The 'Save 12k in 2014' Thread!

Melaniep101

Am I too late to join in?

I'd like to save £10k this year for just an emergency stash (currently don't have a pot to pee in!).

I opened a First Direct Regular Saver a couple of days ago and paid in my first £300 plus I've saved a further £400 this month. I work in sales so if I put the work in, I can make good money this year! I have £9k's worth of credit cards to pay off at the same time, but if I cut back it's doable!

115K

It's payday tomorrow so I'm going to be making my first payment to my 2014 savings. It's weird that I'm so excited about saving. I never thought I would say that.:rotfl:

nat21luv

Im pretty chuffed with myself, I started the month £208 short to pay the bills and I managed to make the extra £208, plus make and save another £300 and am now trying to make a little extra to pay into my monthly pots eg; Christmas, car, holiday ect. Ive spent all month selling on ebay, surveying, writing reviews, and im exhausted! Its not over yet though, hopefully this weekend I can do a car boot sale to clear the clutter and make some dosh

JasX

I've done this myself for a few years now but tend to aim for the ISA maximum (£11,520) and run it April to April before throwing it in to my ISA account -currently on track for this cycle I'm happy to report.

A trick I use is a forward looking spreadsheet -current account (earning 4%) balance in the top right cell, then I have the amount I expect to come in each month (salary basically) running down the next colum, regular bills in the next one, my monthly spending budget in the next and any future one off items i see coming up in the next one (eg 6 monthly service charges bill). I deduct my target savings off the end of month 12 and delete the top row each month so I can see how I'm keeping on track for hitting the target and how much 'spare' money I have /can afford to spend and still hit it.

(Each row is basically labelled jan/feb/mar etc and colum 1 in theory shows how much I should have in my current account/wherever you keep your savings in that future month -basically the number above it plus all the money I expect to come in that month...minus all the money I expect to go out)

If months go by and I'm under my monthly spending budget the 'surplus goes up and I know I can maybe afford a treat. If the 'how much spare cash I expect to have at the end of the year' number starts going down I know I'm over spending and need to take action to cut back.

Farel01

nat21luv wrote: »

Im pretty chuffed with myself, I started the month £208 short to pay the bills and I managed to make the extra £208, plus make and save another £300 and am now trying to make a little extra to pay into my monthly pots eg; Christmas, car, holiday ect. Ive spent all month selling on ebay, surveying, writing reviews, and im exhausted! Its not over yet though, hopefully this weekend I can do a car boot sale to clear the clutter and make some dosh

That's a great start to the year!! :T

I feel slightly guilty for ebaying off a bottle of perfume I got for Christmas, but would have never used it.. Chanel is just not my cup of tea. However since it was a Christmas present originally I felt "compelled" to spend the money on something fun. So no extra £50 saving, but I got some stuff for the house project so not completely faffed it away

Wentthedaywell?

JasX wrote: »

If months go by and I'm under my monthly spending budget the 'surplus goes up and I know I can maybe afford a treat. If the 'how much spare cash I expect to have at the end of the year' number starts going down I know I'm over spending and need to take action to cut back.

I think it's important to factor in treats, otherwise saving can just be a pointless grind. I budget for a £50pm treat and I can let it build up over a few months so I can blow a couple of hundred quid without feeling guilty.

Currently, my treat stash is in negative as I forward funded my macbook from it last year. But that's OK, it just means no treat budget for a few more months.

Nymphadora

First payment towards my goal today. Only £40 but it's a start.

Can't wait for pay day next week to make a bigger dent.

115K

:T

I'm number 182

I made my first payment to my savings today - £800/ £9,000

Thanks!

115K

Jason_Bourne_2

£760 banked. Next few months will be less as I have a holiday to pay for but a decent start for someone who had 10k of debt 6 weeks ago.

LisaJane

Hello!

Could I please join. Just to tell you a little bit about me...I got married in August 2012 and spent all savings I had up until then on the wedding/honeymoon etc! The year after we got married, I convinced myself that I should enjoy myself while I'm still young and did various things such as New York for St Patrick's day weekend, 10 day summer holiday in Italy, attended a music festival, went to the Edinburgh festival....the list goes on really!!!!!!!

I managed to do all of this without getting into debt...however when I got home from Electric Picnic at the start of September 2013, I pledged to my OH that from then on I would start being a grown up and start saving again! Between September and December I managed to save around £2000, but I had to use this for a new car that we have needed for a while. I owe OH £1500 to top up my half of the car. However this will be a long term loan that I will be giving him gradually, so there is no pressure with that at all. Plus any money I give him will be going into his contribution towards a house deposit anyway.

So I start 2014 with £135 left in my official savings account after buying the car. Currently I am able to save around £500 per month, however I am starting a new job on 3rd Feb with a £5000 pay rise, therefore I am hopeful that I will be able to increase this soon. I would also like to try and do a little more internet selling. OH and I had some success with books/dvds/trinkets before Christmas.

I in general take control of OH and I's joint money and am trying to put a little aside from that each month too. We currently have £102 in this account and I would like to keep this separate in the sig. So overall, I would like to try for £10,000 in 2014 (£7000 mine and £3000 joint) and see how I go from there! Would love to be able to increase it once I get my new salary!!