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Our kids mostly wear clothes that other peoples' kids have grown out of. Our car is ten years old, and was six years old when we bought it. We live on the 'wrong' side of town. We've not bee on a foreign holiday for almost ten years. All my bikes are 'cheap' and I am shocked when I see the prices in Singletrack magazine. We have holes in the dining room carpet.
I think you might be me too!...but it's mainly because [i]our[/i] mortgage is 'not far below four figures' each month either.
Amazed how many people are mortgage free - Are you just very old, or have you inherited, or do you just live somewhere very cheap?
None of those for me, earn a pretty good whack but not too confident about how much longer I will so concentrated on paying off mortgage on a nice house. Now I have I'm piling money into a SIPP, if I carry on earning at this level I'll be a well off OAP I suppose.
No debts that I can think of. Can thankfully pay off credit card bills in full each month. Substantial (Surrey) mortgage though 😯
Amazed how many people are mortgage free - Are you just very old, or have you inherited, or do you just live somewhere very cheap?
Being old(er) has two main advantages. Houses were a lot more affordable (eg mine cost me £91k but would now sell for North of £450k) and I've had plenty of time to pay off the mortgage....
So I'm very lucky to have been born when I was! My parents were even luckier and have two large houses with no mortgages, but then houses were cheap as chips when they bought them.....
Debt free. No mortgage, no other debt. Took me 30+ years to get there though. When we were raising our kids it was caravan holidays in the UK every year, not foreign holidays. And scruffy old cars. A habit I still have - just got rid of my 11 yr old Mondeo. I never owned a brand new sofa until I was in my 40s. Had to balance the budget carefully every month.
These days I can afford to stop working for couple of months to go bike touring. I started work at 18 so I look on my bike tours now as making up for the gap year I didn't do in my teens/20s.
I suspect that today's 20 somethings have it far tougher. My first mortgage at 19 was a huge struggle - the rate varied between 11% -13% I think - but high inflation inflated the real value of it away at the same time as increasing my wages in relation to the size of the mortgage. So after two or three hard years it was manageable. I suspect a big mortgage will be a financial millstone for far longer these days for anyone earning anywhere near average money.
My only debt is a small mortgage which is less than I have in ISAs and savings so I guess I am debt free.
A big chunk of the mortgage was paid off when my parents passed away.
It will be nice to pay of the mortgage (approx 2 years) but by then the oldest child will be going to college so I guess we will not be any better off!
I was till today, now ordered some (nice) tea and a helmet have taken me into my overdraft, time to get another job.
Never had any debt except my mortgage (paid off by inheritance, I'd prefer to still have my parents), I couldn't imagine the stress or the "**** it" attitude ppl with large debt must have,
I have a mortgage, but the equivalent in investments. A risk that seems to have paid off well for me is never paying the capital just investing instead.
I have a load of credit card debt on a 0% deal as it allows me to build up savings to offset my mortgage and then pay the balance at the end of the term.
You have to play the banks at their own game!
Will probably pay off my mortgage in full next year, but will probably soon take out another on an investment property, can't decide on a buy to let or a holiday home / let.
200K mortgage and about 20k on credit cards between me and the missus (with equity of about 220k in the house).
Mortgage is pretty low interest and the cards are 0%. We're overpaying the mortgage by a couple of hundred a month and pay off about the same on the credit cards. Also managing to save around 1.5-2k a month so that can eventually go to pay off the credit cards or help pay for a house move.
39 with 2 young kids. Could probably live a hell of a lot cheaper.