Saving, Saving, Saving...

Touche

Valli wrote: »

@OP

are you claiming child benefit (just that it's not specified in your SOA)

Aha, thanks for pointing that out. Yes we are However it gets shifted into an account in my baby daughter's name. Any money from gifts for her also get shifted into that account along with £50 a month from the joint account. She's 6 months old and has around £900 already!

My wife has her own income... as long as we both put £795 a month into the joint account all bills/rent etc are paid and a few hundred also get saved.

I've had a few big expenses last month (clutch and car battery being the big ones with a service due next month) but I'm still hoping to transfer another £1250 into my savings account within a week or so.

optimistic-mummy

well done on paying off both credit cards.

Touche

Thanks optimistic-mummy. It's taken a little weight off my mind.

Just a quick update on what I've managed so far:

Savings
Nov 2011: £1250 saved
Dec 2011: £1250 saved
Jan 2012: £1250 saved + 5 gold sovereigns
Feb 2012: £2500 saved
Total £6250 cash + 5 gold sovereigns

Plus £4300 in debt paid off... in 4 months. At this rate I might be able to hit £30k saved in a year?

I need to update my SOA as my wife is hitting maternity pay as of the end of the month and so I'll have to pick up a lot of extra overtime to make up the slack.

Touche

So my wife's hitting maternity pay and is down to £650 a month. As a consequence I've had to pick up extra work. As you can probably tell from the amount I've saved in the past couple of months I've managed to add a few thousand a month to my paypacket so far.

Here's my new SOA:

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 1
Number of cars owned.................... 2

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 5000
Partners monthly income after tax....... 650
Benefits................................ 81.2
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 5731.2

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 0
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 220
Rent.................................... 1195
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 0
Electricity............................. 0
Gas..................................... 0
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 0
Telephone (land line)................... 0
Mobile phone............................ 40
TV Licence.............................. 0
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0
Internet Services....................... 40
Groceries etc. ......................... 300
Clothing................................ 200
Petrol/diesel........................... 150
Road tax................................ 20
Car Insurance........................... 0
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 20
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 20
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 0
Contents insurance...................... 10
Life assurance ......................... 24.61
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 10
Haircuts................................ 0
Entertainment........................... 50
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Baby savings............................ 131.2
Wife!................................... 400
Total monthly expenses.................. 2830.81


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 0
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 13000
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 13000


Secured & HP Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 0........(0)........0
Secured Debt.................. 4000.....(220)......0
Total secured & HP debts...... 4000......-.........-

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Total unsecured debts..........0.........0.........-


Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 5,731.2
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 2,830.81
Available for debt repayments........... 2,900.39
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 0
Amount left after debt repayments....... 2,900.39

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 13,000
Total HP & Secured debt................. -4,000
Total Unsecured debt.................... -0
Net Assets.............................. 9,000



I've added an extra £400 to the 'rent' I pay into the joint account. That should cover the shortfall of my wife not paying anything in while on maternity leave. I'm also going to give my wife £100 a week as 'pocket money' until August. She can spend it on anything; I'm not fussed. I'm also taking on her car payments - she has a 2011 Seat Ibiza which has around £3500 left to pay on 0% finance. Payments are £220 a month. That's all added around £1020 a month to my commitments. We could manage ok without the extra money on just my normal salary but saving would go out the window. So I'm picking up the extra work to continue saving...

fletch3163

Gosh, I love reading how you all get motivated to save. I find it really inspirational. I too save but find myself a bit hit and miss some months. Sometimes we don't save much because we've decided to spend on the house, or a treat or whatever. One thing I think you're lucky with, however, is your ability to nigh on double your earnings. I wish I had a line of work to allow that. Then I would surely make more hay

Touche

fletch3163 wrote: »

Gosh, I love reading how you all get motivated to save. I find it really inspirational. I too save but find myself a bit hit and miss some months. Sometimes we don't save much because we've decided to spend on the house, or a treat or whatever. One thing I think you're lucky with, however, is your ability to nigh on double your earnings. I wish I had a line of work to allow that. Then I would surely make more hay

I am lucky in that I can earn quite a lot if I choose to... but that comes at a price. My wife was moaning a few weeks back because I hadn't picked up any extra work yet. Here we are 2 weeks later and I've done an extra 100 hours... she's moaning I'm never around anymore and she'd like some more support at home! I can't win

Touche

So here we are a month later and I've had an interesting time. I've worked really hard toward the end of the month and it should pay off as I'm expecting another £4000 to be paid into my account very soon in addition to the money I've already managed to save in March. I'm setting that money aside for April+May's living expenses and rent. I bought some more gold as it's relatively cheap at the moment IMO and it adds a bit of diversity.

I've maxed my 2011/2012 cash ISA allowance with these savings now and will try to max my 2012/2013 allowance by the end of April.

Savings
Nov 2011: £1250 saved
Dec 2011: £1250 saved
Jan 2012: £1250 saved + 5 gold sovereigns
Feb 2012: £2500 saved
Mar 2012: £2500 saved + 5 gold sovereigns
Total £8750 cash + 10 gold sovereigns

I'm hoping I can put all of my work income for the next 2 months into savings now. I'm aiming for another 7-10k by the end of May.

I've also picked up a new hobby... photography! My wife bought me a really nice micro four thirds camera as an early birthday present and I'm really enjoying playing with it and taking pics of my little girl Only problem is that I can see myself spending a load of money on a few nice lenses... but so far I've been really good and just bought some old manual focus lenses with an adapter to play with and satisfy my itch on the cheap

Oooh and stamps... I'm planning a costco trip soon to stock up on essentials with a load of stamps as they're going up in price by such a margin :eek:

Sorry if that's a bit of a random ramble... just finished a night shift and my head is very fuzzy

Touche

So here we are again... my monthly update. This one marks 6 months of saving

I've had an easier going month and have been concentrating on my hobbies with a little wheeling and dealing here and there. I've only actually worked 6 days so far this month with another 2 planned and then I'm looking at a heavy working month of May.

Savings
Nov 2011: £1250 saved
Dec 2011: £1250 saved
Jan 2012: £1250 saved + 5 gold sovereigns
Feb 2012: £2500 saved
Mar 2012: £2500 saved + 5 gold sovereigns
Apr 2012: £2500 saved
Total £11250 cash + 10 gold sovereigns

I've also got £1500 tied up in camera equipment that I've bought this month and I'll be looking to offload that for around £2000.

So... in a nutshell I've spent the past 6 months saving around £13750 in cash/gold and paid off £4000 of debt right at the start

energy90

Now a days I am spending more money. It is necessary for me and I can say ti is my need at this time.

Thirdstream

Thanks for telling about saving its really interesting.