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My name’s Sarah Reynolds, I’m 35, and I live in East London. I’ve no idea how everyone else in London manages to make ends meet, but my reality is a rented room. I share a house with two other people: a girl from work and an older bloke who snores so loudly at night that the paper-thin walls practically shake. It’s not even a studio flat — just a nine-square-metre room where I have to lock myself in if I want so much as five minutes of peace and quiet. I work on the tills at a local supermarket. The shop’s open until eleven at night, and I’m nearly always put on the late shift — two in the afternoon until ten at night. And if we’re doing a stocktake, I have to stay there right up until closing. I get paid just over £13 an hour. After tax and all the other deductions, roughly £1,950 lands in my account every month. Sounds manageable? Let’s do the maths: Rent for the room alone: £950 Phone and home broadband: £55 Buses and the Tube: £180 Food: £350 (and don’t even get me started on meat) Prime Video subscription: £9 (I split it with a mate) Clothes from charity shops: £30 Basic pharmacy essentials: £20 A tiny emergency fund: £40 What does that leave me with? £320. You might think £320 is money. It isn’t. Because that £320 has to cover everything I’ve forgotten about and everything that’s going to happen tomorrow. And “tomorrow” always happens. I’ve been on my own for three years now — ever since my husband and I split up. We didn’t even have any massive rows. We just gradually became two strangers living under the same roof. We stopped talking, slept in separate rooms, and then one day we quietly went our separate ways. Since then, I’ve had no one to fall back on. I get home at 10:30 in the evening if everything goes smoothly. If it’s been a rough shift, 11:30. The house is old. The doors creak. Between the constant noise and the deafening snoring from the older bloke down the hall, there isn’t even a quiet corner where you can be on your own. I don
