Is it rude to ask your annual income?

[dontcomeatme]

I am always gobsmacked and a little in awe whenever a thread gets onto the topic of money. Posters often stating they have an annual income of 100k+, but still struggling with finances for example. I am really interested to see if this is a demographic thing, so same job = totally different salary depending on location. Which I understand would then be reflected in the cost of living for the area.
But if any MNers feel comfortable I wanted to start a thread where everyone could state their

• individual annual income + job title
• the house as a whole annual income if different
• plus where you live.

No one is obligated so if you dont want to absolutely fine. This is more out of my own curiosity than anything!

Ours -

• OH annual salary before tax £37k, head of year in a comprehensive
• I am SAHM so just CB coming in which we put aside for 2 DC
• North East of England.

We live quite comfortably, just bought a home, save for both DC and a rainy day fund, able to do stuff with DC every weekend and holidays (in the uk) every year, no debt other than mortgage.

I bring in just under 3k a month after tax/pension/student loan. No rent or mortgage. No benefits except child benefit.

Combined income 90k
South East
Average sized mortgage
1 car
No fancy holidays but that's due to prioritising debt repayment and long term savings

Until last year our joint income was 100k, North of England. We also had a decent year and made an additional 42k on our investments.

Now retired early our projected income will be around 65k this year even though it’s been volatile investing of late, with the pensions being close to 40k.

No mortgage, paid off in our later thirties and child is an adult. We both worked in education. We are far better off than our professions would have us, it’s been a combination of luck and skill investing since we were young.

@dontcomeatme my property is worth 350k, in my hometown it would be about 600k and where DH grew up in London probably a million.

We really need to research how to invest properly, we have savings sitting in various types of saving accounts/ISAs but we are very wary about investing at the moment because we just don't have the knowledge. Definitely something we need to figure out as a couple going forward.

The property value depending on location really intrigues me. I suppose it is a little naivety on my part? In my head I can fathom a house near a coastal area to be more expensive for obvious reasons, but big city centre's I never really understood. This thread is making me realise how much I underestimated the draw of somewhere like London.

@dontcomeatme we live in a very nice (expensive) bit of the commuter belt, 25 min train from Central London. Our pleasant but very ordinary 4 bed semi would sell for more than £800k. We're more than a mile from the station though. A similar size house in the town centre could easily be £1-1.2m

It's "Location location" for a reason.

Yup. I live in a £1.3m terraced house in a spenny bit of London. A four bed semi is very much an unachievable dream for us for some time to come, unless we move somewhere else. And we’re not willing to do that.

Location, location! I’m genuinely surprised that this is surprising to anyone.

@dontcomeatme I grew up not too far from London, DH went to a very expensive independent school in London and grew up about 20 mins from Waterloo. Have done all the museums, some multiple times and art galleries. Spent my early twenties in another major city in the North, lots of cocktails after work and theatre trips, had enough by the time I hit about 30. I couldn’t wait to leave the overheated SE, it has always been like that though it’s worse now.

We have had both good and bad times investing but overall good, it’s a risk and the key is only investing what you can afford to lose. DH lost 25k trading one week, his only really big mistake but we were still young and it was easily recouped. No one in our real life has any idea we invest. Many are shocked we have retired early as we didn’t have mega jobs.

Me: £47,000 pension (deferred pension from City days) plus £13,000 interest income
DH: £66,000 pension (recently retired civil servant) plus about £15,000 from consultancy work
Both full state pensions in 3 years
House £2m Zone 2 London - no mortgage
2 children at university

My take away from this thread:

• I am better off than some and worse off than some.
• Mumsnet is a wealthy demographic on average
• Some of the pensioners on here are wedged....

We earn a lot as a household but nothing like some of our friends.

Me: usually 160k, but this year will be £200k
DH: £160k

Company car, chuck 60k each in a pension. No mortgage

Spend the lot.

Live on my own in Scotland. 55 y/o with 3 kids at Uni
Salary £77K, bonus £7K last year, this year will be zero
House worth about £220K, mortgage will be paid off within 2 years
1 defined benefit pension which will pay c.£12K pa plus £130K in a pension pot

Annual Household Income £420K (1 x Doctor – 1 x SM in big Corporate)
Live in South East.
No debt other than mortgage which is £4k per month.
4 kids. Household support (Childcare/Cleaners etc) £3k.
Food bill is astronomical...my kids are big eaters!
We also save/invest heavily as we:

• plan to pay mortgage off next year.
• are focused on retirement funds/Pension as want to do less stressful work after 60 and take it a bit easier but have a nice quality of life)
• want to provide for our children’s future so we have 3 separate funds for each child – a SIPP, a further education fund and saving for a property deposit.

We run 2 cars and we go on holiday a lot – our holiday habit aside we live fairly regular lives.

This thread is getting more and more gross!

I think the noses are getting longer to be fair.

Noooo it's unfeminist and bad for our daughters to be skeptical that 83% of MNers earn more than 98% of the population!

Can’t you believe people have millions? I live in a very affluent city, houses are twice the national average and many go for many millions. There are a lot of rich people out there, I work with them!

Why is this gross?

Both my husband and I trained (and paid ) for many years to be able to do our jobs which BTW not only add value to the fabric of society and economy but also we pay a whopping big tax to the government who in turn support those that need it - who do you think funds the NHS/welfare payments? ). We are both state school educated BTW and neither come from wealth.

It’s the ONS stats for UK income. Quite possibly people do strategically reduce their income, but you must realise that’s a huge salary compared to the vast majority of the working population. I’m university educated and in a professional role, albeit public sector and not in London and I know one person who earns that much. So it depends on the circles you move in.

Equally I only know one person on minimum wage so I think it just shows that most people mix with people in a relatively similar income bracket to themselves.

35k gross. That’s my salary. dH doesn’t work. We don’t claim any benefits or allowances. I’m in zone 2 London.

I also think we are more inclined to respond as I like to think it lifts the curtain.

So many lawyers! I only have one lawyer friend and she works 24/7. She does earn a lot, though.

We are two academics, assistant/associate prof level, earning about 115-120k jointly fulltime.

Live in London, quite centrally. Both made some money in previous house sales (we moved in together in mid-30s and had our own flats at the stage). One primary-aged dc. No childcare costs and free school meals. No car, but no debt.

House needed a lot of repairs, which we have slowly done plus built an extra bedroom. We're comfortable but definitely not wealthy.

I used to work for a company based in Liverpool with no geographical allowance. I was based in Guildford. My equivalent in our Newcastle branch had bought a 2 bed flat and a car. I could only afford to rent a bedsit, let alone driving lessons.

We do now have a mortgage free house (simply down to time passing - no inheritance) nearby which we could never afford to buy now.

I earn 48k as a Commercial Data Analyst & DH 61k as a branch manager. Kids grown up now so just the 2 of us. We rent out our 1st property we bought in 1990 on an interest only mortgage which we still owe 31k with a mortgage of £60.03p a month with an income of 1k a month. Only 2 more payments to go on our main mortgage so will be mortgage free at 59. We have 3 holidays abroad a year and are comfortable but DH pension is not great so will be saving extra now for retirement. My car is 11 years old & DH has a company car but as I WFH and only go into the office once a week I don't feel the need to spend money upgrading it until I have to as I've always been careful with money and like to know that if anything happens there's money saved for a rainy day. Also have circa 40k in shares bought through company sharesave scheme. I live in Birmingham. TBH it's only as we have got older that we have disposable income as when our children were younger we were always counting the pennies and overtime as our best friend😁

Jointly we earn approximately £95k

No mortgage on house worth £500k

Live in Yorkshire, teens

Since paying mortgage off we're now doing a large renovation with is taking up all our spare cash!