DMP - help needed

rattlesnake2018 wrote: »

£1000 includes accommodation and ALL bills but I pay for Sky TV and broadband. That's my only spend in terms of hobbies/recreation. I don't smoke or drink.

Food/housekeeping is difficult to guesstimate. I have two young children (4 and 5) so I thought £110 p/w is reasonable but I do think it is much less than this.

I do believe I get child benefit. I'll ask the Mrs to check tomorrow. Good point actually.

Just a point on food/housekeeping. I have six children, two of which are in nappies still and I have a budget of £100 per week for everything. That also includes packed lunches for four of the kids and lunches for me st work. So I definitely think you can bring this figure down. I meal plan and only buy what I need for that weeks meals. I also bake cakes and puddings, freeze any leftovers or take them to work with me for lunches and batch. Ok. I also shop online so I can see how much I am spending. I tend to spend between £60 and £70 a week on a big shop and then top up with bread, milk and fruit during the week. I don’t buy anything else when I top up though. At one point I had to learn to live on that budget as I truly didn’t have any other money, now I have more money available but I still don’t go over my budget.

Pixie5740 wrote: »

£80 is still a lot to pay for Sky. Check out the Sky Haggling Success Stories thread on the Phone & TV sub-forum.

£80 + £80 = £160 p/m for internet, TV and phones. That's astronomical :eek:

Your vehicle costs look very high as well. Obviously different things factor in for different people but they do look high.

Food/toiletries bill could be practically halved if you really try. Plan your meals/shopping trips. Shop at Aldi or Lidl

What is £80 p/m sundries/emergencies for? Yes you need a sundry fund but do you really need this much?

Definitely room to squeeze your budget

rattlesnake2018 wrote: »

@ January2015 - thanks for your comments. I want a expenditure sheet that looks realistic to creditors so this is really helpful.

I pay £80 for Sky TV, £35 for fibre optic broadband and £40 for two mobile contracts (one for the wife and one for me) so it is £155 all in. Take into account my wife and I don't smoke/drink and don't really spend money on hobbies or subscriptions. Is that deemed too high?

Vehicle costs is how much I pay. It is for both my wife and I. Tax is £300 and insurance is £840 for the year. Monthly fuel and parking for both of us combined is £190 - to get us to and fro work and to go shopping and to functions etc.

Food/toileteries is less I guess. This was more a guesstimate than proper working out. Clothes is a difficult one as we don't shop monthly for clothes so I just put down £60 for two adults/two kids.

I'm not sure what to put down as sundries. Could I just leave this as £0 (is this what I put aside for emergencies)?

Hi

Definitely shop around for your tv/internet/phone/mobile costs. Then when you find a bargain, negotiate with your existing provider to see if they will match, or beat, your quote. If they won't, then switch. However, if that's what you are paying then put it in the budget - it may get queried but possibly not.

I pay £65 p/m for landline (unlimited calls for local, national and mobiles provided they are less than 1 hour per call), 150mbps broadband, TV package, and 2 mobiles - each with 5gb data, unlimited texts and messages.

Sundries - I always put £25 per month. That seems to be acceptable to creditors. I definitely would put something in this category, but I just thought £80 looked high

Vehicle costs - if that's what they are, then that's what you put in the budget. It looked high to me, but then we have a car which is £20 a year for car tax so that reduces our vehicle annual costs.

We don't smoke or drink but I did add a pet we don't have Pet food and pet insurance gave us flexibility. If you make your budget too tight you will fail your DMP. For me, the dog we don't have gives us wriggle room.

rattlesnake2018 wrote: »

That's very helpful indeed.

I like the 'pet' idea which could in effect help knock down my Sky/phone deal somewhat - and it wouldn't be a lie as we do have pet fish but I didn't think about putting that down on my expenditure sheet. The work meals could also be cut down to £0 I guess and I can knock the food down to a more realistic £350 as that was a pure guesstimate on my behalf.

I'm still unsure about clothes though. How do you work out the cost over a month for clothes?

I can't help with clothes budget. Our children are all grown, so it's just me and my other half. We budget £40 p/m for clothing. We tend to wait for sales and buy clothes and shoes then, but I appreciate it's going to be far more expensive with growing children.

You haven't included any budget for life insurance. Do you have any - if not you should think about getting some.

I might have missed it, but did you budget for Christmas and birthdays? With kids you have to have a budget category for this.