Do you live below your means?

Primrose

We have spent all our marriage living well within our mean,  basically because we are pretty frugal people who are easily contented and not greatly aspirational towards a consumer oriented lifestyle.  Also two very unexpected period of redundancy taught us relatively early on that it pays to put money aside for a rainy day.

Everybody  has to work out their own lifestyle priorities.  With each you probably sacrifice something,   If you stress easily,  peace of mind will be important to you and giving up some of life's luxuries to make yourself financially secure  is well worth the sacrifice.  On the other hand, if a big house, multiple annual foreign holidays and an expensive car are essential for what you regard as a happy life, you must recognise that if hard times  come,   you may not be able to dig yourself out of the pit and will have to live on your happy memories. 
Life can bring disasters do us all. Health problems are often beyond our control but it seems sensible to me to live sufficiently prudently that you can protect yourself against financial disasters when they threaten.  
The real problems happen, I suspect, when people with strongly opposing financial philosophies live together.     Not to be recommended and often ends in tears.   

MoneySeeker1

One of THE clues as to how it's possible imo to live right up to your means is how secure (or otherwise) your income and accommodation are. 

I can see that someone with insecure income would have to feel differently.

I can see that someone with insecure housing (eg privately rented) would have to feel differently.

I feel these two things are pretty key imo as to whether it feels possible to "live right up to your income" if you have to (ie because it's low). So, on the exact same income I'd have had to be more "cautious" if I'd been living in a privately rented place and/or hadnt known that if my employer (till I retired) would have had (worst case analysis) to basically give me at least a few months notice one way or another if I were to lose my job and probably a payout as well (depending on whether they could get away with unfair dismissal or no).


I am living up to my means now in retirement because I own my own home (without a mortgage) and the low income is State pension and secure job pension. But I buy anything/everything I've decided to buy asap in case the price goes up in real terms (because I fear I will never be financially straight and therefore had better buy whatever-it-is before the price does have a chance to rise - and at least that's one less thing on the "Am I ever going to get it?" list).

Horses for courses basically.

Jonathan_Powell

annabanana82 said:

We live under our means, we chose to have one parent at home with the children. We are fortunate that our mortgage is low, and we don't subscribe to Sky/TV packages, expensive phones etc. We don't have a TV, microwave, dishwasher and our car is 15 years old. 
I earn about 20% over the average wage, but manage to keep a husband and 3 children and have money left in the bank each month. We do have a holiday of some description each year, not always abroad but when money allows we do. We also have quite substantial savings, which we tend to forget about. 

We have no debt besides the mortgage which even my bank found difficult to believe when we first enquired about a mortgage. 
I feel we waste a lot of money, and I am trying to cut this down. 

When my Husband goes back to work in 3 years time we'll be massively better off month to month, our mortgage is due to be paid off by the time I'm 50, 13 years time. We know only too well life can take unexpected turns but all being well we should be quite comfortable in later years. 

You have no TV?! Do you actually have to talk to your husband and and pay attention to your children?

In all seriousness, why don't you have a microwave?

strawb_shortcake

Jonathan_Powell said:

annabanana82 said:

We live under our means, we chose to have one parent at home with the children. We are fortunate that our mortgage is low, and we don't subscribe to Sky/TV packages, expensive phones etc. We don't have a TV, microwave, dishwasher and our car is 15 years old. 
I earn about 20% over the average wage, but manage to keep a husband and 3 children and have money left in the bank each month. We do have a holiday of some description each year, not always abroad but when money allows we do. We also have quite substantial savings, which we tend to forget about. 

We have no debt besides the mortgage which even my bank found difficult to believe when we first enquired about a mortgage. 
I feel we waste a lot of money, and I am trying to cut this down. 

When my Husband goes back to work in 3 years time we'll be massively better off month to month, our mortgage is due to be paid off by the time I'm 50, 13 years time. We know only too well life can take unexpected turns but all being well we should be quite comfortable in later years. 

You have no TV?! Do you actually have to talk to your husband and and pay attention to your children?

In all seriousness, why don't you have a microwave?

No we don't have a TV and not had one for 18 years?? I don't think we are that unique as we may have been 18 years ago, we do watch 4oD and ITV hub and buy DVDs. 
Not sure why we don't have a microwave, but never missed having one and now I have no idea where one would live or what we'd use it for.
I tend to listen to my Husband more than talk :-D but yes we pay attention to the children, we play board games and read quite a lot. I have been off sick a few days this week and noticed how nice it was that once the children completed their homework they came in the living room, eldest put some music on and they got comfortable and read for 30 minutes. 

JGB1955

We're retired.  I'm 65 and looking forward to getting my state pension next January... but only because it will double my pension income. My husband is 67,  claiming his state pension plus a DB pension from his employer of 18 years (from 55). He has a couple of personal pensions that he's not bothering about claiming yet.  We struggle to spend our income but must,to avoid IHT. It's really hard to spend after a lifetime of austerity.... but we're working on it!

Pollycat

Jonathan_Powell said:

annabanana82 said:

We live under our means, we chose to have one parent at home with the children. We are fortunate that our mortgage is low, and we don't subscribe to Sky/TV packages, expensive phones etc. We don't have a TV, microwave, dishwasher and our car is 15 years old. 
I earn about 20% over the average wage, but manage to keep a husband and 3 children and have money left in the bank each month. We do have a holiday of some description each year, not always abroad but when money allows we do. We also have quite substantial savings, which we tend to forget about. 

We have no debt besides the mortgage which even my bank found difficult to believe when we first enquired about a mortgage. 
I feel we waste a lot of money, and I am trying to cut this down. 

When my Husband goes back to work in 3 years time we'll be massively better off month to month, our mortgage is due to be paid off by the time I'm 50, 13 years time. We know only too well life can take unexpected turns but all being well we should be quite comfortable in later years. 

You have no TV?! Do you actually have to talk to your husband and and pay attention to your children?

In all seriousness, why don't you have a microwave?

In all seriousness, why do you ask?
Your thread is about how you live.
Have people asked why you don't do certain things, have certain things?
annabanana has shared his/her story.
My sister does not have a microwave, has never had a microwave.
Her choice.

Lots of people who post on here don't have a TV.

svain

I find it odd that people like to judge people with nice things/cars etc .... Someone can have a nice car and nice house and still live "under their means" .... We only live once and having nice things is not a crime nor is it always a sign of unmanageable debt

theoretica

I do live well below my means for now, because I intend those means to cover living for more than just the now and let me stop working before whatever the rapidly retreating retirement age has got to. 

Once_a_Lion

Far within my means. The decision I face is at what age to stop throwing money into shares and to start really splashing out. 

Fireflyaway

Personally I live right in line with my means! So although I no longer borrow or have debt ( that's a recent achievement), I don't have savings and I'm still renting ( I'm 40) which isn't great. 
My parents always lived a little bit below their means. Whilst their friends bought bigger and bigger houses my parents stayed in their 2 bed. It's a nice area and just the two of them so it's doing them ok. The benefit is they paid off their mortgage by age 50 and have been able to travel and retire at a good age. I think looking ahead is key. My plan now is to actually start saving and having an emergency fund. Living to your means is better than living above them but you do need a cusion. A job loss or illness can soon unsettle things. A few years back we were given notice to leave our rented house. The landlord wanted it back. It cost nearly £4000 to get the deposit / rent in advance etc. I no longer want to live at the mercy of others!