Pipo's SOA - your feedback please

barnaby-bear

pipo wrote: »

Thank you to all who put their tuppence in.

1. Clothing allowance i thought was a bit high. I'm still wearing t-shirts from 5-6 years ago so i guess it will have to go down to luxuries. Make £10 a day sounds interesting.
2. Same goes for Eats & Drinks. It's kind of easy to get carried away sometimes, especially under the influence and everyone around you splashing the cash. I might try and cut out all alcohol in May to see how that goes. Meal planning is not practical as we're both away a lot, and on varying dates etc. We may try using a monthly pot and sticking to it each month.
3. Insurances were all quotes and haven't been taken up yet. I still have time to shop around so thanks for alerting me to this. :j
4. I put an annual figure of £1000 for both of our cars' maintenance. We have a family friend for a mechanic and he charges mates' rates but the figures was to compensate for unexpected repairs. How do I put a more realistic figure to this? We do look after our cars but things just go wrong from time to time.
5. Haircuts. Mine is just £10 and currently mrs is getting hers done by a mate who charges £20. Thing is, she's a bit partial to Tony & Guy who charge extortionate amounts IMHO.
6. Newspapers & magazines not really needed but they get bought every now and then, especially as holidays for us will revolve mostly around camping after our one last big summer hols of 2009.
7. Can't downgrade car unfortunately as work requires cars used for business to be less than 6 years old.
8. The rail/bus/coach/taxi is generally for taxis if we've been out somewhere that needed a taxi ride home

All in all it looks like we're just gonna have to be sensible when it comes to our social lives. Once we get our house (which is now in the conveyancing stage) we know what our priorities are anyway, and as long as the mortgage & relevant insurances, bills and food are paid for, everything else is a luxury.

Loans and CCs set to disappear by mid-2011 (sigh) but ideally we'd like to put money away for overpayments so that date comes sooner.

Many thanks again to all. Will keep an offline diary in May to see how it compares to our current SOA and will post again on here. :T

Cheers.

houses need maintaining too.... even decorating eats money - you go to B&Q to buy a roll of masking tape but are obliged to spend £50 (I don't know why either ).... a boiler can explode in a £3k boom - the gutter gets clogged and you have to spend £100 on a ladder, you need a loo roll holder, a curtain rail, you have to pay a CORGI cartel to plug the cooker in....

Cars go to car heaven... so where are the the next ones coming from? If you aren't setting a weekly depreciation cost aside for a replacement (I call it our bus pass fund) then you'll be Mr. Car-credits bestest bestest friend.

Scary - if she does that with her hair - just wait until you get her in the home furnishing section; all your friends will see your house - just think how PWETTY she'll want it to be - retail parks full of tat will absorb your weekends...

xxisabellexx

Not much to add, just a few thoughts...

Maybe you could suggest to the mrs that you both get your hair done every other month instead of every month? And agree that she only goes to the expensive salon once or twice a year? Probably sounds a bit gross to you but I only get my hair cut every 4-6 months! Even if you go for the every other month option, thats £70 every two months for the overpayment/emergency fund.

Drinks out...£368 a month!...Wow!! Either youre going to some expensive bars or youre going out rather a lot! My suggestions are that if you insist on getting smashed, buy booze from the supermarket and drink it before you go out. If you really can't resist buying drinks while youre out, take out £20 (thats an average night for me, pick something reasonable for you) and leave all your cards and cash at home, no way to get more drinks then. TBH, however hammered I get, I always have an idea of what I'm spending, either the money saving force is strong within me or I just don't see the point in getting so !!!!ed that you dont know what you're doing (Bit of both actually).
And to all those mates who are 'splashing the cash', they could be in a far worse situation than you but just haven't realised it yet or in denial. There's not many people who haven't been affected by the financial climate. Just a thought.
And if they turn their nose up at the suggestion of a few cheap nights in instead of spending loads on a night out, its their loss and you might want to consider getting some new mates!

Also... not sure what the £50pm eating out budget includes but there have been lots of 2 for 1 deals around if you can go out during the week. My OH and I personally love the orange wednesdays deal with the cinema and pizza express. Excellent night out for £20 or less.

Good luck with buying your house, hope it all goes well for you
xx

Supreme_2

What is the point in this thread? Unless you are a complete idiot, then it's really not hard to see where you spend too much money.

OrkneyStar

pipo wrote: »

Hi MSEs,

I thought I would post mine and my OH's 'future' SOA on this forum as we are buying a house so I’d like to know if it will stack up. The mortgage and insurance figures under the first section are for the best deals we could get (based on what we think is the top of our budget and required insurances as suggested by our IFA) and the bills are based on our current outgoings.

I have completed the MSE budget planner and here are our monthly expenditure results. Please feel free to dissect and comment as you see fit, as I may have over- or (more likely) underestimated many things. I'm not easily offended so please be as harsh as you like!

Here goes nothing! Figures are based on monthly spends:

Mortgage / Rent - £787.00
Buildings & Contents Insurance - £42.04
Council Tax - £99.33
Water Rates / Meter - £21.90
Gas Bill - £23.00
Electricity Bill - £38.00
Internet Bill - £65.00 are you sure ?
HOME TOTAL = £1,076.28

Mortgage Payment Insurance - £58.07
Mortgage Term Assurance - £12.74
INSURANCE TOTAL = £70.81

Food & Household Shopping = £160.00
Eating Out = £50.00 hmmmm, ok if you can afford it!
Drinks for Home - £21.65 should come from food budget
Drinking Out - £368.05 are you serious ? this is completely and utterly ridiculous!
Smokes = £5.00
Meals at Work - £43.30 take a packed lunch and only have the odd meal at work
EATS TOTAL = £648.00

AA / RAC Membership - £13.28
Rail / Bus / Coach / Taxi - £20.00
Car Maintainence - £83.33
Car Insurance - £76.00
Car Tax - £35.00
Petrol / Diesel / Gas - £173.20
TRANSPORT TOTAL = £400.81

Car Loan Repayments - £290.00- fixed ? APR ?
Credit Card Repayments - £150.00 fixed ? APR ?
Other Loan Repayments - £350.00 fixed ? APR ?
REPAYMENTS TOTAL = £790.00

Mini Cash ISA's - £100.00 are you getting more interest on this than you are paying on debts....if not can you throw this/some of this to debts in the short term ?
SAVINGS TOTAL = £100.00

DVD / Video Rental - £5.00
Book / Music / Films / Games - £1.67
TV Licence - £12.12
New Clothes - £100.00 again too high, cut back to about £20 max until debts are cleared......reuse and recycle!
FUN TOTAL = £118.79

Cost of Christmas - £50.00 how many for ?
Cost of Birthdays - £33.33 how many for ?
Other Big One Offs - £41.67 like what ?
BIG ONE OFF TOTAL = £125.00

Newspapers / Magazines - £8.66
Haircuts - £70.00 per month ? too high imho
ODDS TOTAL = £78.66

TOTAL (COMBINED) MONTHLY SPENDS: £3408.35 :eek:

Our combined take home pay is £3269pcm, excluding bonuses and mileage tax relief allowances (both are quite significant sums). Currently the expense v income result has a £117 deficit which i'm hoping to get into black without using those monies as i would rather they go into the rainy day fund.

Thanks for looking.

pipo

Have added some comments.
You have a good income but it seems you don't really think about the spending very much!
What are the total debts ?