Average Briton has £2,205 in savings

nickj_2

nomoreboomandbust wrote: »

This average figure for savings can only keep going down in the future. Wages either stagnating or being reduced for most people, mortgage rates will eventually rocket ,essential living costs such as utility bills will increase too. I cannot see how most ordinary people will be able to save. Traditionally the people with any significant savings are over 50, but they are being squeezed too with their children living off the bank of mum and dad. It really is looking grim.

I really am a ray of sunshine on this gloomy morning here in SW london (it looks lovely in Scotland- just saw that Alex Salmond been interviewed on Sky news).

Oh i forgot to mention savage tax increases which will have to be imposed sooner rather than later

don't forget that as well as all this people are meant to be saving more for their retirement ..........c it does look grim for the country in the next 40 -50 years

mbga9pgf

phil_b wrote: »

I had a similar dream before I bought my house, calculating what I'd have left over as a good chunk to blast the mortgage with. The reality is far away from the dream though when you factor in all the things you want to do with your new asset and all the lovely furniture you want to put in it .

The Mrs has been briefed. We have just had the onerous joy of going through the previous owners letters to sort out contacting the lenders, it was a repossession. We need to sort out terminating any outstanding amounts with energy suppliers, shark loan companies etc

Not going into too fine a detail, but I was shocked, saddened and truly upset about how quickly credit can bite you in the @rse and how it destroyed this familys life.

I am keeping the mortgagee in possession letter until we get the mortgage down to 3 times sole salary. Every time we think we NEED new furniture, a holiday abroad, letter will be coming out....

The house itself needs significant work doing to it, the paddock, garden and surrounding area will take 2 weeks slave labour to sort and is going to be a continuing Labour of love. Some facias need replacing and the chimneys need sweeping and I know its not going to be cheap. Looks as if we will be shopping at Asda a while longer.:)

PasturesNew

For a lot of couples, £2000 is their household takehome salary (two people, £16k), so if they don't buy too much tat it's not that hard to accumulate £2k in savings.

However .... a lot of people DO love tat ... and buy a lot of it. So they have nothing.

Singles, on the other hand, get the short, sh1tty stick ... and £2k is a blimmin' fortune!

lostinrates

mbga9pgf wrote: »

I am keeping the mortgagee in possession letter until we get the mortgage down to 3 times sole salary. Every time we think we NEED new furniture, a holiday abroad, letter will be coming out....

The house itself needs significant work doing to it, the paddock, garden and surrounding area will take 2 weeks slave labour to sort and is going to be a continuing Labour of love.
f

Thats a great idea bout the letter. wish we had a similar motivating tool. two weeks slave labour sounds good. The one we are looking at might be more like two years to just break the back of it....part of the fun though, isn't it?

Primrose

It would be interesting to have another poll to discover what the average person spent on alcohol, cigarettes and annual holidays. That might be one reason why many people have such a low level of savings. Sometimes the level of one's savings depends on choices made on how to allocate your income and people will often have vastly differing priorities.
In many cases the thrifty and prudent ARE subsidising those who have a more extravagant lifestyle but it would be a very clever economist who worked out how you could reward them without punishing those whose incomes are so small that they cannot afford to save, as opposed to punishing those who just spent their money recklessly without thought for the future.

mbga9pgf

lostinrates wrote: »

Thats a great idea bout the letter. wish we had a similar motivating tool. two weeks slave labour sounds good. The one we are looking at might be more like two years to just break the back of it....part of the fun though, isn't it?

When I say break the back, I mean get it down to around 3.5X my income. :eek:

lostinrates

mbga9pgf wrote: »

When I say break the back, I mean get it down to around 3.5X my income. :eek:

yes...I was talking about the work to be done in new places...our ''maybe'' place has an outside lavatory, which is fine ....but its..um...not connected to anything. Sewerage will be pretty important...but out of our skill. But that's ok, we'll still be busy, because there is something that will ''need'' to be done rather than ''should'' be done for a very, very long while

mbga9pgf

Dont get me started. I have a sneaky suspicion our rainwater drainage has been connected to the Septic... Incorrectly. I think we may have to dig new drains to drain the rainwater to the local brook. the good news is its all downhill from the house, but its a cost we hadnt budgeted for.

lostinrates

mbga9pgf wrote: »

Dont get me started. I have a sneaky suspicion our rainwater drainage has been connected to the Septic... Incorrectly. I think we may have to dig new drains to drain the rainwater to the local brook. the good news is its all downhill from the house, but its a cost we hadnt budgeted for.

still...least you have a septic.

we've budgeted for two major works, and we'll keep fingers crossed for the rest.

mbga9pgf

lostinrates wrote: »

still...least you have a septic.

we've budgeted for two major works, and we'll keep fingers crossed for the rest.

Good plan. We accept the fact that things wont happen overnight, however, stuff has crept in that we should really get sorted pronto but we cant yet afford to

We found the facia on part of the house has rotted... do we go for cheap n tacky PVC facia and be done, or fork out and go to the effort of hardwood and be done with it?

Decisions decisions. The LPG tank is going to take a grand a fill and I hear its not a very cheap way to heat the house. We are planning to use some of the massive firs we need to cut down to heat the house in a year or two, as we have the bonus of 2 lovely wood burning stoves.

Cant wait!