Want to start money saving but where to start?

Lyndsay_21

Yeah i will try that too we normally spend £80 every 2 weeks on food for 2 adults, 1 toddler and a baby but that doesn't include nappies, wipes or baby milk, thats extra on top. here is our outgoings this month
1. £160 - Shopping
2. £80 - driving lessons
3. £233 - Dave work (£39.10+£7+£12x4=£232.40)
4. 90.50 – Littlewoods
5. £86.66 - NTL
6. £40 - lynz spending -
7. £40 – Dave spending
8. £12 - Dave’s contact lenses
9. £35 - Gas and electric
10. £22 - Water
11. £380 - Rent
12. £110 - Council Tax
13. £25 - Baby Milk
14. £30 - Nappies & wipes
15. £5.50 - Contents Insurance
16. £18.80 - TV License
17. £36 - Chloe’s nursery
18. £20 – Dave’s Debt
19. £47 - Barclaycard

The personal spending we get includes any bus fares, days out, mine normally includes odd bits for kids ie socks etc.

My OH has just passed driving test so that should cut out the £200+ he spends to get to work plus the driving lessons he was taking £160 PM (shocking i know)

Oh yeah the ntl includes phone bill, broadband and cable channels etc.

Lillibet_2

Hi Lindsay

Thats a good comprehensive list of your outgoings, well done:beer:

Don't wish to scare you but do you have the money for a car put away, 'cos if not that £200 you're going to save on Daves bus fares etc could easily be swallowed up in car payemnts, tax, insuance & running costs?

Also that list doesn't inculde the £80 per fortnight for groceries, have you accounted for this in your actual budget? If it's an oversight you could find yourself £160+ short every month, of course you might not have included it in your list here because you mentioned it at the start of your post, in which case I'm sure everything will add up OK;)

Are you going to keep actual recipets/records of your spending against these targets, if so you will easily be able to see where you have over & under budgeted:D

Keep up the good work
Lillibet x

System

Lyndsay

You could try suplementing the nappies for cloth nappies if you are in the house. I used to used to make my own wipes out of just cutting j cloths down and wetting them and putting a bit of baby bath on them.

Lyndsay_21

The £160 shopping at the top of the list is food shopping not anything else.
Also his mum (long story) said she'd pay for the car to be put on the road so all we'll have to pay for is tax and the insurance deposit up front. so the first month we wont have a lot left but hopefully in june we'll start to see the benefit of him driving.
Also we got given the car from a friend (luckily) so wont have any car payments. so really the 90 (max) insurance and £150 (max) petrol a month is a saving on the £230 (sometimes more) travel and the £160 driving lessons.

Lillibet_2

Lyndsay_21 wrote:

The £160 shopping at the top of the list is food shopping not anything else.
Also his mum (long story) said she'd pay for the car to be put on the road so all we'll have to pay for is tax and the insurance deposit up front. so the first month we wont have a lot left but hopefully in june we'll start to see the benefit of him driving.
Also we got given the car from a friend (luckily) so wont have any car payments. so really the 90 (max) insurance and £150 (max) petrol a month is a saving on the £230 (sometimes more) travel and the £160 driving lessons.

I knew you'd be ahead of me:D

Lyndsay_21

i just know that i spend too much on non-essential items(crap basically) stuff i dont really need and i'm a sucker for the reduced section of the supermarket.

Lillibet_2

Lyndsay_21 wrote:

i just know that i spend too much on non-essential items(crap basically) stuff i dont really need and i'm a sucker for the reduced section of the supermarket.

Don't worry, you'll naturally cut back over time as you absorb the money saving way of life! Remember ....... baby steps, try to do too much at once & eventually you'll just lose enthusaim. Tackle one area at a time.

If it helps, I set myself a limt for "bargians" each supermarket shop. They always form part of my list but are not specified, sometimes I find BOGOF's which we can use, last night it was 2 chickens in the reduced section for less than my £6 limit, they have gone in the freezer for incorporation in meal plans at a later date.

Good luck;)

Edinburghlass_2

Lyndsay, you need to read the Telephone Boards, £86 a month is way too much to be spending, there is room for a £50 month saving there

Curry_Queen

Have you just started paying yout TV licence on DD? After the initial 6 months that will go down to £10.50 a month and I fully agree with Edinburghlass re the telephones board as that's a lot to be paying out a month and they're are various ways of saving money there. I pay virtually nothing for calls now and just £12.50 a month to BT for line rental, whereas my monthly bills were £30-£40 pre-MSE days!

Have you checked out Tax Credits to see if you can get help with childcare costs for the nursery fees?

I'm a bit confused over the driving lessons budget as you have it listed at £80 yet have twice referred to it as being £160 a month. Sounds like you've already got car expenses sorted but remember to budget £10 a month (presuming it's a small engine car) for future tax so you don't have to find it in one lump sum. Also make sure you shop around for insurance quotes as they can vary enormously.

Your Littlewoods account - is this an ongoing payment or are you just paying off specific purchases? If you can get that paid off you might be better saving that money in a high interest account to use for unexpected purchases in the future so not only will it earn you some interest but you'll have much more freedom to find the cheapest place to buy as MO catalogues tend to inflate their prices considerably, IMO.

As others have already said, have a look around the various threads to pick up some great money-saving ideas too

Lyndsay_21

Yeah sorry i meant to put the ntl bill includes phone line rental, broadband, and the 'family pack' with cable and also the phonebill itself .
The £160 was the normal monthly driving lessons tht outgoings i copied where this months and my boyfriend only had his test and 1 leson this month thats why it was lower.
We've been shopping around for insurance and the quotes do vary considerably we've managed to find on for £830 thats with pass plus fully comp as my OH is only 23 i dont think he'll get it much cheaper being young and male.

The littlewoods we are paying off things we purchased i was wise enough to put everything with no APR so i'm just paying the catalogue price not interest on top too, at the time when we first moved in we couldn't afford to buy from the shops but we haven't ordered things for a while but they still keep upping our spending limit but we've decided not to use it any more. so we've just got to pay off the balance.