Mick Hartley

The BBC has in the last three days published two features about how the cost of living crisis has affected six ordinary people.

All six people are cross-dressing men pic.twitter.com/jPgkxfwvc0

— ripx4nutmeg (@ripx4nutmeg) July 22, 2024

https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

What are the chances?

Here's the latest, today:

Software engineer Emma Harris earns £50,000 a year and said the cost of renting and bills takes up about two-thirds of her salary. "I am not likely to ever own a house and it’s just depressing," she said.

She lives in Birmingham, and last year the average price of a first-time buyer home in the West Midlands was £215,000.

Ms Harris said: "I feel completely trapped in the situation I am in. The chances of me owning my own house are pretty much non-existent.

"I want to cry. I want to scream. I want to shout, and do various other things but none of them solve the issue – that I don't have the money to put away each month to scrape together the money for a deposit."

She said the prospect of raising money for a deposit caused "a few sleepless nights".

He's managing to put on a brave face though.