2016 Frugal Living Challenge

FunBrum

I'm not too well today so I haven't really done anything on the frugal front today....I suppose conserving my energy is frugal enough!;)

£100.42 direct debit will be coming out of my bank tomorrow, so that is the last for this month. I will deduct it now from my balance as I might not be able to get online tomorrow.:D

Toodle pip.....Happy frugaling :money:

evuka

So I sat down yesterday and re-calculated my annual budget. All in all, that is, including e ve ry thing (bank charges due, late payments and money owed to a friend and savings) it came to a total of £13,735.80! :cool:

I expected much more so it's a relief. A few details:


ctax, bills, bband, mobile, buspass and groceries 3,252
an online course paid in installments ~1,305 (depends on $ fx rate)
late payments, OD, etc 1,245
variables/adjustables 869 (save monthly for flight 60, hairdresser 9, entertainment 10 thru Feb-Dec)
saving for cat fund 500
rebuild emergency fund 2,000

I have other saving goals as well but not sure how much I can shove into those... Started working part-time with options to do overtime and planning to go partly self-employed (VA, writing/blogging, babysitting) so a lot depends on how much I can earn.
Obviously, late payments/OD/etc is priority and basic living expenses plus the online course as it is debited from my account. Variables are exactly that: may set aside as much as planned may not - growing hair to ultimately eliminate the need of a £25-30 haircut! :eek:, discovering more and more frugal fun and can reduce the flight home to one/year.
Next on the list is EF, the cat fund can grow slower, she is healthy and indoor.

NSD's, YS, batch-cooking, stockpiling, making my own cosmetics/cleaning stuff, freecycling, ebaying, swagbucks, surveys, creative cooking

I've seen comments on TV, freeview, freesat here a lot. I said goodbye to my TV in November,2013 since then I used utube and f(ree)filmsdotorg (leave out the bracketed part in the browser) to watch films and shows. I've watched minimum 1 film every single days and dare I say, sometimes even 3-4... and there are still a lot that I haven't seen! I love the home made videos of cats, dogs, animals, babies, whatever and love Hoarders, Supernanny and How Clean Is Your House?. I found all these on utube.

If you're a family it might not be so easy to decide what to watch or if your kids have their own laptop/tablet, you may want to monitor somehow what content they watch but it is definitely a good way to substitute TV. You can use an HDMI cable to connect your pc to your TV to enjoy the bigger screen. (And me thinks it was Martin who once wrote about these cables being available in P0undland so no need to spend a load.

For DVD's - I used to buy them in charity shops and I know libraries have them as well though never tried that. Maybe doing a dvd swap with friends or neighbours could be something to do in the future?

(I think this is my longest post ever. Time to shut up and check my potato on the hob!:rotfl:)

evuka

bmma wrote: »

it has been ages since I had clootie dumpling Frugaldom- I can see it and nearly taste it:j

What is a clootie dumpling, please? :question:

evuka

COOLTRIKERCHICK wrote: »

Does anyone else do ' save the change' with their bank?? Lloyd's have a thing where they will round up any payments you make to the nearest £, and put the diff in a separate saving account??

I have it with TSB though recently my account's in OD... using the Plus to pay for things. Anyways, it's worth to have it! Pennies accumulated so fast for me in the past, incredible. And it's not really noticeable as it's not much leaving your account so you don't feel 'deprived'.

cw18

I ditched my TV licence at the end of 2010, and haven't missed it. When I'm away from home staying somewhere that has a licence (house sitting / decorating for DD, or at the property I have use of in the Lakes a couple of times a year) I rarely turn it on there either, even though it would be legal to do so.

I don't use any of the catch-up services either. I've had (probably still have) access to DS1's Netf!ix account, but don't think I've used that in over 12 months. From time to time I get a free trial offer for an alternative (currently on N0wTV and watching a film after work most days), but always cancel before the trial ends.

Other than that I watch DVDs - mostly from Amaz0n marketplace (after watching prices for anything from days to months until they drop to a level I'm prepared to pay), but a few from a local charity shop. I've also borrowed some from OH, and still have one of his sets here to get started on and am waiting for him to finish another so I can borrow that.

COOLTRIKERCHICK

Thanks evuka, I have just had a tsb account now to get the 5% cash back etc.. But I c0cked up my password lol so waiting for another code to be posted to me, to re- set it.. So thanks for the heads up that they do, save the change too

The_Only_Girl

Sorry I haven't posted at all. Will go back to the first pages and catch up with your posts. It will take me a while to catch up.

I just want to say we had a very frugal dinner tonight. Bought some yellow goodies from sainsburg this evening and when I got home I quickly rustled up a vegetable stir fry for 4 (oriental stir fry mix for 34p plus cabbage and leeks for 24p, and apple pie for 40p.

The_Only_Girl

COOLTRIKERCHICK wrote: »

Thanks evuka, I have just had a tsb account now to get the 5% cash back etc.. But I c0cked up my password lol so waiting for another code to be posted to me, to re- set it.. So thanks for the heads up that they do, save the change too

Hubby and I opened the plus account before Christmas and we're excited about the high interest rate for the balances up to £2,000. Was told that with our tax bracket, we'll earn around 3.9%. Interest. We also opened a regular savers account for each of us. Hubby is so fixated on the £5 cash back on the £100 contactless payment.

In last week's MSE email from Martin there is a link for the £100 switching bonus and £4 cash back for first £100 contactless payment. I still have a current account in Virgin that I could switch to TSB and will opt in for the Save the Change as well.

The_Only_Girl

I did a small top up shop today. Spent £20.72 (most of the items are ys. I got a voucher of 6p off per liter of fuel. So I filled my petrol tank to the full and paid only £30.91 which is the lowest I've ever paid for a full tank of petrol. That plus the groceries and a wombled receipt gave me a total of 202 nectar points with a value of £1.01. I also had 25p cash back on a loaf of bread.

cw18

Am I the only person who doesn't like (and won't use) contactless payments?

One of my cards has been used that way twice - but only after I handed the card to the stall holder at a food festival (different festivals and different stalls) and they did it before I realised. Didn't realise he'd done it the first time until I got my statement as it asked for my pin (presumably due to being first time), but realised the second when he passed me back my card with a receipt without me entering the pin.

I've contacted my banks to see if I can have cards without the function, and the answer has been 'no' for my credit cards and 'not if you want to use pay at pump' for my debit cards. Don't really understand the latter as they have a contactless limit of £30 but I can put up to £99 of fuel into a vehicle ?!?!?!

So for now I've used a black marker over the symbol of each card in the hope it'll raise queries before anyone else tries to operate them that way.......