How Much 14 Women In The UK Spend On Their Pets

As impossible as it seems, there have been positives to be found in the lockdowns of 2020. And those positives are pets. Pet owners who were once out of the home nine hours a day, five days a week, now get to bring their dog/cat/rabbit to their makeshift office. You have a reason for going outside if your pet needs to go for a walk, a source of companionship, and someone to listen to you when your partner is sick of hearing you singing Annie Lennox’s "Walking On Broken Glass" for the 300th time that week.

Understandably, the desire for pet ownership has been on the up in 2020. According to a new survey by Ipsos MORI carried out on behalf of LetterOne, 41% of current pet owners got a new pet during lockdown, 95% of whom were existing pet owners who got another animal, while 5% did not own a pet before the lockdown. However with that purchase comes responsibility – a factor that is not always part of the decision-making process. And the spike in adoptions and purchases can have a worrying impact. According to a survey conducted by NaturesMenu, "16% of dog owners admitted their purchase was an impulse decision and 11% stated that lockdown was the sole reason why they welcomed a dog into their family. These were the most common two reasons among the 25 – 34 age range."

As such, many feel they are not equipped with enough knowledge or guidance to take care of a pet. From the same survey NaturesMenu found that almost a third of dog owners have admitted they regret purchasing their pet, with one in 10 going as far as considering putting their dog up for adoption. 
 
Bringing an animal into your life can be a hugely rewarding experience and it is especially fulfilling to create a loving home for one found through adoption. But to misquote the famous Dogs Trust slogan, a pet is for life, not just for lockdown.

To give you a better understanding of what a pet can cost, we asked the pet owners of our Money Diaries Facebook group to account for their upfront and monthly costs for their four-legged friends.