PerthNow’s Cash Confessions asks a wide variety of West Australians what their income is and what they spend their money on in a week.
This week, a married couple, both musicians with one child, share what they spend their salaries on in a week.
Age: I am 37 and my husband is 39. We have a three year old son.
Live: Parkwood, WA
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Jobs: We both have casual contract jobs teaching in schools. We are both paid by the hour but only for around 32 weeks of the year, so we have to save money and work hard over the school term to make ends meet during the holidays, especially the lengthy summer holidays!
We both are performers with fairly regular gigs which keeps the money trickling in but being freelancers it is never stable.
Some months are good, but some months the gigs are dry and we have just our school teaching money to live off.
Hubby works a lot less at the moment as he is studying part-time and also caring for our child one day a week.
Salaries: We aim for between $87,000 and $90,000 per year by combining our all of our earnings together.
Our salaries are a bit unpredictable as we are musicians and one of us is also studying. I work five days a week in my school teaching position but with all of the holidays and unpaid breaks it adds up to about $61,000 a year.
Hubby works two days a week in teaching at the moment which will rake in about $22,000 over the next year.
While our hourly rate is fixed, our income can fluctuate based on how many students we have and if there are any absences.
We also don’t get paid if we have to take a day off due to illness or other reasons, so we need a bit of a margin.
We get paid varied amounts depending on what type of gig we do, how long it goes for and where it is, so we just count our gig income as a bonus and use that for the extras (such as going out for dinner, buying non-essential items, Christmas/birthday presents/personal treats and savings towards travel/home improvements).
MONTHLY EXPENSES:
Mortgage: $1,820 per month plus we pay an additional $330 per month in strata fees and rates.
Food/groceries: Between $600 and $750 per month
Utilities: $342 per month
Insurance: $173 per month
Phone/internet: $360 per month (includes paying off one iPhone/iPad and a 15GB prepaid phone package)
Medical: $250 per month (two regular appointments a month, plus some extra put to the side for any GP appointments, etc)
Petrol/parking/Smartrider: $520 per month
Vehicle maintenance/registration: $413 per month
Dining out/takeaway: $400-$500 a month
Alcohol: $30 per month. Hubby doesn’t drink but I do drink a little, although I usually get free drinks at gigs anyway. At home, I only drink what we already have from gifts and things like that.
Car loan (private arrangement): $186 per month
Clothes/presents/personal maintenance etc): $300 per month all up
Streaming services: $35 per month
Internet: $110 per month
Gym membership: $110 per month for two people
Childcare: $675 per month (this is for four days a week after the rebate)
Solar panels: $165 per month
Money we put into savings: Whatever we have leftover
Finance for overseas asset: $230 per month (This is for an affordable block of land overseas that I bought when I was living abroad, before I became pregnant. In the end, we decided to raise our child in Australia surrounded by family but I’ve held onto the land.
ASSETS/SAVINGS/EQUITY:
Equity: Roughly $90,000 from our home that we bought in 2022.
After one-and-a-half years of intense savings (incomes combined) and a $10,000 early inheritance from a treasured grandfather figure in my life who died plus $25,000 from the sale of a previous asset (a separate piece of land I jointly owned overseas with my ex-husband), we were able to secure a loan for a $403,000 home. It’s a three bedroom, one bathroom strata home which was built in the late 70’s on a good size block with a decent backyard. We purchased it in late 2022 in Parkwood. We put down an $83,000 deposit and are paying off the rest over 30 years.
Other assets (combined): $26,000.
We own a cheap runabout car outright which is worth about $3000, and we are paying a family member off for a newer car that we were sold for $14,500.
We are also paying off the block of land overseas which now holds some equity, but probably only about $10,000 so far.
We also have an old 1986 caravan which we got cheaply (bought outright) but have since done up a bit. It’s probably worth about $5,000 now.
Savings: $5,000
This will probably be eaten into over the school holidays though.
ABOUT US:
We had both lived very dynamic and carefree lives as performing artists prior to the birth of our son.
We spent most of the last 20 years travelling, studying and gigging overseas, rather than being greatly focused on creating a strong financial base for ourselves.
I had a block of land with an ex-partner which was split in half when we separated, and I was able to use my half towards our home deposit. It had been sitting in the bank for about four years waiting to be put toward my future home.
Then we got unexpectedly pregnant in 2020, in the peak of the pandemic, and we were living overseas at that time with very little to live off.
We made the decision to move to Perth (my birth town, although I had lived away from Perth for about 15 years) to be able to start afresh and rely on family support while we tried to build a new life together.
We were hoping to be able to build a more stable life for our son.
We spent almost two years living in my sister’s home as boarders with a newborn. We had seven people under one roof! This helped us while we adapted to parenthood, searched for jobs and saved for a home deposit. Without doing this, I highly doubt that we’d have been able to save for a home. At that time, I was working about four days a week and hubby had started working six to seven days a week juggling several different jobs (not to mention rehearsal and gigs!).
All of this allowed us to get a loan from the bank for our humble three-bedroom, one-bathroom home.
It was challenging at times for us, and most certainly for my sister, but we were so grateful because the housing crisis was very stressful and we would have had a really difficult time trying to get a rental.
Immediately after moving into our home, we started saving toward our next goal: bringing my mother-in-law over from overseas.
We saved enough money for hubby to go overseas and assist her with her trip over, and cover the expenses related to that.
The next goal was to save for an overseas holiday for the four of us, and the money for her onward journey back home.
In a year, we saved about $15,000 toward this trip and we were able to get by financially (coming back with almost nothing in our accounts, but happy with what we had managed to achieve).
Now we are focused on extending ourselves career-wise so that we can secure more stable, fixed-salary jobs in the future.
This requires us both to do further university study, so we plan to take turns. This year hubby is studying, and maybe next year will be my turn to do part-time study while he picks up the weight of our expenses. If that doesn’t work out, we may have to consider taking in lodgers so that we can manage our payments.
Hubby is very keen to upgrade his 21-year-old runabout vehicle so is trying his best to set aside money for that, while I am more interested in saving for another family trip overseas and some home improvements.
When we have finished our studies and are gaining a better income, I’d really like to set aside $100 a week for our son’s future.
I am also thinking we’d be wise to consider getting private health cover for the family.
DAY 1: MONDAY
Hubby is at home today studying and job-searching.
I do the school prep but ask hubby to do the daycare drop-off because I was cutting it fine to get to work for a 9am start. This is unusual because I normally do Monday drop-offs.
I take a vegemite sandwich to work and that does me for the day, but I am admittedly hungry by the time I get home at 6.15pm.
Hubby had already done the daycare pickup/petrol refill for his car and had started preparing dinner by the time I arrived, then I joined in with the cooking too.
We make home-cooked rice, an omelette and a massive soup using veggies that were looking a bit sad in the fridge.
This makes quite a few containers of yummy, healthy soup to be used as meals on other days.
Hubby - $31 fuel
Me - $35 Optus pre-paid top-up for my phone
Total daily spend: $67
DAY 2: TUESDAY
On Tuesday we both have a very early start. I start work at 7.30am, and hubby starts at 8.30am. He does the school prep/daycare drop-off once more.
Hubby eats yoghurt and granola for brekkie and comes home for lunch. I have no time to eat myself unfortunately, but I wasn’t too concerned because I had a cafe brunch (my shout) pencilled in with my sister on my “brunch-break”.
She was still a bit full from breakfast so didn’t eat much, but had a coffee and Florentine cookie, while I had a bagel, soft drink, and a coffee.
I work through until 5pm and then do the daycare pickup as hubby has an online class that night straight after work.
I fill up the car on the way home, taking advantage of “cheap Tuesday” prices.
We all eat soup again for dinner.
Hubby $0
Me - $36.70 cafe brunch for two
Me - $35.94 petrol stop
Total daily spend: $72.64
DAY 3: WEDNESDAY
On Wednesdays I do the school prep/daycare drop-off.
I took two mandarines to eat for breakfast because I was racing out the door in a flap again.
Hubby was also working this morning for just half a day. He eats bits and bobs from the fridge when he gets home.
I had a medical appointment after working until 4pm, which cost me $98 (after the Medicare rebate).
Just over $235 was taken from my account but the rebate ($137) came through not long after.
Hubby meets me nearby (and accompanies the appointment) and buys us a $6 ice cream each before racing off to do the daycare pickup and another online class.
I had a work event scheduled for the night but squeezed in a quick meeting with my dad at the nearby pub. I shout us to a bowl of chips and a pint of LLB to share.
I then fill up on nibbles at the event which was my “dinner” for the night.
Hubby and the little one are still making their way through soup and leftovers for dinner!
Hubby - $12 for two icecreams
Me - $20.13 at pub
Me - $98 appointment
Total daily spend: $130.13
DAY 4: THURSDAY
Another 7.30am start for me and I skip breakfast as I can’t stomach food so early in the day.
I do take advantage of the coffee machine at work though!
Thursdays are hubby’s day to stay home with our son and take him to music class late morning.
I join them for the class on my “brunch break” and there is time for me to go with them to the park for about 20 minutes at the end of the class.
Hubby brings some homemade sandwiches and muesli bars for us to eat.
I get home from work at 5pm and get stuck into making dinner. Tonight is pasta with a mushroom and pesto sauce.
Hubby has a rehearsal that night and ends up picking up some fries and a drink from McDonald’s.
Hubby - $8
Me - $0
Total daily spend: about $8
DAY 5: FRIDAY
Today I do the school prep/daycare drop off as hubby has an 8am start quite a drive away.
I start at 9am and have time to make some toast for breakfast.
Both hubby and I take the pasta leftovers for lunch at work.
Hubby does daycare pick up that day and we end up having my folks over for dinner.
Dinner constituted all of the leftover pasta plus some other bits thrown together from the fridge including air-fried pies plus chips.
We didn’t have the energy to cook and didn’t want to spend money getting food in.
We managed to score a free spare bed on the Buy Nothing page and roped dad into hoisting it onto his roof racks.
Total daily spend: $0
DAY 6: SATURDAY
Today was a quiet one for us. We stayed at home for the most part doing household chores, gardening, several loads of washing and hubby spent a great deal of time studying too.
Once I got our son down for a nap, I popped into Bunnings to buy some tools (so we could assemble the bed) and garden supplies.
I also needed to do a bit of a food shop for the basics for the week (fresh foods mainly).
Once our boy woke from his nap, I fed him some dinner from the fresh grocery shop and then decided to take us out to get gelato at Messina for a family outing and treat.
We had our ice-creams and then promenaded up and down Beaufort street until we were ready to go home.
$115.49 - Coles shop
$50.24 - Bunnings purchases
$21.18 - Messina ice-creams
Total daily spend: $186.91
DAY 7: SUNDAY
Another quiet morning for us before we take off to visit my sister and her husband for lunch.
We did some four-wheel driving with them and then stayed for a bit of dinner before heading home.
No expenses at all that day and it was a really fun day!
Total daily spend: $0
TOTAL WEEKLY SPEND - $464.68
Note: Mortgage payments didn’t come out this week, and no bills were due — other weeks are far more expensive!
REFLECTION:
I have never wanted to use credit cards and have always wanted to “live within my means”, so getting a home loan was a big deal for me.
However, I could clearly see that it was the most cost-effective and less stressful option for us during the current housing crisis.
I was always set on getting a home that would allow us to pay the mortgage payments even if one person was unable to work for whatever reason, so a $380,000 loan was my absolute limit.
I am very glad that we decided not to go for something more luxurious, even though we possibly could have managed a higher loan at the time.
I want to be able to live a simple life with low financial stress and just be able to save up for regular family trips because travelling is important to me and we have so many loved ones and family members overseas.
Neither of our parents were able to offer us much money to “get started” in life but have always been supportive of our endeavours and have been extremely generous with what they could give.
I’d like to be able to offer our son something so that he doesn’t have to worry so much about securing a home of his own.
If we can both manage to get “normal jobs” at some stage, we’d like to increase our mortgage payments so that we can reduce the amount of interest that we will pay overall.
We don’t intend on upgrading our house for a bigger, better one any time within the next 10 years, but we would like to make some home improvements so that it meets our needs better moving forward.
I’d like to be able to go out and eat at nice places a bit more often, and spend a bit more on self-care and things like that, but we are very grateful for the quality of life that we are able to live, especially because we are earning well below the median yearly income!
We definitely did the right thing by making the initial sacrifices during the first years of our child’s life so that we can live a bit more freely now and in our very own home.
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