40 Year Old With No Assets Looking For Advice

Age: 40
Spouse’s/Partner's age: 38

Annual gross income from employment or profession: 84,000 + 5000 Bonus
Annual gross income of spouse: 40,000 (currently on career break ) - going back next year

Monthly take-home pay : 4,300
Type of employment:
Private sector
Civil Service (spouse)

In general are you:
Breaking even/Saving 400 a month
Dipping in for adhoc costs insurance etc

Rough estimate of value of home : 430,0000
Amount outstanding on your mortgage: 244,000 , 24 years left on the term
What interest rate are you paying? 2.55%

Other borrowings – car loans/personal loans etc
None

Do you pay off your full credit card balance each month? Yes

Savings and investments:
Savings 18,000

Do you have a pension scheme?
Yes, only contribute 6 + 8 employer
Civil Service pension (spouse)

Do you own any investment or other property?
N/A

Ages of children:
5 + 7

Life insurance:
Yes

What specific question do you have or what issues are of concern to you?
Length of mortgage lack of pension/investments/kids funds

Any advice how to improve our situation

Have you ever done a budget to see where your money is going?

You do have assets.

You are saving.

You are building up a pension scheme.

You are paying down your mortgage by €7,500 a year which is a form of saving.

Your spouse took a career break which is exactly the right thing to do to focus on the family when they needed it.

By all means, examine your spending, but don't panic when you have young children and you are "only" managing to make normal contributions to your pension fund and to pay down your mortgage.

Brendan

Hi HollowKnight,

We do not stick to a budget (my wife does all the spending) although I do review the monthly expenses

A snapshot of October worked out like this:

Joint Acc (Mortgage Repayments 1050 + Sky 25 + Life insurance 44 + House insurance 36) 1500
Savings 400
Food (ranges between 800-1000) 805
Medical (VHI 196 + 138 Phamacy + 73 Doc) 407
Kids (clothes + books + school) 100
Car (113 Deisel + 88 repair) 201
Takeaway (157 takeaway + 100 restaurant) 257
House (bins + things for house) 114


Thanks Brendan. Sorry to come off like that. Any advise is appreciated.

On the numbers you provide, you have another €516 unaccounted for. (net pay - expenses)
Maybe start there.