Adulting - How much money you're gonna need for your chosen lifestyle and what job you should have.

Spend all that time in school learning about the Battle of Whatnot and the Capital of Siberia, but then realise you have no way of buying your dream mansion? Well listen up, I'm going to give you an lesson in the cost of adulting.

Not what you need when you finish university, but what you might want a few years on from there.

These examples are in Pound Sterling and based on outgoings in the UK. I'm sure somebody will helpfully comment on equivalents in your country.

First off, pick a desirable house on an online estate agent in the area you want to live. I picked this one off of RightMove, it's in the uninspiring town of Swindon, UK. Swindon has good transport links and.. well I'm sure somebody else will come along later and talk up the sports centre or something...

TWO bedrooms AND an upstairs bathroom. Look at you greedy eyes. Looking to lord yourself over your colleagues.

How much that house gonna cost me? £180,000.

Don't worry, the bank will lend you some cash for the house. Hopefully by the time you've bought yourself a nasty flat somewhere and worked a bit you'll be able to get an 80% loan and have enough to cover the £36K deposit.

Calculate mortgage repayments (excludes setup fees and other house purchasing expenses): https://www.google.com/search?q=mortgage+calculator
£144,000 at 5% over 25 years is £850.

But wait, there's more.

Council Tax for this one £105/m.

Electricity £45/m

£20 on gas (I guessed with the gas/leccy split. £65 is the average small home dual-fuel bill. I use more leccy than gas, I also spend more on leccy than average). Probably less in America as energy is cheap over there.

£15 on buildings and contents insurance. Again, based on averages, but do the numbers, get an online quote for a property you're interested in and tot up your wish list of assets you want in your own home.

£40 on line rental and broadband from a shitty ISP. Not the lowest price point, but you guys probably don't want the lowest quality broadband either. You can get it down with constantly shifting from one shitty provider to another.

£12.25 for the much disliked TV license (pays for the BBC), probably not applicable in most countries!

INTERLUDE
So those were your standard mandatory fixed outgoings. The ones that if you don't pay you'll get into trouble. But of course, there are more "optional" ones...

For those not keeping count, we're at £1,257 per month currently.

BTW - this gif is courtesy of the BBC that the TV license you don't like paying produces.

Yeah, you might want to feed yourself. £180? Won't get you eating out, and you'll be living off the basics range in Sainsbury's.

Mobile phone? Sim only for £15/m and use your WiFi.

£200 a month on your car finance. You can get a small and slow hatchback brand new on a PCP deal for about this. Or, you can have a second hand car and run it into the ground, but you'll probably want to still put £200 aside for the increased maintenance and inevitable replacement of it. Or not, adjust this example to fit your desires, maybe spend that on that extra bedroom eh?

£150 on commuting costs to your place of work. Even with a car, you have to fuel it (can highly recommend getting an electric car for your commute, saves me more that the cost of the finance). If you don't have a car, you have to wrestle with public transport. Perhaps you're lucky and can cycle or something.

Clothes, haircuts that sort of thing? £40/m too much? I don't tend to buy clothes often, but spend a lot when I do. You can do it cheaper, but this isn't about skimping, it's about where you want to be.

I think that covers off the basics to adult in your dream two bed in Swindon. How much is that going to cost you? Close enough to £2000/m. Flex the values to your aspirations.

Or, £24,000 / year. Average UK Salary for a 20-24 is about £16,000, but this isn't about starting off in life, it's about where you want your career to go. And the overall average is £27,000.

But wait, there's the never ending taxes. If you get £24,000 you don't go home with that. For the Brits in the room, take a look at https://www.listentotaxman.com, it gives a great break down on your taxes.

You would have to earn £32,500 to cover income tax, national insurance and a 5% pension contribution (trust me, you want to do that bit), and still come home with £24,000. I suspect there are some other equally easy to use websites that break down your taxes for other countries.

So now you know how much you need for your desired lifestyle, you can see what jobs you can get paying that. Get looking on the job websites and put in that salary and see what sort of jobs come up. Don't worry about things like experience and what not, this is your career, you'll gain that.

If something tickles you, fantastic, you've just completed your careers advice session and you know what you need to work towards in life.

Cat tax! Middle-aged now, still likes to chase mice, birds, rabbits. Pretty well behaved.