Live on £4000 for a year - Part 3

BlueFleur

It sounds like a good idea nyk, but if it was me I'd probably pay the £150 just in case I'm a chicken like that... It is great news for you either way mollymop.

I ended up spending today as we had nothing for dinner. I blame dropping the pasta bake earlier this week! :rolleyes: I'm counting down the days till I get paid. I want another pot of money to play with! The aim for the next few weeks is to spend as little as possible so that I can use the remainder to put towards paying off debt. My bf and I have agreed to have really quiet birthdays this year. We used to spend quite a bit on going out to dinner etc, but we both figure that it is best to pay bits off instead. And we're still going to have a good Christmas one way or another (first one living together)!

The tea advert with the monkey just came on tv- buying 80 sacks reminds me of all you [STRIKE]hoarders [/STRIKE]stockpilers out there

Frugaldom

I'm an out and out chancer when it comes to spending I've even asked for discount in the £ shop! :rotfl:

:j I've had a response to my free 'wanted' ad on eBid. I have been offered a nice winter woolie black cardigan for £4.50 including P&P :T As per the cash neutral part of my challenge, I now need to make that amount asap to offset this cost. Going to see what I can find to list right away. :cool:

Mollymop5

Thanks Nyk but I'm a bit of a chicken too when it comes to haggling over an already bargain.I've been quite strict and firm in my other negotiations but feel this is a really good offer.I've never tried to dismiss my debts or get out of paying them back as they were debts my husband and I built up during our marriage when both of us were working and thought we could pay them back no problem, until we both got paid off within 2 months of each other that is Then our marriage crumbled, he denied all the debt and because they were in joint names I just took them with me to make it easieer.It's been 3 years now and some are coming to an end.I can see an end in sight so I'm just going to accept this offer graciously.I may also photocopy the letter and send it off to my other debts and make small offers too and see how many follow suit.It would be great if others followed.woohoo!

Marru

Hello everybody,

Yes Nyk, busted. I was watching that programme of 9/11 and left comp open. I did manage to get to bed half ten wich was a great progress for me.

Today was my payday!!! From my dog walking job!!! Yahoo!!! I will put that money aside and hopefully that will be in the future my grocery budget (food only). It will be tight but with strict planning (and by leaving purse at home) I will give it a go. Talking about dog walking my 14 year old lab won tug of war with this very energetic youngster. I couldn't have been prouder .

At college we have now settled to routine of lectures and it is getting better by the day. I am now in the process of sorting out my block placement for next summer, so that letter still needs to be written tonight.

I have two bingo sites running, both have tickets on the hour every hour. And I have everything crossed.

Talking about mistakes in English language. When still living with ex he once asked me to put beer on the shopping list and I wrote bear. Was it a spelling mistake or wishfull thinking? :rotfl: I will let you to decide.

Still to do tonight: clean all the animals, put breadmaker on, put soup to cook in SC, put joghurt on, write letter to possible work placement place for next summer.

So I better go and get cracking with it.

Have a great rest of the evening.

Marru

PS Janey, Have a fantastic holiday!!!!!
PS2 Mollymop, great news about the loan payment!!

Frugaldom

Mollymop, hope all goes well with the settlement and better still if you manage to get rid of others the same way! That would be great for you!

I've now listed an item in the hope it sells for enough to cover the cost of the new cardie, which I have just paid for using PayPal. My 'To Do' list is almost complete, just a washing to put on and that's me finished.
Whitewing, I think it was you got me started on actual daily to do lists and they really do help. I just wish that items like ' make an extra £50' could gel added and ticked off as completed every day

Good luck to anyone in free bingo, having no luck here today.

Edited in: checked back on today's 'To Do' list and I never got around to stewing the apples or wrapping & storing the tomatoes. Got everything else done though, plus the listing

sophiesmum_2

Hi Frunchkins,
Just arrived home from mum's. Tonight we are having a Marie Curie nurse sit up with bro so we can all have a night's sleep:j, things are going as well as we can expect them to and it is so much more personal and better for him being at home.If anyone has this choice to make in the future I would say that the effort is well worth it for the difference it makes to the person involved.Bro is very poorly but still feels part of the family as we are buzzing about him all day long, friends and relatives are popping in informally to visit him and even the family cat can wander in and out of his room as usual. He would miss all this if he was in hospital conforming to rules and visiting times etc.There is a lot to be said for the way people used to deal with death/illness years ago before the interventions of hospitals and undertakers. It must have been much nicer and more personal when you were nursed at home and the lady down the street came and laid you out.Sometimes we lose things in the name of progress

Anyway enough of all that,:o

Mumzy - hope the first day at school went well,hope you managed to get some school pants to fit - he is so tiny;)

Mollymop - great result with the settlement offer:T

Marru - glad the course is going well:D - you are sounding very domesticated lately:eek: and scarily organised:D

Whitewing - sounds like DS has made you proud again:T

Nyk - I swear by the to do list method for getting stuff done:D there is something satisfying about crossing stuff off a list, even small stuff.

Called to asda earlier to pick up some bits for mum and they were selling large heinz salad cream reduced from £1.56 to 10p a bottle no idea why as it is dated almost 2010, bought 10 bottles for my stockpile so spent £1 on that and also another £1 on 10 packs of straight to wok noodles also reduced to 10p and long dated , and 8 punnets of plums which i will make into jam etc, which were also 10p each.Will update sig in a minute.Total spent £2.80:j
My stockpile and batch cooking have paid dividends this past week as OH and DD have lived off my pre prepared meals etc and have not had to go shopping or think about cooking whilst I have abandoned them:D

Janey - Glad to hear mum's care is sorted out, hope she settles in well.
Enjoy your holiday:D

Bails - I probably have missed where you are going but have a good break till Tuesday:D

Everyone else :hello: :hello: :hello: ,

Slowlyfading hope you are feeling better about things, glad you got some nice supportive comments from everyone:A , please don't feel that you can't post because your issues feel trivial:o = I feel that I am sometimes bringing doom and gloom but I can only write about what is happening in my life, which is the same for all of us, and it is good to be able to post on this thread where we all have different issues, and know that there is a lot of support out there.:A

surfsister

barefootlinzi wrote: »

Hmm, have been number crunching and this is what I have come up with:

4k a year challenge
£76.50 a week

overdraft cost: £1.25
cleaning products: £2.30
mobile bills: £17.50
food: £40
car tax: £2.50
petrol: £20
pet food: £3.75
gym: £7.50
christmas: £7.70
birthdays: £5
loan: £51.25

TOTAL= £158.75

As you can see, far far short of the target!

The overdraft charges will go once overdraft is gone.

Cleaning products refer to a bulk buy of ecover washing powder. Not the cheapest, but cheaper in bulk and have just got one which I hope to last me 3+ months (this is the first time I have got it so hard to tell exactly how long it will last). I know ecover is extravagant but I am trying to balance saving money and being eco (something very dear to my heart).

The mobile bills are mine and my OH.

Food includes a organic box, and I hope to bring this down more but will have to see what I can do. I am going to be growing more next year so can cut out the veg box.

Petrol is high but unfortunatly I have to use the car for my job, but I do get 21p a mile (so should I still include the petrol on here?)

Gym is for my OH....he won't give this up so it has to stay!

Christmas and birthdays......this is a project estimate, I hope it to be less as I want to make more presents in the future.

And the loan...we put the repayments up to pay it off quicker.

Can I take the loan, overdraft fee and phone bills out of this? Or do they count? If they do then I am never going to make the target
If they aren't counted the total is; £88.75, this I can work with and bring down further.

Any help and suggestions to lowering these (especially food and petrol) would be appreciated.

Linzi

Just edited to add that I get £10.22 child benefit a week....which takes my weekly total to 86.72

do you not pay things like poll tax, rent or mortgage, mot and repairs for car, house insurance, water rates, elc or gas? Or are these things not included? Sorry if I'm confused but my weekly bill is nowhere near £80 as poll tax is £35, water rates £4, insurances £10 (car house etc), mortgage £50 that's just the first thing without food, mot repairs to car etc.


Help required please.

Mollymop5

If i'm right rent and council tax aren't included. I include water rates gas electric, telephone , home ins as these are everyday living expenses.The loan and overdraft fees are what I call "debt" and these aren't included in my challenge.I have another budget that pays for debt and other things and If I can live off £4000 plus child benefit then it means I have more money to put towards this other budget which means I can pay off my debt quicker.
If I'm wrong Nyk will be along soon to correct me.Hope that helps.

whitewing

Sophiesmum,

i'm glad you're enjoying your time with bro. I must admit when Nan and Grandad were in hospital, we always felt that we could pop along and see them at any time. However, other people who were close friends didn't feel they could intrude, even though they'd have been most welcome. Our family is big enough that there was always someone at the house to give out updates. But in a lot of ways it would have been much better not to have had to keep going back and forth, and like you say, to have them in the very heart of the family.

Nyk,

To Do lists are great. I even write jobs on after I've done them purely to cross them off. Drives DH mad. I had to get into the habit of To Do lists because I am a morning person and he isn't. So he'd walk out of the bedroom, and I'd start, 'Right, we need to do, x, y, z etc etc' and he wouldn't be functioning. Now we have To Do lists, he can go thro them at his own pace. And my memory is bad so it helps. It especially helps on the money side of things.

We had some more luck - DH got a tax refund in his pay. So rather than taking any deductions, this week he got £50 more than we expected. (I wanted to laugh when I saw Nyk write 'Get £50' - perhaps it is that simple!).
Anyway, we had to boost our savings by £240 which we thought we would be able to do with this week's and next week's pay. In fact we have been able to do most of it this week (and the rest once Granny's cheque clears). This is great as we are seriously running out of food. We've done well though as have only really bought bread, milk and the odd treat since the wedding.

Well, as I sit here rambling my To Do list gets ever longer.

Frugaldom

Good morning - Mollymop you are right - this is a 'cost of living' challenge, so only covers the basic costs to live. We exclude rent/mortgage/council tax because these are all dependent on individual circumstances, as is anything associated with debts, work or 'luxuries'.

Food
Cleaning products
Laundry products
Toiletries
Electricity
Gas
Fuel - oil, coal, logs etc
Telephone
Internet access
Mobiles
Household insurance
TV licence
Essential clothing & footwear
Gifts
Essential household items & basic repairs

The above is roughly what I include in the £4000 (+ child benefit if you have kids) and anything over the 4k is channelled into paying off debt, personal savings or spending on luxury items, holidays, cars etc. If you have children and work then any associated costs such as travel, child care, lunches etc are work related.

Hope this helps.

I am a happy bunny today - seller is posting out my new cardie today and I already have a bid on the item I listed last night, so that will offset the spend. I think I'm going to like this money neutral challenge and am looking forward to starting over on 1st Jan 2009.

PS: Got my 'To Do' list by my side, Whitewing. Have included the words, 'Make £50' just in case it works. In fact, I've written it thrice, just to be on the safe side. LOL

Edited in: The MSE smileys don't appear to be working today, so here's my fave one from elsewhere

Edited in more - on the whole 'make £50' thing, rhat's how much the prize draw is on eBid... maybe I'll win that! :rolleyes: