Pensions Planning: The NUMBER

bownyboy

Wow, our 'grocery' spend for two of us is around £6k a year! BUT what does everyone class as grocery? For us its all our food, toiletries, alcohol, cleaning products etc.
It doesn't feel extravagant. I'm veggie, my wife eats mostly fish and some lean meat. We cook most of our meals, we check the reduced section! 
I think in lockdown many of our shops were the local coop for convenience which is much more expensive than driving 3 miles to Lidl or the large sainsburys,   
But well done to those who manage on £35 a week!

sheslookinhot

We budget and spend around £600, per month on foods and groceries for 3. Food, drinks, kitchen/ bathroom provisions etc.

I did meat free January with my daughter and still doing it today. Some great tasty meals have been served up, using Quorn and Tofu.

LHW99

bownyboy said:

Wow, our 'grocery' spend for two of us is around £6k a year! BUT what does everyone class as grocery? For us its all our food, toiletries, alcohol, cleaning products etc.
It doesn't feel extravagant. I'm veggie, my wife eats mostly fish and some lean meat. We cook most of our meals, we check the reduced section! 
I think in lockdown many of our shops were the local coop for convenience which is much more expensive than driving 3 miles to Lidl or the large sainsburys,   
But well done to those who manage on £35 a week!

Ours (mainly for 2) covers that, although we don't spend a lot on alcohol. We do cook most of our own meals, not vegetarian, although we don't on the whole buy red meat.

trevjl

I've not eaten meat, red or poultry since i was 18, 40 years ago, but £35 a week ?? we spend more than that on the dogs a week !! 

SomeMadeUpName

£4-5k a year on groceries (I think, but really it's only an estimate), that includes everything except booze, which until this year always came home with us from France (going to have to up the number of driving trips now Brexit will limit the quant on each). That's for a family of 3 who are meat eaters (but not much red meat, which tends to be the dearest). I have absolutely no idea how a couple can eat on £35 a week, though I know I have friends who reckon they manage on £50 for a family of 3.

randompenitent

Since Covid (i.e. for pretty much the last 12 months) we've been spending between £110 and £130 per week on a delivery that includes pretty much all our food, plus bathroom/toilet/cleaning stuff.  That's for two of us eating meat only once or twice per week, but eating pretty well - lots of fresh stuff, no "ready meals".  During the entire period, we've eaten out once and had two meal deliveries, so the figure covers pretty much everything except wine which is an occasional (bi-monthly?) purchase costing another £100-£150 or so.
I can easily see how we could economise if needed, but I'm assuming our costs will remain similar into the future at £6-7K/year which is, for us, affordable.
Of course, once it's safe, I hope we'll be eating out regularly and that's not cheap here in London. 

SomeMadeUpName

Going back to the 'number': I spoke to a friend the yesterday, who is an active retiree in her early seventies. She has an income of £21k a year and cannot spend it (her words, and clearly I offered to help). She says she is saving £400 pcm. Call that £5k of savings pa and as that come from taxed income she is saying she could happily cope without £6k of her gross income. So her number is £15k.

cfw1994

SomeMadeUpName said:

Going back to the 'number': I spoke to a friend the yesterday, who is an active retiree in her early seventies. She has an income of £21k a year and cannot spend it (her words, and clearly I offered to help). She says she is saving £400 pcm. Call that £5k of savings pa and as that come from taxed income she is saying she could happily cope without £6k of her gross income. So her number is £15k.

She should go on more exotic holidays, cruises even (post Covid, obvs) - a first class cabin could eat up her cash nicely!

SomeMadeUpName

cfw1994 said:

SomeMadeUpName said:

Going back to the 'number': I spoke to a friend the yesterday, who is an active retiree in her early seventies. She has an income of £21k a year and cannot spend it (her words, and clearly I offered to help). She says she is saving £400 pcm. Call that £5k of savings pa and as that come from taxed income she is saying she could happily cope without £6k of her gross income. So her number is £15k.

She should go on more exotic holidays, cruises even (post Covid, obvs) - a first class cabin could eat up her cash nicely!

Until recently she had one son working in Singapore and one in Switzerland, plus a best friend in Spain, so holidays were pretty cheap. Both sons back into the UK a couple would free her up to splurge a bit more on hols, but the associated explosion of grand kids will probably still limit that. Mind you, grand kids, that's an easy route to dissipate the surplus in itself you'ld think!

CFrog

It's a bit difficult for me to 'un-pick' our grocery spend from my credit card statements but for a family of 4 meat-eating adults, I'm looking at £1000-1100 per month.  For the last 12 months we've been having a Sainsburys home delivery which typically runs to £150-175 per week (including c. £30-50 per week on wine and the 'usual' household stuff you'd buy at the supermarket). I know it's a bit more expensive but I always buy meat from a local butcher (typically £40-50 per week).  The monthly figure includes the occasional take-away.