Frugal Living 2010 -The Cost of Living Challenge, INTRO

grandma247

Hello to all the new people. I think its going to be a great frugal year.

As my username suggests I am a grandma of nine lovely children and have six children,two still at home age 19 and 10 both boys. I have been married for
36 1/2 years. We are trying to pay off our mortgage early so we can save a bit for retirement in 81/2 years so this challenge helps keep us motivated. Our pension fund is worth little now because of the crash and there is not enough time to build it up now.

Pink numbers it is probably a good thing you are making your own soap. You may or may not know that shop bought soaps mostly use caustic soda in the processing. Glycerine soaps do not.
Dorastar My dh is a lot better than he used to be about money but he does not have his own bank account or cashcard and our bank account is in my name only. We had a joint account years ago but I will never do that again as he was hopeless.
He is now frugal about most things except his car. I have not told him about this challenge but he knows I use this site and he understands my aims and appreciates my efforts are to benefit the whole family. He doesnt have an allowance although he gets fuel money from some workmates he takes to work so I told him to keep that for spending money and we put fuel in the car twice a week from our budget. If he wants something he normaly warns me and I find the money for it but he does not need much usually.

knithappens

grandma247 wrote: »

Hello to all the new people. I think its going to be a great frugal year.

As my username suggests I am a grandma of nine lovely children and have six children,two still at home age 19 and 10 both boys. I have been married for
36 1/2 years. We are trying to pay off our mortgage early so we can save a bit for retirement in 81/2 years so this challenge helps keep us motivated. Our pension fund is worth little now because of the crash and there is not enough time to build it up now.

Grandma27 - i love big families , especially at this time of year, i always loved the hustle and bustle of the house, i am one of 9 myself , and have 3 of my own, i would have had alot more but sadly divorced now so wont be

Norman_Castle

Hi,I bought a plug in monitor about a year ago,to find out exactly where my expensve electricty was going.Three things cost more than expected.The fridge,small ,under counter type costs £69 per year.Kettle,7 cups per day,allways boil min amount £26 per year,and vacuum.Henry used twice a week in one bed flat,£22 per year.(Henry vacs use approx 850 watts,some bagless vacs use up to 2000 watts)
Using the washing machine costs approx 15p for a 40 wash,this varies from summer to winter depending on mains water temp.60 wash cost approx 22p.Most of this is used heating the water.
Desktop computer and monitor costs 2p per hour.
Old type 21"tv uses approx 50 watts,14" portable is 39 watts.14"Tv/video combined uses 8 watts on standby.
Video and cordless phone are 2.8 watts,approx£4 per year each.
Suprisingly cheap are recharging batteries,4 AA nicads cost 0.25p.Bargain!.
I have also found that some items that I thought were switched off are still using power.The desktop computer uses approx 6 watts when its still plugged in and a radio which uses 1.6 watts in use and 1.5 watts while off but still plugged in.
I now defrost the fridge regularly(and carefully.I defrosted my old fridge with a knife,hence the new fridge!).I dont dawdle when I vacuum and I am carefull with heating water.Every thing that is using power while its off is unplugged,including the video(what is their to record?).I set the monitor at 20p per unit which may be more or less than you pay but cheap and expensive will still be the same.Hope this saves you some cash.

Frugaldom

Hi Frugals and guys

First of all, SFT - haven't you forgotten something?
Where's your grocery budget gone? :rotfl:

Welcome newbies, I'll get the latest names added to the list asap. Nice seeing you back here for 2010, Ddraiggoch and Mollymop5. :T

I've almost completed my budget but am still awaiting a final decision from HS (houseshare) and DS as I really need their support if 2010 has to be a success.

Re the living on £1 per day - I believe that the writer paid for a full 12 months rent/council tax/water etc in advance of her challenge and was in a situation that she had ready access to a load of events and situations that wouldn't be possible for many of us here. But the title's a great marketing ploy for her book. :rolleyes: Oh, and don't forget you'll need your passport if you expect to make it across/under the Channel for that free holiday. :rotfl:

Free soapnuts link is in among the 'handy links' on page 1 of this challenge thread

Laundry gloop can be made with any soap, as far as I'm aware. But here's another thread on MSE about the topic. There's also a 'recipe' for soap powder/granules rather than the dissolved gloop. I don't use borax in mine and I use vinegar rather than fabric conditioner. I also find that by hanging the washing outside on a windy day, the gale force blast we get here softens the towels really well. It's the frugal force!

As this thread is moving at such a fast pace, there will be a new challenge thread starting for 1st January. It will be linked to the 1st and last posts of this thread so nobody should get lost.

Optimisticpair

OptimisticPair here waving not drowning

Sorry I haven't got the budget done for 2010 yet been too busy making Christmas presents.

Will update to include the new budget asap.

Included
food/ toiletries/ cleaning & laundry products - £200 month / £2,400.00 year
TV Licence £145.00
Gifts £300
Landline £120 year
Mobile £20 year
Coal £150.00 year
Logs/Wood & kindling £150.00
Electricity £300.00 year
Oil £700 year
Building and Contents insurance - £86.50 (paid for year 09/10)
Non-work transport costs £360 year

---

Haircuts Dental and prescriptions £50.00
Non-work clothes and shoes £50
Furniture/ Household repairs/maintenance 140.00
Miscellaneous £28.50

[FONT=&quot]= £5,000.00 (£86.50 spent / 5k = £4,913.50)

[/FONT]

homegrown_life

skintjenny wrote: »

Yesterday I got 'How I lived for a year on £1 a day' out of the library and it has inspired me! I so want to try that, but feel like I can't with my phone contract and car (necessary in Cumbria!) and other contracts i happily signed up for without thinking... it has hardened my resolve to make 2010 the ultimate year of thrift though!

I've just reserved this from my library too, hoping to get some good ideas or at least lots of inspiration from it

Kittikins

Hi NYKMedia, KITTIKINS signing up for the challenge again - not sure of my budget yet, CW18 very kindly sent me her amazing spreadsheet recently and I put in my figures for everything and wow it was scary...but am going to work on it again before the new year

Dorastar

pink_numbers wrote: »

I don't think I could do this without my OH's support (he's better at this money saving thing than I am)! He is sticking to his own tight budget for next year, it's just that our sums are different, because he obviously has more costs due to his work.

Do you give your OH an "allowance" now?

Yep - He's at home looking after ds (aged 2) while I'm at work so we do an envelope system of cash through the week e.g. £50 for food, £10 for entertainment, £15 for dd (lunches and brownies/dancing etc) He has control of this in the week and if he does get any temping work he gets to put some in his account to buy stuff he wants. Altogether though I do stash some away from him just so I know we have enough for essentials & extras and for the long term too - his family have a history of getting into serious debts (£40k!) so don't want us to go that way iyswim.

taka

Ermmm SFT did you mean to miss out clothes and shoes too? Sorry if this was intentional.

I'm still playing with my numbers (as we speak!) and trying to finalise it. I've decided to do an all in except my mortgage (as I plan to make overpayments) and holidays (as I still don't know what I plan to do). :rolleyes:

Ches

Dorastar wrote: »

Another question, do any of you share this with your other halves? Mine is completely useless when it comes to money and doesn't even have his own cash card now so he can't mess things up, not sure he could handle the stress if I told him the total budget!

My OH and I don't 'share' money. He gives me £80 per week for bed and board and pays for all car costs (I don't drive) holidays and entertainment for both of us (but only if we go together). I pay all household bills (the house is mine so I have always had the bills in my name). OH is good with money and doesn't even have a credit card. I luckily have paid off my mortgage and have no debt so its not all bad. The reason for joining this challenge is because I have always frittered away money that could be saved. After bailing out a family member (again) my meagre savings have gone and I have booked to go on a cruise with a friend next year. As OH is not coming with us he isn't paying so I have a lot of saving to do.