OK, OH earns 125k, his secretary probably earns 35ish, how much should he spend on her Christmas present?

[DontWantToLookTight]

Just that really.
Hev namechanged cos don't want you to all think I'm minted!

Remind me someone how much our boys out in Iraq and Afghanistan are earning? I'm not sure myself, but I'm fairly sure it's not a great deal. Whatever I might think about what they're doing, I sure wouldn't want to be them this Christmas.

WW, that sounds quite reasonable to me [warped sense of property value from living in London forever]

no no WendyW, it was on 125k not for 125k!!

WW - I think Hunker meant on a salary of £125k. That would make a 2 bed maisonette costing around half a million?! Now that is

MDS - you're not being picked on here, it's the general state of affairs I find hard to stomach.

The OP's dh earns £125k, he can afford to borrow several times that and certainly more than a bloody studio flat!

Really, hunker?

Well, it does help me understand how come a salary of £125K doesn't get you much in London; but what about the poor buggers on nothing like £125K?

Sorry got confused. The 2 bed maisonette was the OP.

Edam - if there were no people making money there would be no taxes being paid and there would be no money for cleaners and health workers.

Whether you believe it or not, without wealth creation there would be no work pension schemes at all. If your pension scheme is crap then move the cash else where because most pension schemes have been doing reasonably well recently!

Yes - i have a mate who bought a two bedroom pokey flat in London for a quarter of a mil.

No garden or outside space, shitty entrance, not much room.

It's madness i tell thee.

it's easy to earn that amount if you work in the city which i'm assuming op's dp does.

OK
assume 3 x income so = 375k

that is a modest 2 bedroomed semi or flat in a not-overly-fashionable part of London.

not some swaggering mansion.

And the people who provide essential services to all those people making money earn peanuts. Strange isn't it?

A two bedroom flat in a new complex at the end of my road sold for £750k allegedly! Are we are far from the centre of London!

Eric, last year we sold a one bedroom flat in London (no outside space apart from a balcony) for £350,000.

hatrick what a nice post!

it's not fair, but look at nick leeson

No sympathy I'm afraid. I'd say they should move out of London, but then they'd only come and price locals out of the market elsewhere. [Yes I am feeling curmudgeonly at the moment]

Oh MDS, you're really pushing me. Go on then, tell us exactly why only a handful of people could do your DH's job?

Twinklemegan, we can't all just move out of London. DP would have to give up the job he's worked all his life for, but we have to live somewhere within a hour's commute otherwise he'd never see the children. Therefore we live in a small but very expensive house.

Haven't read all the posts, but wish my DH was on £125k a year ...then maybe when i finally get pg i could take as much time off as i liked!

Anyway, to answer the OP, my two bosses are on similar to your DH and they bought me an iPhone (I think they're about £270). Was chuffed to bits, wasn't expecting such an expensive gift.

Where was that Lyra?

Must have been a very desireable part of town.

Twinkle I don't think anyone in this position is after sympathy. I think the point about small houses was made simply to disabuse anyone of the notion that large mortgage=large house.

All I'm saying is that you reap what you sow. Many people in London are on ridiculously high wages therefore they themselves have pushed up house prices ridiculously high - c'est la vie.

I do, however, feel desperately sorry for essential workers on relatively low wages whose lives are made even harder by this fact. And when the inflated house prices spill out of London to fund "second homes" in areas where people can't afford their first home, that makes me very angry too.

To the op - OBVIOUSLY a case of wine. Generous and useful over Christmas. Always welcome. I don't know anyone who wouldn't be happy to recieve a case of wine.