HOW I MANAGE MY MONEY: MANAGER ON £12K A MONTH WORKING TO BUILD A £1M PENSION POT

In our How I Manage My Money series we aim to find out how people in the UK are spending, saving and investing money to meet their costs and achieve their goals.

This week we speak to Mark Smith, 40, who lives in Oxfordshire with his wife, their daughter, two, and his stepson, aged eight. Mark is working to build up a £1m pension pot and wants to retire at the age of 57.

Monthly budget

My monthly income: I take home between £6,000 to £6,500 per month from my job as a platform engineer manager at a software business. The sum I receive varies as I sometimes do on-call work. The amount of money I make from my social media work varies significantly. In June, it was £2,500 a month, but in one previous month it was £18,000. I typically make around £6,000 to £7,000 from my social media work each month. I reinvest the social media work money back into my limited company. We do not qualify for child benefit. My wife brings in an income from her job connected to the care sector. 

My monthly outgoings: Mortgage, £2,480; child maintenance for my two children from a previous relationship, £1,100; council tax, £302; groceries, £650; gas and electric, £131; water, £52; broadband, £40; Sky TV package, £77; mobile, £35; running two cars, £700; subscriptions like Netflix, £35; life and home insurance, £105; childcare, £750; money into emergency fund, £200; money into pension, £1,750; hobbies and activities, £200; money into pot for holidays, £500; money for gifts, £250; guilt-free spending on treats, £200. I generally put whatever is left over in a stocks and shares ISA.

I grew up in a very poor single parent household as the eldest of three siblings. My mum worked in different jobs for a number of years but got into debt and ended up relying on benefits. I was definitely the poor kid at school and relied on free school dinners.

I left school when I was 16 and completed a course in accounting in Oxford, before pursuing a career in finance. I worked in accounts payable and as a finance assistant, before moving into the charities sector, focusing on donations and payment processing.

At the age of 33 I quit finance and started a new career in tech. I now work as a platform engineer manager at a software business, taking home between £6,000 to £6,500 per month.

I was never particularly good with money when I was younger. I could never say no to a night out or holiday. I had four credit cards and ended up in £45,000 worth of debt. In 2017 I entered into an Individual Voluntary Arrangement (IVA) to sort out my debts. It took me six years to pay off the debts and I’ve been debt-free for a couple of years.

Having an IVA taught me a lot about strict budgeting and I now keep a close eye on all my finances. After my own experience of getting into and out of debt, I set up a TikTok channel called Markinthemoney, where I talk about money, particularly investing, pensions and debt. From income streams like TikTok and affiliate marketing revenue, I typically make around £6,000 to £6,500 from my social media work, though this varies a lot.

As a higher earner, I think I pay a good amount of tax. The main problem in the tax system is that the personal allowance is too low. This can have a significant impact on lower earners. As a higher earner, there is also the issue of losing access to child benefit when you reach a certain level of income.

The effective rate of deductions from your pay as a higher earner can be very high. I also think there is a major issue when it comes to the tax and benefit treatment of single person households as opposed to couples. The system is often unfair for the former.

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I did not focus at all on pensions when I was younger and avoided them when I was up to my neck in debt. I only really started adding money to pensions when auto-enrolment started. I am now adding £1,750 per month to my work pension. My employer adds £450 a month to it as well.

I have amassed a work pension of around £43,000 in a short period of time since I started working at my current company. I also have old pensions consolidated in a Sipp via PensionBee, which are currently valued at £32,000. My wife adds £250 a month to her work pension.

My aim is to retire at the age of 57 with a £1m pension pot. I used to want to retire in my early fifties, but have had to rethink this. If I maintain my current income, I believe a £1m pension pot is achievable. I want to enjoy married life without the pressure of work when I retire.

I’m now adding so much money to my pension that I’m back under the £100,000 threshold for the government’s free childcare scheme. We now pay £750 a month for childcare, which is less than before.

In terms of savings and investments, I have a stocks and shares ISA which I add any money left over each month. I opened it last year and there is about £10,000 in it. I also have a cash ISA with £10,000 in. Other than that, I have various pots in a Monzo account, which are used for things like holidays.

We purchased our four-bedroom detached house in Oxfordshire last year for £585,000. It is the first property I have ever owned. I couldn’t get a mortgage due to my debt history before. I imagine we will live in the house for a good number of years while the children grow up, before potentially downsizing once we retire.

I want to be able to help my children throughout their lives and be able to leave them a decent inheritance. I know that I will not not inherit anything from my parents and this has driven me to want more for my own children. As I was in lots of debt, I didn’t travel much when I was younger, so I am also keen to make up for lost time in this regard. I’m happy with my income and have no desire to earn more.

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2025-06-30T05:34:12Z