Why are our bills so high? 6k a month...!

[NewtothisFBK4921]

Is anyone able to workout why our bills so high aside from suggesting we move house?! Are other people in similar size houses (5 bed, very old single glazed farmhouse) paying similar?

We pay about:
2k nurseries fees as work full-time (cheapest local village nursery, another year still school starts!)
£400 electricity bills each month (this is so high as bloody kitchen is only heated by underfloor heating, no radiators, which we didn't realised cost so much when we moved last year, we set it to 17 degrees so always freezing still)
£400 oil (thermostat to 17 daytime, 18 evening, single glazed house)
1.3k mortgage
£35 tv subscriptions
£35 Gigaclear
£100 for x 2 phones (£50ish each)
£265 car (Renault Clio)
£368 council tax (!)
Rest on food and baby wipes and trains to work etc.

Don't get me wrong we live in a gorgeous 5 bed in a village and appreciate we have a wonderful life but we moved from a terrace house in London and just can't workout why our bills have got so high. Especially as never eat out or anything like that anymore. Struggling to afford everything but on our salaries it shouldn't be so hard... am I missing something blindly obvious we can change (besides selling the house!) or is life just crazy expensive?!

Childcare years are always hard. But not forever.

It would probably be worthwhile getting a cost for radiator/s in the kitchen

and getting quotes for triple glazing

You haven’t said how much your income is.
Having the heating on during the day shouldn’t be necessary. If it’s single glazed invest in fully lined curtains. £800 on gas and electric is a lot, you need to try and cut this down. You’ll be significantly better off without such big childcare costs and only another year until they will reduce.

I'm sorry you find yourself in this situation.

Fact is, it IS the cost of living, everything has gone up, not helped by wars around the world.

It's shit, isn't it?

Ouch! I also live in a single glazed 5 bed farmhouse so I get it! I don't have childcare costs any more but our mortgage is higher. Combined gas and electric bills are £400 for us though. I would be looking at ways to get your energy costs down. Is the house listed?

Do you need a 5 bed house? I would imagine the bills on that to be high. What;s Gigaclear?

Change your phones for starters, I pay £35/ month for 4 sim cards. You could pay £20 for 2 and save a bit.
If you're working do you need heating during the day? Can you wear slippers in the kitchen and reduce the underfloor heating? Basically are you reducing your electricity and oil usage as much as possible. You might need to wear more clothes.
How many children do you have? Could either of you compress your hours to save a day or two of nursery per week?

Move...

The childcare cost years are so difficult.

They will end.

Just bear this in mind when you come to schooling. If you can, choose a school with breakfast club and after school club to minimise your spend.

Sorry OP, but I don't think yours are particularly high if you take out the £2K of nursery fees and your fairly high mortgage. Ours are very similar. The childcare years are crippling. Not much help I know!

Most of that sounds very similar to our 5 bed semi.
Our Aga devours vast amounts of gas, and is on the list to go as any decent range will pay it's way within a couple of years.
Is your central heating oil fired? I would turn off in the day if you aren't home, and keep at 18 when you are, with another jumper on. I am guessing you don't have a mains gas supply.
How much are the commuting costs, you don't list them? Is there a way to reduce that?
Food bills - how much? Can you change supermarket?
Can you double glaze?
Rugs on the kitchen floor?
Changing things like phone providers is peanuts compared to the childcare and mortgage costs. It will get easier once the nursery years are over.

You can't help the childcare, mortgage or council tax. But you paying way to much on heating and electric, I pay less then £50 for 4 phones and we don't pay monthly for a car as if it's lease higher that's the most expensive way to run a car.

You needed to look at insulating your house better, agree about getting rid of the electric underfloor heating or if you can afford a bit of investment look at solar panels.

Change your phone contracts, reduce your TV spending. We flit between streaming services and only have amazon constantly as I use prime delivery a lot.

Why is nursery so high? It's £100 a day which seems insane to me (I pay £60 a day) with no relief. Surely if she is 3 (you said she starts school in a year) you are entitled to 15 free hours at least. So should save you at least £100 a week? Maybe even 30hours.

Are you get free nursery hours? 15 free hours at 3 is universal. Are you getting tax free childcare? Why are you heating a full 5 bed house during the day? If you’re working from home just heat the room you’re working in.

Other than that - do you need a 5 bed house? This is the biggest cost other than the kids but it’s frown upon to sell them. You could reduce TV subscriptions and mobiles but that’s a drop in the ocean compared to mortgage and heating.

Your mention of thermostats sounds like your heating is on all the time. I'd adjust that to be timed for breakfast and evening. Also buy an oil filled electric radiator for your kitchen from somewhere like ScrewFix, these are cheap to run and very effective.

You could get cheaper phones.

Invest in better glazing.

Curtains and draught excluders.

Why did you buy a 5 bed house?

Even with solar, if you get this you still have to pay the 'standing charge' on energy bills so hard to reduce them by much. £2000 for nursery fees is a lot, if it's only one child but not much you can do about that. Otherwise I don't think your bills are that high to be honest.

Shock news... massive houses are expensive to run. Are you heating the whole house when you aren't home?

Childcare will go down.

It would be a worthwhile investment to change the windows before next winter.
We have one single-glazed window in the bathroom and it's a complete heat sink in winter, I can't imagine having the whole house like that, you must be freezing! We've bubble-wrapped the inside of it, which has been surprisingly effective, but the gaffer tape does make it look like a crime scene from the street so not realistic to do on all of your windows.

Rest on food and baby wipes and trains to work etc.

Can you break this down?

I'd turn off the under floor heating in the kitchen and put an electric heater in there if to really need it. We had underfloor heating in ours and after the first £500 bill it was permanently switched off!

Those heating and council tax bills are horrific! Combined mine are £190, but I'm in a 3 bed reasonably insulated hose with gas.

Would you qualify for any grants to improve insulation or add solar to the house? Insulation must be the answer for you to lower those bills.

Do you have the heating on at 18 overnight?

Yeah I'd move, sorry not helpful but those costs are nuts unless you're millionaires 🤷‍♀️

We have underfloor heating downstairs. Once we realised just how expensive it was to run, we switched it off. We had plug in radiators until we had some other work done and put in traditional radiators at the same time. We never put one in the kitchen in the end, as it is always warm enough when we are cooking in there. Depends on your layout though.

If you are able to change your windows, that would help your bills. Put your nursery fees towards that once DC are at school. At the very least caulk the drafts up, try window film to make secondary glazing and line all your curtains.