Can you survive on £35 a week? A guide to student finance

If you thought that “the talk” about where babies come from was excruciating, just wait for the talk with your student offspring about making a budget for living costs.
Talking intimately about money is peculiarly uncomfortable for the British. We all need cash, but we don’t necessarily want to discuss the details, least of all with our kids. It can feel exposing, especially if you cannot afford to hand over hundreds of pounds every month to fund their M&S food habit, Netflix subscription and football club. But finding the right moment before they leave for university to tackle issues such as getting a part-time job, what to do if they run out of funds or their laptop breaks needs a full and frank discussion.
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If a student receives less than the maximum maintenance loan — which is means-tested on parental income — the government expects their parent(s) or carer to make up the shortfall.
According to the latest National Student Money Survey, the average cost of living at university is £1,078 a month (almost £13,000 a year), which hugely exceeds even the maximum loan available outside of London (£10,227).
“In other words, even if you contribute as much as the government expects, it likely won’t be enough — so either you’ll need to pay more or your child will need to find other sources of cash,” Tom Allingham, a money expert at the advice website Save the Student, says.
If you are contributing financially in some way, and/or need them to contribute themselves, you are going to have to sit down and calmly do the sums together.
First, establish the basics. There are several non-negotiables that must be paid for during term time; in accountancy speak, the “must-haves” rather than “nice-to-haves”. Rent for student halls, private student accommodation or a shared house. Food. Transport. Laundry.
Whatever level of maintenance loan your child receives, see table, parents of new students are often shocked to find that if they are living away from home it will not even cover the full cost of the rent, never mind living costs on top. Again, it’s also important to consider the cost of accommodation when selecting potential universities. Some parents expect their child to contribute the difference themselves. But most, my parental straw poll suggests, find a way to cover the gap. Such as by going without holidays abroad for a couple of years, as one friend confides.
It’s the variables that bring the headaches. Laundry costs and transport will depend on what’s provided on-site and the location of accommodation from lectures. But food — where to start? Liat Hughes Joshi, a parenting author and coach, shares a handy hack: “Gauge how much you think their weekly shop might be by doing a sample basket at your local supermarket or online. What would a reasonable meal plan cost for, say, three days? Add in a bit for loo roll and toiletries and the like. Multiply that by the number of weeks in a term and you should have an idea of supermarket costs for the next few months.”
Save the Student’s National Student Money Survey found that in 2023 parents contributed an average of £227 a month (£56.75 a week), compared with £149.80 (£37.45) in the previous year. “But this is just an average,” Allingham says. “How much you should — or can afford to — contribute will be affected by the size of your child’s loan, where they’re studying, whether they can find part-time work, plus a whole range of other factors.”
Student-parent Facebook groups share hugely differing accounts, from one parent paying for accommodation and food, plus handing over £150 a week for “treats, tickets and haircuts”, to another arguing that their son is happily surviving on £35 a week for everything on top of rent. Is this reasonable, or even doable?
“Living on £35 a week is doable — our research would suggest that lots of students are having to live on as much, if not less,” Allingham says. “But that’s not to say it’s always comfortable, much less advisable. If you’re living in a cheaper part of the country, can walk to uni, don’t have too many course costs to cover, maybe don’t want to go out or drink too often (if at all), then £35 could be enough to get you through a week. But for many others, the cost of simply getting to and from university would make a significant dent in that.”
Many parents, especially those with other children either still at school or university, simply lack the financial wherewithal to meet the loan shortfall.
“Try to avoid making assumptions,” Lucy Myers, a psychotherapist and therapeutic coach, says. “If your child is anxious about exam pressure, a part-time job could feel terrifying, but they may equally have been keen to get a job but worried you’d think they weren’t taking their studies seriously.”
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Prospective students should know that certain degree courses, medicine and veterinary medicine for example, have a significant taught timetable, 9 to 5 and beyond in some universities; this might make finding the time for a paying job difficult.
We haven’t mentioned books and course materials. This varies hugely, but if your child is taking fine art, for example — which demands paints and canvases — or anything medical or healthcare related, when scrubs, special shoes and equipment may be required, this should be factored in.
Then there’s the “oncosts”. Mobile phone (plus insurance), wi-fi if not provided, Netflix and Amazon subscriptions. Again, opinions differ, but if it’s a case of a few pounds a month to keep them in an existing family deal for any kind of tech, it looks churlish to kick them out.
Nice-to-haves like entertainment, meals out, Ubers and new clothes? Most parents seem to agree that this is where the student must stand on their own two feet, either by dipping into savings — perhaps from a summer job — or finding paid work while studying, if feasible.
This life transition requires a leap of faith on the part of parents. On top of this careful planning parents also need to accept that even if your child has a stellar string of A*s at A-level, their brain is not yet fully equipped to cope with all this talk of budgeting.
Louise Tyler, a British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) accredited therapist, says: “Most students starting university are still teenagers, so they’re still going through the period of adolescence, which lasts from the age of 12 up to 24. The prefrontal cortex, responsible for decision-making, planning, understanding the consequences of actions, solving problems and controlling impulses, is still developing.”
Add to that what Tyler calls the “unbelievably invasive consumer culture, with 24-hour pressure to buy and the ease of ordering everything online at the touch of a button”, and it’s easy to see why many parents worry.
• How to plan a student budget and manage your money at university • How much does university cost • From pints to public transport, how affordable is your university?
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