How Much do you ACTUALLY spend???

wegle

Where we live and work it would unfeasible and incredibly expensive to do without a car. When we first started our budget I investigated if I could ditch the car just for getting to work and back. It's a 3 mile journey each way by car. It turned out I would need to get 3 buses to get to work, it would take 1 hour 45 minutes and cost £20!! There were monthly tickets but they didn't cover all 3 of the buses I would need. Living rurally has its disadvantages. The only other option is cycle. I'm not a very good cyclist and to get to the nearest dedicated cycle track where I would feel vaguely safe I would have to go up 1 mile of dual carriageway and 1 mile of back lanes. So that was out as well.

Cat2011

I spend per month:
£45 - Birthday/Xmas/Weddings
£20 - Work canteen
£225 - Car (Fuel, MOT, Tax, Insurance, Servicing, Parking)
£30 - Clothing
£80 - Eating out (restaurant, cafe, petrol station drink etc.)
£125 - Food (incl. toiletries, cleaning stuff etc.)
£65 - Holidays
£10 - Mobile
£40 - Social Life (Night out, gig, show etc.)
£200 - Sports (entry fees, travel, accomodation, equipment etc.)

Which is £840. It varies wildly from month to month, but those are the averages.

iolanthe07

We spend about £500 a month on food (two pensioners), but we do like to eat well. We could manage on a lot less. We save £350 a month towards holidays, and after utilites, council tax, petrol etc. have about £400 spare for leisure activites. I think the secret to a good 'autumn of life' is to retire debt free.

MrsHappy85

I spend on average:

£60 on lunches :eek:

£350 ish on groceries (for two people), plus on average one take away a month.

£50 on buses

£20 on petrol

£23.20 on pilates classes

£100 on clothes

£150 on going out/entertainment/socialising

£60 on beauty treatments (shellac nails and waxing)

£40.00 phone

£50.00 or so on inevitable things that crop up or are required periodically, such as prescriptions or hair cut (£30 every 3 months)

Not good really, I could think of much better ways to spend most of this money

zenthra

virtuallyfree wrote: »

I pay less for public transport per year than for all the costs plus petrol if a car. I got hit by someone else on average once a year so had to pay excess.
Premiums go up. Last crash in 2011 she drove right across my path.
I did not get a replacement car. No car since then. No debts.
Convenience is a state of mind, it does not make you a penny.

i agree.. to be honest a big part of why i got into massive debt pre IVA was down to car expenses as they were never ending.. i now pay £26 a month for a bus pass and can use the bus as much as i like within the city boundaries so that takes care of work travel.. for other trips where i can't use a bus i use taxis but thats not very often.. you pay dearly for the convenience of a car but can see for some folks because of where they live and work its an essential.. for me though the reason i have my monthly savings money is just down to not having any car running costs!

tiger_eyes

After fixed bills are paid I try to get by on £150 for all discretionary spending, so that's food, rail tickets home, meals out, the odd item of clothing etc.

[Deleted User]

Cycrow wrote: »

then about £100 on other services, like mobile, broadband, tv, etc

That seems an awful lot to me.

I spend less than £25pm, on mobile phone and BB, and nothing on TV.

luckystarr

Yes i am intrigued there is me and my OH and we can spend over £400 per month on food:eek: i want to drastically reduce this ... help is very much needed ... sorry if this is the wrong place to post ..

New_and_Improved_Me

Ummmmmm....

Reading some of the responses, i think im doing OK in regards to the monthly spend for one person..ie ME...

My monthly spend is about:-
350 - car (including petrol/road tax/mot/repairs...Basically EVERYTHING).

200 - Food (including eating out /Takeout’s / work lunches)...This is HIGH i know but as a single bloke don't really do cooking...:)..)

50 (Max) on entertainment - Have a free gym membership currently and im on a health kick so don't really go out much at all at the moment and partly why food is high...healthy stuff is SO much more expensive.

20 - Mobile bill (with unlimited Internet )- No BB or home phone

That’s about it really...Ofcourse all fixed bill are not included for home.

Damn...i sound like hobbit hiding in my cave....lol...

In the voice of Ali G - I do have friends...honest...just ask me mum...lol

foxgloves

Interesting thread. After all our bills have gone out of the account, including petrol, we currently spend £200 a month on food & we give ourselves £60 a month each 'personal spends'.....that's for the occasional magazine, coffees or a pint out, toiletries, etc. Toiletries such as basic deodorant, shampoo, bubble bath, soap, etc, bought as part of normal grocery shop, but non-essentials, i.e make-up, or an expensive branded moisturiser, etc, would come out of our own £60. £50 then goes into our WTSHTF emergency fund.
This summer we set up a piggy banking system to help us budget for other areas of expenditure. It's just 6 big envelopes with dates they need paying & tick boxes to say paid:
1)Car fund £50 (all these are monthly)
2)Clothes £40
3)Household maintenance £30
4)Holidays £40
5)Leisure/entertainment £20
6)Presents £20
Petrol isn't included in the car fund, it's more for tyres, MOT, service, etc. It's a fairly new system for us, but seems to be working so far. It does concentrate the mind on what is an essential purchase, as can see the actual money in the envelopes going down. Also, it makes us think about whether we want to squander leisure/entertainment money on some pretty average take-away or meal out when we could use it to buy concert tickets or use it towards a festival weekend, etc. We're giving this system a year to see if it works better than paying all the bills, then just telling ourselves to 'be careful' with the rest. Really don't want to fall back into our naughty old ways!