To say there’s always a high earner thread? Tell me about your income vs expenditure if you are of the opinion that you are broke/not well off?

[Moneymadness]

Just that really. Every other money thread ends up taken over by those with large incomes and low expenses, or just large incomes tbh. If you want to. Post your numbers if you are bloody broke and just getting to the end of the month(or not)…a safe space that cannot be taken over by the higher earners maybe?

A safe space for people to talk about how broke they are..hmmm

This is just poor financial management. Your mortgage / rent is too high compared to your salary. You presumably made that choice?

Income after tax between the two of us 72k, expenditure 32k and mortgage paid off. In our fifties which I feel is very relevant, child is a young adult working FT.

Obviously totally fine.

Yes. And?

Wrong thread?

Sorry, i wasnt querying if i would be entitled to anything, i know the answer to that at the moment. I dont have any mortgage/rental costs same as people who get their rent paid via UC and even though my income is less than someone else with children who works and gets UC would get (no disabilities), i do ok, so my query was what is the biggest spend that people in this position with a UC top up have that makes them struggle?

I was curious about that post also.

spending 2.5k a month with no mortgage. That’s definitely not broke living…

There’s been a few on the thread bizarrely 😬

This is what I really mean when I say we can’t afford to buy a house. Our UC would drop by £600 a month (social rent) but we’d then have to pay £1500 mortgage for an equally sized property, so we would be £2100 worse off each month buy having the privilege of being “home-owners”. That would be a huge sacrifice in our current lifestyle and would make us absolutely broke (and that’s based on a 35yr mortgage but we are already in our 40s). However, it does mean that when we are old and looking at retirement we have to factor in rent so we are better off now but will likely struggle a lot when older. You, however, might be struggling now but you will be thankful of it as you age and will have a very comfortable retirement due to not having housing costs. I think it balances it all out eventually, even if it seems so heavily unfair right now.

@Differentforgirls I only read the first part of the question so obviously shouldn’t have posted.

We all do it xx

Single parent. I’m disabled myself and I have a severely disabled child in part time education - so I couldn’t work even if I physically could. I have to rely on benefits, and whilst it may look like a ‘lot’ due to the disability elements - I can assure you the expenses to cover my disability and my child’s disability means I’m in the minus each month. I only have savings because of the back pay with my son’s disability. And with those savings, I’m going to go on holiday for the first time in 10 years and the first time for my six year olds lifetime. Unfortunately I think it’ll barely cover an abroad holiday and that’s likely all I’ll be able to afford for the rest of my sons childhood.

It's really not that easy. Rents are really expensive in a lot of places with very limited availability..It's also going to limit your options if you have pets.

Not skint not rich but I'd say my situation is a bit precarious.
Earn around £32k (can only work p/t due to health issues and am really struggling)
Am single, live alone, have a mortgage of around £780 plus pets but no children. In my late 40s.

We are a fairly high income household: I earn just over 50k and my husband earns 100k but owns his own business so has the potential for more as it grows. We don’t feel well off on a day to day basis and have the same money struggles anecdotally as others I know, but I guess if you really dig down then that probably isn’t true.

We’re paying for a skiing holiday for our eldest which has cost a little over 2k. This has been a strain each month;

We have a weekly cleaner x3 hours (£50)

I spend £300 a week on food (Waitrose or M&S); we don’t eat out much but get maybe a monthly takeaway / dinner out

We have two cars

Our mortgage is >£1,200 monthly (we live in an expensive area which we moved to for secondary school but out house - while lovely and fairly large - is 3 bed semi detached)

We don’t watch what we spend, but we don’t spoil our children, nor do we buy much for ourselves; we didn’t do huge 40th celebrations recently as we felt we couldn’t afford it)

Our house is a money pit; we’ve spent roughly £40k so far renovating and it hasn’t touched the sides. Our back door is currently broken and we can’t really afford to get it fixed at the moment

Last year we went away on two holidays - a week in Northern Europe and 10 days in Greece. Our holiday this year will cost around 6k

We spend nearly £400 a month on a luxury gym membership and tennis lessons for our kids

Objectively, we are well off, but we don’t always feel it. We have money worries like everyone, and you get used to your income and have to remind yourself of that!

This is surely a wind up post.

Good one 🤣🤣

I am sorry but this is really crass, if a genuine post, especially in the context of this thread.

Exactly that.

My husband and I separated early last year. So I had to find somewhere to rent on my own with 2 dogs. There really wasn't much choice and I needed a garden for the dogs.

Luckily I was accepted in a private rental in time. I live in Suffolk and Sizewall C is a big thing with all the workers snapping up the rental properties.

My house is bigger than I need. 3 beds, 3 toilets. But I was desperate. So long as the dogs are comfortable, I'm happy. But I'll look to move again hopefully later this year, and I won't need to panic this time.

What's with the pissy comments on here?
You told another poster that they were bad at managing money, without knowing anything about their outgoings.
You're suggesting this poster has made a bad choice by paying £1200 a month rent, what 'choice' do you think they have? Should they live in a tent?
People don't 'choose' to pay rents that are a high proportion of their wages, they're forced to because the 'choice' is between having somewhere to live and being homeless. And if you think that they could easily find somewhere cheaper because you're renting for less, then you clearly have no fucking idea how privileged you are.

I'm lucky, we were able to buy ten years ago, my mortgage is 600 a month. I have good friends, one of whom was assaulted by a neighbour, living in a much rougher part of town, renting for £900 a month. They tried to move after the assault, to live in a dive in a rough area starts at £950, to live in a safer area they're looking at £1100 upwards. For a 2 bed. In the northwest. Many people are skint because the cost of essentials has gone up so much, nothing to do with their skills at money management.

For many years I was in increasing shitloads of debt, but seemingly doing OK, big house, shit car, but it was a car. Holiday abroad with partner and kids every other year. But it was all debt. And I used to often scrabble together enough for a lunchtime sandwich from loose change I had to hunt for.
Now I'm single, retired, income of roughly £1,000 per month. House all mine and all paid for. Bills etc about £375 a month. No debts any more, and have savings for the first time in my life. (And I'm happier than I've been for decades! 😊 Debt saps your energy.
So, my income is low, but I don't feel poor. When my state pension kicks in, I'll be doing just fine 👍

Still leaves £1400 after rent though. That's £350 a week for a single person, and about £200 a month less than I'm on with 2 kids AND a mortgage coming out of that...

No it doesn't. 35k after tax (and assuming no student loan etc) would typically be around 2300-2400 after tax. So 1100-1200. Then take off bills, which aside from a small CT discount aren't going to be any less for a single person compared to a dual income household. That doesn't leave a lot for food, transport, disposable income etc. Also I don't know if you're comparing wages or income, but a single person won't get any of the top up benefits that a low income family would.

I'm a high-ish? earner (not sure what a high earner is in this context and sorry if this isn't appropriate) but I'm a also a single mummy with next to nothing in child support, less than £10 a week,

My mortgage is about £1200 a month on a nice but small 3 bed house, nursery fees £1500, household bills £450, groceries approx £300, petrol £100 and I try to keep £250 a month for everything else e.g. mobile, kids clothes, kids swimming, annual boiler check etc and in a good month put aside up to £100 for birthdays/christmas/car maintenance/short UK break - that means I need to earn over 4k a month take home to keep treading water. I don't pay into a pension, I don't have savings or holidays abroad ever and there are a few jobs around the house that need doing but that I haven't been able to afford to pay tradespeople to do, nor figure out how to do myself via youtube,

I have some old debt I'm trying to pay off with the help of stepchange and when I first became a single mum I fed myself for about £2 a day which involved going going to bed hungry every day - my car is very old but paid for and reliable - and hopefully once my kids are a bit older I'll have more money available. It helps that I have in my biased opinion, the best kids in the world :-). I guess its all relative.

My total income is less than 18k. Live alone so have full household bills on my head. No savings. Less than £200 in the bank.
Work crazy numbers of hours as I’m self employed and building a CIC business.
Haven’t been abroad in 15 years. Not had a holiday in 10 years.
It’s tough and I doubt it will get better anytime soon