With recent statistics that says UK is a pretty expensive place to live, and from the jobs that are advertised, the salaries look mediocre at best.Now YOU bn villagers especially Living in London How do people manage to live here? expecially those living below the river..damn them places are so trendy and everything seems to be OVERPRISED by 10p

What are the secrets to making ends meet? (both legal and Illegal)



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I am listening to AMAZING by Luther Vandross.. how nice

London weighting on top of the wages for SOME people. For others, extra hours and yes you are right, we live on credit. Some people to a ridicolous extent.

Credit is so prevalent in society and so conditioned are we too it, that the notion we are spending somebody elses money and will have topay it all back (with interest and fees) is lost on the majority population who continue spending the country into a false boom...

If the EU gets its way and clamps down on all our hours what will we do? Hmmm

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Can anybody tell me how long we are allowed to work each day. I think it is 75 hours a week, Im not sure, but I have no idea what it is for each DAY.

Even with London Weighting applied within the Civil Service, the salaries are terrible.

I suppose the expense of living in London has led to many people relying on bikes and public transport to get around, as owning a car is expensive. There are ways to save money - shopin thrift markets, you'll always find a sale going on somewhere, and buy in bulk.

I also know of quite a few people who either "hustle" or have a legitimate second job. I myself "moonlight" on certain occasions.

That said, when I go to Nottingham, I'm always amazed the prices there are on par with London - even, in some cases more expensive.

LOL

@Coltrane

I will give examples of parents.................

get post grad education and go and work in tax free haven like Kuwait.................after 8 years you will have enough cash to buy 3 properties cash straight without a mortage......................once you have no mortage to pay the skys the limit.....................

and

invest outside while living in London, my mu has several shares with oil companies in Middle east..................properties in Qatar..................all of these things ables you to live in London.

so unfortunatly the big sacrifice is working in the middle east.

@lady vee

what do u mean by:

I myself "moonlight" on certain occasions



just curious...

@soofresh

afriend of mine works for 3i as some sort of investment consultant thing (my eyes glaze over when she tells me what she does). She's renting some mews house in Kensington for (wait for it)

£36,000 a year.

That's an amount most people can only dream of earning gross in a year.



Yeah I know about the Gulfand the thing about there is that White Brits think they own that place its very difficult to get a job with british companies there unless you have someone to pull the strings for you I mean a country like Oman a Abudhabi& Qatar is completely taken over by Brits while Saudi is all American but not for long as them Arab graduates from the west are going back to take their jobs back



Yeah its agood thing to invest in oli companies there but I think the classic example is the Nile Oil company of sudan their shares just shot up just after signing of peace in Southern Sudan

@DM

The average debt per UK household is around £7,000, excluding mortgages1. Politicians want us to believe this is due to irresponsible spendthrifts abusing easy credit, but according to recent research at least one in five people in Britain resorts to debt to cover basic living costs

of course, some people do use credit to fund "greedy" lifestyles, but overall spiralling debt has more to do with Britain's low-wage culture and high poverty level. The government doesn't want you to think about this, with politically sensitive issues such as student loans in the news.

Patience is the key to living in London, wiat for sales, dont be sucke din to the latest fads, be very econmical with utilities, save, and invest in safe companies

Save from a young age for a deposit on a property. I did this from the age of 16 (saved a third or half of every paycheck) whilst I watched my mates spend every penny they earned.Many now cannot afford a deposit and waste their money renting. Put yourself in a position to get a well paid job. I suppose I was lucky that I got on to a graduate scheme with agood employera month after graduating. Hook up with a partner that also has a good job so that you can split the mortgage payments because London is a lot cheaper if you can split bills. Shop around for the cheapest utilities and as Cashmoney said wait for the salesd to buy those nice shoes from Selfridges! Never get a credit card, people always say that they will only use them in an emergency and then they eventuallyuse it for everything. If you do all of this, you'll be ok and living in London is then fine.

have to agree with babygirl, wise words.

ill add one sentence:

Live Below Your Means.



the biggest trap people get into when they start earning a decent wage is to start increasing their expenditures.

Luxury foods,Wine Bars, New cars, weekends away etc etc.

Big Mistake, avoid this like the plague.

Easily started saving from 16, used that to pay for my university, didn't apply for a loan which was tempting but nah...... last year of uni survided on toast, and tesco's tuna.....

As for me...I got a relatively good job, for someone of my age.... so the living cost doesn't really bother me as such....banana.gif... doesn't mean I don't save... and I don't have dime of creditto my name... but for most part I think many pps still leave with family, which saves them alot of £ on rent...