Live on £4,000 for a year - 2009, Part 3

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Well done on getting your food hygiene cert Nyk :T

Just found my last receipts for the month and it looks like I'm slowly getting the hang of working to a budget

I know how you feel Vixstar :cool: who would have thougth that sticking to a budget could be so hard sometimes? Only way I seem to be able to keep on top of it is to update my spreadsheet everyday.

We've asked for money for the honeymoon instead of gifts

I think that's a wonderful idea Lynda My friend is asking for holiday vouchers for their wedding but we've already warned them that we're gettign them a surprise As for honeymooning in Swindon.....:eek:......we escaped to Cotswold Water Park

P.S. I can believe we're almost in our 4th part of the year!

Frugaldom

My final update before heading off to set up the new thread for the fourth quarter

For the month of September, despite it being the month in which DD got married and having up to 15 house guests for various coffees, lunches and/or snacks, I managed to keep the spending down to £208.78 from the household budget, so I'm really pleased abiut that. The freezer and cupboards are fairly full and I have been doing quite a bit of LETS trading recently, which helps enormously. Groceries accounted for £82.87 of the total spent and I put £70 of credit into the electricity meter - I still have about £18 of that left.

My grocery budget has been taking the biggest hits, what with all the bulk buying and stockpiling earlier in the year, so I will have to rein in the spending drastically in that department if I'm to complete the challenge with my original £1200 annual budget. If this becomes too unrealistic, I SHOULD have a little leaway with the electricity budget, as I allowed £100 per month for that but have managed to keep it down to £80 per month so far. But winter is looming large.

To conclude my final roundup, the following are my figures as of today. By now, we should be 75% of the way through our budgets, so I shuld have £1000 left to see me through to 2010. I actually have £1251.23 remaining...

Food - £1028.48/£1200 - 86%
Toiletries - £42.58/£50 - 85% (under-estimated for toilet rolls!)
Cleaning products - £13.12/£20 - 66%
Electricity - £720/£1200 - 60%
Coal etc - £108.78/£160 - 68%
Logs - £120/£200 - 60%
Internet - £159.92/£240 - 67% (to be reassessed now contract has ended)
Mobile - £20/£30 - 67%
Telephone - £95.84/£150 - 64%
Essential clothing/footwear - £74.02/£100 - 74% (excluding wedding wear)
Gifts - £219.92/£400 - 55%
Extras - £19.21/£50 - 38%
Travel - £50.85/£100 - 51% (non work related)
Home insurance - £47.50/£47.50 - 100% (paid up front then got cashback)
Miscellaneous - £28.55/£52.50 - 54%

TOTAL £2748.77/£4000 - 69%

With a little bit of jiggery pokery and a lot of creativity around seasonal gift giving time, I'm adamant that I WILL succeed with my £4,000 budget in 2009. I may even have a little left over to contribute toward the TV license! (I don't class TV as an essential in my household but DS and HS do, so they pay it! )

Hope everyone else is all set for the fourth quarter. My mini challenge within the master challenge is to live from the store cupboards and freezer as much as possible and bake all my own bread.

HS just got in and announced that it's warm enough out to go foraging! He's learning!

PART 4 OF THE 2009 CHALLENGE IS HERE

Good luck to everyone for the final part of our 2009 frugal living challenge!

Welcome to all our new challengers.

grandma247

Well done Nyk. I hope you can start a little business making your lemon curd etc. you inspire us all.
taka the necklace is lovely I would wear it.
Lynda my dd1 is getting married on Saturday and she has asked for money as its a second marriage for both of them and they have enough stuff between them even after major clearout sessions. They are paying for everything themselves so we just have to pay our share of the taxi mini bus because she lives near Manchester. Dh did not want to drive and there are some without cars so this was the best option. £80 each way for 16 seater.
Mooloo I hope you are feeling better today and things are calmer.
lingo I hope you are on the mend now too.
I've forgotten everything else I've read so hugs to those that need them etc.

Frugaldom

shaz_mum_of__2 wrote: »

well done Nyk

Mine expired a few months back ..................hanging on hoping for a freebie (community groups nearby sometimes offer them)

Shaz, I didn't realise that the food hygiene certificate could expire, how long does it last?

I know my first aid one has expired and, like you, I had been waiting for a freebie course, but one hasn't come along yet.

I can't decide what I'll do next - it's whatever fits into my 'quit smoking' savings fund. I'll need to keep a tally on that. Using my £2 coins to pay for passport, I think, as these managed to be overlooked during DD's wedding splurge.

BB, I have followed you over to diet thread, I think the quitting smoking has well and truly caught up with me and the running didn't shift a single ounce of weight, so here I come - mini-challenge within a challenge within a challenge - use the last quarter to seriously get into the way of eating & exercising to lose weight.

cw18

Thought I'd better come and report in with my figures before the thread gets locked.....



Things not looking as good this month as at the end of months 1 thru 8 - and all down to the huge vets bill I've had this month (has come in at a staggering £573.69, and we're still going for check-ups - which are thankfully free as long as no meds or test are needed)

Overall I'm £69.43 under where I should be at this point in the year, but I still have a large 'one-off' bill to come in that I no longer have any money put to one side for :eek:

And I've also got the expensive dog food that'll be starting soon - vet hopes to know which food is required by Monday's checkup. I currently have just under £163 in the food budget, but will probably need 4 bags of the food (which is likely to come in at closer to £215!!). And that's without buying any more food for the smaller dog (what I have left of the one they've both been eating should last her a while, so not yet sure what I can anticipate there )


I'm still waiting to see if the cashback on my car insurance is going to go through - so either another £14 to find for that budget or £6 to come off it......

I just might be able to claw a little bit back from my petrol budget, but doubt it'll be more than a tenner - so that won't go far towards balancing the other areas



Like Nyk, it would appear I'm going to have to get very creative with my presents budget - especially as I still owe younger DS a pressie for his 18th (which was in July!). I have a feeling that, once he gives me the precise specification of the graphics card he wants for his PC, this alone will actually wipe what I have left there (so I'll end up without anything spare to do 'off-setting' with). I'm almost tempted to not include his pressie as part of this challenge, as I wouldn't normally spend anywhere near as much on him - this is purely a one off for his 18th (we tend to 'do' 18th rather than 21st in our family).


DD reduces her hours at work after next week - down to just 2 days a week. At the moment I drive down to her workplace 5 times a week to collect my GDs (and often once a week to drop them off), but after her change I'll be picking up and dropping off both days she's at work - so 4 round trips instead of the 5 or 6 (hence the petrol saving). It's also allowed me to wipe a further tenner off my grocery budget (though it hardly seemed worth bothering !)


However I'm NOT throwing in the towel yet, and will endeavour to stay as close to my £8k as I possibly can - I'm just thankful that it's not a case of having to stick to the £8k 'cos it's all I have coming in. The £8k seemed to work as a good figure to aim for when I set my budgets at the start of the year, as 2010 is going to be much more of a financially challenging year (I won't have much more than the £8k next year, and won't even have £4k in 2011 unless I find paid work)