Back to Frugal School after the Spending Holidays

debtfreewannabe321

Hi summertea :hello:

I'm another one here for loving a new plan/goal for the Autumn, funny enough I stick to these more than ones I make in the new year too

I'm just finishing paying off my debts and then I too want to start a savings plan. I'd like to save around £30k in 5 years (£25k for a deposit on a house) and £5-6k for an emergency fund, because as you can see from my signature i've been caught out before with debts and if I can help it I don't intend on going back there once this last bit has been paid off!

My circumstances are a little different to yours, i'm married with 3 kids and in my mid-30s but I would like to save for the same things as you are I've subscribed and will keep you company on your journey :T

summertea

Echodelta i do have a serious weakness for stationary and notebooks i used to love buying new matching stuff to take back to school.

debtfreewannabe321 Thanks for dropping in i agree i stick to mid/academic year goals way better than new year.

Very glad to have you along on the house deposit ride, must be tricky to save with 3 kids ( i hear they're expensive things to have).


Well i got another 20 items on E**y today so just have to hope they sell, i also joined the 52 week savings challenge. I'm hoping to use this particular little money pot to top up my pension. Speaking of which i must update my sig.........

summertea

Had a slightly more spendy day today than i intended

I spent a couple of pounds on packing materials for my E**y items, i like to reclaim as much packaging as possible but eventually it runs out. I then treated myself to a coffee with a friend and a couple of biscuits. Nom.

I did my weekly shop as well though and bought some reduced steak to make beef and red wine stew (will pick up the wine on a mystery shop tomorrow). I have some of those Mr S vouchers for money off a £20 shop so i've bee using the free £4 to buy additional spices, vinegars etc so i can make a wider variety of stuff from the "store cupboard" next week i need more oregano and basil and maybe some mint.

Put a pound in the 52 weeks savings pot as well, pot has been freely obtained by painting an old tin can red with some acrylic and sticking some raspberry shaped stickers on it it looks very cheery.

summertea

Pay Day:dance:

Spent a fun 5 minutes this morning moving money around into various saving pots and over to my rent account so that's all sorted.

I'm off to Ludlow food festival on September 13 so I booked my train fares yesterday. £38 return so not to bad and I put it through Quidco and received the princely sum of £0.54. I'll be trying to offset this with money making this month. I don't actually feel that bothered about going but I promised a friend I would go with her as her birthday present. Also brought in £2 form a MS (not worked out the tax yet).

No gym yet this week so that is the next thing on the list :j I want to exercise, I want to exercise, I want to exercise...............

ellerose

Great diary, I'll be subscribing! Totally sympathise with the September thing, and just to make it all worse I'm a teacher so I definitely get the back to school feeling as badly as I ever did! Envious of your debt free-ness....... I'm on my way to joining you!x

summertea

Hi Ellerose and good luck on the debt clearing mission

Yesterday I did not in fact go to he gym :j I ended up in the pub :beer: with my writing group. However, I kept my expenditure to a respectable £7.05 and found £0.08 in change to add to my road kill money piggy bank.

Currently I'm waiting for my office mates to drink their way through another large jar of Nescafe because I want the jar to decorate. They make great vases or you can make up cake mix less the wet ingredients and give it to people as presents. My male friends are really quite keen on the here is a jar full of stuff ad an egg and water to it and you will have cake present as they don't seem to like measuring and fiddling about with ingredients but they do like cake.

summertea

Hmmm mid afternoon update on the way captain!

So did an MS and was so thrown by the bad service I received I totally forgot to get a receipt so I'm £2.60 out of pocket and they the lucky little bunnies have gotten away with it.:shocked:

Still I get to do it again tomorrow so its more of a reduction in fee than a loss.

Sold a few items in the bay of E last night though I put them up for a friend. I started them at a higher price because of free listing but they still didn't sell for a lot despite including a Karen Millen Dress and a Coast Camisole. I almost don't want to give her the money in case she thinks I did a bad job, but they are on par with items of similar colours and styles.

People who don't use E**y seem to think that if one branded dress sells for £50 then they should get the same but its really affect by the age of the item and the colour and style. I check a bunch of other similar items that had sold, beige dresses don't seem to be selling for over £12 at present.

I'm sure it will be fine but I don't think I will put up stuff for other people again, well maybe my sister but that's it.

Also applied to be part of a focus group and a scientific study about food would bring in £20 and £80 respectively so fingers crossed i meet the criteria

debtfreewannabe321

I've noticed eb@y isn't doing as well as it used to! I generally try fb sales pages now for selling and my last resort before the charity shop is eb@y! Well done on the bargain-ous book from whs! I'd like to get the take away one everyone raves on about. Will put it on my xmas list maybe

I signed up to a few focus groups this year but not heard anything back since i might chase this up as you've just reminded me

summertea

Hey debtfreewannabe321

How do you find local fb selling pages? I typed City Selling into the search bar and found a few but I'm not sure how they work nor if they are in the UK or USA?

I can heartily recommend the Hairy Bikers Fakeaways I've made a few and they are all delicious.

debtfreewannabe321

I live in Essex (England) and just typed in selling/for sales in essex (or your local area/town) once accepted on the group you upload a picture put some details on and a price you want (I always go a little higher and try my luck but also put ONO after the price not to put people off) we have at least 30 local pages to sell on :eek: but I know where the busy ones are now I've used them a while and best of all no post office trips with parcels as they collect and no fees! hth x