Do most people have savings?

I have savings. Any 'extras' I get in my wages (backdated pay award once a year etc) gets saved too. Ex Mr Dief and I used to save £200 each a month in a joint account, I now save that £200 in my own account, plus extra, and anything left in my current account at the end of the month gets transferred to my savings account. I never have a huge amount of savings but I do have enough to pay for any emergencies that may arise / holidays that I want to go on.

I have zero savings, I get paid weekly atm and it's gone again by the next week generally. Miniumum wage doesn't go far when you've got to pay rent, electric, buy food and live a bit. My circumstances are about to change quite dramatically due to pregnancy and as such I'm hoping I will have the opportunity to save and I want to have something there to fall back should I need it.

I was looking at savings accounts/ISAs and was very shocked at the interest rates! It almost doesn't seem worthwhile keeping money in a bank ?

I do, but any money in it is odd amounts that I have scrabbled together rather than anything planned. I can at the moment afford a £150 emergency!!

Nope, neither of us have any savings as we're both using any "extra" money to pay off debts (CC and ODs).

We both have big graduate ODs so any emergencies take us further back into them. It's not ideal, but there is no point earning 1% or whatever on savings whilst we still have CCs and ODs.

I save about 40% of my wages. Its useful when you're self employed as you never know when work might dry up. After a year, if I haven't needed it, I blow a good chunk of it on a few fabulous holidays.

We're not big spenders on day to day things, we have a very small mortgage (and a very small flat) and we don't drive expensive cars or spend lots of cash on alcohol and fags. Our luxuries are our holidays so as long as the blls are paid and some put aside for monthly spends, the rest is saved.

I have separate savings to help with me being on maternity leave and we have a joint saving account, which has helped us towards changing our car recently. We definitely do not have the 3 months of salary FIL thinks we should have in the bank.

Bx

I've managed to put aside a fair bit in the last few months and I'm hoping to save most of my shift allowance in the coming year so that when I have to go back to day working the drop in income won't come as a sudden shock. I feel lucky to have a little extra to fall back on if necessary. I'm aware a lot of people don't have that luxury.

Three months' salary is what I aim for - I rarely achieve it though!

We do have quite a bit because it was being saved for maternity leave, it is now going to be used to get a baby so I can go on maternity leave . That's irony for you ?

Yes-we both do, although H had substantive savings from way before we met. Since being with my H, I have got more savings savvy. Before, there were always reasons (some valid, some not!) why I would end up emptying any savings reserve I had at any point in time.

I am a locum, and work via a Limited Company. When I don't work, I don't get paid, so whilst for several years I spent it as fast as I earned it, these days, I try and make sure I have enough in the pot in the event that a contract comes to an end, and another isn't seamless.

Holidays, are my downfall. I could save much more if we didn't go away as often, but as far as I am concerned, I am not taking it with me!

Zero - I must be the poorest person ever who has worked the past 15 years in financial services.

In saying that I could access some pounds if I really needed too and we've never died from winter yet...

This year I have literally been living day to day, so I'm determind that when I get back on my feet, I shall be putting something away regularly.

The only "savings" I have is an emergency £10note, in the ashtray of the car,in case I get stuck for petrol.

We are poor!

None at all (which scares me witless) - after years of funding trips abroad for H to see his children from a previous relationship, our wedding last December, plus loads of work being done on our house we are skinter than ever. I plan each month to put between £100 - £200 away and even have the standing order set up, but it just ends up getting transferred back into the current account and spent ?. The latest run of bills has been on car issues, so it's not as if we're frittering the money away. I keep reassuring myself that in 6 years time we'll have less childcare to pay and a loan we have will be finished so we'll be able to save then, but it's not ideal I know.

We do, but it's only been since H's redundancy 2 years ago that we've had a decent amount in the bank. He'd been with his employer for 10 years so got a decent payout and we saved the majority of it to cover my maternity leave.

Sadly H has now been made redundant again and I'm on Stat Maternity Pay. Unless he gets another job pretty quickly our savings won't last too long

Hahahahahahahahahahaha [slaps thigh] [wipes eyes] savings? That's a good one ?

Not a bean, not a penny.

We don't have savings, i've tried and failed to save spending money for our holiday next month, I don't know where it all goes. Just when I think I have some money to put away I get a bill drop through for car tax or something.

MrSun has a motorbike sat in the garage worth about £5k, when it's sold it'll go straight on a new car so I guess again, we won't have anything saved.

We put away a fair amoutn each month. A lot of it goes on holidays and spending money, some on bigger purchases like furniture and PC stuff and the rest gets left "for a rainy day"

I've saved for big things like my wedding and holidays but don't save for the hell of it.

At the moment I'm putting aside £300 a month for a holiday.

I have savings. I'm also being made redundant in May and if all goes to plan I will be banking over half of my redundancy payout. I do plan to use my savings to pay capital off the house though. I am in a very fourtunate position that I have had money left to me that I have used to pay off debt first and have then been able to save the rest.

Savings... I remember those. I used to have savings, but then when I had to take on the mortgage of my house on my own, they vanished into thin air. I had started to build them up again, but my fiance has just been made redundant, so they've all gone again. Hopefully with his pay off we can build up our finances again. I just had a look and I have £56 actually, so maybe things aren't as black as they seem!

We did used to have savings up until 6 months ago. Since MrB work has died a death over the last few months we have gradually eaten into it to love, and now there is nothing left. Although we were in a good financial position before his worked stopped we have said we are going to be really tight with money when he is earning again so that we can make sure we put every spare penny away.

We really don't have the spare money. And we don't lead a lavish lifestyle either. This is what working part time and having 2 small children does for your finances. We have a small amount in the bank atm but that is to cover my mat leave so will be all gone by the time I go back to work in a few months.

With the sh1tty interest rate atm savings aren't really being encouraged are they.

We used to, but no more. i stopped work in 2006 due to illness and then got upduffed so we've been on one salary for ages. we also lost a chunk of money on our last property, and are about to stretch ourselves financially to buy another house.

we are skint, skint, skint.

Savings? What are those then?

Actually we have something through Mr G's work and they take it out of his wages which is great as then I have no inclination to spend it!

I'm afraid if it's there I spend, especially if I can get to it easily ? I do want to save but having spare money seems to panic me ? Really need to get an account I can't access online and put it all in there.

I always used to have savings but since moving in with MrSC (6 years ago now) there has always been something to spend them on. Just beginning to save properly again since paying off the wedding, but the current lot is earmarked for our holiday, and then the next lot will be towards getting me a new car. After that though I want to start working towards having a decent amount in the savings towards maternity leave - the next project once the OU course finishes! We're currently saving about £200 a month between us but I think if we cut back a bit we can afford more.

I wish! The last time we had savings was in 2006 when I went on maternity leave.

I work part time now, but what we earn we spend. H gets a bonus every quarter and we use that to pay for holidays/car repairs/odd expenses. It's always ear marked for something! I can't imagine that we'll be in a position to save again for a long time.

We both have a savings account, much of it has come from a lump sum we both got from a shares package when the company we both work for was sold. I put all of my disposable income into my savings account by standing order, but most months a couple of hundred pounds is transfered back to cover something ..but I currently have 3 months salary saved and will try and keep that there if I can.

The long term ain is to use that for an extention on our house to replace the conservatory....but we will see.

Yes, but it's our house deposit fund and the product of years of being miserly.

It's nice to have a cushion of savings - a few times we've had to dip into it to cover unexpected stuff like car work etc. We're now wondering whether we should lower our sights housewise - instead of getting the biggest bestest house we can, maybe we should get a cheaper house which would enable us to continue saving and give us more flexibility to go part-time etc jobwise.

FiS - you may be skint but you will have a fab cooker?

hopefully ?. if we get the property we are after we won't be able to afford to do the kitchen for a good six months while we pray for a payrise and increased borrowing potential, so until then will be cooking on a campstove in a kitchen that hasn't been touched since 1945 ?

At the moment we're saving for our holidays - we've got two big ones planned this year and as my husband gets paid weekly we put 3/4 of his wages to one side. We're also moving our daughter to a private school in September so once the first holiday is paid for we will need to set up regualr savings to pay her termly school fees(I've alreayd decided that most of my wages will cover that cost though). I've already said that once this year is over we need to really think about saving for our future, whether it's funds for a house, self-build project or the childrens university fees we need some sort of buffer. My car went in for a service 3 weeks ago and it cost £1100! We're lucky in that OH wages covered it no problem, however it would have been nice to extract it from a large savings pot.

That said we do put £40 a month away into two child trust fund (saving rather investement fund) and we plan to let them have their books when they are 18 to spend on whatever they like (I'm hoping it will go on a car rather than booze LOL). They're 9 and 11 at the moment so it should be a nice little bundle for them when they turn 18

We have no savings but we have a current account mortgage and arrange for extra money over and above the interest/capital repayment to be stored each month so it that sense we are saving, its just being used to offset the mortgage rather than being transferred anywhere else. So far we are looking at paying off the mortgage 15 years early, that seemed more sensible than saving as mortgage rates are always higher than savings rates. because of the type of account it is we can access the money as spendies if we need it.

We have savings even after I was out of work for 8 months due to our outgoings can be completely covered by H's salary. It helps that we are both on good salaries, are fairly frugal in our day to day living, don't have debts (other than the mortgage) and don't have children (they do seem to be very expensive!). Some of the savings are ear marked for annual things like house insurance and car stuff. Some of the rest is for holidays and house improvements. The rest is just in case. I'm thinking of paying a chunk off the mortgage as interest rates are so low and, even with a tracker mortgage, we're still paying more on that then we get in interest. TBH I feel quite embarressed about the amount of savings we have especially when I know most of friends and family don't and some are finding things tight.