My SOA - advice and tips welcomed

Eoin_McLove

After several pieces of very helpful advice from some people on here, I thought I'd post my budget/SOA for September 2006 to September 2007 and see if anyone has any advice on how to reduce my outgoings.

I finish my Masters degree in August and then start training as a chartered accountant. My 'only' debts are a £1,000 overdraft and an £8,000 Career Development Loan (which I'm switching to a Northern Rock personal loan once I begin my career). All figures are annual:

INCOME:
- Net Salary: £12,192
- Security Deposit Returned from Current Rented House: £285
TOTAL: £12,477

EXPENDITURE:
- Rent: £4,200
- Food/Provisions: £2,080
- Career Development Loan Repayments: £1,047
- Council Tax: £914
- Birthdays/Christmas/etc.: £415
- Petrol: £400
- Egg Card Repayments (£1,000 overdraft balance-transferred to this): £318
- Mobile Phone: £240
- Electricity and Gas: £250
- Telewest Bundle: £207
- Car Insurance/Tax: £170
- Haircut: £110
- Accountancy Books: £100
- House Insurance: £92
- Water: £87
- Asthma Inhalers: £80
- TV License: £66
- Student Loan Repayments: £45
TOTAL: £10,821

REMAINDER: £1,656
Per Month: £138
Per Week: £31.85

This remainder is left for me to do what I want with. Not a huge amount, but there are people worse off.

N.B., my rent has been estimated, as I haven't found a place yet. But £4,200 (£350 pcm) is the maximum I will be paying each year. Hopefully I should find somewhere for £325 pcm (£3,900 p/a), which will free some money up. Incidentally, I'll be living with my girlfriend, who'll be paying the same share as me for joint things like rent, council tax, house insurance, elec/gas, and water - but NOT food; we buy our own food. So, the above figures are what I alone will be paying, just for clarification.

My starting salary (£15,500 gross) is typically mediocre for trainee chartered accountants, so my budget is tight, but if I can get to September 2007 on this, I'll be hunky-dory 'cos the pay-rises and bonuses will (hopefully) start rolling in thereafter. :cool:

Any advice is greatly appreciated. :beer:

piglet6

Hi Eoin and well done for posting your SOA in advance of getting into un-manageable debt :T (I guess thats what being a chartered accountant does for you!! ).

I'm not qualified to offer advice on shaving your bills, but I have no doubt that the good folk of the DFW board will be along very shortly with some bright ideas to save you money, pay back early your graduate loan, and generally set you on the road to sensible living!;)

Good luck in the journey - and well done for finding this board and asking for advice before you hit "out of control and in desperate need of assistance" like the majority of the rest of us!!:rolleyes:

Piglet

Eoin_McLove

piglet6 wrote:

I'm not qualified to offer advice on shaving your bills, but I have no doubt that the good folk of the DFW board will be along very shortly...

I thought you'd posted on the wrong forum for a second there. I've got to stop drinking...

piglet6

:rotfl:

Piglet

Prudent

Are you earning enough to have to repay your student loan? I thought you had to earn £15,000 before you had to repay (but could well be wrong!).

lynzpower

It is quite difficult to tell with the annual figures, we tend to work monthly here

Can you post the figures for us monthly- then ill set to work

All the best
Lynz

Eoin_McLove

Prudent wrote:

Are you earning enough to have to repay your student loan? I thought you had to earn £15,000 before you had to repay (but could well be wrong!).

I'm earning £15,500 gross, and you have to pay 9% on any amount over £15,000. So just the £45 for me next year. No doubt they'll try to take more though.

Eoin_McLove

lynzpower wrote:

It is quite difficult to tell with the annual figures, we tend to work monthly here

Can you post the figures for us monthly- then ill set to work

All the best
Lynz

No problem.

Things like birthday/xmas presents are obviously only bought at certain times of the year, but I have given the monthly average. All other irregular spending like having my bouffon trimmed or getting petrol has been worked out as a monthly average.

INCOME:
- Net Salary: £1,015.99
- Security Deposit Returned from Current Rented House: £23.75
TOTAL PER MONTH: £1,039.74

EXPENDITURE:
- Rent: £350
- Food/Provisions: £173.33
- Career Development Loan Repayments: £87.23
- Council Tax: £76.17
- Birthdays/Christmas/etc.: £34.58
- Petrol: £33.33
- Egg Card Repayments (0%, btw): £26.52
- Mobile Phone*: £20
- Electricity and Gas: £20.83
- Telewest Bundle: £17.25
- Car Insurance/Tax: £14.17
- Haircut: £9.17
- Accountancy Books: £8.33
- House Insurance: £7.67
- Water: £7.29
- Asthma Inhalers: £6.65
- TV License: £5.48
- Student Loan Repayments: £3.75
TOTAL PER MONTH: £901.75

REMAINDER PER MONTH: £137.99

* I'm with T-Mobile on a monthly contract (£14 - but figure above of £20 overestimates for extra texts/calls etc. - my average bill at the moment is £17 per month, but I imagine I'll be using my phone more when I'm doing the ol' accountancy thing), but my contract ends in mid-August, so I'm going to use the Martin techniques and hopefully haggle it down to £10 per month.

Thanks for your help. :beer:

lynzpower

Hi again cheers for that

A few thoughts from me really.

I understand that you are going to be working on estimates so of course I take this into account. I also presume that your OH will be paying half of the costs which is why your figures look a bit random??

one thing I will say is that your food will be quite high if thats the case, somewhere in the region of 350 a month between you?? Is that right? for 2 thats astronomical. Me & OH do 100 a month all in, and yes, it can be tight, but it gives us more for other stuff. We dont buy cheap meat & buy a lot of organic produce on that, so Im not condemning you to a year of pot noodles lol believe me it can be done

Of course if the telewest bundle works out cheaper than things seperately, it might be an idea to keep it, but it may not be. Be brutal if you can

david_hellier

Hello. According to my calculations you have £9.40 per week to spend on anything not in your budget in order to avoid overspend. Not quite sure where you get £31.85 from; have I missed something? I've excluded the rent deposit refund as it's pretty insignificant.

income weekly monthly
self 1016.00
partner







total 0.00 1016.00
234.46 divided by 4.33

234.46 total weekly income

spend weekly monthly
rent/mortgage 350.00
council tax 76.17
elec 10.42
gas 10.42
water 7.25
secured loans
TV licence 5.50
fines
dvt loans 87.25
food 173.33
b days/xmas 34.58
petrol 33.33
egg 26.50
mobi 20.00
cable 17.25
car costs 14.17
hair 9.17
books 8.50
house ins 7.67
inhaler 80.00
student l 3.75









total 0.00 975.25
225.06 divided by 4.33

225.06 total weekly spend

Start= income - spend = 9.40 per week


Generally you seem ok, if you want more cash, eat less, get rid of the car and do not use CCs. Go digital on terrestrial. Good luck.

Eoin_McLove

lynzpower wrote:

Hi again cheers for that

A few thoughts from me really.

I understand that you are going to be working on estimates so of course I take this into account. I also presume that your OH will be paying half of the costs which is why your figures look a bit random??

one thing I will say is that your food will be quite high if thats the case, somewhere in the region of 350 a month between you?? Is that right? for 2 thats astronomical. Me & OH do 100 a month all in, and yes, it can be tight, but it gives us more for other stuff. We dont buy cheap meat & buy a lot of organic produce on that, so Im not condemning you to a year of pot noodles lol believe me it can be done

Of course if the telewest bundle works out cheaper than things seperately, it might be an idea to keep it, but it may not be. Be brutal if you can

Thanks.

Yeah, my girlfriend is paying her half of all things shared. Everything listed on my budget is what I alone will spend.

I spend roughly £70 on a supermarket shop, and that lasts me about two weeks. I have kept a 'spending diary' since September 2005 when I began my MA, and I average £35 per week on food; however, I work in Sainsbury's at the moment so I get a 10% discount. Hence I've budgetted £40 per week for food this coming year, since I won't have the 10% discount. As weird as may be, I buy my own food, and my girlfriend buys hers, although we do share some stuff. But as I said, my budget lists what I buy and spend; just regard me as an independent being without a girlfriend. What she spends doesn't affect me. I think c. £160 per month for me alone on food is quite good considering how much I eat and that I cook everything from scratch. I don't eat junk, and I'm not willing to make many compromises on my food shopping. I could save £10 per week on food, and so £520 a year, but I'd be unhappier as a result, and not be eating what I wanted to. I'm amazed that you only spend £100 on food for two of you. I'd struggle on £100 just for me alone.

At the moment, I'm using NTL for digital/broadband/phone, but I have to use Telewest from August because NTL doesn't operate in Tunbridge Wells, apparently - which is fine, because Telewest is about £6 cheaper per month!