s.o.a budget planning[font=courier new][b]Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance S

christopher52

hi, im a newbie to all this ,so hope ive done this right,attached is my current soa,if anyone has any suggestions on improvements feel free to comment!
things have been getting tight recently,with a daughter a uni and my youngest starting secondry school in september.have managed to pay off all credit cards etc by remortging to a lower rate 2.5%.property value £243,000 new mortgage £106,000 = £855 a month.all cards cut into bits and no other secured borrowings!have also secured a ppi repayment from a loan taken out some years ago,they have even repaid the compound intrest back,it took 2 weeks from start to offer,so if youre in the process,stick with and dont let them off! anyways if anyone has any other suggestions please post:beer:

tbourner

That didn't work! You need to paste the copied text from the SOA page into the main body of your post, the top bar (title) should be a meaningful title like "Need help with SOA". It's text that's been formatted in a certain way not an attachment.

Just click in the 'Quick Reply' message box below and paste the text you copied from the SOA page you were using, then click 'Post Quick Reply'. Sorry if I'm sounding patronising I've got no idea how PC savvy you are!

christopher52

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Monthly Income Details
Income from Employment (after tax). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3,650.00
Income from Self Employment (before tax). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
State Pension . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Private Pension / Annuity Payout. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Benefits (Inc. Child Benefit/Tax Credits & Income Support). . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Income From Savings & Investments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Gifts From Family / Friends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Monthly Expense Details

In Your Home

Mobile Phone(s) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106.00
TV Licence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12.29
Internet. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.00
Home Phone. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26.00
Cleaning Products/Cleaner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Garden Maintenance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Household Maintenance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Oil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Electricity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110.00
Gas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100.00
Water . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57.73
Council Tax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110.00
Overdraft Cost. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70.00
Bank Account Fee. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12.95
Home Insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46.30
Mortgage/Rent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 855.00
Plumbing/Boiler Cover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Mortgage Life Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Mortgage Payment Protection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46.33
Life Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137.51
Food and Household Shopping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 500.00
Drinks for Home . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Motoring & Public Transport

Petrol/Diesel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300.00
Parking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Car Tax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23.00
Car Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124.28
Car Maintenance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Rail/Bus/Taxi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Breakdown Cover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Debt Repayments

Credit Card Repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Hire Purchase Repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.67
Personal Loan Repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Car Loan Repayments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167.00

Savings & Investments

Pension Payments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Buying Shares . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Investments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Mini Cash ISAs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Lump Sum Saving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Regular Saving. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Family

Pet Food. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21.00
School Trips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
School Meals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79.00
Pocket Money. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15.00
Nappies/Baby Extras . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Laundry/Dry Cleaning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00
Children's Travel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.00
Baby Sitting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Childcare/Play Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Pet Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Travel Insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Entertainment

Satellite/Digital TV. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34.10
Family Days Out . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Cinema/Theatre Trips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.00
Books/Music/Films/Computers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Big Days Out. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Shopping for Fun. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Pet Costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Hobbies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
IT/Computing (eg Anti-virus etc). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
DVD Rental. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Drinking Out. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Eating Out. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Clothes, Health & Beauty

Complimentary Therapies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Optical Bills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Haircuts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25.00
Dentistry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
Beauty Treatments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Healthcare Cashplans. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Dental Insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Private Medical Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Fitness/Sports/Gym. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00
Work Clothes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40.00
New Children's Clothes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16.67
New Clothes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Education & Courses

University Tuition Fees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
School Fees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53.33
Your Courses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Big One Offs

Funeral Expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Wedding Expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Sofa/Kitchen/TV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Birthdays . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50.00
Winter Holiday. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Summer Holiday. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25.00
Christmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58.33

Odds & Sods

Newspapers & Magazines. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Tax & NI Provisions (self-employed only). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Regular Charity Donations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Meals at work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43.33
Smokes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Coffees/Sandwiches/Snacks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00


Total monthly income. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3,650.00


Total monthly expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3,376.83



thanks for the advice,obviously not as pc savvy as i thought,lol:beer:

tbourner

OK, so what are you hoping to achieve? You don't have any debts now apart from the car and mortgage? You seem to be covering all those things, do you just want to have more money available each month?

First things, are these all monthly payments? Including £56 for clothes!! £50 for presents and £58 for Christmas yet you manage a holiday on £25 a month?

I guess you use your car for work? That's a big cost, you don't have anything for MOTs saved each month? Is anything paid for by work or are you self employed?

Also, your life insurance is HUGE!!! Can that be changed at all? Go through https://www.quidco.com or https://www.topcashback.co.uk and look for life insurance, that way you'll get some cashback as well from switching.


I don't receognise the format of the SOA, which site did you use? It's fine but most on here I think come from http://www.makesenseofcards.com/soacalc.html.

RAS

Christopher

MSe does not recommend that people put unsecured debts obnto their mortgages, as over the lifetime of the mortgage, this is massively more expensive even though the APR on the debt is lower. Also, if you stop paying the mortgage, you lose your home. If you stop paying your unsecured debts, you lose your credit rating.


The fromat is not MSE, so a lot of people will struggle to work woth your OSa, but I will post a few comments when you reply to tbourner.

bargainbetty

A few ideas.....

[
Mobile Phone(s) .. . . . . . . . . . . 106.00 - this is very high, if your daughters need an allowance, keep it low.
Internet. . . . . . . . . . . 20.00
Home Phone. . . . . . . . . . . 26.00 - Can you not look at combining these with your TV?
Overdraft Cost.. . . . . . . . . . . 70.00 - how big is your overdraft? You need to get out of this!
Bank Account Fee. . . . . . . . . . . 12.95 - and you get what for this?
Home Insurance. . . . . . . . . . . 46.30 - a bit high, shop around.
Mortgage Payment Protection . . . . . . 46.33 - ditto above.
Life Insurance . . . . . . . . 137.51 - Ditto again! This is very high.
Food and Household Shopping . . . . . . . 500.00 - This can be cut, look at the Old Style Boards for advice!
School Meals. . . . . . . . . . . 79.00 - packed lunches.
Satellite/Digital TV. . . . . . . . . . . 34.10 - see note on telephone and internet.
Haircuts. . . . . . . . . . . 25.00 - every month? Try student/model wanted days.
Birthdays . . . . . . . . . 50.00 - cut back to immediate family only.
Christmas . . . . . . . . . . 58.33 - as above!
Meals at work . . . . . . . 43.33 - take packed lunches
[/QUOTE]

If you are struggling, keep a spending diary - you might find you let more pennies slip through than you think!

Good luck x

Tixy

Hi

Is there just 3 of you living at home? and eldest in the holidays?

I have put in areas you could cut back if you need. Without seeing details of your debts, overdraft balance etc its hard to know how much you need/want to cut back.:)

christopher52 wrote: »

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Monthly Income Details
Income from Employment (after tax). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3,650.00 do you both work?

Benefits (Inc. Child Benefit/Tax Credits & Income Support). . . . . . . . . . . 0.00 Child benefit for youngest child?

Monthly Expense Details

In Your Home

Mobile Phone(s) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106.00 why so high? how many phones? are you in contract? try to reduce your package or look for cheaper contracts.
TV Licence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12.29
Internet. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.00
Home Phone. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26.00 try to combine internet & home phone into 1 package (start at around £20 combined)
Electricity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110.00 Looks very high, shop around for a cheaper supplier/ better tariff & reduced usage
Gas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100.00 also very high, as above
Water . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57.73 metered or unemeasured?
Council Tax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110.00
Overdraft Cost. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70.00 what is this? is it interest daily charges?
Bank Account Fee. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12.95 what benefits do you get from a paid account? how many do you use and are they worth £150 per year?
Home Insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46.30 looks quite high, have you shopped around?
Mortgage/Rent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 855.00 what balance? what apr? fixed apr? repayment or interest only? house value?
Mortgage Payment Protection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46.33 shop around to check competative and check it will pay out.
Life Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137.51 Very high, shop around, unless either of you have existing health problems should be able to make a substanial saving here.
Food and Household Shopping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 500.00 When there are 4 of you at home should be able to do easily for £300, many manage on £200.

Motoring & Public Transport

Petrol/Diesel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300.00 do you drive efficently? are all journeys essential? how many cars?
Parking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Car Tax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23.00
Car Insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124.28 seems very high. do you shop around at renewal? any reason for high cost (eg points, children insured etc)?
Car Maintenance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00 need to budget for MOT, services, new tyres etc
Debt Repayments

Credit Card Repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Hire Purchase Repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.67 what is this? how long left to pay?
Personal Loan Repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Car Loan Repayments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167.00 how long left to pay? what balance?

Savings & Investments

Family

Pet Food. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21.00 how many pets?
School Trips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
School Meals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79.00 could take from home if you need to cut back
Pocket Money. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15.00
Nappies/Baby Extras . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Laundry/Dry Cleaning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00
Children's Travel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.00

Entertainment

Satellite/Digital TV. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34.10 cut down to a lower package or combine with landline/broadband
Family Days Out . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Cinema/Theatre Trips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.00
Clothes, Health & Beauty

Haircuts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25.00
Dentistry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.00
Fitness/Sports/Gym. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00
Work Clothes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40.00
New Children's Clothes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16.67
New Clothes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Education & Courses

University Tuition Fees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
School Fees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53.33 What are these for?

Big One Offs
Birthdays . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50.00 could reduce this
Winter Holiday. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Summer Holiday. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25.00
Christmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58.33 and this

Odds & Sods

Meals at work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43.33 Could take from home and should be able to do within a food budget of under £200
Smokes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Coffees/Sandwiches/Snacks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00


Total monthly income. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3,650.00


Total monthly expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3,376.83



thanks for the advice,obviously not as pc savvy as i thought,lol:beer:

Hope some of those ideas might help, you might not need or want to cutback everywhere but I would be looking to reduce so you can get the O/d (s) paid off and not pay that £70 each month.