If the UK is expensive?

Question

How are middle class people and uni students able to live comfortably and pay rent for their houses and flats? I live in the US and I want tos study in and eventually move to England, but all I hear is "The UK is so expensive, you'll never survive" and I know not every one in the UK is S**t rich and that there are middle class and poor people just like us in the US.

Answer 1

it's a struggle for everyone unless you have a lot of money. There are so many people living in poverty it's unbelievable for a country such as the UK. It would be ever worse for an American coming here, you would basically lose half your money in the exchange rate because the US dollar is so weak compared ot the British pound Sterling, and the cost of living here is probably double what it is in the U.S

i'm a Uni student, and i'm only 20 years old and i am already in £20'000 of debt, which by the end of next year, i will have added another £8'000 on to that probably.

Answer 2

no.!

Answer 3

'How are middle class people and uni students able to live comfortably and pay rent for their houses and flats?'

Haha oh boy... you're wrong there. It's a constant struggle for both groups. My fiance can't even afford to further his education because we have zero money - and we wont have enough money until he gets a better job - which he can't get until he gets a better education.

It is very expensive and hard here. The only ones who get by are the poor people on benefits (they get alot free) and rich, middle aged people who got jobs at a time when qualifications weren't important - and of course people born into a family with quite abit of money.

The rest of us suffer. Trust me. When I say suffer, I mean the working to lower middle classes. My family is a very hard working family, all hours of the day - yet we're struggling a huge amount. We're only just getting by every month. Sometimes, we're out of pocket by the end of the month.

As for uni students living comfortably - I have no idea where you got that from. They may live comfortably but they end up with £20k ($40k!) uni debts they have to pay off when they get a job after uni. As you can see, some prefer to live in a shizzhole than have that debt hanging over them. You just can't win.

Answer 4

new york is the best for shopping...........because its cheap!!!!!!!!=) so we brits go over there to shop til we drop lol

Answer 5

lots of LOANS. My friend is in £20, 000 in debt now she has left uni.

Answer 6

Our government is very generous to the unemployed and poor so they get a very good range of benefits to choose from, as for the rest of us who actually work for a living its a bit tougher as they give us absolutely nothing but then tax us  on everything and make us pay through the nose for things like petrol rather than reduce their cut ( tax ). come on over and try it out and good luck to you, you will need it.

Answer 7

Middle class are usually people like doctors and lawyers, so they're OK, they do quite well.  Working class are the less well off people financially.  

I'm working class.  Not working at the moment, but when I was I was earning about UK 800 (sorry, no pound sign!) per month after tax.  I was living in a shared house (4 of us sharing the rent) and we were paying about UK120 per month each for rent.  It'd be a bit more now, but not excessively so.  Rent hasn't actually gone up too much where I was renting which was Cambridge (and considered more expensive than average, but obviously not as much as London would be).

Utility bills would be shared (not usually included in the rent) and would probably be around UK40 each per month (including council tax which is quite expensive)

Groceries are actually not that expensive.  The supermarkets are always doing offers.

Travel can be expensive (and c**p!).  Many people like to have a car for this reason.  You can rely on trains and buses if you live somewhere with a good network (mainline station or in a city with trams, underground rail and/or buses) but if you end up living slightly rural (which can be cheaper for rent prices), you'd have to buy a car.  But that can be OK if you don't have to go too far.

I think you'll be OK.  I've never been rich, but I've never been totally destitute either.  Just budget every month and you should be able to have quite a good life.  You might not be able to go out wining and dining every weekend, but you're bound to find some pubs and clubs you enjoy which are in your price range.

Answer 8

it's not expensive for a british person to live in britain,

but if you move from the us, you'll find it rather expensive.

the gas is sky high atm, and the houses are quite expensive.

and then there's the fact that when you change one dollar to british money, you get roughly 50p.

Answer 9

It has to do with how much the currency is worth. In the UK an US dollar is worth around $1.18 or something like that (so one pound would be worth $1.18). That means it would be more expensive to live there. Though it's a small amount of change difference it adds up.

I know people from the UK that moved here and they basically doubled the money they had because of moving here.