How much per month do you give your young person?

[0hno]

I think the loan should cover the accommodation so I'm wondering how much to give them per month to live on? They don't spend much, don't drink (currently!)

Minimum loan, we topped up accomodation costs by £3.3k, and give £550 a month. We are retired! She's now decided to do a Masters 😭

£200 is plenty, they need to get a part time job during term time and full time in holidays. Degrees are worthless, work experience is what counts.

Clothes were from the charity shop etc. It was totally normal. I see students now in a UK city eating out and loaded up with shopping bags - it's a different world!

Are you for real? You sound like that Monty Python sketch - "we was poor but we was 'appy!"

Students these days are categorically not wealthy and will inherit a world in a much sadder state than you or I ever had to deal with, along with their £10,000's of debt. I feel sorry for them.

We had it much better than they can hope to.

I think I’d have to agree with that from experience.
One of my ds wanted en-suite at all costs, not mine I pointed out.🤯

£80 is a v good rent. Our sons problems are the 52week contracts whereas my older son, even in private rental for the final years, only had to pay for 42weeks.

But yes I agree, expectations are higher than ‘in my day’ 🤣🤣 I was thankful for a window that wasn’t broken and a bed that wasn’t stained and infested. A shower / 5 people was a luxury it was usually a scummy green bath.

From my experience all my kids friends get everything from Vinted and Depop

I got nothing. My mum couldn't afford it (dad died when I was 19).

No idea what you've taken such offence at my post, but then it wouldn't be MN without an argument I guess. I'm just pointing out that there will be a real mix of all levels of prosperity among students. As you can really easily see for yourself just from the posts on this thread. Some will be funded by parents, others accumulating debt that they will pay back down the line.

"Students these days are categorically notwealthy and will inherit a world in a much sadder state than you or I ever had to deal with, along with their £10,000's of debt. I feel sorry for them"

That's not what I see in my student city, lol. They eat and shop and live in better accommodation than I have in years 😂

No you haven't. I think you've got a biased sample on mumsnet. Most ordinary families can't afford to give their kids hundreds of pounds per month.

My parents didn't give me money when I was a student. My student loan covered my accommodation and I worked Saturdays and during the holidays to cover food and going out etc. It's not that hard. University breaks are long.

I took offence at your post because you romanticised how you didn't have any money and compared it to students of today who, according to you, are loaded and swanning around city centre restaurants and shopping.

That is simply not the case and young people of today are much worse off than you ever were, simply by virtue of when they were born.

You're right that it's a different world, but not in the way you said.

It's a different world in that young people of today will have to deal with a lot more financial challenges than you. Even though you had to (shock horror) shop at a charity shop when you were a student.

😂 give over.

And do you have debts of £44,940? (this is the current average amount of student debt).

If you don't - then those students are worse off than you - and are also going to live out their 20's and 30's in this shit show of a country in the current cost of living crisis - not to mention the looming climate chaos.

If you're currently over 30, you really can't complain that you in any way were worse off than today's young people.

Don't worry, lots don't have much money. My son used to pay another student to go out to buy his food sometimes! My son had £150 a week all through the year but that was quite generous and loads of people had a lot less. Some people had £20 a week. It is very variable. Plenty of students look for part time work. Some take a whole gap year before university to work full time to save up.

We give dd £50 a week . She doesn't / won't work ( anxiety ) this seems to be enough . We pay the shortfall for her fees etc and her phone and any extras that come up

I was at uni 85/88 then postgrad 91/92 and received a grant as well.
So nothing to pay back.

My parents didn’t have any money to top up so yes we were just poor or overdrawn.
Didn’t buy clothes except the odd bit in a charity shop.
Parents didn’t buy us pots and pans and plates. We just bought stuff from the markets or ‘one stop shop’ in Birmingham.
Food was minimal and buying a single pint out was a treat. A lot of my friends had tap water in the pub.
No phones or tvs, no gym memberships, or cars. No luxuries whatsoever ever. Certainly no buying coffees and lunch out.

The grant just covered rent, plus basic food. Not much else although I was able to pay for a train to get home but short £500/yr as I was in overdrawn at the end of my degree. After postgrad I just got very thin.

However the situation isn’t really that different now with rents so high these days there’s, for a lot of students, very little left over even to buy food.

In Exeter for example £7000/yr is average for rent. A full maintenance loan stands at I think £10300 ( approx )
Leaving £3300 for everything else inc bills. Based on say 42 weeks and ignoring travelling home costs that’s £78/wk left for food, study equipment and bills.

It’s probably more than being on a grant but students now have to pay that all back, which we didn’t.

My DSS is at uni - gets full loan but this only covers his accomodation costs (he is in expensive city and at a drama school with no accomodation). He is full time in uni so is struggling to find work. We give him £80pm for bills and £100 for living costs & his mum gives him approx £50 a month- he is finding it difficult but manageable. We also pay for his phone, Spotify, netflix etc.
My DSD she had full loan, lives in a cheaper city and cheaper accommodation and her course means she can find work easily (lifeguard and works in a shop) so we only have to top her up by £150 per month and she doesn't get anything from her mum.

Planning on paying the accomodation and leaving them the min maintenance loan, 4.somethingk per year, and paying the rent ourselves. Works out about 400pcm I think. I'm noting that student loan levels even at max are way behind inflation and so expect them to have 11-12 k a year altogether depending on rent. I'd expect them to work too though possibly only in vacation.

I didn't romanticise it at all. I worked throughout 4 years of uni and had no money. But neither did anyone else I knew. This is just fact and based on me attending two unis in the UK. I am in Leeds a few times a month and the student population is huge and supports a thriving nighttime economy and busy high streets. I've no idea whether it's student loans, parental contribution or everyone working part time that contributes to this. Of course I don't see those students who can't afford (or just don't want) to go out as the counterpoint. Because they're in their halls etc.

My DPs paid for my accomodation instead in my first year, and that included two meals a day too as I had catered halls. So that was me fed and housed so they didn't worry about anything else and I lived off my maintenance loan which was the minimum one granted due to my DP's earnings.

Then I got married so then me and DH were independent students and got all the full allowances and fended for ourselves from that. I had a part-time job through my final year too.

My ds is autistic and in his second year at uni, depending on how a levels go DD will start uni in Oct. She is also autistic and has ADHD.

We give ds help sporadically so pay for phone and clothes and stuff he needs from Amazon etc. he pays rent from his loan and gets a discount due to disability. He has DSA for mentor support and some tech. He is very frugal, outside the chess club doesn't go out, cooks all his own food and gets regular Tesco deliveries. Terms are pretty short he will be home by mid June and stay till next term starts.

Savings added to child trust fund have provided a buffer. We are going to be more stretched with 2 in uni at once and neither will be easily able to work. But ds has secured a short job this summer so will have some earnings.

DD is going to do volunteering over summer. She has her CTF we will be applying for PIP and DSA. We will manage I think but DD is likely to be more sociable at uni so will be more spendy than her big bro.

Costs vary depending on how your young person spends her money op. Rent will be fixed but other costs can be budgeted within available means. It will be ok and there is a lot of advice available for students.

Well romanticising your poor student days compared to today's supposedly wealthy students is how it came across, whether or not you intended it.

You said you were poor and had no money left after food and had to shop at charity shops, whereas students today are eating out and shopping in the city.

In reality there have of course always been students attending night clubs in the city. Back when I was at uni 15-20 years ago, some students would spend all their money on booze and have none left for food. Others would have plenty of money for nights out. There's always been a disparity.

But overall, today's students are much worse off, and anyone saying otherwise is deluded.

In your post there was an implication there that students today have it easy and you went through some kind of lack of wealth that they'll never understand.

That's simply not true. As a whole, young people today are much worse off, and their future prospects, both economically and considering climate impact, are shaky at best.

Just because you sometimes see them out in the city doesn't negate that. This has always been the case and students find ways of having fun.

We have three university age and they have had to either work gap years during courses or decide on our local university.

Luckily our local university is a good one. Our agreement is we will cover food and a few extras if they decide to go further afield but that's all.

If they decide to live at home we will cover all food, bills, WiFi and contribute to the transport to get them to uni.

The household's income, including the income of the YP is taken into account, not many households will be earning less than £25k.

It's a joke.

Sometimes sadly the reality is the YP has to opt for more affordable options. University is a privilege not a right.

I got £500 per month, plus my loan and money from working in summer holidays, which was enough.

DS is only 3, but we’re planning to save 40k per kid for uni which is ridiculous.

I was at a London Uni in the olden days (but not pre-fees or when people got loans). Some students had accommodation where they shared rooms. I didn't fancy it but it was a thing, I suspect mainly for those who could visit the parental home easily for a break. Might be a nightmare for ops dd but is an option for others who are worried.
Also there were a lot of people working in call centres, which doesn't involve eye contact or face to face like retail or hospitality.

My son is in Leeds. You won’t see him much, except maybe in Spoons once a week where he can buy a meal and unlimited fruit juice for £8.50. Or buying good value food from Kirkgate market.

Lots of his friends work, as does he. Yes, there are some who are affluent, there are lots of international students too but most live frugally.