Some people just seem to have unlimited money

JulieGeorgiana

I can understand where the confusion comes in... If I take my closest friends:

1) Had two cars, one brand new on finance. As he's in the military they get a cheap house, and have 2 children in private school (1 paid for by his job, and her mother pays a lot towards the 2nd child). They pay a fortune in food each week, and buy new clothes and nice things all the time, and expensive holidays.

They earn 3 times more then I have between them. They have HUGE debts!

2) he lives in a council property, eats beans on toast, never goes on holiday, and has no money to go out, drives an old banger.

He earns more then us and he has HUGE debts

3) she lives in a council house, has a brand new car, goes on nice expensive holidays, goes to legoland all the time, buys her son so many gifts each year, spends £300-£400 on Christmas for him. Always buying new clothes.

She and her partner earn double what we do, they have reasonable size debts debts!

4) we Rent and pay nearly double of all our friends, we have two cars (older ones, although one is being sold), go camping a few times a year (and we are going to Norway in 2012), we always have nice meals, wear second hand clothes. We are big MSE-ers, but still have money to buy gifts for people... and have a strict budget.

We have NO debts and 65% of what we need for a deposit on a house!

We earn the least of all of them. Yet from the 'outside' we are better off then friend 2 only!!!! Truth is we are the best off... even with our old car, old clothes and basic lives.

When I used to work, we had double the income, yet we had debts... no savings... childcare... 2 newer cars... take-aways...! Actually from the outside we hardly looked any different then we do now... because we had just as little money paying off the debts (Once I paid them off I set my wages after childcare and car costs into the savings, which is how we got such good savings).

I look at others and wonder all the time... how can they afford it?!?!?!?! And then I know, that images can be decieving!

Pollycat

Nice post, JulieGeorgiana. :T

I think that people who earn 'a reasonable amount' (and I'd certainly consider £50K reasonable) often feel they should have a certain standard of living.
I'm not saying that's wrong and I can see how someone earning that amount would feel that they deserve a couple of foreign holidays a year, to drive the latest model of whatever car they like to drive, to go out for a meal every fortnight and have the latest electronic gadgets for them and the kids.

But sometimes life conspires against people and redundancy comes a-knocking at the door.
If that happens, it's people like this who have been used to earning and spending a lot of money who tend to struggle the hardest.
They often have built up huge debts and aren't used to hunting round charity shops for reasonable quality clothes for the kids, let alone doing the battle of the elbows to get that last bag of reduced spuds in the supermarket.

The OP has been honest about her circumstances and I think from what she says below, her OH is one of the type of people I mention above.

Spidergirl76 wrote: »

I think my main issue with our finances is I am a saver, and am careful and budget, whilst my DH is a spender and will spend and spend. So I can make all the cutbacks that I like, and take tips from here, but anything that is saved, he will spend. I am, however, training him in the art of being frugal;)

Spidergirl - good luck with the training. I hope he learns fast.
Don't forget - check out the DFW board & Old-style board for great tips.

Mini_Bear

This is a very interesting post OP and one i ponder too (i would never ask a friend how much is on their credit card unless they made a quip or genuinely asked my advise - Im an IFA amongst other things). We live very modest lives, we don't want to appear flashy and have no need for the one-upmanship some of our friends seem intent on competing with. i still live/eat/shop like a student and i graduated YEARS ago!
Some of our friends have extraordinary assets on finance (think 50k motors). I would much rather have a bit of savings and be able to sleep at night without worry.
We also know couples who have had double inheritance windfalls this year and been v sensible with them ie mortgage paid off/ extensions in cash and car upgrades.
I would say from my experience though that a household bringing in 50k (at least in the south-east) will not be able to have a huge amount of luxurys assuming mortgage repayments and all bills are paid!

cord123

My god! Its like this post read my mind! I have a friend who has two children and two step children. she is married to someone who owns his own business. When they frist met around 6 years ago he was on the brink of bankruptsy.... apparently it didnt happen but I know his debst were in excess of £60k. She constantly shops, lives in a five bedroom house, always on weekends away and then for christmas he bought her and ipad, iphone and a weekend in NYC to see ghost! I just cant understand where they get their money from.... or their credit!? Surely credit eventually dries up?
My SIL doesnt work. They have three children and her OH works int he family shop. They live in a 5 bed house, drive an audi and a barand new mondeo, have atleast 2 holidays a year but insist they get no help from his parents. She reckons he takes home similar to what my husband earns around £32k..... how comes they have that life and we dont and I work as well!?

I just cant understand it! Perhaps I am jealous, but it makes my blood boil that I am working and never have any spare cash and these people live in the lap of luxury... perhaps they will come back down to earth with a bump I dont know but it annoys the hell out of me! Oh well, As I tell my hubby, he has a fab pension plan so come the age of 50 we will be retiring somewhere hot while no doubt they need to work until god knows when cause I know my friends husband (who id 14 years older than her!) has no pension pot, no savings and doesnt pwn the house! xx

JulieGeorgiana

Pollycat wrote: »

Nice post, JulieGeorgiana. :T

I think that people who earn 'a reasonable amount' (and I'd certainly consider £50K reasonable) often feel they should have a certain standard of living.

Exactly Pollycat! £50k is a lot of money!

My DH loves this book called the 'Secret Millionaire next Door' which dives into Millionaires in the US.

If you take two people one Dr and one Farmer.

Who is a Millionaire??? The Farmer!

The Dr is 'expected' to have a nice home, nice clothes a nice car. But the Dr has hardly any 'net worth'

The farmer has a battered truck, clothes and an old farm house and saves his money, and barters/swaps goods and trades for food and never eats out. His net worth is more, because expectations are less!

How many people live how they do, because they are expected to be seen as living to that standard?

Since reading this book my DH insists on saving and not spending (this is a men who when I met him had huge debts a BMW 3 series and a new Rolex watch each year!!!!) Now he buys second hand... and had a £5 watch and doesn't care what other people think.

Spidergirl76

My DH definitely feels like he should have a certain standard of living whilst I'm happier to spend less but still like to have some "nice things". That book sounds fascinating, JulieGeorgiana, I might buy myself a copy (secondhand on Amazon of course hehe)

Pollycat

cord123 wrote: »

My god! Its like this post read my mind! I have a friend who has two children and two step children. she is married to someone who owns his own business. When they frist met around 6 years ago he was on the brink of bankruptsy.... apparently it didnt happen but I know his debst were in excess of £60k. She constantly shops, lives in a five bedroom house, always on weekends away and then for christmas he bought her and ipad, iphone and a weekend in NYC to see ghost! I just cant understand where they get their money from.... or their credit!? Surely credit eventually dries up?
My SIL doesnt work. They have three children and her OH works int he family shop. They live in a 5 bed house, drive an audi and a barand new mondeo, have atleast 2 holidays a year but insist they get no help from his parents. She reckons he takes home similar to what my husband earns around £32k..... how comes they have that life and we dont and I work as well!?

I just cant understand it! Perhaps I am jealous, but it makes my blood boil that I am working and never have any spare cash and these people live in the lap of luxury... perhaps they will come back down to earth with a bump I dont know but it annoys the hell out of me! Oh well, As I tell my hubby, he has a fab pension plan so come the age of 50 we will be retiring somewhere hot while no doubt they need to work until god knows when cause I know my friends husband (who id 14 years older than her!) has no pension pot, no savings and doesnt pwn the house! xx

Don't be jealous, cord123.

As I and other posters have said, you have no idea what goes on in other people's lives.

If your friend's OH's business went bust and it turns out they owe £00000s on 'stuff', would you still be jealous?

Maybe your SIL is lying when she says her family don't subsidise them.
Maybe they have a drawer of unopened credit card bills which they are trying desperately to ignore.
Why would you be jealous of that?

But - when you and your OH retire at age 50, (you may need to rethink that to age 55 as there has been change in the law regarding occupational pensions unless you have reserved rights) I'm pretty certain they'll look at their 'stuff' - state-of-the-art TVs, mobiles, that brand new car on the drive that has £30K of finance hanging on it - and be jealous of you!

JulieGeorgiana

Spidergirl76 wrote: »

My DH definitely feels like he should have a certain standard of living whilst I'm happier to spend less but still like to have some "nice things". That book sounds fascinating, JulieGeorgiana, I might buy myself a copy (secondhand on Amazon of course hehe)

This is the one I got him >>> http://www.amazon.co.uk/Millionaire-Next-Door-Thomas-Stanley/dp/0671015206/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325177087&sr=8-1

Just remember it's american and it doesn't tell you how to be a millionaire... just tells you how millionaires live.

But very very interesting... even I like to hear bits he reads out to me

Marisco

JulieGeorgiana wrote: »

Exactly Pollycat! £50k is a lot of money!

My DH loves this book called the 'Secret Millionaire next Door' which dives into Millionaires in the US.

If you take two people one Dr and one Farmer.

Who is a Millionaire??? The Farmer!

The Dr is 'expected' to have a nice home, nice clothes a nice car. But the Dr has hardly any 'net worth'

The farmer has a battered truck, clothes and an old farm house and saves his money, and barters/swaps goods and trades for food and never eats out. His net worth is more, because expectations are less!

How many people live how they do, because they are expected to be seen as living to that standard?

Since reading this book my DH insists on saving and not spending (this is a men who when I met him had huge debts a BMW 3 series and a new Rolex watch each year!!!!) Now he buys second hand... and had a £5 watch and doesn't care what other people think.

And that is the best way to be!:) I couldn't give a toss either, I don't have Sky - 20,000 channels and still sod all on, my mobile is about 3 years old, no x boxes etc, the car (paid for cash) was 5 years old at the time, it's now 7, we've got a flat screen telly, but that's only 'cos the old one finally turned up it's toes last year, and it was 3rd hand!

Nothing is bought until it falls to bits, I don't wear "designer" clothes, and the clothes I do wear never go out of fashion, so they last for years!! I do buy a lot of books though, but I can afford them because I don't "waste" money on labels I don't stint on food either, can't be doing with the "feed your family for 10 quid a week"! I've done all that in the past when I had to, I don't have to now, so I don't!!;)

jo1967

I havent read all of the replies but I had a similar feeling about friends. I just couldnt understand how they "did" so much. A birthday for one of the kids would be presents, go ape, karting, cinema & a meal! 2 or 3 hols a year, spa days etc etc. Suppose I was a bit jealous - then Mrs left Mr & the kids & it turns out the debts are huge, no equity in the house, loans etc. We often wondered where we went wrong & it turned out other mutal friends thought the same. Well we werent "going wrong" only doing what we could afford without using cards overdrafts etc & going daft. Mr will probably not be able to hold onto the house & they will have nothing left. You never really know whats going on behind closed doors!!! My life is ok, not grand but good!:)