What is the absolute minimum you need to survive on?

Red-Squirrel_2

Interesting question! I think I'll add the figures up or how things are now, but I'm moving house soon (and paying off most of my debt in the process, woohoo!) so some bills will change.

Mortgage - 226
Service charge/ground rent - 80
Council tax - 74
Water - 18
Electricity - 30 (pay 50 at the moment but if I wasn't earning I'd cut right back)
Mobile - 15 (If unemployed I'd cancel Tv licence, Sky, landline and broadband and get a SIM only on my phone with unlimited data)
Groceries - 100 (me+2 dogs)
House insurance - 12

This is if I had no income apart from JSA etc. and absolutely had to live on bare bones.

I've not included my car costs because if I wasn't working I'd SORN it until I got a new job (not worth enough to sell)

So if needed (and fingers crossed it will never be needed, I have generous sick pay in my job, which is as secure as any can be) I can live off £555 a month as long as no emergencies/unexpected situations occur and as long as I am ok with having basically no life and never seeing anybody or going anywhere!

Bored

As a single person living in a flat share my outgoings are:

Rent: 563.33
Council tax: £40
Utilities: £15
Water: £14.65
Internet: £8.20
Transport: £86.10
Mobile: £5

= £732.28 for bills

I currently spend £240 - £300 per month, however I could cut this down if required so I would say £1000 would be my minimum needed to survive.

Puddylove

I do really admire the people who manage to eat a healthy balanced diet fairly frugally.
I really struggle with this - not helped by being lactose intolerant (to the point that I'll actually throw up if I drink a glass of milk, or eat eggs).
Any tips, or links to help with this?

To answer the OP - I suppose all my expenditure could be reduced depending on circumstances...at the moment my bills excluding food total £1118 per month - but £1000 of this is rent, council tax and livery for 2 horses.

HappyMJ

Angry_Bear wrote: »

Well no, but you can do a balanced diet for a lot less than the diet you've quoted (and we are talking minimum to live on in this thread). For example, if you switched a lot of the fruit and veg out for seasonal equivalents. Dropped the brand names (Walkers and Richmond). Make other nutritionally-equivalent switches such as "baby plum tomatoes" for "tomatoes". And those are just a couple of examples.

I'm curious to know what you think you could cut your groceries down to if you absolutely had to, and still get a balanced diet. Just as a thought-exercise?

That being said, I don't think you can get enough to eat - here I mean enough nutritionally, flavour optional - for £20 a month. And I don't think you could live on the previously suggested £18 diet, even for a month, without suffering some damage to your health.

Baby plum tomatoes are so much nicer. I do like good food. I do also pick vine ripened tomatoes just on this occasion it was baby plum. The basics tomatoes have no flavour and well...I don't like them. Yes I know I could get basics salted supermarket branded crisps but they do not compare to Walkers and for only a penny more per pack I'll stick with Walkers. Same with the sausages - Richmond is actually a cheap brand they have much more meat than the basics sausages but are no where near as expensive as butchers sausages that I watch the butcher make in front of me with real meat. They are my favourite sausages for special occasions.

Minimum I could spend is £210 per month for 2 adults. I spent £280 per month the last 2 months and I know that can be cut down. I've always said on the DFW board that people should aim to spend about £25 per person per week to get a good balanced diet and have enough for personal toiletries and household cleaning supplies in their budgets. It's a long term budget figure that I am aiming towards myself. In the the short term I could for the next month spend zero and survive on my store cupboard, food banks and discount vouchers (complain about everything you always get a voucher-I've got about £70 of them at the moment) but that is extremely difficult to do in the long term. I cannot recommend that to anyone.

Reya

Interesting exercise. Here's mine:

Rent £382
Council Tax £77
Gas & Electric £50
Water £20
Internet & phone £50.60*
TV License £12.12
Mobile Phone £29**
Contents Insurance £8
Groceries £40***

TOTAL £668.72

Currently unemployed since being made redundant after 20 years of service. Looking for work (without much luck so far; employers don't even respond with an email these days if you don't make it to the interview stage) but not claiming any benefits. I'm living off my redundancy payment at the moment.

*I could go with a cheaper ISP if I had to, but I've been with this smaller company for years, and their service is second-to-none. Try getting any of the big name ISPs' call centres to patch directly into your telephone exchange to fix your connection there and then, seconds after you call them up with a problem. The internet is a lifeline for me, so I'd rather pay a wee bit more for personal service like that. If I absolutely had to, I'd drop down to a big name ISP for £10 per month.

**In a contract with one year to go. I've negotiated it down to the lowest possible tariff.

***Groceries are this low because I live alone and only shop every three weeks, spending roughly £30 each time. It would be lower, but I don't live near the supermarket so I can't just walk there and take advantage of the YS offers. Every few months I do an Approved Food shop, so my cupboards are full of things from there. I don't starve

YoungBusinessman

Mine is horrible reading....

Joint account (covers mortgage,council tax, insurance etc) - £600 pcm
Running costs of van - £140
Entertainment/misc - £300
Debt repayments.......£1600.

Total = £2,640.

bexster1975

Won't be forever young businessman.

Would be more horrible if you didn't earn enough each month to cover it. Chin up!

Bexster

YoungBusinessman

bexster1975 wrote: »

Won't be forever young businessman.

Would be more horrible if you didn't earn enough each month to cover it. Chin up!

Bexster

Good point, just an eye watering amount to spend on a debt, more than my outgoings are to pay a mortgage and run a van :eek: Roll on DFD :j

dylan2011

Hi, We are a family of 4 (2 adults, 2 children)
Rent: £550
Car: £150 (includes fuel for work, insurance, tax etc)
Council Tax: £130
Gas & Electric: £80
Water: £42
Phones/Internet/TV - £40
Mobile Phone: £12.99
Debts: £200
Groceries: £200-£250
Total: £1404.99-£1454.99
just wanted to say, pop over to the Old Stylers board for advice re. the grocery budget. I really find it quite derogative reading comments about spending less than £210 a month not being healthy for 2 people etc. We are a family of 4, and spend £200-£250 a month. We cook from scatch, and eat a very balanced diet with lots of fruit and veg daily, fair size meat portions etc. I actually find it is the "packet" stuff that costs a lot more than eating fresh. My children have fresh fruit available to them at all time - currently, there are apples and satsumas. When they run low it will be topped up.
A typical daily diet for us:
Breakfast - Weetabix or Porridge followed by a banana or other fruit. Plus boiled eggs for partner.
Lunch - Omelette, Soup (home made), Sandwiches or left overs from dinner with yogurt, fruit & some times a home made flapjack or cake. Occassionly a bag of crisps. (Aldis own brand are really nice, much cheaper than branded ones and much tastier than the value brands)
Dinner - Home made spag bol - 5% fat mince, grated carrot, celery, mushrooms, peppers, onions, garlic, herbs and tinned toms or passata with spaghetti.
Snacks - Fruit, Veg sticks and dips, yogurt.
We do have treats as well, and the house always has plenty of food in. We shop mostly at Aldis. Decent meat is a must for us, as I believe you get more for your money. (eg. a cheap mince won't fill you up anywhere near as much as a lean mince, low meat content bready sausages won't fill you up as well as higher meat content ones - I buy the Aldi ones - pack of 6 at under £2, over 80% meat content, 2 is plenty to fill an adult up as they are large and meaty).

andyfromotley

YoungBusinessman wrote: »

Mine is horrible reading....

Joint account (covers mortgage,council tax, insurance etc) - £600 pcm
Running costs of van - £140
Entertainment/misc - £300
Debt repayments.......£1600.

Total = £2,640.

You need to take out the entertainment misc as this is for the absolute minimum. £2340 - looks better already!