Child Benefit for 52K p.a.

Muttleythefrog

princessdon wrote: »

With no benefits like CTC or CB? Could you honestly live on that

I could easily. When I claimed JSA and had a £300 mortgage per month I was only deliving into savings for the mortgage payments of around half of that. So about £250 per month JSA plus no council tax was more than sufficient for me to live alone in my own house... about £50 per month on food and consumables and £50 on bills and subscriptions. Probably could live on less than £2k a year mortgage free.

Currently, with mortgage of £300 per month, ESA and DLA with added premiums I have £550 spare per month... from total of £1100 per month. So if we ignore mortgage I'm currently estimating my spending to be £250 per month... and that even includes things like boiler servicing...lol. I pay no council tax so that would have to be included in any calculation along with income tax to figure out a working income equivalent necessary. I'm currently engaging a major transformation of my house to spend my excessive money and try to reduce the symptoms making me so disabled.

Bottom line is people have wildly different expectations. Some people can spend without even appearing to do it..lol.. coffee here, can of coke there. I was criticised for blowing £60 one day recently on a vodka binge in the local pub.. my social spending for the other 364 days of the year could well end up as 0... so £5 a month on going out...lol

For the record I lived for a few months on less than 1500 pesetas a week.. about £6.. when I part owned a business in Spain.. bar provided my food and I smoked dirt cheaply... accommodation was provided via favours..lol... my main expense was tobacco.

Anyway it seems the Op's question has been answered..lol.

zagfles

melbury wrote: »

Is it only me who considers £50K to be a very high salary?

It might be a high salary, but if it supports a big family it's not a high household income.

Try this tool from the IFS http://www.ifs.org.uk/wheredoyoufitin/

It "equivalises" your income (ie accounts for family size using generally accepted equivalisation factors, which are used for govt poverty measures) and shows where you fit in.

Note that it uses net income, after tax/NI and benefits.

A £52,000 gross income is £37,000 after tax and NI. For someone with 4 children child ben would about £2500 (80% due to new rules).

So net income £39500. Put that into the calculator - say two of the children are 14+

That would be on the 35th percentile, ie well below average income!

KxMx

Usually when you see people saying 52k isn't/ might not be enough, looking at where that money is spent usually turns up holidays, cars, sky, meals/days out etc. Children doing x amount of after school activities, £100s spent at xmas and birthdays.

We're not talking about essential bills only, such as work expenses, food heating and rent/mortgage on a property which isn't bigger than needed.

There is nothing wrong with buying everything mentioned in the first paragraph but don't plead poverty if you do!

annie1975_2

She has 2 children Zagfles....
My OH had a much better paid job then got made redundant,and now on low pay,you just have to manage on what you get.

princessdon

Muttleythefrog wrote: »

I could easily. When I claimed JSA and had a £300 mortgage per month I was only deliving into savings for the mortgage payments of around half of that. So about £250 per month JSA plus no council tax was more than sufficient for me to live alone in my own house... about £50 per month on food and consumables and £50 on bills and subscriptions. Probably could live on less than £2k a year mortgage free.

Currently, with mortgage of £300 per month, ESA and DLA with added premiums I have £550 spare per month... from total of £1100 per month. So if we ignore mortgage I'm currently estimating my spending to be £250 per month... and that even includes things like boiler servicing...lol. I pay no council tax so that would have to be included in any calculation along with income tax to figure out a working income equivalent necessary. I'm currently engaging a major transformation of my house to spend my excessive money and try to reduce the symptoms making me so disabled.

Bottom line is people have wildly different expectations. Some people can spend without even appearing to do it..lol.. coffee here, can of coke there. I was criticised for blowing £60 one day recently on a vodka binge in the local pub.. my social spending for the other 364 days of the year could well end up as 0... so £5 a month on going out...lol

For the record I lived for a few months on less than 1500 pesetas a week.. about £6.. when I part owned a business in Spain.. bar provided my food and I smoked dirt cheaply... accommodation was provided via favours..lol... my main expense was tobacco.

Anyway it seems the Op's question has been answered..lol.

That poster has children. I don't know many families who could live on £12K PA and pay a mortgage with children.

Muttleythefrog

princessdon wrote: »

That poster has children. I don't know many families who could live on £12K PA and pay a mortgage with children.

Oh I don't know her circumstances... I was just giving a single person low end calculation that could be scaled up with some liberal assumptions for multiple persons. I think people have wildly different expectations and it will often be these that determine cost of living. Obviously location can be a factor too... you'd struggle to get a single car garage in some parts of London for the value of my house. A family of four on £12k PA with mortgage.. yes that would be tough... it'd need someone as miserly as me to do the household dealings..lol

zagfles

annie1975 wrote: »

She has 2 children Zagfles....
My OH had a much better paid job then got made redundant,and now on low pay,you just have to manage on what you get.

So that would put them on about the 48th-58th percentile, ie around average.