Moving out for the first time

saterkey

Our outgoings for 3 bed semi, 2 adults and 2 kids - not including mortgage or rent is around a 1000 a month, this includes all the electri gas, council tax, tel, sky, life insurances for 2, food, household goods and petrol, scouts, doesnt include holiday, savings, spending money, clothes, presents we make sure there is enough in the joint account to cover that, we used to say that whatever we earnt that was left was ours to spend. This works when you are both working.
Now with a family we allocate ourselves 150-200 is spends each month and the rest goes into a savings account.

rodenal

To give you an idea

We bring in around £2600 on a 4 weekly basis

Household bills (rent ctax, home insurance, car insurance, 2 mobiles, sky, bb, etc) around £1000
Food around £200
Petrol around £100
Car related £200
Spending for 2 £400

We usually manage to put around £4-500 away per month (always end up spending more than planned, but if we couldn't then it wouldnt be the end of the world) and although the o/h moans about me trying to keep some sort of control over our spending I feel we live pretty comfortably.

On your combined wage you'll probably find it quite tight but perfectly manageable - if you get used to living on what you have left for now then when the promotions and payrises come in you'll be able to stick some away for a deposit

PasturesNew

Before you move in: question if you could afford it on one salary, in case you fall out
Once you move in: save hard for your next credit checks/deposit on the next place you'll be moving to, because if you don't start saving now you'll find you can't drum up the money between when you think of moving and when you want to.

AlexPrentice

So, we've paid our referencing fees etc and the references have been done.

All set to move in on the 23rd, quite nervous but the next week or so is going to go so slowly!

AlexPrentice

So, two months and a few days later we're completely settled in, everything we needed to buy we've bought, all our direct debits and standing orders are sorted so 99% of them come out in the first few days of the month.

I'm pleasantly surprised, all our bills/rent comes to around £1,000 then loan repayments, credit card repayment and car insurance is about £400 in total so £1,400-£1,500 a month.

I also got a new job in the meantime, with a nice payrise so our income has increased by £100-£150 a month meaning we (in theory) can now save a good amount a month, though at the moment we are enjoying ourselves a bit and spending more than we save, but that'll calm down.

Now to browse around on ways to cut my costs even more.