Not eligible for benefits but struggling, what do we do?

[Nomoneyleft9743]

This is a lesson to always live well within your means.
My husband has had a good career for 15 years in senior management travelling across the world etc. His pay was enough to enable me to be a sahm raising our children and we bought a large home . We lived comfortably and could save a bit but not a huge amount (1st mistake)
Unfortunately my husband became very poorly and has been off work for 5 years now. He is still employed by the company but wont be going back anytime soon. They have been amazing and luckily for us they had group payment protection insurance so they were able to continue paying him 50% of his wage.
This was not enough for us to live on due to our large bills . We have never been frivolous, buy our clothes off vinted, no cars on finance etc. We reduced all unnecessary bills down . No holidays etc
I went back to work but due to me being off so long I could only get a minimum wage job. This has seen us through just about ok.
Now on top of everything else I have become disabled and cant work myself .I've had to leave. I am eligible and I am claiming high rate pip . This isn't even half of my previous wage.
We have 2 teenage children who need a lot of things paying for. Over the 5 years we have depleted our savings down to nothing and are now struggling . Our only option is to downsize our home but that cant happen overnight, due to the lengthy selling process.
We are not eligible for universal credit as earn over the threshold. I've got two kids at high school who want school dinners like their friends. That alone is £200 a month (£5 a day) and I can't pay it . I can hardly afford to buy us food . Is there any help for people in our situation?

Giving up school buses is only an option if it's just down the road and/or there is a safe cycle/walking route. DD2's school was only two miles away but not a safe route to walk or cycle with a dual carriageway in the middle and no cycle path. My school was two miles away but my mum didn't want me walking down isolated country lanes to get there. DD1's school was ten miles away as she went to the grammar school. Easy to get there on school bus or train but certainly not walkable!

Actually sometimes driving them to school may be cheaper. It is to get to local schools where we are as the bus pass is only good value if you are going further afield. Shame to add to rush hour traffic but understandable on a tight budget.

@Nomoneyleft9743 I think you would be entitled to UC on that income, with limited capacity to work and carers elements added it works out at £800 Universal Credit a month on a take home pay of £2500. That is with no housing element because you own so therefore not eligible.

Your partner's job must be paying very generously

Assuming
Standard allowance 628
LCWRA 423
Carers 201
First child 329
Second child 292

You'd need household earnings of £4090 per month to have zero entitlement to universal credit

If there is no chance of your husband going back to work you might be better off if he retired through ill health, so you would be entitled to universal credit. I'd seek some proper advice on this.

I’m not an expert on the system but I think you would be eligible to claim for universal credit. Best thing to do is to just apply. If you’re not eligible you just won’t get anything.

Log in to entitled to website and see if you can claim anythin g.

Lots of people have given great advice, I would strongly recommend you start with the Entitled to website, stick in all yours and DH's details and see what you can apply for.

Off the top of my head you might get:

Universal credit
New style ESA
Pip for DH - This is not means tested so it doesn't matter that his company's insurance is still paying out.
Council tax reduction
Free school meals - the threshold on this is very low so not sure on this one, but worth checking

Have you actually applied for UC as your income and the elements you would be entitled to would suggest you should be receiving UC? Is your child benefit included in the 2500 or additional? If dh has been off work for 5 years due to health he should also be applying for pip

I've run some numbers here.

So prior to your husband getting ill, it was just him working (you SAHM), obviously for 100% of salary.
Then he got ill, and went down to 50%. You got a minimum wage job at some stage in this, to top up the income.
Then you got ill, can't work, so your family income is now your PIP and his 50%?

Your income (presumably after tax) is 2500. High rate pip is £778, so his 50% pay must be 1772 roughly. When you were on minimum wage (presuming full time), your joint income would have been slightly higher than when you were a SAHM.

From where you were comfortable to now, you've got a shortfall of about £800 to make up, from what I understand it? Though to fit in your stated incoming you need to find about £330.

Whilst thats possible to squeeze by reducing your overheads (those packed lunches again, getting rid of a car, reducing food bill etc), the most practical option might be to look at creative ways of earning more. It depends on the nature of your disability obviously, but some part time remote earning could plug that gap. Or as others were saying, carers allowance. Or both.

So true.
It's not good for kids to have everything they ask for handed to them on a plate. Most kids today would benefit from hearing the word No more often.
Right now the family is in a pinch and like everyone else, the children have to adapt to that. If they have a sound foundation to their character, it will be the making of them. If they become whiny and obnoxious, then I'm sorry, but they weren't very nice people to start with.

Are you sure you are not entitled to universal credit? That amount is low for a family of 4, I would apply and see what you can get - especially as you are in high rate pip

Contact Citizens Advice - they can go through everything with you and make sure you are getting everything you are entitled to. Benefits are so complex and you don’t know what you don’t know.

A tv on standby will only cost about £2 a year so not even worth worrying about anyway

In the short term say no to school lunches and provide a packed lunch.

In the long term get your house on the market ASAP and start
looking for somewhere in a cheaper area to reduce your mortgage payments.

I tend to agree. We could pay for a stupidly expensive school trip but I absolutely wouldn’t. I’d just say no and that would be the end of it. I don’t know why anyone would feel particularly bad about saying no to their kids about something like that or having packed lunch instead of school dinners or not getting designer clothes/a particular phone etc.

No one can have everything and it does kids absolutely no harm to realise that. Not to say it’s bad to buy them or that you shouldn’t but just that it’s absolutely not necessary and there is nothing wrong with choosing to direct your money to something else you think is better for the family as a whole.

What disabilities do you and your husband have?

@Nomoneyleft9743 is this really your whole budget? What about clothing, internet at home/any streaming, car service/MOT/repairs. Just be careful when you eventually sort selling house/moving that you budget for those kinds of costs as well when considering what you can afford to buy

Most of us are only a few similar steps away from where you are.

Humans feel smug and think it won't happen but everything is fragile.

Good luck

You’ve had really bad luck and already lots of good advice. Downsizing the house won’t be cheap because you’ll eat up equity in moving costs and stamp duty - it’s a last resort, I’d say

Is there nothing your dh could do at all? Has he really been unable to do anything for 5 years? It sounds like he is bright and experienced- could he tutor maths or similar online for example?

As always some excellent advice on this thread, but the op hasn’t come back to update or answer any questions since early this morning 🙄

I hope people reading this will wise up to how easily and quickly you can become those people on benefits you despise so much. OP have you tried claiming Universal Credit, I am sure you would be entitled to it as someone who is too sick or disabled to work.

So frustrating, which leads me to believe it’s all bullshit…though we shall see…

Do you need two cars? And 100 a month on fuel seems quite a lot given the circumstances. Where is all the driving too, can you cut it back a little and share one car?

also 600 a month on food can be cut back , focus on filling carbs, pasta, rice bread, potatoes etc to bulk meals out.

You're not living within your means. You need to reduce the food shop (because that is really high) and forget the school dinners. They can bring a sandwich, apple, crisps and a bottle of water from home. This is what I do with our teens too. Get rid of a car and talk to the mortgage lenders about making it cheaper by extending the mortgage for longer. The teens may want alot of things but they don't need it. Stop the pocket money and encourage them to wash neighbours cars/cut lawns/de-weed for pocket money. They don't need the latest phones or unlimited data.

I don't think downsizing is a last resort. It's a no brainer, and should really have happened before now. Clearly they had a very different lifestyle five years ago and it's taken this long to get to a point where they need to sell but the stress is how long that'll take, so there's still some (understandable) head in sand here. They might downsize and be mortgage free which would massively ease things, but in the meantime, the packed lunches, selling a car, and kids or them doing whatever work is viable to earn something would help with immediate pressure.

Know the kids won't like not fitting in with how things have been but things change and that's no bad lesson. Always felt it helped me to come from a place with very little so I know I can always manage like that, so whatever initial discomfort the kids feel, they'll get other strengths building along the way.