As the results show, if you're a single person with no children you should be able to live comfortably in the UK on a salary of just over £20,000, while a child-free couple could live comfortably on a combined income of around £27,000.
Living alone set to increase
More and more of us in the UK are living alone. The number of people living on their own went up by 16% to 7.7 million between 1997 and 2017, while the UK population increased by only 13%. By 2039, the number of one-person households is projected to rise to 10.7 million2.
When it comes to living independently, younger generations are practicing patience, according to a new report from Zillow. The study revealed that, as of 2017, the average age that people start living alone is 26. (For comparison, it was 23 in 1980).
According to research (2021), couples in the UK need a minimum retirement income of £15,700, to live a moderate lifestyle for £29,100 or £47,500 to live comfortably. These stats are a national average outside of London, and your circumstances could be different.
Living alone gives you that freedom of course, but it also brings with it the ability to be actively independent. Anyone can be independent (even when living as a couple) but living alone brings with it authentic independence and self-discipline like nothing else.
Senator Elizabeth Warren popularized the so-called "50/20/30 budget rule" (sometimes labeled "50-30-20") in her book, All Your Worth: The Ultimate Lifetime Money Plan. The basic rule is to divide up after-tax income and allocate it to spend: 50% on needs, 30% on wants, and socking away 20% to savings.
To rent a decent place on your own, you'll need an annual salary of around £117,000. The mean salary needed across all London boroughs (plus the City of London) is a shade under £40,000.
In the UK, a monthly net income between £2,000 and £3,000 is considered to be a good salary. With that income, you can afford a decent life in a large British city, including renting a two-bedroom apartment, eating out, and spending weekends away.
Summary. £25,000 is a fairly low salary for the UK as a whole if you've been in the workforce a while, but it's a pretty good starting point if you're a graduate or fairly new to the workforce.
Summary. £35,000 is an ok salary for the UK as a whole, but in higher cost of living places like London it's not going to go as far. It's slightly higher than the median full time earnings outside of London, and therefore it puts your personal income at a higher level than many others.
Yes, saving $2000 per month is good. Given an average 7% return per year, saving a thousand dollars per month for 20 years will end up being $1,000,000. However, with other strategies, you might reach over 3 Million USD in 20 years, by only saving $2000 per month.
Fast answer: A general rule of thumb is to have one times your annual income saved by age 30, three times by 40, and so on.
The thought of living alone may be terrifying to some. But for many people who have actually done it, the experience turns out to be not only enjoyable but enriching too. Living alone may seem scary at first, but it can be so wonderfully rewarding.
Households are in low income if they live on less than 60% of the median income. This was around £28,500 for a couple with no children in the period from January 2017 to December 2018 before housing costs.
A single person in the UK needs to earn at least £13,400 a year or £157 per week for a minimum standard of living according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) whilst a single pensioner needs a minimum of £136 per week excluding Housing costs.
20k is a good wage if you're young, fresh out of uni, still living with parents or in a house share but for a career it's not a lot. You'd still be living pay cheque to pay cheque. You can't buy a house or support a family on 20k. Lots of households support families on incomes of less than 20k.
Living alone doesn't mean being lonely. It means that you have more control over who you spend your time with. You can still invite friends and family over, and you can spend most of your free time out and about in the city. Yet, you keep the freedom to choose to spend time in your own company.
For one thing, having a partner makes big and small expenditures much more affordable, whether it's a down payment on a house, rent, day care, utility bills, or other overhead costs of daily life. One recent study estimated that, for a couple, living separately is about 28 percent more expensive than living together.
Living in a solitary environment gives you the opportunity to learn more about yourself, such as your strengths, weaknesses, motivations, behaviors, and desires. This can help you to become more self-aware and introspective, and it also encourages you to mature and grow as a person.