living on 25 grand in north london, no mortgage, family of 4? possible surely?

[hotHELL]

was having a discussion with a friend who moans always he is skint, blah, blah, no money to do anything, always goes overdrawn. They live mortgage free in a beautiful house in Highgate, surely having 24 grand to live on is plenty? Have just sent him lots of advice regarding budgeting, so maybe that will help them. What do you think? They have access to free schools too and their main holiday is paid for by grandparents. Have no debts.

No mortgage must make a huge difference. That's basically 25 k for bills and then disposable income. Can't be skint. Is he living a 'keeping up with the jones's' type lifestyle? Flash motor, holidays, designer clothes etc?

24 grand net or gross?

What band are they for council tax?

What, no rent, no mortgage, no school fees, 25 grand a year, and they think they are skint?

Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

DD and I live on about 7 grand a year. That is skint!

They seem to have no idea how other people live!

The council tax might be high, not sure, we pay around 150 a month, can it be more than that? No, they don't do flash motor, having said that they have a flash car but it was a present. No designer clothes either. Weird innit?

It's about £1.5k a month isn't it? I guess it depends but all the following cost money

• train and tube travel
• tax and MOT on a car
• servicing a car
• tv licence
• car insurance
• home insurance
• dental care
• subscriptions to professional bodies
• clothes
• council tax - prob substantial on a house that size
• home phone/mobile
• internet access
• water
• gas
• electricity
• eye tests
• contact lenses/glasses

and that's before you've started on food! So I couldn't live on it, no. But I'm sure you'll get lots of posts saying of course it's possible. We couldn't live on it, in or out of London, no.

blimey...do they drink or smoke or have a drug habit

And tihs is bound to kick off, always does when specific values are mentioned!

No tube travel, he works from home. Car fees paid by grandparents. Also servicing car. Have no mobiles,weird but they are both at home. They certainly pay the bills and certainly buy lots of stuff 2nd hand. Seems weird.

I can't see how they can be skint on £500 a week, when rent/mortgage is out of the equation.

Maybe they are partial to footballer's white powder? Or any other vices thet they don't like to mention?

No, no drug habits, always been on the dull side I'm afraid. Don't mean for this to kick off, but I really wondered how can somebody who lives mortgage free can complain. I think they must budget badly.

No powder there, not at all. They are quite square, enjoy some nice wine occasionally, they certainly eat well, but they are both good cooks, so they do meal plans.

Hmmm.

No idea then.

Where does the 24 grand come from? Is it salary or after-tax salary or what one or both of them take in as self-employed?

Council tax could be up to £230/month in Highgate.

Are they saving a lot? Putting a lot into a pension?

I suspect that if they have families who can give flash cars and holidays as presents then they are, in relative although not in absolute terms, skint. You couldn't afford to buy random flash cars for other people on that kind of income, and if that's their yardstick of "normal"...

the word "skint" means different things to different people. it often just means that someone has less disposable income than they used to have.

your friend probably just fritters money away on coffees, meals out, organic food from the local deli, etc. It is easily done, especially it you live in an expensive area like Highgate.

Well, we live in north london on less than that, with a mortgage and 2 kids.

Have told both of them that maybe they spend a lot on coffees here and there. He will inherit a lot of money one day, so not sure if they need to save for a real pension. Maybe their council tax is very high, but then everybody pays it. She doesn not earn at the moment and he is a freelancer, so no commuting. I think it must those coffees in Highgate...

They are maybe wasting money unwittingly, as you say on coffees ! We went through a lean patch last year (but wouldn't have complained of being skint !) and sat down and toted up ALL our outgoings to see what we could trim, while not compromising on good food etc.

Without going into too much detail there really was a lot of money being frippered away in an invisible kind of way on things we didn't need and didn't give much thought to. So we tightened our belts a bit accordingly.

I don't think anyone living mortgage free in Highgate with a paid-for car can complain of being skint.

Maybe they've each got pension payments to make and regularly skim off money to savings/bonds/university funds for the kids, meaning that after the bills there isn't anything left over?

We could definitely do it. Would seem like easy street tbh. (We're SW london.)

childcare even for schoolage children would be my main concern. Childminders could account for more than half that if they don't pick the children up from school themselves.

mortgage/rent is the biggest expenditure. If they arent paying any they must have an extremely lavish lifestyle. Its easy for anyone to run out of money -rich celebs do it all the time. They must eat out/ buy expensive clothes/ furniture/ take lots of trips or something because that's a lot to get through imho anyway.