Money DOES matter! How much left after expenses ?

[Ozster]

Would you please share how much money you have left each month after ALL essential costs ? ( mortgage/rent/bills/food shop/petrol/car insurance/council tax/childcare)

We are thinking of buying a bigger property and I am number crunching.

It would be good to get some perspective and comparisons, please.

Thank you in advance

This just seems to be a huge bragfest. Strange how on mumsnet hardly anyone earns the minimum wage???

Myself and DH have approx 2200 left after all outgoings .. Mtg, bills, fuel, car loan, food, petrol, phones, gym membership etc. So this is left for clothing, going out, takeaways, holidays.
We’ve had lots less in the past though and managed. All depends on what you like to do in your spare time with your spare money.

This thread is just mind-blowing.

Today 12:55 DCIRozHuntley

This thread is just mind-blowing

I really wouldn’t believe half what you read on mumsnet. I think a lot of people like to dream.

I have £800 disposable at the end of the month but I save £1600 a month across various accounts (saving up for a deposit and trying to build up an emergency fund)

I thought we were really well paid. Have enough and some to save but after reading this I feel like a poverty stricken waster. Comparison is indeed the thief of joy!

Think of it in percentages. 60% of our income goes on monthly expenses. 10% for luxuries. 10% savings for holidays etc. 20% for long term savings and emergencies. Getting expenses under 60% is the most important to us and not having debts like a credit card or loans. It’s all relative.

After house bills and my weekly shop i have about £2,000 but after i've added in 3 monthly phone bill, car, eating out, gym, clothes, shoes, holiday's, husbands and kids footballs passes, football and dance lessons its about £1,500 but also i like replacing blinds, curtains, beds, carpets, gardening and painting/wallpaper it could be as low as £700 or £500. But i try and save some money for christmas, birthdays, emergancy's. It is different every month but its around£500 to £700

Ha, this month after everything (putting none into savings) and an unexpected bill, I have about £175 for the calendar month.

Usually it’s around £800 - £900 but I’m still on a reduced Covid salary. I do wonder what I spent it in though.

Single income family.

God I’m poor. Since Covid we are in minus month after month at the moment.

I have about £50 left over each month, if I'm lucky. But, we have a roof over our heads that's kept warm when I want it to be, a car to get me to work, a job (never thought I'd feel so much luck at that), food in my fridge and I feel like I am doing OK for now. Sure , I'd love to have enough to pop into savings, but right now I don't and I am ok with that, I will keep looking for ways to improve my financial situation, but probably not until 2021. Right now, I'm housed, I'm safe and I'm surviving.

@YouDidWHATNow

What an honest and humbling response.

So often we focus on our goals that we fail to see what we have.

Thank you for reminding me to be grateful.

@YouDidWHATNow my grandad used to say if you had food in your belly and a warm roof over your head you’re rich.

He’d come from a poor Irish background to England where he was treated really badly by the English, for the first few years he couldn’t even rent a room ‘no Irish’ and had to start from scratch but had an amazing outlook on life. You reminded me of him. X

I think it’s really important to be aware of the costs of maintaining a larger property. I moved from a small flat on an estate where the landlord took care of common parts, landscaping and roofing to a large house with garden and trees. I spend hundreds a year just on the garden/outside of the property, if I want to paint or carpet it costs multiple times my old property so I now budget 200-300 a month for repairs and maintenance sinking fund to cover boiler, painting, garden etc etc etc it feels like a lot of money to me and I don’t have a lot of ‘disposable’ once that is factored in - maybe £300 a month but that is allocated for holidays, Christmas, haircuts, clothing, entertainment etc (stuff I do spend on most years but could cut back on).

Whenever you look up, always look down..it's all relative.

I recently watched a YouTube video about children rating mudcakes (google if you're interested)..so we should all try to be grateful for our lot (I know hard in today's consumer driven culture).

Gosh DH and I put around £500 a month into joint savings and £100 into a savings account for the DC and I thought we were doing pretty well until I read some of these answers!

Between us we earn £12.5k a month and after outgoings, we’re left with £4300. We put £6k a month into savings.

My grandmother used to say "enough is good as a feast".

All of our bills come too around £700 a month. Combined we earn around £1700 - 2000 a month. We live pretty small :)

After everything is paid, we save anywhere between £1000 - £1400 depending on whether we go away for a few days, someone’s birthday, garden furniture etc... things that we wouldn’t ordinarily buy.

It’s been closer to £1500 the last few months though because we can’t go anywhere so we just end up saving it

This is MNs so you will get lots of replies along the lines of "income 30k, 29k straight to savings & we live on 1k" 🙄

You'll also probably get lots of replies saying their income is £200k but because of necessities of big mortgages, bills, car payments, childcare, school fees and a £1k pm Waitrose bill, none of which they see as the luxury option despite being unaffordable to 90% of the population, they have no spare money whatsoever, couldn't possibly save and feel really skint all the time.

I have between £400-£500 left at the end of the month after all expenses

@CathyWuthering thanks for sharing :)

How do you find it ? We are a family of 4 and I think I can make it work

@Ozster I manage it fine. I know my partner is left with around the same at the end of the month as well after all bills. However we don’t have any children at the minute so that money is literally just for us to spend on whatever we like. I do think if we were a family of 4 we’d be able to pool resources together and make it work!