Same as sixkitten, they'd never have let me through the door, if they'd seen my bank statements - simply laughed. I am 1/2 way through and it's a constant struggle with the fees & to be honest I don't really know how/ if I will be able to pay my way through from one day to the next.
The money I earn from teaching only covers my living expenses and the money I earn from freelance work, always takes ages to come through - anything up to 60 days from invoice & even then I sometimes have to chase it - so it's really unstable.
I had no choice though. other than self funding.
I am one of those people who is stuck somewhere between the AHRC & ESRC. I applied to the open ESRC competition and although I scored reasonabley & my supervisors got an amazing score - they still turned me down & I found out that this year the ESRC awared a grant to only 1 ( yes thats a big fat one) person in my subject area out of nearly 4000 applicants.