping?
Faring better than you by the sound of it...and the majority of us have far less money coming in.

It's trite to say it but count your blessings.

You have a mortgage you can't afford leaving you with no disposable income. Other people are fine regardless of whether they earn more or less than you because they made different choices.