Forever Home Fund

LannieDuck

ourcornercottage wrote: »

We are currently at £40-£50/week for 3 of us and in addition about £150 per year on loo rolls etc. that includes all work lunches and we eat really well. This doesn't include alcohol as miniOCC has mainly closed that avenue of pleasure as it's just not worth it when you have to deal with a small person first thing! The key is to meal plan and avoid the top up shop as much as possible I think.

Can I ask what sort of meals you eat for £50/wk? I'm struggling to get our food costs under £100 for 4. I know there are lots of ways I could cut it, but OH likes good quality meat etc.

I'm wondering if some types of food are just cheaper than others, e.g. last week we realised that the fish pies had £6 worth of fish in them, so weren't actually very cheap afterall...

ourcornercottage

2 of us are veggies, 1 is gluten free so we save on meat but have to buy special GF foods which are expensive. I consider meat very expensive although when BF does eat it and will only eat good quality. Perhaps adopt meat free Monday's as it is really good for you to eat non meat protein once a week anyway. I think most serious money savers adopt at least a part time veggie diet.

I do my main shop at Aldi but do use farm shops too which are often much cheaper and the veg are a lot fresher. I'm not talking the fancy pants farmers markets but actual farms!

We eat really well and are never short of good food. We cook from scratch every day and don't buy hardly any processed food at all and processed food is expensive.

Is that any help?

katep23

OH and I have had a chat and he reckons the only thing that works is when I batch cook; at least then he can start dinner before I get home. Next weekend will be revision as I have 2 exams the week after but will plan to do some batch cooking the following weekend.

Just need to come up with some meals which don't involve mince

Mum and I had a big sort out of my clothes and took 3 binbags (1 of rags, 2 of saleable clothes) to the charity shop along with a load of miscellaneous stuff (lampshades, curtains that were left here, odd mugs etc). Felt really good to get stuff out of the house.

Had a brief sort out of the kitchen cupboards, have done an inventory of packets and sorted them out so I can find them easily.

Also found 5 tubes of tomato puree Something I buy almost shopping delivery as I am sure I have one but can't find it

Need to sort lunches out, have a bath then an early night because I was up at 5.30 this morning :cool:

debtfreeoneday

We budget £60 a week for 4 of us and a cat and usually spend £50. I agree totally that planning is key and we do nearly all of our food from scratch, that amount also does us packed lunches as well.

LannieDuck

ourcornercottage wrote: »

2 of us are veggies, 1 is gluten free so we save on meat but have to buy special GF foods which are expensive. I consider meat very expensive although when BF does eat it and will only eat good quality. Perhaps adopt meat free Monday's as it is really good for you to eat non meat protein once a week anyway. I think most serious money savers adopt at least a part time veggie diet.

I do my main shop at Aldi but do use farm shops too which are often much cheaper and the veg are a lot fresher. I'm not talking the fancy pants farmers markets but actual farms!

We eat really well and are never short of good food. We cook from scratch every day and don't buy hardly any processed food at all and processed food is expensive.

Is that any help?

We do most of that already, e.g. we're having oeufs florentine with potato wedges for dinner tonight - veggie and made from scratch.

We have a lovely farm shop in the area we've moved into, but I don't get the opportunity to get there very often. The only time I can make it when they're open is Sat pm, and we're often doing things with the girls then. But when we can visit the food is lovely

Pearla*Merle

katep23 wrote: »

Also found 5 tubes of tomato puree Something I buy almost shopping delivery as I am sure I have one but can't find it

:rotfl: I found two tubes of tomato pur!e in my fridge the other day for the exact same reason.

My inlaws do the same with salad cream, once counted about 10 bottles in their pantry. :eek:

katep23

Oof, so tired, OH was off to "the smoke" today so he was up at 4.30 and I got up to iron a shirt and make him breakfast (aren't I a good wifey ) before going back to bed for another hour.

Today will be a long day, thank crunchy I am working from home

Ebay woman has paid and I have shipped the leathers which have been delivered but got a feeling I might hear back about this so not drawing the money down from P@ypal or OPing it just yet.

Had a meeting at work yesterday about our pensions, the company will be paying in the absolute minimum and the fund seems rather conservative (only one fund available) so I will take it as it's free money but not relying on that to fund my retirement.

Was shocked at how many of my colleagues have no provision for retirement at all; I have a couple of small funds (one personal and one private) and I know that they are nowhere near enough, how do people cope not having any pension at all? I worry that, based on having this pension, will think they will be fine in retirement but the minimum input in year 1 is 1% from employee and employer each and in year 3 it only goes up to 5% from employee and 3% from employer.

This is all very much on my mind right now, we're in our late thirties and right now our money can have the biggest impact in a number of areas: renovating thte house, OPing the mortgage (both to allow us to increase LTV and remortgage to the best possible rate over the next 4 years), investing in S&S ISA and investing in pension.

We could really do with meeting an IFA to understand how best to use our income.

Add to this that we are both a bit unsettled at work and it's "exciting" times right now :rotfl:

Due a small rebate from HMRC so will OP that once it arrives.

Off to shuffle some money then the long commute to my desk

katep23

£1,500 moved to offset, have updated the figures in post 201.

Two weeks to payday, should be a good month as will get my bonus and some commission so hopefully can shift a good chunk over to the MOS.

v1ckyt

Well done all moving in the right direction.

katep23

It's obviously something in the air, I see you were up even earlier than me!