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Is a £130-140 a week after rent and bills enough to 'live on'?
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rageagainstessays
Posts: 2,147 Forumite
Hi All,
I'm 18 and will hopefully going to be uni in September. I've worked everything out and after my accommodation has been paid (which includes bills) I will have between £130-140 a week to 'live off'. Out of this I will have to pay food expenses, books and course costs other than tuition.
Will this be enough money or do I need to obtain more?
Thanks
I'm 18 and will hopefully going to be uni in September. I've worked everything out and after my accommodation has been paid (which includes bills) I will have between £130-140 a week to 'live off'. Out of this I will have to pay food expenses, books and course costs other than tuition.
Will this be enough money or do I need to obtain more?
Thanks
“Washing one's hands of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless means to side with the powerful, not to be neutral. ”
― Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed
― Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed
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Comments
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If its just you then you can easily spend around £20-£40 tops on food plus whatever books costs for you. My daughter is at uni and she also works p/t as a waitress she is careful with money and also uses bank of mum and Dad to get her odd thing as she is tight0
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Lol, 130 is loads, I think I lived on about 20 a week this year at uni - take books out the library.0
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Books usually come at start of term, and are fairly priced for standards. So 2nd hand cheaper (but may often come with pre-written notes which may or may not be handy!) or brand spanking new, but may come at a discount with a uni affiliated store, but always check likes of waterstones with a student discount, as well as just amazon and such like.
Outside that unless you are drinking and eating at high class places you will have more than enough to "live" on. You may have grand ideas about full meal making and such, so unless if you have the likes of a freezer and bulk make food, it'll be the cheapy side of things by the end of the first term ;D
For basic living costs outside of accommodation and bills you'll be fine with that. If you are worried about course materials try and put 10/20 a week back for those book emergencies, or consider second hand to make them cheaper. That means at every term if you need to buy them you have a book bank ready to pay for them.
It seems a really silly thing to say but the less you are in debt during uni the better you life will be after, and if you can penny pinch, whilst not putting yourself out and missing good social events, then you can leave uni with a lot less worries.
If you buy lots of dear food, clothing, and the latest whatever and spend thursday to monday in the pub/club/bar it might be a struggle
One of my exes going through uni several years ago (overseas) would buy 3 or 4 of the same book/set of (programming) books, new in the uk, and have me ship them over. Even with the cost of shipping they worked out quite a bit cheaper than over there off the shelf, and he'd get his mates to buy the others. It was obscene how expensive some of them could be!
Good luck with your future studying!0 -
Wish I had £130-£140 a week left after all the bills.
But then again at 18 I could happily p**s £140 up the wall on a Friday night :beer: (living at parents, pre mortgage, wife, kids, pets! :doh:)0 -
yes of course it is, luxury budget!This is a system account and does not represent a real person. To contact the Forum Team email forumteam@moneysavingexpert.com0
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Bank of mum and dad was what my daughter used....Politicians and diapers have one thing in common. They should both be changed regularly, and for the same reason.0
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Cashflow is what is important0
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You should definitely be more than fine with that!
In terms of books, shop around for the essentials, consider 2nd hand to keep costs down & check the availability in the library before you buy. If there are a number of the core texts in the library you may be alright without buying but this isn't always the case! Also consider adding some to your Christmas list: I did this & it definitely helped.
You've also got more than enough there to have a good social life & join any sports/societies that you're interested in, just work out how much they would cost & prioritise.£2 savers #121: £1820 -
That's more than many young professional people have to live on after paying rent or bills - you'll be lucky if you have that much in your first graduate job!0
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Without accommodation costs that's a huge amount of money for a student! You won't spend vast amounts of money on food for one person so you'll have about £90 left for everything else - going out/clothes/books/stationery. You'll be fine and should even be able to save something.0
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