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stay at home Mum
Comments
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maggieann2luke wrote: »We are not trying to "grab money for nothing", only trying to find out what we could be entitled to. Moving houses is not an option as there are none available in the area. Housing association tenants are not allowed lodgers or to work from home. Our rent is £100 per week,as is my daughters,c.tax £174.00 a month, a price we pay in a tourist hotspot.
The answers seem to be you or your daughter are not entitled to anything else. Which is why suggestions of your daughter looking at her outgoings and where to make cut backs have been made. This is what has to be done when income can not be increased. No need to make childish comments about being hermits in a cave, people are trying to help and have made some good suggestions.0 -
Well then you need to look into the other most expensive areas of your lives - you're doing mostly everything you can saving-wise with the grub, so now you have to look at utility suppliers.
Make sure you're getting the cheapest of EVERYTHING - gas, electric, internet, phone etc and get rid of anything you don't need like TV, big phone contracts, 'treat' spending such as chocolate, beer, smoking, expensive shower gels, clothing spending, accessory spending, hair cuts etc.
Really see where you can trim all the fat out of the expenses and then see where you can add the odd thing back in when the finances allow based on priority/your preference.
It doesn't make for a fun life but then again a roof over your head and food in the fridge are the two most important things. You could even live without electric and gas if you really really HAD to.
I've recently moved and I've become extremely tight fisted. Some of the things i'm currently doing to save every extra penny:
Never spending outside of the home at all on food or drink. So for instance, if i'm out about town and am a bit thirsty, I don't buy a drink. I never buy food in town. I will go for what I went for then go home without any extras at all (some 'shopping guru' in some book I read says that if everybody only ever bought what they went in for, the economy would collapse within weeks.)
We grow all our own veg and herbs where we can. It's hard at the moment because we don't have prepared soil, but we're getting it prepared for sowing in April/May time.
'Sandwiches' for Uni/work have become cheaper options like pasta (really cheap) with home made sauce put in, home made hummus and veg, home made flapjacks (oats are cheap) and other stuff which is cheaper than buying sandwich fillers and bread.
My lights go off even if I leave a room for 30 seconds. Times that per room, per hour, per year and you've probably got the best part of a monthly outgoing.
I turn all the electric off except the fridge when we're in bed, and it's all off through the day when we're out.
The heating only goes on if it's bitterly cold, if otherwise we put an extra layer on. The hot water will go on for as long as it takes to heat, then off again, we keep our eye on it.
We uSwitched the utilities and broadband and got the cheapest deals we could find, and we also just bought the Ovivo sim.
I drive in the most mpg-friendly way I can, and we recycle as much as we can so we can personally reuse it, instead of giving it to the council to recycle and then make money out of.
No takeaways, no extras that we don't need, no 'treats' that we don't need, no TV, no fancy mobile, no anything of that sort really.
We're also constantly scanning the floor for money as a lot of people seem to love throwing coppers on the floor - we weighed £14.55 into the Asda machine a few months ago, all from 6 months of picking up off the floor - every little helps!
Not saying you should live like us, but it's a good example of the little things that people often overlook which can add up to huge savings.
EDIT; forgot to add, get rid of the birthday and Christmas presents, and also cards for anniversaries and 'special holidays' like easter and valentines day. This should save you loads. You can easily make toys for kids or get them real tiny gifts like books. As for cards, I find telling someone you love them to their face better than paying £2 to say it in card form.
Nice self-deprecation. :T
Ta for your posts in this thread, they have been most interesting and thought-provoking.
I've acted on your Ovivo advice by ordering their sim card and will take on board most of your other tips too.
For any puffers around here who simply can't give up the habit and suffer much pocket pain as a consequence, I'd like to add that growing tobacco is very easy-peasy and perfectly legal in the UK. The tricky part is curing the stuff but that too isn't difficult with the help of a little online research.0 -
Yep! The missus is a horticulturalist and she's very interested in growing some, just because she likes the plant. I couldn't afford to smoke nowadays, when i gave up it was £7.50 a pouch on the 'black market' ('imported' stuffBurnleyBob wrote: »Nice self-deprecation. :T
Ta for your posts in this thread, they have been most interesting and thought-provoking.
I've acted on your Ovivo advice by ordering their sim card and will take on board most of your other tips too.
For any puffers around here who simply can't give up the habit and suffer much pocket pain as a consequence, I'd like to add that growing tobacco is very easy-peasy and perfectly legal in the UK. The tricky part is curing the stuff but that too isn't difficult with the help of a little online research.
), got my dad some last time i went to see him - £17 a pouch, no thanks!
Also glad i could help someone, my 'advice' seems to get people to thinking i'm a 'troll' round here because i tell them what they don't like hearing usually, but i'm nice really. I'm all for people saving and not being enslaved to bills, it's not what life is about!
MY sister pulled the 'skint' card for years, until you realised she had a £42 a month iPhone contract, £45 a month gym membership, was spending on credit cards and eating out all the time, and buying name brand foods in the shops that are no different in quality to some cheaper brands, etc. No sympathy for people like that unless they're willing to make a change and not just 'i need more money from somewhere', especially when that place is the benefit office; i'd give my right arm to never have to deal with them again.0 -
Yep! The missus is a horticulturalist and she's very interested in growing some, just because she likes the plant. I couldn't afford to smoke nowadays, when i gave up it was £7.50 a pouch on the 'black market' ('imported' stuff ), got my dad some last time i went to see him - £17 a pouch, no thanks!
.
And that's different from fiddling the benefits or tax system in what way exactly?0 -
Well that's another thing that can be done to ease their suffering - checking whether they're in the right council tax band and possibly getting a rebate if they're not. They can't just decide you're in a holiday hotspot so the council tax is more expensive. Well, i didn't think so anyway (could be wrong), i thought it was to do with size of property.
My understanding of council tax is it's based on the value of the property. I live in a tiny 2 bed new build flat but I previously lived in a three bed house that was twice the size - they're three roads apart (same borough, same suburb within the borough). The council tax is the same band and price on both properties. If it was to do with size I'd pay half as much now because the flat would easily fit into our old house two times over if not more!
If it's based on the value of a property it would be more expensive in desirable areas because even a three bed council house is worth more if it's in a desirable area.0 -
But 'desirable' areas have changed over the 20 years since it was introduced.My understanding of council tax is it's based on the value of the property. I live in a tiny 2 bed new build flat but I previously lived in a three bed house that was twice the size - they're three roads apart (same borough, same suburb within the borough). The council tax is the same band and price on both properties. If it was to do with size I'd pay half as much now because the flat would easily fit into our old house two times over if not more!
If it's based on the value of a property it would be more expensive in desirable areas because even a three bed council house is worth more if it's in a desirable area.
Maybe it is that expensive, but it couldn't do any harm to check.0 -
But 'desirable' areas have changed over the 20 years since it was introduced.
Maybe it is that expensive, but it couldn't do any harm to check.
Yep it's definitely worth checking.
If it's in certain areas of the country it could have been worth more for quite a long time. I'm from a part of Cornwall where local people in some areas have been priced out of areas for about 20 years now, you don't find anyone under 40 living in villages unless they've inherited property because no one's able to afford to buy!0 -
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