Ruby's "Stop Spending, Start Saving" Diary

ruby_eskimo

So I guess I had better start one of these things to stop myself from spending quite so much. A little bit of background:

I'm 22, live at home and work full time in a stroke rehab unit. I'm going back to uni in October to do a Masters and have to save £4000 for this (i'm not entitled to any grants or anything for this, I've already checked!). The only real debt I have is my Student Overdraft (and my loan *grumble grumble*) but I'm really trying to curb my spending habits and try to get some savings behind me. I am aiming to start learning to drive in November and obviously need some cashish for a car etc... I'm very lucky that my parents are letting me live here rent free for the moment, but that will change once I have the money in the bank for the masters and actually have money again.

Anywho, today I have listed 3 old textbooks on amazon to hopefully sell. Payday is Wednesday and that's when the real test begins: to see how many no spend days I can have for the next month! Got work tomorrow (7am till 9.30pm) and will need £3.60 for the bus there in the morning (my dad is so nice to pick me up after work).

Hopefully you can all spur me on to not spend more than I need!

Here are the list of Challenges for 2010! All updates can be found in the Sig.

Weekly Spend: Hoping to stick to £20 a week for things like my weekly coffee at uni, lunch at uni and other things. Anything left over will go in the Sealed Pot!

Sealed Pot: This is where all spare change goes and all £2 coins!

Virtual Sealed Pot: This is where every week my online balance is rounded down to the nearest £10 so anything extra is added to the VSP. Also any extra earnings such as bingo wins, scratchies and eBay winnings will go in here.

100 Day Challenge: Trying to not buy make-up or toiletries for 100 days (kind of failed with the Lush sale though) Anywho going to try and keep this going, and maybe try and keep it up for the entire year!

House Fund: Trying to save £10,000 towards a house deposit by August 2011

ZiggyStardust_2

Hello Ruby_eskimo, and welcome! :hello: I've recently started a diary and think they can really help to keep you motivated! Well done on doing a masters. Do you have any idea how long it will take you to save the money/timescale you are aiming for? Selling textbooks is a good idea to make some extra cash, a friend of mine at uni sold hers and made quite abit!

ruby_eskimo

ZiggyStardust wrote: »

Hello Ruby_eskimo, and welcome! :hello: I've recently started a diary and think they can really help to keep you motivated! Well done on doing a masters. Do you have any idea how long it will take you to save the money/timescale you are aiming for? Selling textbooks is a good idea to make some extra cash, a friend of mine at uni sold hers and made quite abit!

Thanks! I've been saving £500 a month towards the big M which is half of my pay. At this rate I will be getting the full 4k at the end of October (just in time!) The big problem I have is that I always end up back in my overdraft by the end of the month because after being a frugal student at uni and then when I was on JSA, I seem to go a bit crazy on the spending front when I get paid because its the first time in a long time that I've had money!

Today has been a good day, I only spent 60p extra today on a bottle of Lucozade (I really needed it because it was so hot and I was really flagging after 10 hours and with 3 hours left to go!)

Plans for tomorrow:

• Walk into town (and back) to pick up parcels from the sorting office
• Do all my washing (I'm guessing about 4 loads?) and hang out to dry
• Generally tidy my room
• Try to find more things to list on eBay/Amazon

ruby_eskimo

So today I was pretty good.

Walked into town rather than get the bus and picked up parcels and cleared out my purse to put £1.22 in my sealed pot! Tomorrow is pay day, and I have to go into work so hopefully won't be spending anything!

ruby_eskimo

Yesterday I went to the cash machine to get £10 out for my bus fare but they only had £20's so I had to pop into the shop to buy a packet of crisps and bottle of water to get some change. The bus drivers around here get really annoyed if you pay with notes. Anywho I transferred £500 to the big M fund yesterday and I have about £300 worth of overtime lined up for September! Also I have this dinner and dance thing coming up beginning of October and I've found a couple of dresses on eBay that are really really cheap that would be excellent for it! For something that I'm not going to be wearing all the time I don't see the point in getting something brand new for like £30.

Today I'm cleaning again!

ZiggyStardust_2

ruby_eskimo wrote: »

Also I have this dinner and dance thing coming up beginning of October and I've found a couple of dresses on eBay that are really really cheap that would be excellent for it! For something that I'm not going to be wearing all the time I don't see the point in getting something brand new for like £30.

Very true! :money:

ruby_eskimo

ZiggyStardust wrote: »

Very true! :money:

Well last year I spent ages trying to find something and ended up with a £10 purple satin dress from Primark (only one like it in the store and just so happened to be in my size!) that I love and got amazing comments about it all night. No one could believe how much it cost let alone where it was from!

ZiggyStardust_2

I've bought some lovely unusual stuff from primark before (I like boho, retro and hippy stuff) I like the big stores, usually go to birmingham. My hubby's face was priceless the first time I took him to that store- so busy with everyone pushing past, his idea of hell Only been to the London one once though

ruby_eskimo

Yeah my boyfriend is starting to like some of the stuff in there. I've never got the courage to go into the one on Oxford Street, all the people sitting on the pavement outside with their huge bags puts me off! I go to the Lakeside one, which is pretty huge in its own right!

Just bought a Dorothy Perkins dress from eBay for £4.95 including postage! Thought it was a pretty good bargin!

Liliboo

Hi Ruby
I've just started a diary too...I'm hoping it'll help to keep me on the straight and narrow.
What are you going to be doing your masters in??
It seems like you're doing pretty well, £4k is alot to save up in a short space of time.
Bargain hunting seems to be the key though.

ruby_eskimo

Liliboo wrote: »

Hi Ruby
I've just started a diary too...I'm hoping it'll help to keep me on the straight and narrow.
What are you going to be doing your masters in??
It seems like you're doing pretty well, £4k is alot to save up in a short space of time.
Bargain hunting seems to be the key though.

Psychological Research Methods. Statistics basically! Yeah I know it's a lot but I'm managing! Yep I'm getting a lot of stuff from eBay and it's saving me money in the long run!