I just about to buy a house outside of London. I'm also about to send my 2 kids to private school as all the decent local state schools are full with waiting lists (thankfully a lot cheaper than the figures mentioned here). I had a look at one of the options for commuting into London. This is the quickest option from where I am (via HS1). I'm already up to the following monthly expenses:
Mortgage: £3200
School Fees: £1375
Travel: £450 (next cheapest is £300)
Insurance: ~£300 (Critical Illness, Life insurance)
Bills: £1500 (guestimate)
These are a mix of expenses I'll have to pay personally, and some that I can pay as business expenses.
So I'm up to £7k monthly outgoings already, without even trying. In reality I'll need to add another £3k ish for loan repayments and other bits. As a contractor I'm able to be quite tax efficient, but as a single salary earner, http://www.thesalarycalculator.co.uk/salary.php tells me I'd need to be earning > £200k to cover this.
I could economize. I could get a cheaper car for example and I could have bought a cheaper house - the one I'm buying certainly isn't a palace though.
But, yeah - London is expensive!
Mortgage: £3200
School Fees: £1375
Travel: £450 (next cheapest is £300)
Insurance: ~£300 (Critical Illness, Life insurance)
Bills: £1500 (guestimate)
These are a mix of expenses I'll have to pay personally, and some that I can pay as business expenses.
So I'm up to £7k monthly outgoings already, without even trying. In reality I'll need to add another £3k ish for loan repayments and other bits. As a contractor I'm able to be quite tax efficient, but as a single salary earner, http://www.thesalarycalculator.co.uk/salary.php tells me I'd need to be earning > £200k to cover this.
I could economize. I could get a cheaper car for example and I could have bought a cheaper house - the one I'm buying certainly isn't a palace though.
But, yeah - London is expensive!