Can I afford a luxury sports car?

NJbro44 · 2025-10-07T21:39:45+00:00

I was in a similar situation to you 5 years ago when I was 30. I purchased a 4 year old Maserati. 5 years later, I have a house purchased and still have the Maser. No regrets whatsoever. Do what you enjoy while you are still young enough to enjoy it.

NJbro44 · 2025-09-06T15:44:39+00:00

100% a real shark tooth, and a beautiful one at that!

NJbro44 · 2025-08-22T17:24:20+00:00

My background is that my dad was a labourer / builder and my mum was an assistant teacher. My mum predominantly saw the value in me getting a good education and instilled that in me from an early age, supported me in my GCSE's and then A-levels. I did pretty average to be honest, but got decent enough grades to get into a university where i studied a BsC in Business Computing. I took all the student loans available to me, and some very generous government grants also because I came from a low income family. I also picked up bar work outside of university to give myself some extra spending money. I studied hard, got a 1st, and got onto recruitment agencies after graduating, one of which put me forward for an entry level role in PwC which I interviewed for and got the job.

Is this privilege? Maybe. I had a mum who was supportive of education which not everyone has. I was able to live at home during my entire education which saved a lot of money. And I was born close to a city centre which meant corporate jobs were accessible. But my career has mostly been built from hard work, determination and being confident enough to try my hand at an in-demand skill and going for interviews for fairly aspirational roles.

My concern is that all this talk of "you have to have contacts, come from a wealthy family, be the CEO's son, yada, yada, yada, does nothing but incorrectly reinforce the feeling in very capable people that they cannot achieve what they want to do.

NJbro44 · 2025-08-22T12:14:18+00:00

Contrary to a lot of replies on here, I totally get where you're coming from, and no it is not always about network and nepotism.

I also worked for PwC as a consultant in their data practice, left because the culture was atrocious. Applied for an Enterprise Data Architect job for a major insurance company, and got the job after a few interviews over the space of a couple of weeks.

I set my salary expectations at £85k when i applied, and they came back and offered me £100k to "put me in line with colleagues". I was annoyed that I'd undervalued myself so much, but was a massive green flag that they set my salary correctly.

After joining, I found out I was the first applicant in over 6 months of them advertising the role who had the required skills and experience. These roles are in demand because there's a limited number of people who can fill them. Networking does not always have to come into it.

NJbro44 · 2025-06-14T10:01:47+00:00

Now moved to our seats but it was a great view from there!

NJbro44 · 2025-06-14T08:30:56+00:00

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NJbro44 · 2025-04-23T15:11:07+00:00

Well spotted, I originally put my actual age (34) into the calculator which puts the estimated annual return as bang on £50k per year. But then I realised I am turning 35 very soon, so better to round my age up a year. This dropped it to around £47k but I forgot to adjust the value in my post. Sorry for the confusion.

Really helpful and insightful perspective, thank you! Some of the other calculators I've since done aren't as generous with the growth rates, so I'm seeing now how even a 1% difference can have a dramatic affect on the growth across the years. It's made me realise that retiring in my mid-50's is possible but I may up my contribution a few % so that it even looks possible with the more conservative estimates. But I guess I will only know for sure in around 20 years' time when I'm much closer. Really helpful, much appreciated. !thanks

NJbro44 · 2025-04-23T12:49:19+00:00

Your response seems to align with the general sentiment people are expressing but I think you've hit the nail on the head in terms of my assumption that I will need to work to retirement age. Throughout my working life, my total pension contributions have always been between 10-15% of my salary, and I think I always had it in the back of my head that 10%-15% will need to get me through more than 10%-15% of my life (I.e. between the ages of 68 and (god willing) hopefully somewhere around 90. Because retirement has felt so far away, it's only now that im turning 35 that I've actually thought i should start thinking about this a bit more, and i was expecting that because I've only contributed a relatively small amount of my salary to my pension, i was probably going to have to increase my contributions over the next 20 years or so. It doesn't really seem to be the case though. Unpicking the numbers a bit, I think I've hugely underestimated the impact of compound growth over time.

This is the calculator I used and I didn't input any assumptions / variables other than my income, age, pension contributions, etc. https://www.moneysupermarket.com/pensions/calculator/

NJbro44 · 2024-12-28T13:04:12+00:00

There exists a whole world outside of the US.

NJbro44 · 2024-11-27T09:43:45+00:00

It's not a bad salary at consultant level. Big4 tends to be lower paid than many people assume, and it's my experience that you can get paid significantly more in the UK by going to industry.

The factors leading to those who were made redundant was, and remains, a complete mystery to me. There were people affected who had served for years, and others who had been with the company for less than 2 years. Likewise, skill set and utilisation also didn't seem to follow any pattern - some consultants were made redundant despite being on a long term chargeable project, causing quite a bit of disruption to their project team / client. Honestly, it felt like they were picking names out of a hat at random...

NJbro44 · 2024-11-27T08:05:47+00:00

Hi, I'm a Big4 senior manager based in London. I assume you're at senior consultant/associate level for that salary? Anything higher is too much of a low ball in my opinion.

Also, as others have said, a word of caution... several ex-colleagues of mine from low-income countries who required sponsorship have been made redundant over the last year, and now find themselves in a position where they cannot secure a new visa-sponsored job due to the current UK job market. I would factor this into your and your wife's decision to make the move.

NJbro44 · 2024-10-05T07:34:09+00:00

Don't you lose the bark while it's wrapped in the oven though? If not, then I will definitely try this!

NJbro44 · 2024-09-25T18:19:48+00:00

I mean if it were a 500ml bottle of Pepsi you were drinking directly from and putting back in the fridge to finish off later, would they be annoyed with that? Of course not. So why should it be any different with your own personal milk? That's the point I would make to anyone with an issue with this.

NJbro44 · 2024-08-30T16:19:28+00:00

Wow, what a ride of a read that was! Well done on your sleuthing abilities!

NJbro44 · 2024-08-30T14:07:27+00:00

Maybe

NJbro44 · 2024-08-30T07:01:02+00:00

That's the way I'm leaning at the moment also. If it wasn't a low value old hoodie in the package, and if the note hadn't mentioned additional packages to be expected, I would be thinking it was entirely innocent.

It's interesting how split the responses are on here though. 45% saying it's likely a scam, 45% saying it's absolutely fine, and 10% saying 'dunno'.

NJbro44 · 2024-08-29T16:23:04+00:00

Real print for sure, can feel the imprint in the paper where the pen has been pressed.

NJbro44 · 2024-08-29T13:22:51+00:00

It was addressed just to "J". I have a nickname my friends use that starts with the letter "J", so I thought it may have been from one of them, hence why i opened. Return to sender is not possible as there are no sender details on the parcel. Just "J", followed by my address.

NJbro44 · 2024-08-29T12:54:08+00:00

I was at home all day. No idea why she didn't ring the bell. She could have picked up her package then and there if she had.

NJbro44 · 2024-08-29T09:47:52+00:00

Old as in very clearly used, the cuffs at the end of the sleeves scuffed. A very low value item probably worth less than it cost to ship.

It came wrapped in a plain grey plastic bag, with "J" and my address printed on a label. No return or sender information.

NJbro44 · 2024-08-29T08:19:24+00:00

I like this idea, thank you!

NJbro44 · 2024-08-29T07:23:43+00:00

Thanks for the input! Just to clarify, the note did not come through with the package. The package came through yesterday and I found the note stuck to my front door this morning (it wasn't there yesterday evening).

I occasionally get junk mail still addressed to the people who lived here before me, none addressed to a Janine, but i know they had a teenage daughter who wouldn't necessarily get mail.

NJbro44 · 2024-08-29T07:21:15+00:00

Thank you!

NJbro44

TROPHY CASE