Joint SOA - please review

mountainlioness

Council tax............................. 50 It sounds low but you should be able to get bandings from your council so you can see what the kind of property you're interested in would cost. Lettings agencies would have CT banding info?


Water rates............................. 15 Is this half a £30/month bill? We're a frugal 2-person household and use £25/month each for gas and electric and £22 for water if that helps)


Groceries etc. ......................... 50 Assuming half a £100 spend? This is def doable - we're on about £50-60 between 2 and love waitrose! Meal planning is def way forward for keeping bills and waste down.


Petrol/diesel........................... 50 Sounds about right for your journey length.

Amount left after debt repayments....... 307.83


You have a reasonable amount left - my only comment would be is this realistic? Maybe keep a spending diary for a month to see where any extra goes? I have a budget spreadsheet and tend to leave about £100 unallocated as realistically this will go most months - the odd takeaway, the coffee and paper, a larger CC bill from the month before etc etc. If you do have £300 left a month, great! but a lot of ppl find that the budget doesn't seem to translate into reality. Some wriggle room is probably a good thing unless you really can't afford it - otherwise MS becomes just a hard slog and you're more likely to fall off the wagon. The odd treat here or there as long as the bills get paid is no bad thing

Odette

I like to think its realistic bearing in mind this hasnt happened yet and Im trying to put the amounts as something over what I would usually spend. Im insanely MS:cool: and my bf is very game and wants me to look after the money aspect. So whatever 'little' extras should be soaked up in the extra that i save, the overtime i make and the ebaying I do. And as I said ideally i would save 200 a month, and if i was hard hit one month, i wouldnt be adverse to dipping into this. Also bf does make more and can cover if needs be.

Im convinced, are you? Is 100 really enough left over? minimum?