What are your monthly extra costs after rent or mortgage?

[admylin]

I was wondering because I find ours are quite low, we live in Germany. We rent quite cheaply for the centre of Berlin and the extra costs aren't huge. That is water, heating and electricity. The costs for rubbish colection, cleaner for building and garden are shared by all 8 flats so they are minimal. We hope to move to the UK next year and I think we might be in for a shock especially if we rent. We have 2 kids.

our council tax is £160a month, water is £30 a month, gas and electric is nearly £100 a month

We have a big house, so high council tax. I think extras are about £250 plus £300 or so for food.

That is definately more han here. Have you got extra costs for TV cable or digital - we have cable for 10 Euro a month.

Well, we bring in £1200 a month. About £400 of ths goes on mortgage, the rest all on essentials (bills, food etc). Any non essentials such as going places with the boys sends us in the red. So I guess your answer is £800 a month for us as extra costs.

We have a small 2-bed house. We pay £98 council tax, £30 gas, £36 electricity, £32 water, around £20 phone. Council tax will depend where you live, and of course how big your house is. Fuel prices have rocketed up recently.

£150 for gas and electricity, £110 council tax, £30 water plus food, phones, insurance, car insurance + petrol etc etc

Cable will cost you more here!

I had to ask this a few weeks ago.

where are you moving to? search for council tax and the council name on Google - council tax varies a lot.

for water electric and gas you should probably search too as you know what your consumption is. electricity is cheaper in the uk than in spain for example, but water more expensive (odd that really). heating depends on what you use.

finally bear in mind you'll get family allowance and possibly tax credits. look here for more details

sky tv is £50 and tv licence is about £11 a month, food bill comes to approx £100 a week and then on top we have all the different insurances like pet, life, house insurance etc

you pay 50 quid a month for sky tv?? that must be with ALL the channels and several porn flicks a month surely?

no that is for all the channels on sky plus and multiroom which is £10 included that price, we provide our own porn thanks

You can buy a freeview box and get digital channels, but only the free-to-air ones.

oh forgot to mention the phone ill which is £30 for the home line and £30 for mobile and broadband is extra again

50 quid is alot for TV, we will probably be doing without at first anyway. Dh will be quite well paid so we don't really have any problems but I think we are better off here in germany - the cost of living seems less. Better not tell dh though or he'll lengthen his contract we'll have to stay on here.
Council tax goes by the size of your house or number of family members?

Five bands - value of your house.

Council tax is roughly by size of the house. Our costs include ADSL line, not Sky or cable tv, though.

Council tax is based on the value of your home - its done in bands so the more expensive your home is worth, the more you pay in council tax.

In one mth we pay £790 mortgage for 3 bed flat (in south east av price for renting 2 bed flat is £800 if not more), £95 council tax, £35 service charges, £70 utilities, £50 sky, £11 tv licence, £15 home phone, £90 insurances!!!! So £366 additional costs to mortgage and that doesn't even include food or running costs of cars ha ha ha ha!!!!

Council tax band A is the cheapest and so on and so on ours is band F if thats any help!

Oh, more than bands then! I didn't notice that at my lowly band B

£900 rent
£90 gas and elec
£15 water
£68 car insurance
£14 life ins
£60 dog insurance
£105 council tax
£50 tinternet & phone
£10.99 tv licence
other small bits of crap...

Rent £505/month - housing association, 2 bed flat
Council tax - £140/month
Power - £102/month
Food - approx £300/month
Car tax - £25/month
Petrol - £40/month
TV license - about £10/month
Broadband - £25/month (I claim this as a business expense)
Mobile for DH (in case DD1s nursery has an emergency) - £10/month
Other bills and crap (we got screwed over by the Tax Credit office and wound up in serious debt) - about £150/month
Then there's Tumble Tots for DD1, clothes, minor emergencies, a little entertainment - not sure

Sorry, but one of the academics just got back from a year in Berlin and she hasn't stopped moaning about what a rip off it is here compared to Berlin.

TBH, if I could get away from here I would.

Believe me, I'm working on it.

Sorry, but I find it too f*cking expensive.

expat your council tax is high for a 2 bed flat that is £505 a month rent?

Hijack alert - expat, how was the weekend away to the area you're thinking of moving to?