Independent Living

Learning Objectives To understand some of the costs of independent living To appreciate that individual circumstances might affect personal finances when living independently

Zoe’s finances Do you know what it might cost to live independently? Look at Zoe’s finances and see how much she is paying for basic living expenses. Are you surprised by what she has to pay for rent etc? Zoe’s got some financial decisions to make – what would your answers be?

Living independently What other expenses do you think you’d have – apart from rent, energy and communication bills?

The Flat A story of financial dilemmas Four students are sharing a flat. One of them, Kelly, is due to graduate next year but she cannot concentrate on her studies because she is faced with serious problems and her flatmates are no real help for her in solving them!

Your job is to: piece together the evidence to see what is happening and what the problems are. (Careful! Some of the evidence is not easy to find but there are clues on each sheet) look at the advice received by Kelly and decide what is good advice and what is bad advice and decide why draw up an action plan based on the good advice and your own ideas to help Kelly and the rest of the students out of their dilemma present your ideas to the rest of the class. You’ll have to be quick! You’ve got 30 min to do this.

The flat The problem? What do you think Kelly’s problems are? Flatmates who owe her money Flatmates who don’t contribute to the bills An ex flatmate who’s run off owing money for rent and has also stolen both her cheque book and money from her account An electricity bill that she can’t pay A threatening landlord An overdraft on her bank account that she needs to pay off No budget in place!

The action plan… Contract so that flatmates agree to pay their share of bills Making flatmates responsible for some of the bills so it’s not just Kelly’s problem to make sure they are paid Arranging for all of them to pay rent by standing order so the landlord stops threatening them Reporting Torquil’s theft to the police Sorting out with the bank how she might start paying off her overdraft Getting a part-time job to earn some money Working out a budget for each month to enable her to manage her money

Real life… Threatening landlord Loan sharks Addressing problems head on e.g. speaking to the bank or electricity company Resolving conflict with flatmates Theft of money, cheque book etc. Keeping track of finances so you notice these things quickly Personal security when sharing a flat

Budgeting Do you budget the money you have now? What might you need to do in terms of managing your money when you leave school?

Reflection Write down one thing that you have learnt today that they didn’t know before Now write down one thing that you would like to know more about in terms of independent living and budgeting Share these ideas with the rest of the class What concerns you the most about the financial aspects of living independently?