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Original poster

How much do you have for a "rainy day"?

92 replies

ChochoCrazyCat · 01/05/2021 16:38

Just curious...how much do you keep for emergencies and how much would be your ideal amount?
I'm trying to work what a sensible amount would be so that there's a cushion, but also not having lots of money in a bank depreciating...as interest rates are so low.

OP posts:
whataballbag · 04/05/2021 15:13

About £1.63

SweatyBetty20 · 04/05/2021 15:16

About a grand. Was around £5k but I've had to just pay for my younger brother's funeral as he died suddenly a couple of months ago. He lived from hand to mouth with his girlfriend due to medical issues and there was no way I was letting him go with a council funeral. Will take a while to replenish as I'm also renovating, but no fault crying over spilt milk.

MLMsuperfan · 04/05/2021 15:29

That's a kind thing to do

Wegobshite · 04/05/2021 15:46

About 4K in the bank
Roughly 8k in cash
And roughly 35k in another bank account
DH has about 30k that I know of but he may have a little bit more in cash as well
I appreciate that we are in a fortunate position to have this amount money
Plus we have no mortgages and kids are grown up
We could also get about 60k on various credit cards if we needed to

Lurak · 04/05/2021 17:48

About £300, got debt and a low paying job so £300 is pretty good for me.

Fcuk38 · 04/05/2021 17:56

13k but only due to Covid and being made redundant and getting a job pretty quickly after so had 8k left of redundancy and then saved to top up to 13k. Next year rather than saving I will pay off chunks of the mortgage as that will save more money in the long run. 13k would cover 8 months living costs, longer if I was made redundant again as I have redundancy insurance.

Reinventinganna · 04/05/2021 18:17

@SweatyBetty20

About a grand. Was around £5k but I've had to just pay for my younger brother's funeral as he died suddenly a couple of months ago. He lived from hand to mouth with his girlfriend due to medical issues and there was no way I was letting him go with a council funeral. Will take a while to replenish as I'm also renovating, but no fault crying over spilt milk.
I’m sorry for your loss. That is such a nice thing to do for him.
Ukholidaysaregreat · 04/05/2021 18:20

SweatyBetty so sorry to hear about your little bro. What a nice thing for you to have done. 💐

Hockeyboysmum · 04/05/2021 18:23

£700

imsoinmyhead · 04/05/2021 18:29

25k. But I do have two mortgages and private school fees to pay for so it wouldn't go far if the shit hit the fan!

KeyboardWorriers · 04/05/2021 23:39

@SweatyBetty20 I am so sorry Flowers.

loverloverlover · 04/05/2021 23:57

People saying a years salary with no context - that could be £7000 or £70,000 so it's hard to know if it's a decent amount or not!

We have 40,000 in the bank, money in shares and some investments and then money in the house but it's all earmarked for moving house

MoreOnlyMore · 05/05/2021 00:53

I was 16 when I had a child and was in benefits. I had nothing so having savings was so important to me. As I got older I started saving (its very addictive) and now have an amount that would cover me for 4 years if I was out of work. I'm disabled and this is a worry for me.

TedMullins · 05/05/2021 01:02

£300. But, I’ve just bought a flat and all my savings went into that. I’m planning to build them up again but it’ll take a while. I’ve got critical illness cover in case something awful happens! It would take me about 20 years to save a year’s salary so that’s never going to happen.

BeefSupreme · 05/05/2021 01:08

My baby has £4 in his piggy bank that random old people in supermarkets have given him. That’s all our savings

mmollymeekinss · 05/05/2021 01:20

Around 20k in savings and around 4K i could access now

Rewind 2 years ago overdrawn by 2.5k every month and 6/7k barclaycard credit card and around 2k on a very account

FinallyFluid · 05/05/2021 11:42

About £25k

Overdraft allowance of £15k hasn't been used in ten years, I think they have forgotten they gave it to us. Grin

Come August we will have a salary and final salary pension for a year, so savings will increase then.

August 2022, we will be pensioners, with final salary, state pension and a savings pot in excess of £150,000 can't touch this yet.

It wasn't always like this, we used to enjoy spending.

I saw the 2008 crash coming cleared the credit cards, trained DH to only use debit cards, and slowly and I mean slowly we chipped away at it, we were as the name implies FF following eight long years.

It can happen,so take hope from our tale.

SpnBaby1967 · 05/05/2021 11:58

Currently have a little over £5k but are buying a house so that will cover all the legal fees etc and come July will probably be down to zero.

We can only save small amounts each month so it'll take us several years to get back to that kind of level again. But I do really want to as we lived so many years hand to mouth where one broken kitchen appliance was the end of the world and panic stations. I never want to be in that situation again.

sansou · 05/05/2021 20:36

Ar least 12+ mths' living expenses. Why? DH & I had overlapping redundancies back in the last global recession of 2008/9. It took us 6/9 mths respectively to obtain equivalent employment back then. The current recession will be worse, longer lasting and more detrimental for the 50+ which we now are. The only benefit this time round is that we have paid off the mortgage and have savings (retirement planning) to cushion us. My saver's instincts last March went into overdrive - facilitated by lockdown. Wfh albeit with a 15% paycut for 6 mths, I'm one of the fortunate ones since the small number of people put on furlough last year at my company have since been made redundant.

MissMarplesstylecoach · 05/05/2021 21:06

Now we have about 150k in easy access accounts and are debt and mortgage free , plus reasonable pension pots . Go back 10 years we had zero savings . Go back 15 and we had zero savings and considerable debts, so I know the stress of living day to day .

inmyslippers · 05/05/2021 22:04

£1000 single mum and very low income. Scarped it together from hardly anything. Sleep so much better with it. Will hopefully be fully debt free in January if everything goes to plan. Then I can grow a larger emergency fund.

Original poster
ChoChoCrazyCat · 06/05/2021 08:09

Those of you who say you have money in investments...what do you mean by that exactly? Stocks and shares? Savings accounts are rubbish at the moment with almost non existent interest rates so I'd like to look into other options but wouldn't know where to start with that kind of thing. This is the most money we've ever had as we're still relatively young.
How much would you need to have before you start investing, and what would you invest in?

Those of you who've had redundancies...did you get a payout? My industry is really struggling so redundancy is a very real possibility. DH and I work in the same company so if we were both made redundant it would be a bit of a disaster.
I'm torn between hoarding all our savings for such a scenario, or putting money into doing up the house to hopefully raise its value as we want to sell in a few years.

OP posts:
savvy7 · 06/05/2021 14:06

It's all about balance ChoCho and your attitude to risk. I would want a reasonable safety net - ideally 6 - 12 months salary equivalent - in terms of accessible cash savings before pouring money into the house or other investments where your capital is at risk.

Capricornandproud · 06/05/2021 16:09

I have just scraped together my first £1000 of savings and put them in an ISA this week. I am so proud of myself. I’m a single Mum working 4 days a week in a decent job and this is the first time I’ve really been able to knuckle down and save. Its going to be 5 years of frugal living but I have £90k left on a mortgage that I want to kick the arse of!

fromdownwest · 06/05/2021 16:43

I don't know why I look at these threads! So Depressing.
I have 3 months tops.
After that I would be in a pickle.
I do however have excellent income protection polcies and critical illness. If I could not work due to this, the mortgage would be cleared and enough to live on provided.

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