Can You Save a Grand in a Day? on ITV, 7.30 tonight

Penelope_Penguin

As this has now been on, and isn't strictly Old Style I'll move it to the Martin's Appearances Board

OrkneyStar

Skint_Catt wrote: »

He can only cover one family! What's the point in covering someone with no debt, nothing to cut back on and grows their own veg?

He could cover a normal working family, trying to budget and make ends meet, yet with no debts!
We assume everyone has debts but really they don't!

pupsicola

Good programme. Did wonder if some of it was exagerated though. Find it hard to believe people can be so stupid and need martin to come and straighten them out so much

MSE_Martin

pupsicola wrote: »

Good programme. Did wonder if some of it was exagerated though. Find it hard to believe people can be so stupid and need martin to come and straighten them out so much

Not exageratted at all. The interesting thing here is the family were downshifting and weren't spending much any more - pain free was more difficult to find than painful.

They'd made an attempt on their finances - but this forum doesn't represent how most people deal with their cash. The family last night is far closer to many people I meet and who ask me questions. This was a bright intelligent articulate family but they weren't moneysavers

As for working over debt free families - we used to do that in Make Me Rich. This programme was originally meant to be called "New Year Debtbuster" however for me as many don't have debts I thought that not appropriate as it says 'only sort your cash if you're in debt' when many of the savings work for those in debt and those not.

Remember this is the January - big pic programme - the one to encourage those who don't MoneySave to get into it - and its deliberately targetted that way.

As for gas & elec it was in the final total the list of things I mentioned was a "this includes..." not comprehensive - as there were lots of little things.

Martin

OrkneyStar

MSE_Martin wrote: »

Not exageratted at all. The interesting thing here is the family were downshifting and weren't spending much any more - pain free was more difficult to find than painful.

They'd made an attempt on their finances - but this forum doesn't represent how most people deal with their cash. The family last night is far closer to many people I meet and who ask me questions. This was a bright intelligent articulate family but they weren't moneysavers

As for working over debt free families - we used to do that in Make Me Rich. This programme was originally meant to be called "New Year Debtbuster" however for me as many don't have debts I thought that not appropriate as it says 'only sort your cash if you're in debt' when many of the savings work for those in debt and those not.

Remember this is the January - big pic programme - the one to encourage those who don't MoneySave to get into it - and its deliberately targetted that way.

As for gas & elec it was in the final total the list of things I mentioned was a "this includes..." not comprehensive - as there were lots of little things.

Martin

I suppose there are many people out there who just don't deal with their finances properly, perhaps because they don't know how, don't want to, are scared, or a combination of all three (or more!). We all know people end up in debt for many reasons, and although greed or stupidity is often cited, it is much more often illness, redundancy or such causes which are behind, or escalate, the problem!
We are not in debt (thankfully!), and we don't want to be rich either (honestly!), just trying to live on a budget (due to me being a SAHM for now) but get the best we can from our money.
I did enjoy the programme, as I do with most of Martin's appearances, but like everything in life, suggestions for improvement can also be made .

savingholmes

MSE_Martin wrote: »

Not exageratted at all. The interesting thing here is the family were downshifting and weren't spending much any more - pain free was more difficult to find than painful.

They'd made an attempt on their finances - but this forum doesn't represent how most people deal with their cash. The family last night is far closer to many people I meet and who ask me questions. This was a bright intelligent articulate family but they weren't moneysavers

As for working over debt free families - we used to do that in Make Me Rich. This programme was originally meant to be called "New Year Debtbuster" however for me as many don't have debts I thought that not appropriate as it says 'only sort your cash if you're in debt' when many of the savings work for those in debt and those not.

Remember this is the January - big pic programme - the one to encourage those who don't MoneySave to get into it - and its deliberately targetted that way.

As for gas & elec it was in the final total the list of things I mentioned was a "this includes..." not comprehensive - as there were lots of little things.

Martin

Hi Martin - I watched last night's programme with my daughter aged 6 - the first thing she said was that we need to be on the programme and the second thing was - we didn't need a cleaner we could save money there and she would do that job bless!

Seriously if you are up for a challenge - I would be happy to appear on the programme (would need to seriously tidy up first tho :rotfl:).

• I have already moved my CC to 0% where possible,
• Have downshifted brands and use mysupermarket.com to suggest further downshifts (but not every week)
• Use cashback sites eg for insurance, free trials, loopholes etc
• Occasionally do surveys to make extra cash
• I use free sites for free amazon vouchers and exploit gambling loopholes for extra cash
• We moved our electric and gas a few years ago - and currently pay £73 on a 4 bed house which seems okay to me
• We have dropped our home insurance cost by two thirds since joining the site
• We moved to talk talk - saving us about £15 a month on previous bills
• We have 1 car and 1 motorbike and 2 kids
• Last year I wangled 2 free holidays from time share companies but have nothing planned for this year

Our income has also dropped significantly in the last year and we haven't added to our debt and continued to meet our repayments - thanks largely to this forum and of course my original reading of your money diet book.....

I think we have already made the pain-free savings - but would be more than happy to be proved wrong - and are only left with the painful savings.....

We spend about £100 a month on life insurance, mortgage protection, etc which is probably the biggest area left that we haven't tackled but don't want to lose cover which is why I've left these alone...... That could be a useful focus....

In the past we have also used childcare vouchers but because my employment is temporary we haven't gone down that route this year...

We currently have just under £10K of CC debt and £4K of family 0% debt. This has come down from £22-24K off CC debt 18 months or so ago. The £4K debt was due to both our cars going wrong while I was unemployed!

Hope you can help!

MORPH3US

I did enjoy the programme, if only because it made me feel better about myself and how little money I waste.

I would agree with the above though that it can be quite annoying watching people who are so wasteful with money getting the help, only because it doesn't help me at all.

I said to my g/f at the time, people like us could never be on that programme as Martin would probably only save us £100 over the year if that... which is a good thing of course.

Gorgeous_George

Gigervamp wrote: »

It wasn't on here in Wales. Thanks for pointing out that it's on ITV player, now I can watch it.

It wasn't shown in Wales? Why not?

Lost cause maybe? (funny link of classy Welsh bird in Tesco's) (Disclaimer: It's humour - I even have some Welsh friends - well, friends that live in Wales, is that the same thing?).

GG

Former_MSE_Dan

Hey folks - just thought folks might be interested in my short blog on this

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/team-blog/2010/01/29/fame-at-last/

Errata

A happy moment of fame for you Dan, watch out for the groupies :eek:
I shall look forward to you doing it with a female pensioner