For my husband to earn £65,000 per annum and we still can't afford to live in this bloody country!!

[winegoddess]

Mortgage has gone up, electric has gone up, 5 mouths to feed, 3 children to clothe etc etc and month after month is a bloody struggle. Am fed up with straping money together when my husband earns a good wage and we should be able to get by! I now need to search for a way of 'me' bringing in some money but with a young baby at home and 2 others at school i am at a loss as to how! Please give me some job ideas or ways to make money!!

Why should you rightly be offended at someone elses good fortune to earn a decent salary? The OP was not looking for sympathy either. Winegoddess is obviously not as good a budgeter as those of you on or below the average wage. So surely you are the right people to advise her on ways of saving money now that the credit crunch has hit, not have 15 pages of mainly bitching about her audacity to offend you all with her supposed bragging. Sometimes it's like a bag of cats on this site.

My husband earns more then hers, we have a lovely car, we own our flat, we dont have to watch what we spend and we have lots in the bank. Partly because we are good with our money. I love a tip on saving and I avidly read all the threads on how to stretch the weekly budget. Will I get slated for my good fortune also???

Winegoddess, perhaps cut out the vino for a while? If you cant, buy in bulk when your faves are on special.
Shop in Lidl, Aldi and ASDA
Check are you getting the best deal on your utilities.
Same with your mobiles - are you on the plan that suits you best.
Do you make lots of national/international calls - find a cheap provider - Telediscount
Make menus for the week and shop to those menus.
Dont shop when you are hungry.
Cut out the junk/treats.
Give the children popcorn instead of crisps, cheap and children love to make it.
Buy cheap cuts of meat and slow cook or use for soups.
Make stock from your bones/carcasses.
Dont eat out.
Keep a diary of your spending for a month and cut out all but the essentials.
Turn the heat off at the radiator in the rooms that are not used during the day.
Set your thermostat lower and use a timer rather then constant heat.
Shop around for your petrol.
Walk rather then drive when possible.
Sell the childrens toys on e-bay (the ones they have grown out of obviously).
Make do with what's in the wardrobe for now.
Charity shops for childrens books and toys.
Join the library - free reading for all the family.
Consolidate your debts if they are spread around.
Dont use your dryer, hang the clothes to dry. Unless they are filthy, clothes can generally be worn more then once. I'm not a complete maggot - underwear excluded.
When cooking, use lentils/beans to bulk out a meal while adding loads of extra nutrition.

Good look. I'd suggest lurking for a while and reading and re-reading everything you post for potential offensive comments!!!

hence, money would by them happiness, tilly.

and if they truly cannot afford to clothe themselves on that amount there is something really wrong with how they manage money.

Are you in the EU Mumoverseas?

Hear hear puddingeater.

Most have indeed missed the point of her salary quoting.

It's all relative - the people who say they reall are struggling still have access to free healthcare and education, which is more than most people on this planet can ever dream of or aspire to.

Nobody should be made to feel ashamed of earning more than somebody else.

Of course they can clothe themselves on that money, just can't keep up with the Jones'es.

I reckon that if they did have more money, they woould still find that it wasn't enough for what they thought they had to have.

PuddingEater,

Could you roughly, and of course hypothetically give a brief run-down of a monthly budget of someone on roughly £65k who has little to spare, in the SE? And rough figures like size of mortgage?

Salleroo on Thu 06-Nov-08 15:23:43
"Why should you rightly be offended at someone elses good fortune to earn a decent salary? The OP was not looking for sympathy either."

No, she was ranting about this bloody country. Is that better?

Ah, I see Mumoverseas, didn't realise he was already at college age. That does make things awkward and is one reason why I am hesitant to relocate abroad.

Why is everyone so uptight because she mentioned money? The fact that many families earn less than that and are struggling has absolutely no bearing on the OP's situation. If her OP had talked about how wonderful her sex life was would those whose own sex life wasn't so hot feel compelled to flame her? She's just moaning about her own circumstances which we all do. Give her a break.

FWIW, DH earns more than that and we are having to be very careful at the moment. Wearen't struggling but with a 4k mortgage, far higher utilities and 3kids, things are far tighter than last year.

Mumoverseas we are due to be posted abroad with dh's co - ds is 11 and when we come back he will be 14 - do you happen to know if that rule would still apply, ie to higher ed, thinking particularly of university here, ie would we pay higher fees because of the time abroad?

And we are not in the SE!

I think we just spent too many years living up to the edge of our means and of course buying a stupidly expensive (though not huge) house.

people are uptight because money is one of those subjects on which everyone has a view and is highly emotional

like politics/sex/religion

if you don't realise that it will provoke people then you are showing a lack of awareness

I have sympathy for the OP. You spend within /up to your means, and then suddenly you have to tighten your belt.

My DH earns a bit more than OP's DH and we were beginning to tighten the belts. I then went back to work, and we're ok now...BUT this might not work for everyone. We have 2DSs in full time nursery and the cost is £18k a year. Shocked? I was. You'd need to clear about £25k in salary to break even.

FWIW we don't have a flash lifestyle, although I am certainly not complaining. We have one car which is an 8 year old 306.

Agree with zippi.

And just want to add that plenty of people can afford to live on less than that. It just means smaller house, smaller car, no holidays.
There is a big difference between 'affording to live' adn 'affording to live well. Perhaps the OP should have added well to the title and she may not have got such a flaming.

I just searched the OP's previous posts and it seems she suffers a lot from anxiety... I think this post is less about money and more about general feelings of anxiety.

Winegoddess, I hope you haven't taken the negative comments too personally, although I fear you have... They are not directed at you personally, but more at people's idea of what you are, and I really think you've been misjudged by a lot of people on this thread.

Hope you'll be OK, try not to worry about this thread on top of everything else and enjoy your holiday if you do decide to go!

combustiblelemon - not in the EU, that apparently is the problem as if we were we would automatically be eligible for free state education.

stillenduringsurrey (by the way, the school that says we has to pay is in Reigate, Surrey!) we found out last year that with regards to university if not in the UK for the previous three years we'd have to pay. We therefore decided to return next year, DS would do his A levels, have a gap year and then go to Uni. We found out a few weeks ago that it applies to 6th form as well but if you are back when your son is 14 you should be ok. To be honest, I really think it depends on the school/area. Where in Surrey are you? I'm sure you will be fine and also, so as not to scare people, MOD/armed forces children are exempt. Just look into it carefully. We (foolishly!) didn't and are coming unstuck. We just stupidly thought be still paying tax etc and retaining our property and paying all bills we'd be ok. Also, you may not be eligible for NHS care. A friend who lives out here for part of the year went home to have a baby in the summer and was warned she may have to pay as out of UK for 3 MONTHS!

But Zippi, if someone posted saying their sex life was fab, would lots of others post back saying,'you're being insensitive talking about that when my sex life is crap.' I don't think so.

Very difficult to sell the house the way things are though.

sorry, gone off on a tangent here. With regards to OP, I agree with flowerybeanbag in that she worded it very badly and obviously unintentionally (I hope) offended people. As others have said, its not really what the salary is coming in, its the 'essential' outgoings going out which a lot of the time depends on your area.
I think everyone is worried about money at the moment no matter how much they earn but hopefully todays interest rate cut will reduce some of the anxiety, in time for Christmas

people do get sensitive to people being in relationships where everything is ok when their's aren't certainly

similarly i get sensitive about jobs because i can't get one

so er yes

mumof222222boys nursery £18k pa for 2??? Bloody hell, think I will return home and open my own nursery. Is that really the going rate? Have I been gone too long?

Thats a hell of a lot less than we earn pa and we manage to live in the UK, I guess it depends on what you consider necessities and what you consider luxuries.

We could all make ourselves unhappy striving for the big house, the top of the range 4 x 4, the expensive holidays - some people just have to have these things and struggle when then economy takes a downturn and others, like us, settle for less.

Maybe, but I disagree that they'd all come on here flaming the OP.

There is so much personal even intimate details discussed openly and honestly on MN yet when it comes to salary we're expected to keep it quiet.

If that is true then the OP should have worded it more like 'we still can't afford to live in this bloody area'. Because unless you had very expensive habits, it would be a good income in many parts of the country.

However it's irrelevant now.

Talk of money always upset people.

Willy, I am assuming there is an error in your first sentence