Paying the car tax via EBay, and other shenanigans.

brizzledfw

Didn't stop chasing my tail all day. Hardly got a chance to do the stuff I planned to..so that'll be my Sunday bollixed then

Hope you get a decent nights sleep

mfmaybe

Oh that's not good Brizzle. Sleep was ok, just not enough of it, went to bed waaaay later than I said I was going to, and then another 5.40 wake up. DS is very up and down just now and incredibly hard to please.

I'm also hard to please, my predicted overspend just shot back up to £123. I knew I had an annual DD of £25 and it was in my budget last month. However I got an email saying it had been taken on the 23rd December. I did think I hadn't seen it, but didn't check. It then got taken yesterday. 23rd February. Grrrr.

Oh yes, and a rather unexpected £600 bill arrived in the mail today. Suspect I'm going to have to pay that. Don't have it saved for. Sigh. The plus side is I found out I am getting a bonus; I just wanted to put it all back into savings.

mfmaybe

Ok so looks like the £600 bill isn't going to be (all) mine after all which is good.

Fluffies are now in their temporary home that should see me through March. Will incur a little bit extra in feed and bedding costs but cheaper than a month of full livery that I didn't really need. Come April I am hoping they can go on grass livery somewhere for summer. And then I'm going to have to hope we've sold up here.

Potential overspend still where it was, but I'm diligently sticking to budget and making sure I transfer money to CC account. Spends have been ok. Food shopping is exactly bang on, albeit I'd wanted to save some money here. It feels like it's impossible to spend less, even when we feel like we've been really frugal and pat ourselves on the back, we get home and realise we've run out of loo roll and olive oil and actually there's nothing for lunch.

I'm quite stressed by my budget just now. Certain things I'm not saving for and that's ok. But even if my rental income was back up to where it used to be, I still would be short every month, and that's without debt payments as I don't have any. Now, that said, it does include £150 into savings which is my CCRF in the signature (which I'm currently NOT doing!) and I do save another £100 into a work sharesave scheme. I do budget for almost everything I can think of but even then I'd prefer it if the figure was a surplus. I guess it's the horses that are the real culprits, and lots of it is me trying to save up for things instead of being suprised by them. But if I wanted to replace my car, say, I'd not have enough slack to incorporate a loan. I need to have a long hard think about it all.

brizzledfw

Oh MFM you sound a little harassed by it all. Maybe cos its Monday too? But to be positive some things are going your way..horses are OK, your food bills are manageable and you're planning for the spends much more...baby steps maybe but steps all the same.

Keep going hun

Brizzle x

mfmaybe

For the most part I remember how lucky I am. I'm not on the breadline and we have a wonderful life. But we've been talking about moving and saying things like "ideally we won't increase our mortgage by much "; the reality is we can't without stopping all savings.

mfmaybe

OK so have managed to (so far) get the budget overspend down to £85 this month. Although I'm kidding myself as I am going to have to spend extra on hay, and also bedding for the horses now. There's £20 left in my hay budget, £10 in my wallet, and £16 in my lunch budget. If I pool all that I reckon I will need another £25 for hay (for this month only they aren't on grazing hence the extra costs). I think I can squeeze that out of the budget but not the bedding costs. Will have to see what I can do on food shopping. Have £77 left (my share) for 2 weeks so ideally each weeks shop wouldn't be over £60. Fuel is another pretty tight area. Might just, just, about manage. But not completely convinced....

Sigh. However some positives are that I have been really good about the heating; and using the stove instead, and still religiously turning lights off when I see them. Fingers crossed electric bill will be lower again this month, the reading isn't due for another week though.

brizzledfw

Hi, read this and though about whether you use a smart meter? OH bought one home from his parents last week, who don't need it anymore, and it's fascinating to see that...for example...each bank of lights in our kitchen cost 3p ph to run...:p So we have decided to use it to better calculate/forecast our bills (maybe even reduce our DD?), rope everyone in to help get that lower etc etc

See if you can borrow one or grab one off Freecycle?

Sunshine out here..hopefully we will go out today. I fancy some fresh air. I envy you your horses right now...

mfmaybe

brizzledfw wrote: »

Hi, read this and though about whether you use a smart meter? OH bought one home from his parents last week, who don't need it anymore, and it's fascinating to see that...for example...each bank of lights in our kitchen cost 3p ph to run...:p So we have decided to use it to better calculate/forecast our bills (maybe even reduce our DD?), rope everyone in to help get that lower etc etc

See if you can borrow one or grab one off Freecycle?

Sunshine out here..hopefully we will go out today. I fancy some fresh air. I envy you your horses right now...

Do you mean the plug-in monitor as opposed to the official smart meter? I think we might have one, but I had it in my head they only worked with a particular supplier. No idea why....

Yesterday was not a sunny day here. It was miserable drizzle and fog. We had a viewing lined up, and after a lovely cold but crisp week we couldn't believe how bad the weather had turned. Of course then the viewer didn't turn up :mad:. Today was very spring like though, and I was out pottering about with them earlier which made me very happy. Then DS and I went out in the garden and did some weeding (a one year old with a 6ft hoe in his hands is hilarious and alarming at the same time :rotfl: ) and for the first time in forever his refusal to wear gloves didn't result in hysterical frostbitten finger meltdown. Yippee :T

In other news, food shopping was £55. Result. Shame we'd spent £20 on a bottle of gin the day before.

mfmaybe

Starting with positives. I said I wanted to put an extra £500 into joint savings over the 2 council tax free months, and I have. There is also another gift in there from DHs parents that was a lovely surprise, it is just forming a buffer fund just now.

Predicted overspend down a little, £78, but not going to meet it as there isn't enough flex left. Obviously put too much into annual bills. I am however pleased with how tight I am keeping things. I've a good bit sitting in TCB/Q'Co which would cover the shortfall, but it's not all payable.

Another positive, the gap on the monthly credit card is getting smaller ie much more is being saved up for as I spend it. I currently have £415 not saved for BUT - £33 is already budgeted in the DD this month, £60 will come from the annual savings next month, oh and £67 won't actually be payable until April paycheck. Need to keep this super tight. I really want to get to the point where the budget is just the budget; and any extra or underspend can go against the CCRF.

The less positives: The other income stream isn't really any closer to being resolved although I've had a frank conversation about how a favour soon becomes a bit less feel-good Things will just remain this tight for now.

DH still isn't working but he does have an interview this week that we are pinning quite a lot on. He's getting quite stressed now and we really don't want to eat into his redundancy.

Oh wait, another positive. I think I have a plan G for the fluffies for the summer. Reasonably affordable and also workable, I think. Fingers crossed.

mfmaybe

Quick note to self. £28 of Pay rise (all of it, probably) must go to CCRF and not into my budget. From June pay £14 will be swallowed by pension increases. The rest from December.