To wonder how other families get to the end of the month?

[gundigirl]

DH and I are both middle earners, with a combined income of around £90k. We have one DD in state school – no fees, but she does a few clubs and after-school activities, which add up.
With the rising cost of living, I’ve had to take on a side hustle. I actually enjoy it, but still – without that extra income, I wouldn't have been able to cover recent repair bills, for example.
I honestly don’t understand how other families (especially those with two or more DC, or just one working parent) make it to the end of the month. I’ve never felt more financially squeezed.
I’m not exactly a super-saver – I like the odd hair appointment – but I do try to save or invest a bit each month when I can.
What am I missing?

You could get £475k, I just checked. And that's about £2800 pm

Guess you bought a bigger house or a posher location that you can actually afford

you can only spend it once

and if that means you can’t afford a modest home but need a small one then you have a small one

You must have very high outgoings somewhere for 90k not to go very far. That's 10k less than us and we have 2 DC, £5k childcare per annum and manage to save about £1.5k a month. Admittedly we are not big spenders.

I believe the traditional answer is to cancel Netflix and stop buying avocado on toast...

We have a combined take home income of c. £2400 a month and we just about get by.

Two teens. State school but we have to pay transport costs about £200/month combined for both kids. One has music lessons at £200 a term. No other paid for activities or clubs.

If we were earning £90K we’d be quids in! Do you have a large mortgage or pay a lot of rent? Could you downsize? Change your car perhaps?

If you have nursery age DC your food bill will be much lower than those with tweens / teens.

IMO if you choose a huge mortgage or to live in an expensive area then you can’t really moan when you’re broke at the end of the month 🤷‍♀️

It ENTIRELY depends on:

where in the country your job requires you to live
if your caring responsibilities add to your costs
if your caring responsibilities require you to within a set area
Commute costs (inc if you need to fund a 2 car household
whether both of you are able / healthy enough to work
whether you need to have the heating on in the day etc.
If you live in a high council tax area.
whether you have to fund education / home school a SEN child.
if you have a child at university

All these things are hugely expensive factors.

After tax we earn £9,500. After the above factors are taken into consideration we have about £2,800 left for food, holidays, presents, clothes, personal grooming, insurance, clubs etc. We manage and aren’t complaining but we’re not splashing the cash.

Your earnings don’t define how much disposable income you have as much as your outgoings. If someone on our combined income had no kids, paid off the mortgage, no commute costs they’d be totally and utterly loaded!

Our joint household income before tax is probably similar however we have 3 children together and older grown up children who my DH is still paying maintenance/uni help towards so probably after that and tax our take home is probably around 55-60k. We do struggle to balance the books and don’t even have a uk holiday each year, our cars are 10+ years old etc, having money to save or invest would be a dream, our food shopping goes on the credit card and we pay as much of it off as we can the following month. We generally have manage to juggle things so we have enough food, clothes etc but repair bills etc are a headache and we’re way overdue for getting our cars serviced etc

A choice, but if that's what you've always known and what everyone you know is doing, it feels normal

If this is how the op arrived at struggling to get by with one child on a joint income on £90k then I have no sympathy.

We have a similar household income to you (but take home is less as it’s one earner and on SAHP). We have 4 children and can just about make ends meet month to month. Our kids do music lessons, activities, etc., and we have all the usual costs of mortgage, food, car, etc. But we don’t spend much on things like holidays, and we run one cheap car (no finance payments).

You must be spending a lot more than us on all the other things. Do you go on holiday? Do you spend on adult activities like nights out, gym memberships, subscriptions, beauty treatments, etc? Do you have a big mortgage? Cars on finance?

Is that 90k before or after tax?

It sounds too obvious, but you are obviously spending beyond your means somewhere.

We are typically probably about £100k combined, but I had to leave work due to cancer, so while Dh is the higher earner, we’ve lost my salary for the past year. So we’re at maybe £70k now (Dh self employed so no set salary). I definitely would say we’re quite comfortable and not pressured at all.

Our mortgage is £1700 pcm, but we overpay some on occasion. We have 2 dc with all their activities. Also have a dog. We both have expensive hobbies, Dh cycles and I have a horse who I pay livery on. We go on holidays, not ridiculous ones, but 2 weeks camping in France last year, I went to Spain solo this year, family holiday to Wales this summer. We may take the camper van to Spain next year. I shop at Tesco and Waitrose.

What we don’t have is lots of little luxury expenses. Don’t buy a coffee on the way to work or a meal deal for lunch. We bring coffee in a flask and a packed lunch. We don’t eat out or get takeaways, maybe for someone’s birthday only. No nights at the pub - I don’t drink anyway, dh only on occasion, but no like big nights out. Dh and ds go to the barber, but I cut my own hair and dd. No nails. No new clothes unless they are outgrown or can’t be repaired. Since the start of the year, I’ve bought 2 shirts from Primark at a total of £12 and that’s all I’ve spent on clothes this year. I have plenty of clothes at home to wear, so don’t need new ones. No cars on finance, we have old secondhand cars that we maintain well.

None of that because we can’t afford it, more because we don’t need it. No point spending £60 on a takeaway that isn’t nice, when I can make the same at home for £10. We have the usual bills, electric, heating oil, internet, phone, council tax, but I really work to not waste electricity. Or we don’t heat the house unless we need it (it’s a big house, we have 3 fireplaces, we light one if we need it, the wood we get for free when a tree comes down or someone needs a downed tree removed).

I would look at where money is going because it’s almost certainly going on lots of little things that add up into big things without you realising.

Is this going to be another one of those threads that the op doesn't return to?

One important shift is to stop thinking about your budget in terms of months. There are always going to be random expenses like car repairs or predictable expenses Christmas and school holidays. You need to make your budget for a year and build in categories for the big ticket items and saving. That will show you the real amount of discretionary spending you have available.

Obviously other people either earn more, or spend less.

I'd think £90k pa split between 2 earners should be pretty comfortable, as long as you make sensible spending decisions.

I wonder the same thing op. We bought only 25% of our house the rest is rent so it costs “only” £1000 a month just a regular three bedroom family home.
I say only because there aren’t many opportunities to do what we’ve done and I see similar sized homes are £1500+ on rightmove. So how the hell is everyone else with kids affording that?

It depends entirely
People on a lower income probably manage better than you because they have a smaller home, therefore smaller mortgage. They only run one car eg.
if you are struggling on 90k maybe you need to downsize your home or other costly outgoings?

Our biggest expenses are:
Mortgage/household bills
Food - £180 a week
DD's wraparound care - sport/clubs
Running 2 cars, which we both need for work
1 gym membership
1 holiday a year

You need to look at every penny you spend boring I know but until you see it written down how can you see where the money is going.For example £180 a week for food that is some budget.Go through every outgoing and take stock.I holiday a year what does that mean?Good luck

Lifestyle creep plays a part too - either lifestyle changes as salaries go up and that becomes the new baseline or you have an idea of what you should be able to afford on the salary you have coming in. I found zero base budgeting was the thing that helped me get a handle on where money was disappearing. Give every pound a job at the start of the month rather than spending as you go. Basically if you’re not managing on £90k, and don’t have excessively high housing or childcare costs the issue is with your budget.

£180/week for groceries for 2 adults 1 child is huge.

I spend £60/week for 2 adults or around £100-110 per week for 4 adults during Uni holidays (and that includes toiletries/household/petfood, and we're not consiously trying to budget).

Good planning could probably halve your grocery bill.

If you have a holiday a year then not scrapping by imo

yes you can save for it like I do weekly and put money aside for it

how much is your mortgage @gundigirl

these threads always ask for breakdown of take home and costs so 2 having a salary of £90k is what take home

but with kids and hobbies it can add up

for example I pay £175 a month for dd gym. I have one child. I couldn’t afford to do it for two

Without numbers, it’s hard to identify where the money is going. If your mortgage is £3k a month or you’re spending £1500 every month in car payments then that’s obviously not going to leave much spare.

You could probably cut your food budget though. That seems fairly high for 2 adults and 1 young child.

It depends on how much those are though. A mortgage of £900/month or £2k will make a difference. Payments on cars, as opposed to just paying road tax and fuel will make a difference. I’d also say £180 on food for 3 people is a lot a week. If you can afford it and good food is a priority for you it’s fair enough but it will impact you making ends meet each month.