Please help me work out a plan.

[Safyre]

DH has a meeting this morning at which it is 99% probable that his redundancy will be confirmed. I am currently on ML with 2wo DS2. DS1 is 23m.

We just moved into a new house in April, and so far have been unable to let our old flat. So we are paying 2 mortgages, 2 lots of council tax, etc.

We have already cancelled the last week of DHs paternity leave, because it was unpaid, and DH is going to see if they will let him go back to ft hours for the last few weeks, but we think that's unlikely. (We both dropped to 4 day weeks to cut down on childcare for DS1.

I don't know what to do next. I don't know whether to trust that DH will get a new job, either internally or elsewhere before the end of his notice period, or whether I should be arranging to go back to work as soon as I can. I have to give 4 weeks notice if I want to change my return to work date, so potentially I'd be leaving a 6 week old baby, and I have no idea who I'd be leaving him with. PiL did our childcare for DS1, but I can't ask them to take on both as well as my DN, who they also help look after (15mo). I also have no annual leave left for this year, so I'd have no time off for anything until Christmas Day, and my parents are supposed to be taking us away for a week in October for my 30th.

I wish we'd never bought this house. The flat was awful and freezing and had nowhere for DS to play outside, but we could have made the redundancy money last so much longer then. I keep telling myself that there are hundreds of people worse off than us, but when I've been awake half the night with DS2 I struggle to believe it sometimes. Now I need to stop crying and feeling sorry for myself before DH and DS1 get up.

In the meantime, can anyone offer any advice? And thank you for reading if you made it to the end.

If your DH is going to be made redundant why can't he be a SAHD whilst you go back to work? What is he going to do all day? My DH did 6 months paternity leave and it didn't kill him. That way you not relying on others.

You need to either get the flat let out or sell it. Why does no one want to rent it? Have you had any feedback?

How much redundancy is he entitled to?

If he does get another job why do you need to return to work after 6 weeks?

He can and would be a SAHD - but we can't really afford for either of us not to be working indefinitely.

We have had no feedback. Every time I phone the letting agents I'm told that the person dealing with it is not inand will phone me back, and they never do. We can't sell because it's in negative equity and we have no savings left to pay all the fees etc.

He is entitled to 14 weeks redundancy, plus 3.5 weeks 'retention bonus' if he works his notice. It should work out to about 4-5 months wages, and he wants to use it to last us to the end of the year and for me to go back to work in January if he hasn't got anything else by then. That feels irresponsible to me.

If he gets another job then I don't have to go back to work early, sorry if I was unclear.

Ok so you have slight breathing room with his redundancy package. Can you market the flat with another agency? Or advertise on gumtree/ word of mouth for friends/acquaintances? Or move back to the flat for a bit and let out the house instead?

Cut back on all kinds of other things - get rid of sky etc, no takeaway food, I appreciate you are in newborn stage so will probably be short on time but I know that we can waste money on food like nobodies business.

Shop at aldi/ lidl.

Could DH temp as a stopgap whilst job hunting?

Why don't you work on the basis of a compromise between both the scenarios you have suggested. You rushing back to work with a 6 week old baby etc. and his plan of waiting until January? With the redundancy money you can safely wait until his notice period is up to see if he gets another internal post. If he doesn't you could give him another few weeks job hunting (and doing temp work) before giving your job notice that you will return in November. That would mean that worst case secenario (him not getting a job in that time frame) you will still be able to put aside some of the redundancy money for emergencies and your not rushing back before he has had a chance to work something out.

I am guessing if your flat is in negative equity that you live up North/Wales/Scotland? I don't know if the same applies in these areas but here in SE there are lots of ads put up by the council offering private landlords a solid rental income if they allow the council to lease their property to council tenants. This might be a lower rent that you would ideally like but it would be more than the 0 you are currently getting, would be the most reliable form of income (because it's paid up front by the council not the tenant), and would take out the hassle of being a landlord and paying an agency fees. You could also think about letting to housing benefit recipients if you haven't thought of that already, many landlords/agencies refuse HB so you might find someone who your agency has missed.

Thank you for the replies. Feeling slightly better tonight as the redundancy money is a bit more than we thought and we will still have some left even if I do stay on maternity leave until January.

We already do meal planning and shopping as much as possible at aldi, and our virgin deal is as low as we can get it. We are tied into a contract so cant cancel outright.

We are in Scotland, yes, and our council doesnt seem to do that scheme, unforfunately,

I don't know where you are but I would do letting yourselves. It's much easier to find somebody by putting a note in a corner shop window or doing it through gumtree. If you had council tax off your hands and additional money coming in it would take a load off your mind. Also if you will be showing people the flat you would be able to get feedback immediately and you would potentially make it easier for professionals to view the flat. I would make it my first priority.