Is £500 a month ok to live on after bills?

[forwardsandbackwardsandup]

I'm having a ridiculous argument with my husband and I have so completely lost sight of what is reasonable. After mortgage/bills, food/petrol, all fixed costs etc. we each have around £500 each month. I usually save around £200 and spend the rest on bits and pieces throughout the month. Coffees, train and lunch the one day a week I go into the office. Little bits for the kids. I pay for swimming lessons and another class from that too. I don't feel rich but I also don't feel poor. The classic "comfortable". I have savings built up from this as well as a bigger (not huge, under £20k) savings pot which has had around £10k from inheritance as well as money from the sale of a property from before I even met him. I appreciate having this cushion and the ability to dip into it if need be, although I rarely do.

He gets to the end of his £500 before the end of the month and thinks I am being rude for suggesting that it is easy to live on this. He cycles, doesn't drink or gamble, I have no idea where it goes.

If it matters, I work part time while the kids are young and he works full time. He pays the majority of bills to allow us to be left with the same figure to spend on us each month. He's starting to complain that he is having to "financially carry this family". I've looked into increasing my days but with 2 in nursery me going up to full time only gives us around £80 more per month so doesn't see worth it.

My question: should £500 be easy enough to live on?

I think thinking you have £500 a month then having to suddenly find £150 or £300 is the rub, you don't really have £1000 a month left, you need to add up all the incidentals per year, MOT car insurance servicing tyres ( needing new tyres is not an emergency it happens you know they will need replacing it is only an emergency isf you rip tear on a nail just after getting new ones!) brake pads oil changes, travel, home, phone etc insurance a fixed amount for household maintenance; enough of an emergency fund so when your washing machine or kettle needs replacing there is money for it ( i would suggest 500-1000 for this), how much you set aside for christmas, how much you spend on kids activities then you divide this by 12 and put into a separate bank account so when car insurance is de the money is there, you might find that actually your truly free spending per month is more like £2-300 but you then know you can spend every penny knowing that there is a fund for emergencies

Thanks everyone. I can see where the problem lies. Because I'm so in control of it all I know that I need to be keeping money aside for all these things and have the cushion of my savings should I need it. But he sees it as unexpected costs that suddenly need paid for.

With the car insurance for example, last year it had increased due to a claim and was £600. I knew it was coming and had money saved for my share. He didn't. I ended up paying for it all and he repays me his share across the rest of the year. We had the option to make monthly payments but there was interest added and it seemed silly to pay extra when I had the money there. I'm not keeping all the information under lock and key. It's all there in a spreadsheet and I try and have conversations but he isn't interested.

I've signed up to YNAB. I'll have a go tonight at a proper budget with every single thing in it and see if it reveals anything obvious.

Re holidays etc, we haven't really gone away much due to small kids and lockdown. Part of the fixed costs each month include £200 into a joint savings account, so in theory it comes from that except it doesn't seem to actually cover much.

If the £200 is all the money you are saving for annual and irregular expenses then it's not enough unfortunately, even though it is a lot of money.

It might cover the family holiday, until your DC are in school and you're limited to the school holidays, then you'll need probably double that for a typical 'week in the sun'.

But then you have Christmas, Birthdays, school uniforms, boiler servicing, car repairs, insurance etc etc, white goods replacement, and lots of other things. What about when the car needs replacing, or other large purchases like new roof or windows?

As well as YNAB, there's also Moneysaving Expert.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/family/money-help/

But if your DH won't engage, I don't know the answer. You can only spend each pound once, so by spending money on X, you reduce the amount available for Y, unless you can increase your income. At least things will get easier when the DC start school and nursery costs fall?

£200 a month is only £2,400 a year.

You pay the car insurance and that’s £50 a month off your £200 (£1,800 left).
Boiler minor repair - say £150 (£1,650)
New tyres x2 - £150? (£1,500)
Car tax?

Kids birthday parties & Christmas gifts - that’s going to cost you at least £25 a month, if you’re very frugal? (£1,200)

Then kids clothes & shoes must account for another £200 again being super frugal with young kids and hand me downs.

Now you’ve got £1,000 for weddings and genuinely unexpected stuff like the washing machine breaking (£300?) and weekends away and whatever.

It’s just not enough. Alas. I wish it was! We might scrape £200 a month on irregular expenses but it couldn’t include holidays or fun spending, and actually kids expenses would be extremely tight out of that.

If you’ve got £1,200 after bills, then at least split it 3x ways and cover more expenses from the £400 a month you save. I think that would alleviate so much aggro.

Definitely think it's a problem with the way you're budgeting, handing out £500 a month each and calling it "£500 after bills" but actually it's not after bills and you're both expected to separately save your halves of a whole bunch of annual bills out of it.

You need to add up all your annual expenses (you say you already do it for yourself) and subtract the cost from your personal spends e.g if car insurance is £600 a year then you're already down to £475 a month each. At least then you know what you have and don't have this overcomplicated system. Your £200 savings a month should cover the unexpected stuff.

I agree that the budget isn’t reflective of your actual costs. We have separate savings accounts for Christmas, car (yearly costs and saving towards a 2 new cars every 8ish years), holiday account and general savings. We each have £200 keepy back each month for personal spends, such as new clothes.