Our financial situation

[Orangesandlemons77]

Please can you tell me if you think our family financial situation is fair?

We've paid off the mortgage a few years ago and have two teenagers, the eldest is 19 and has been working on a year out before university which he is starting after the summer.

DH and I have separate finances, he is self employed and I get a disability benefit (PIP) and also cont based ESA, along with child benefit and a small amount of Child tax credit. I pay for all the food shopping which is around £800 a month.

DH is self employed and had a unit he rents for about £500 a month, and other costs, he therefore earns around £14,000 profit a year and pays the other house bills which again comes to around £800 a month (council tax, energy etc)

DS1 will be getting the full £8,600 stay at home student loan and has calculated most of this will be taken up with e.g. his car insurance (£450 a month) also things like a phone contract (£100 a month) gym membership (£50 a month) and expenses, I think he will also be working one day a week in his minimum wage job.

DS1 also has a child trust fund of 12K and 4K of this he has invested in a LISA and most of the rest in an ISA. he used the rest towards his car, and driving lessons last year.

Does this all sound reasonable and should I or DS be contributing more?

I'd be happy to contribute more myself but am in the middle of a PIP review and they cans top it while you have to appeal so saving a bit extra in case of that. Thanks

£250 a month sounds about right. He can work more than 8 hours a week if he wants to fund a fancy lifestyle!

People who say they wouldn’t charge student DC rent can afford not to. You need him to be paying his way. If he was living in halls, his loan would have to cover rent, food, any luxuries he wanted. And he’d need to top it up with more work if necessary.

No reason he can’t work at least one weekend day and a few nights a week.

In the Op I mentioned being on PIP, DH is a carer which limits his earnings, no won't be affected by the MIF.

If he eats you out of house and home I think it should be more than £250.

I'm on a teacher salary and have never had money spare for gym membership and I bought my phone in 2019, so only pay £8 a month. He's living well beyond his means. It's kind of ok to have a bit of a blow out year, but now he's about to start uni he needs to be sensible with money. If he doesn't need the full student loan he should try to put some aside in a savings account.