How much savings do you have and what age are you?

SusieBlue

ted1 wrote: »

Do you Intend to stay single.
I’ve a few friends who were in the sane situation as you. Some bought the coupled up then were left with a property that did t suit their needs. Some blew every cent they had , meet a guy or girl and pooled their resources. Don’t feel obliged to follow the herd

Ideally I’d prefer to meet someone & buy a property together, even if he wasn’t a high earner it would be a lot lot more doable and less pressure on two incomes.
But I suppose I can’t wait for that to happen and I need to start putting a dent in it now just in case it doesn’t come to be.

I’m stuck in the middle really, while my wage is low enough to qualify for social housing, I’d be extremely low on the list of priority because I don’t have kids yet.
But then on the other hand, the 3.5 lending rule means it’s going to be very difficult for me to buy alone.
So my options are to stay at home, save, and pray I meet someone to jointly apply with or spend the rest of my life blowing the majority of my income on rent.

I wish there was a middle option for people like me. If long term renting for a reasonable price was available I’d do it in a heartbeat.

nthclare

ted1 wrote: »

You sir are the richest person so far

In spirit and I had to do it, because I hated the cooperative world.
It was soulless and full of narcissist's.
I got huge inheritance and said to myself now's your chance to get the hell away from these ruthless bastard's.
Property was still affordable back then.
I'll admit now and again I think to myself will I go back to the cooperative world and make more money for a year and cash in, but my gut says leave the fckers behind.
It's a different world.
Anyhow I'm a bearded shaved headed guy with tats and my tolerance for dishonest transactions is very poor, I don't conform very well to White collar skangers in suit's etc...and people getting prompted for their looks and charm rather than intelligence and productivity.

Have you ever noticed attractive looking people getting promoted above talented normal pleasant looking people ???

Sometimes I go to office's such as a Procurement department, in my tree surgeon gear and you'll see the gouls in their suits trying to cock block you with disgusted look's.
Actually I like dealing with gay guy's or woman in procurement as they're usually great banter and it drives the other boring knobs mad that you've brightened up the gay guy or attractive lady in accounts day.
One office used to call myself and my colleague Seamus the diet coke guy's.
Much to the disgust of Rob and Martin in accounts...

I love it I do

nthclare

jimbobaloobob wrote: »

Have to agree fair play to those savers. Had a good savings that went into investments and property prior to the last recession. Lost the lot

Live day to day now in a small cottage rented very rurally to make it affordable. Working but not now with pandemic.
Don’t regret the choices I made but c’est la vie. Good on ye with the bulging bank accounts.

Remember buddy it's all in the head, enjoy your small farm house and cherish the moment.
Because from where I'm sitting I think you're doing ok .

I'm rural myself alone in a bigger house, but it's a happy home..

Better Than Christ

A modest amount - combination of inheritance and general savings. I recently made a major sacrifice with regard to my living arrangements, which means I'm now spending 20% of my income on rent and bills (it was more than 60% before). I don't drink or smoke, I live quite frugally and I do a lot of overtime, so I'm currently able to put away at least 60% of my income every month. Ideally, I'd like to be in a position to buy a home without requiring much of a mortgage in maybe four or five years, or whenever the next major crash happens.

Oh, and I'm 38¼

Dr Bolouswki

I'm 49, worked mcjobs til age 28, then got into tech - then earned about somewhere between 50k-90k a year varying for about 15 years once established.

Don't work now, spent it all, have no savings.

Happiest I've EVER been.

PommieBast

38 and I would say about €15k in genuine savings.

Blew £100k inheritance from grandfather by living in New Zealand and jet-setting around Asia. I have no regrets.

ted1

PommieBast wrote: »

Blew £100k inheritance from grandfather by living in New Zealand and jet-setting around Asia. I have no regrets.

I wouldn’t call that blowing it. I’d say you made you grandfather smile

onrail

PommieBast wrote: »

38 and I would say about €15k in genuine savings.

Blew £100k inheritance from grandfather by living in New Zealand and jet-setting around Asia. I have no regrets.

Depends on his grandfather!

Yeah I'd agree that enjoying your 20s properly is a far superior choice than having a bank balance. I'm 32 now, wife and child and I must say that spending €20-30k travelling the world was money well spent. Don't regret one penny.

That being said, there's a balance to be had. I worked while travelling and my bank balance is a small bit healthier because of it, and I actually found working to add as much to the experience as anything.

Mister Vain

SusieBlue wrote: »

Ideally I’d prefer to meet someone & buy a property together, even if he wasn’t a high earner it would be a lot lot more doable and less pressure on two incomes.
But I suppose I can’t wait for that to happen and I need to start putting a dent in it now just in case it doesn’t come to be.

I’m stuck in the middle really, while my wage is low enough to qualify for social housing, I’d be extremely low on the list of priority because I don’t have kids yet.
But then on the other hand, the 3.5 lending rule means it’s going to be very difficult for me to buy alone.
So my options are to stay at home, save, and pray I meet someone to jointly apply with or spend the rest of my life blowing the majority of my income on rent.

I wish there was a middle option for people like me. If long term renting for a reasonable price was available I’d do it in a heartbeat.

I can relate to this. The catch 22 of needing a partner to get a place but needing a place to get a partner. The stigma of living at home vs haemorrhaging money on rent and having little or no disposable income. I'll probably end up getting a log cabin at some stage.

lainey_d_123

I'm 34 and have about 9000 euro saved. Nowhere near what I'd want it to be, but I haven't had much of a choice. Until fairly recently, I was earning poverty wages and I've been paying full rent and bills since I turned 18. I've paid a six figure sum of rent in my life, which is painful to think about. I've had some really good jobs as in they were challenging and fulfilling, but working in higher education, it was a lot of poorly paid contract work and instability. I had to live off savings in between contracts and pay my own relocation expenses every time I moved for work, so there was really no chance to put money away.

No assets either - again, have not been able to afford anything. I have travelled a bit and obviously spent money on that, but was either freelancing or teaching abroad at the time, so it wasn't really all 'holidays', and I was saving a lot of money by basing myself in cheaper countries. Have never been a huge spender on material things.

I feel quite depressed by my situation, especially seeing what other people have saved. I often feel like I'm walking on quicksand. I sacrifice a good bit to save anything at all and then as soon as my savings start to look decent, something happens and I end up spending a chunk of them. It feels like I can never get on my feet. Anyone else feel like that?

Donald Trump

These threads always remind me of this character:

theteal

I had lots when I emigrated at 28 (9 years ago), saved my celtic bubble pocket money. Took a year off work for a bit of travelling and committed to studying up for the planned career change. Climbed the ladder and swapped jobs until the salary was decent enough to get a sufficient mortgage. Just over 2 years ago, the remaining savings went on the deposit, about 25% of purchase price. Mostly since then, it's been a case of accumulate some savings and then spend on a project in the house. Not far off being finished that cycle, the house is nearly where we want it. I've swapped jobs twice more since we got the house and salary is much healthier so there is now a rainy day fund (a few months mortgage payments) and the pension contributions are being maxed now for the first time in my life.

I'm not a big spender, I like to buy wisely and make stuff last, the 07 Mazda and 05 Yaris on the driveway are evidence. Yeah we had to move out to the sticks but the house was a bargain and a great learning experience and in spite of the brits voting habits has actually increased in value by a healthy amount - I'm sure COVID will have a thing to say about that.

So, to actually answer the question, some, not lots.

theteal

PaddyLocks wrote: »

How do people manage to save with the cost of living in ireland

. . .by moving to England

Mister Vain

lainey_d_123 wrote: »

I'm 34 and have about 9000 euro saved. Nowhere near what I'd want it to be, but I haven't had much of a choice. Until fairly recently, I was earning poverty wages and I've been paying full rent and bills since I turned 18. I've paid a six figure sum of rent in my life, which is painful to think about. I've had some really good jobs as in they were challenging and fulfilling, but working in higher education, it was a lot of poorly paid contract work and instability. I had to live off savings in between contracts and pay my own relocation expenses every time I moved for work, so there was really no chance to put money away.

No assets either - again, have not been able to afford anything. I have travelled a bit and obviously spent money on that, but was either freelancing or teaching abroad at the time, so it wasn't really all 'holidays', and I was saving a lot of money by basing myself in cheaper countries. Have never been a huge spender on material things.

I feel quite depressed by my situation, especially seeing what other people have saved. I often feel like I'm walking on quicksand. I sacrifice a good bit to save anything at all and then as soon as my savings start to look decent, something happens and I end up spending a chunk of them. It feels like I can never get on my feet. Anyone else feel like that?

I started to make more of an effort to save last year. Cut back on takeaways, started shopping in Aldi, spending less on clothes and so on. I saved a fair bit but then the gearbox in my car decided to die and it cost me an arm and a leg to get it fixed.

Donald Trump

PaddyLocks wrote: »

How do people manage to save with the cost of living in ireland

People who say such things are often those with decent jobs.


There are probably people much less than you but who can survive. And you are probably earning more than you were 5 years ago.



It is generally the case that people set their point of reference where they are now. If you get a 10% raise next year, you'll go and buy something new or reset your reference point in some other way.

Canyon86

I have 22,000 saved, currently in the process of applying for a mortgage,

I intend to start a pension when i have the house sorted, and then build up an emergency fund from there

no loans or credit cards, thankfully, they are evil

Thargor

Johnny0232 wrote: »

42,

Bought my first house aged 34. Sold 4 years later and made a good profit.(€70k) Pooled together a 85k redundancy to buy a bigger property with a lot of rental potential.
House worth roughly 295k is now paid off.
Utilising the 14k per annum tax free room rental.
Current rental income 18k. decided to just work part time for now.
17k in savings.

If you have 18k in rental income from any source you can't claim the 14k rent a room scheme, the minute you exceed 14k it all gets taxed. Revenue will spot that eventually and come after you for the whole amount plus interest and costs.

thomasdylan

I'm 31. Have 24,000 in savings. 480,000 odd owed on mortgage (between two). 6,000 owed on loan for wedding which I'll probably pay the balance on now.

So overall minus a lot of money. I work a lot but would go out for dinner often and would pay for big purchases for my parents (like car).

antimatterx

Canyon86 wrote: »

I have 22,000 saved, currently in the process of applying for a mortgage,

I intend to start a pension when i have the house sorted, and then build up an emergency fund from there

no loans or credit cards, thankfully, they are evil

Loans and Credit cards are absolutely not evil. They're tools to be used, and there's no reason to ever pay interest on your credit card.

Donald Trump

Thargor wrote: »

If you have 18k in rental income from any source you can't claim the 14k rent a room scheme, the minute you exceed 14k it all gets taxed. Revenue will spot that eventually and come after you for the whole amount plus interest and costs.

Yeah, the relief is only if the total is under 14k. If you take in 14001, then it isn't that you are taxed on the marginal 1 Euro - you are taxed on the entire 14001 because you no longer qualify for the waiver

Lyra Fangs

This thread is making me panic something fierce :eek:

I'm in my current role almost 2 years making a reasonable wage. Before that I was 3-4 years working for much less in Dublin (< 25k gross/yr). For the full 6 years I've been paying the usual mental rent, bills etc etc.

I feel like I've only really been able to start saving these last two years and even then it's not much to write home about...

Any words of wisdom from the people doing so well?

(I spent my 20s with my head stuck in a book so no fear that nights out are where my money went )

BohsCeltic

Lyra Fangs wrote: »

This thread is making me panic something fierce :eek:

Any words of wisdom from the people doing so well?

It depends on how you define doing well. I have friends who are well paid and have a nice home, family e.t.c but they would often tell me they would love to live the life i lived.
That is just going travelling at the drop of a hat when i have enough money saved.

This could all change though after we get over this virus. The OH is also fixated on wanting a baby too.

nthclare

I blew half my savings today on a chainsaw, I'm delighted with my purchase.

And I'm going to buy a forest master saw horse tomorrow.

It'll pay for itself in 3 hour's. That's what I call an investment.

None of this blowing money on fluctuating shares and fluffy white cloud's.

I know there's products out there worth investing in, but like I said previously I don't want to be investing in people's misery, money comes and goes.

If I won the lottery I'd builld a surf ranch near the coast, something like Kelly Slater's set up.
Because it'll cost me nothing, and I'd be happy to provide waves during calm period's so surfer's have somewhere to go and practice.
I would charge a lot to have a go either..

vmb

Donald Trump wrote: »

People who say such things are often those with decent jobs.


There are probably people much less than you but who can survive. And you are probably earning more than you were 5 years ago.



It is generally the case that people set their point of reference where they are now. If you get a 10% raise next year, you'll go and buy something new or reset your reference point in some other way.

That's key. My salary has been growing strongly during these years, but I have not increased my expenses.
I've always lived in places with solid public transport so I do not need a car, as I understand cars are extremely expensive. If I need it, I just rent a gocar.

antimatterx

antimatterx wrote: »

Loans and Credit cards are absolutely not evil. They're tools to be used, and there's no reason to ever pay interest on your credit card.

You sound like you know a thing or two about credit cards. I've never used one. So I'm curious, if I take out a credit card that offers 0% interest for 12 months (off the top of my head, I think An Post are doing this at the moment), can I then use the card to, for argument sake, pay €10k off my mortgage, and so long as I pay the 10k back to the credit card within 12 months, I am effectively after getting a 'free' loan?

Also has anyone watched that RTE show "how to be good with money"?

sportsfan90

Deleted User wrote: »

Also has anyone watched that RTE show "how to be good with money"?

Yeah I enjoy Eoin McGee's tv shows and his radio contributions.
I'm currently reading his book of the same name.

Cal4567

62 and have 45k now saved. (Am I the oldest person on Boards?) Only been able to really save once we paid the mortgage off. House worth about 300k. The plan is to work to 65 with about 100k saved between the two of us. Worked a lot in the UK before coming back home in 2004 so qualify for a UK pension as well, if they are around in the future. We have two small private pensions. Once the mortgage was out of the way, saving has come a lot easier. We have a combined income of around 100k. I was unemployed for 2 years after the crash. While the redundancy payment covered monthly mortgage payments, literally the month that ran out, I got some work, in 2013 although my wife kept her PS role.

We then took advice we were given back in the 80s and that was to try and overpay your mortgage every month. A decision I wished I had acted upon much earlier. We had our first foreign holiday in 2017, after 11 years. Our other regret was coming late to the idea of a private pension. Didn't start until we were close to 40.

Planning to sell our house here in north county Dublin in the next couple of years and help the kids out with mortgages as much as we can although they are in secure enough and well paid work, already have as much as we do in savings, they stayed living with us.

My advice to anyone in their 20s would be to stay at home if they can and save. Once you get offered a work pension, take it. You cannot start early enough. And overpay that mortgage if you can each month.

Have a Plan B if this upcoming recession hits us, but's a good idea for a new thread.

lainey_d_123

Mister Vain wrote: »

I started to make more of an effort to save last year. Cut back on takeaways, started shopping in Aldi, spending less on clothes and so on. I saved a fair bit but then the gearbox in my car decided to die and it cost me an arm and a leg to get it fixed.

I already do all that but still struggling to save what I want to. I think my costs are just too high in London. My company is floating the idea of us being able to work remotely on a permanent basis. I'd save up to £600-700 a month just from living in a cheaper city.

I need to work on getting some other income streams together as well. A friend of mine is making over 2 grand a month from an app he made, all just straight into his savings (he has a day job) but I'm not at the level where I can do that yet and not sure what else to do.

fits

40. have a few months expenses in cash. Saving up for next car as loan averse. Anything in excess of that the plan is to use to overpay the mortgage but hasn’t happened in practice yet and we just fixed for 5 years at 2.5%.

Have had investments in the past but am more risk averse now as I have a son with special needs and we need to make sure his future is secure. So we have a life assurance that will set him up with a trust fund. Anything else is used to minimise loan commitments and pay down mortgage.