How long would it take you to save this amount?

[Nobulling]

A friend of mine had done work done in her house (a new house purchase) I could really do with similar. So I asked how much it cost out of interest. The total price was 8k…she then said but it’s not too bad as we paid the first half when we ordered in August and by Oct when they were booking fitting we had saved the other half’s anyway. So that’s 3 months pay MAX depending on how dates fall. I was thinking ok…well I’m not getting this job done it would take me FOREVER to save 4k not 3months! Surely this is unrealistic! How long would it take you to get 4k together?

I could do it in a couple of months living off porridge and not leaving the house apart from going to work. Would be miserable though. More realistically, 4 months

Years and years.
Household income of barely 40k

What you haven’t addressed is whether they could have worked more. Does their job offer paid overtime? Are they self employed and therefore can take on extra work?

Depends on what you mean by not changing behaviour. We direct money into different funds (children's savings, holiday fund, house fund, tax fund, general fund). If we just put all of that into the house fund, then just 2-3 months if nothing major happened in that time, like a car needing new tyres, or a school trip, or a household item needing replacing.....

We are fortunate in that our income while not high by MN standards is very high for our part of the country so housing is only a small part of our outgoings. Plus we don't need childcare

Really depends. She said "we" so obviously 2 people. If their outgoings are not large and salaries are average or above, with (varied) push it could be done.
We would probably need 4 months if we didn't want to sacrifice nicer things. And we are by no means high earners. But we have household set up that it can be all taken care of on 1 lower income on purpose. While I know others who maxed out to two average salaries so don't have the spare really.

Too many variables to yield anything from general diacussion.

About 2.5 years with nothing else cropping up in that time. That would be no holidays no hobbies just essential living.
I'm trying to save up for around 10 grand for reconstructive surgery that the NHS deem as cosmetic. I can't ever get there because the car will need repairs, a white good needs replacing/boiler/heating. Something always crops up. It feels selfish to put my children through a life of bare minimum just so I'm not in pain anymore.

I've got family members who can not fathom that not everyone has lots of savings or disposable income. Whilst they buy a 3rd 60 grand car.

So no op I think most people can't save at all or it takes them years.

Three months

You’re paying inheritance tax? Change your accountant!

Ah ah, we own our place but have no savings whatsoever to have "work" done.

Don't assume from your small circle of acquaintances that this is the case for everyone.

Good luck with that! HMRC are not to be messed with!

14 years.

But I am 58 and soon to be 59 and due to retire in 8 years time.

My salary is £1000 a month, I would never be able to save £8000 because I need every penny I earn just to live.

If I have an emergency I have to use a credit card.
I’m utterly astonished by the people on this thread saying they aren’t high earners on £50k+.

About 6 months assuming DH was contributing too and we weren’t using any savings we already had

No it’s not. It’s either one person earning about 130k or two earning 51k to take home 80k.

She didn’t say take home of £80k she said household income of £80k.

To save 2.5k? 2-3 months without any changes. 1 month cutting back.

Me personally, about four months. But quicker if OH was contributing too. That would probably mean no savings for anything else though, so it would definitely have to be a cheap year in terms of holidays and treats.

It would take me years. Ive never had anywhere near £4k in savings. Right now I have £82 in my savings account.

I had managed to save about £800 over this year but it got wiped out by car repairs, my kids' birthdays and Christmas.

I earn in a month what some people are saving 😂

Average UK salary is about 37-39k. So, for two average earners that would be about 74-78k.

Would we say that 80k per annum is significantly higher than 78k per annum?

We could save it in 2 months. If we needed to I could take on extra work, cut back and probably do it in 1 if we were in a dire situation

But this question is how long is a peice of string. We are well paid but neither of us do outlandish jobs, our mortgage is sensible and we don't have Dc (yet). Lots and lots of jobs will pay enough to save 1k each a month and lots of people will have small mortgages or even no mortgage/little outgoings. But obviously lots and lots wont. It's neither shocking that people can save 4k in 3 months or shocking that people can't save it in a year.

We put aside 1k each per month & put 30% of our salary’s in pension

I've never had that amount so probably never! If I pooled all my birthday and Xmas gift money and saved maybe twenty quid a month, I guess about six and a half years?!

4 months assuming I used my normally monthly saving amount - honestly though for something like this I have a house maintenance fund saved so would use that and then save it back

£4k would take me a year and a half. if i had no other debt. but as i do i would have to say about five years.

I have savings already but if I wanted to save 4k for a particular purpose I think I could do it in about 6 months providing I was disciplined and avoided unnecessary expenses.