Can we realistically survive on one salary long term?

Age: 35
Spouse’s/Partner's age: 42

Annual gross income from employment or profession: 58,000 (incremental annually until 69,000)
Annual gross income of spouse: Currently on Job seekers benefit

Type of employment: e.g. Civil Servant, self-employed:
Public Sector (me)
Construction sector (spouse)

In general are you spending more than you earn or are you saving? Saving

Rough estimate of value of home: 300,000
Amount outstanding on your mortgage: 150,000 (20 years left on interest rate of 4.5% approx but due to come off fixed rate later this year
What interest rate are you paying? 4.5% fixed

Other borrowings – car loans/personal loans etc None

Do you pay off your full credit card balance each month? Yes
If not, what is the balance on your credit card?

Savings and investments:
200 per month into Evergreen fund(I know!!) We had 17,500 in it not sure what its worth now
115 into Smart choice account for boys (was hoping to increase this)
150 into everyday savings account

Do you have a pension scheme? Yes Public sector pension(me)
Spouse was paying into construction sector pension

Do you own any investment or other property? No

Ages of children: 3 & 1

Life insurance: Yes 58 per month and also one attached to mortgage


What specific question do you have or what issues are of concern to you?
My husband was laid off work early this year, he has a chance of a job but it will be ad-hoc and we have our children in childcare full time in the hope that something more permanent coming would come up. We are just wondering what people feel is our position for him to leave the workforce full-time?
Everytime we mention it we get funny looks from people as if it just wont work, (maybe thats more a gender issue and not for this forum!!)
Would appreciate your views

Why shouldn't your husband leave the workforce full time?. Whilst it is not the norm, if it works for you and him, go for it.

You can improve your tax position by transferring his tax credits over to yourself so you end up paying less tax

Ask yourself a question, how much will it cost you to keep your kids in perm childcare. Then what will your husband need to earn to pay for this. ?

My wife gave up work when we had our first as I was the highest earner. I'd quite happily stay at home if she was earning more.

Only down side, do you trust him to do the ironing????

Mpsox said:

You can improve your tax position by transferring his tax credits over to yourself so you end up paying less tax.

Click to expand...

I've no disagreement with the rest of the points, but this is not accurate. A single-income couple with children can pay up to €6,240 more in tax each year than a dual-income couple earning the same amount. Do a search here for "individualisation".

Thanks for your very prompt replies
Mpsox... Thats the thing I wouldn't trust him to do any house work but if the kids were happy then so would I!
Our childcare is 250 per week so we had a good 250 on top of that or more with Spouses salary a week and always seemed to get through it quickly, mind you have just finished paying off both cars so that will no longer be a headache so hopefully with a bit of belt tightening we will be okay!
That seems a bit unfair re tax for one income families, obviously encouraging one parent to stay at home is not on the governments agenda.

Your financial situation looks good to me Mammyto2 particularly with no debt other than your mortgage and with a healthy amount of investments.

Plenty manage with a total household income less than yours.

Seriously, would your husband manage with household duties? How does he feel about it?

He could always supplement income evenings/weekends etc too of course.

well in terms of how well you are doing, I think it is feasable for him to be an at home dad. If he is happy with this choice and so are you, it does look like you can handle it financially.
In terms of the house work, i think as primary carer for 2 toddlers he will get with the cleaning programme... after all after one fruitless search for a shoe, going forward he'll start doing the 'place for everything, everything in its place'.
Best of luck to you both.

Hey, Thanks again for replies
Not sure he'd be great at the chores or that we would have seriously considered this if his work situation was any different but after spending sleepless nights wondering how we were going to cope with creche fees whilst he's been off weeks on end it is starting to seem like the only solution.
Im one of these people who need security but I am so worried that we wont cope. Also Im hoping that we can live a fairly decent life, I hate to think of always struggling, I'd like to have a few luxuries but hell its only for a little while until things right themselves again in construction, right??!! Or maybe its time for a complete re- think of what he does.