Why if we brought in 40k last year can we not afford a holiday ?

[Lonelybunny]

I can't believe after looking at p60's we brought in 40k where does the money go exactly? We have 3 dc under 8 no child care costs we rent but seriously I can't afford to save ? I must b doing something wrong seriously !?

Bills or debts though?

No debts no , never had a credit card , yes I need to sit down and properly work this out , cause its a joke really it is !

Our monthly standing orders and direct debits amount to more than £2,100 (mortgage £800 ish) with no car loan ... so, no, I don't think you are paying an awful lot in bills.

Have your been on the money saving expert finance calculator? It's really good for working ut where the money's going.

We have far less than you just over 25,000 but a similar amount on the mortagage (we overpay to that level).

We can't afford much of a holiday but we have got cheap uk flights to stay with family (5 of us).

You really need to get a grip if you are getting overdrawn.

you;ve been asked ten times, is it 40k before or after tax? If you don't know something this simple, its hardly surprising you haven't a clue where your money goes, since you don't even know how much you have!

We earn less than that, have a higher rent, and still have a holiday.

I think a lot of us have been in this position, I used to earn a lot but had no savings.

What you can do is make that spreadsheet up.

Eg a paper and a coffee every day isn't unusual for lots of people but £4 a day Monday to Friday is over £800 on a 48 week working year.

So, once you know where the frittering is happening, (and lots us have frittered over the years), and stopped it eg packed lunches and a travel cup of filter coffee every morning you can move onto the bills.

Got Sky? Virgin Tv? How much do they want to keep you? Enough to halve the bill? Ring up and tell them you need to cut back. They'll put you though to customer retentions who will offer you a cheaper package. Haggle. They offer you £50 you say £40 would make all the difference, I love my sky tv but its so expensive etc etc. Same with BT, although I had a major fallout with the girl I got through to as I REALLY wanted to cancel.

Basic energy saving such as switching off lights, turning the hot water thermostat down to 60, insulating the loft to 270mm, lagging hot water pipes and draught proofing do help. I have two jackets on the hot water tank because it used to be tropical in the airing cupboard when we first moved in.

If you ring the electric/gas provider are you in credit? You might have some money in there they can pay back to you. Don't fall for the "that's to pay for the expensive quarter", if you've overpaid they can pay it back.

If you have a water meter look on the water boards website for free water saving devices. I got a shower insert, a tap insert and hippo bags for the loo free of charge. Just putting tap inserts in the old house saved £20 and that's with two of us out all day, a family with kids washing their hands numerous times a day would save more. If you have a garden get a water butt in Aldi, there £20 but its free water after that. If you have a child with a medical condition and they require frequent bathing is there a discount for that? It's worth asking the question.

I would also say shop at Aldi, dh doesn't like brands anymore if I buy them, he says well that wasn't as good as the Aldi one. If he ever finds out we have sainsbos smart price tea I am in serious trouble though.

These threads are good.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/credit_crunch/1600030-Small-money-saving-habits-petty-even

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/credit_crunch/1543785-your-top-tips-for-money-saving-and-a-more-frugal-life

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/credit_crunch/1628874-Gas-Elec-Bills-monthly-and-SKY-so-angry

Register with topcashback, I got cashback on my car ins this year, £150 for fully comp. £60 back for a Sony smartphone that costs £7.50 a month. It all adds up.

Do you smoke? Friends of mind couldn't understand why they were broke till they counted up smoking twenty a day at seven quid a go, each! That's £49 a week each!

£42k in my house is £2500.

No we don't smoke . I've said 3 times it's 40,000 on our p60's combined so I'm guessing that's before tax , sorry I don't understand p60 if its before or after tax , I think it's before .

I have a spreadsheet and a "budget" but in reality we spend most of what we earn, bar DC savings, school fund and a little for the ISAs.

I have just this minute added up what I spent on Clothes in the last 5 years, and disgustingly it added up to average 12k/year! We aren't in debt, but we've hardly saved anything in the past 5 years either and I feel like I've wasted what we could have gained. Well I actually have wasted it!

So I feel your pain. And this week the spending stops. It makes me feel sick, and I'm tired of frittering away our hard earned cash.

Don't worry op, no one is born with an innate understanding of inland revenue forms.

The tax is shown in a seperate column.

Right yes then it's £40k before tax well £41 k lol

Is that 41k for both of you? Eg. 20.5k each?

Patpig - cash for cars? Where does this cash come from? I could save but what would I do for a car while I'm saving? I might as well pay that money in to a car loan and get a descent car now.
How would anyone afford all the £20k+ cars I see on the road?

Ok, so you have what - £2800 a month after tax? Do either of you pay into a pension through work?

If you are paying roughly £700 rent and £750 bills, then you should have £1350 left each month. What other regular outgoings do you have? Car costs? Insurance? Kids activities?

fatima we only pay cash for cars. Otherwise if you can't afford the repayments (illness, redundancy or whatever) then the finance company will take the car off you and you are fucked. We buy something which is 12-18 months old and has done minimal miles, it will be 50-60% off list price and essentially a new car, and then you have no finance.

Well I'm on about 16,000 to 17,000 k DP 24 k

If you earn in the low 40,000s you will not be eligible for any tax credits etc or any benefits other than CB. What you earn is what you get. It is actually not quite enough to keep a family of 3 children on. People living on far less income, but with other credits and benefits, might be surprised to find out how little take home money 40,000 is.

DH earns a similar amount and we were seriously waaaay better off when we both earned 16,000/year twenty years ago. In the last 10 years, we've gone from me not needing to work at all + a couple of holidays a year to me needing to work full-time and can no longer afford holidays at all. DH's salary has stayed essentially the same for 10 years (he's a civil servant), not even index-linked, and everything has doubled in price. The only way out I can see is for me to go to work away from home in a very well paid job. DH loves his job and can only do it where he does it at present.

Oh and all our clothes come from ebay! No gambling habits, no excessive spending. Along with many people living in old houses in rural areas, we were living in fuel poverty until last autumn when we installed a biomass boiler and can now go scrounging wood from ditches.

Sounds sensible ali. We went similar with getting an 8 month old car so saved a huge chunk on list price and it didn't have many miles. We'd have had to save ages to pay cash so we see the finance as sort of paying for use of the car.
Ours is a loan and so although for the car it's not directly linked to it like HP so if we came into financial trouble we could either come to an arrangement with the loan company or sell it.
It will shortly be paid off though, can't wait!

On your income and with 3 kids, I'd say you can't afford to have a car that costs £300/month.

Can you sell the car and buy something for a grand instead? That'd save you £2.5k/year straight off.

Had you realised that you're spending a tenth of your net income on your car repayments?

If you bothe earn then should get more as both getting approx £10k tax free

So £40k from one person= £10k tax free, 30k taxed at 20-40% ( the 40% margin is around £34k ish I think)

But if like you say 40k is over two people ie 20k each. Then you would get £20k tax free and 20k at 20% tax so a lot better off

You need some serious help op. You have to get to grips with your incomings and outgoings, and start prioritising the essentials and stripping out the wasteful luxuries. Because it sounds to me as if you haven't got a clue what budgeting actually means and entails, and it won't be long before you can't just not afford a holiday, but are actually in debt.

This is what worries me :( I pay £150 for car loan not £300 I don't know where money is going I really don't , I need help with this :(

I don't care about the holiday anymore I more care we can afford to pay everything and not be over drawn :(

Hmmm, we're pretty organised since I work in banking, and when we first moved in together we only earned £24k combined because my DH was in training on just £6k! So we combined all our finances to manage it better, and I have to say it works well, so we've kept it like that though we're now on more.
We have a joint bank account that both of our wages go into, and all our direct debits go out from there. They total about £900, and that's:
Mortgage, Council Tax, Water, Gas & Elec, his & hers mobile phone, his & hers car insurance, life insurance, Sky, contact lenses, home insurance, TV license, boiler service, & union membership.
Then we budget £600 per month for household expenses only, i.e. food shopping and petrol (we both commute) which we put on a joint credit card which gets auto-payed by direct debit from the current account, so we don't get behind. I monitor this bill carefully, so if we overspend, I'm on it to find out why!!
We then get £400 each to our own personal bank accounts. This money is our own for nights out, presents, clothes, hair cuts, DVDs, whatever.
So that's £2300 for necessities. The rest is saved! We have a certain amount into 'rainy day savings' for stuff like holidays, home repairs, and then we have longer term savings for special stuff.
Saving is very liberating, as glib as that sounds, because if you need something, you can do it!
Start small, break down your outgoings and economise where you can, then start saving! On the day you or your DH get paid, have a standing order into two accounts, £100 into a holiday account, and £50 into a Christmas account. That way next year you can book a £1200 holiday (a week b&b in Europe? or even a week all inc in Spain if you're out of school hols?) and you'll have £300 in the other account at Xmas to spend on kids/family pressies and avoid the overdraft!
I also agree on the car loan, for £300 a month, that's a £3600 car every year! Go second hand, and save yourself loads :-)

If you earn in the low 40,000s you will not be eligible for any tax credits etc or any benefits other than CB. What you earn is what you get. It is actually not quite enough to keep a family of 3 children on. People living on far less income, but with other credits and benefits, might be surprised to find out how little take home money 40,000 is.

Exactly.