Not Buying It- A Consumer Holiday 2016

tatabubbly

Happy new year, I'm planning on hopefully being more active this year!

Start of the year hasn't been so good - OH sister stayed in our house while we were gone and left a few days ago. Turns out she didn't know where the trip switch was and I had to throw out all our food as it had spoiled in the fridge!

Planning on reducing our spends as we will be expanding our family this year and need all the extra cash we can get!

meandmaboy

Skint_yet_Again wrote: »

Hi everyone, count me in too I would love to join you all.
My aims are


1. food shopping only once a week and NO top up shops ! This is my downfall - stern talk to self - if I pop to the shop for milk I will only take enough cash for milk and leave my purse and cards at home


2. no takeaways - I will meal plan and make my own


3. no buying chocolate or biscuits - I am diabetic and must not eat them


Must grow a backbone and get some willpower


Happy new year everyone

Hello Skint yet again,
We must be twins you have stolen my thoughts exactly :D:D
Like you i do need to try much much harder this year.
Took redundancy & a small pension from work in the summer, have settled into not going out / spending as much.
Still feel I've got lots of room for improvement as my state pension doesn't kick in for 11 years :eek::eek::eek::eek:
Have followed this since last year as a lurker but now time 'come out' for 2016.
regards to everyone
E x

Primrose

Aboard again and tomorrow the Cristmas decorations and cards will come down. I haven't bought scribbling paper for years as I cut up the backs of envelopes and the blank sides of Cristmas cards into squares and keep them in those cube blocks for holding small scribbling pads. Don't know why people pay good money for pristine new scribbling /note jotting blocks when there's so much other perfectly good paper around which can be recycled.
Hapy New Year everybody!

nursemaggie

Well I made it until December not buying it. We got eviction notice at the end of October so needed to spend. If I could wave a magic wand and move our house contents I would. I resent all that money to load a van, go round the corner and unload it. I don't think they will get out of second gear. All because a company decided to sell all it's property in the North, leaving all the housing associations rehousing hundreds of people in the last two months of the year.

I also resent having to buy a fridge and a freezer because the housing association will not allow fridge freezers and put the work surfaces end to end on both sides of a galley kitchen.

Primrose I have been using backs of envelopes for about 20 years. It makes up for all the junk mail we get. Since I now do just about everything on line my mail is just about 100% junk.

I have one of those blocks to put paper in given me to about 5 Christmases back. I never use it just grab some junk mail when the phone rings. I may remember one day.

Apart from the odd ornament bought as present in the past the only non essential things I have in the house is a collection of about 10 tea pots. You got to have some pretty things in the house. I have decided to stick to flowering plants from now on, especially the sort I can bring back in the room every year for it's flowering period.

[Deleted User]

Hi everyone! I'm back in for another year. DH and I have bought some things in the sales - all of which has been clothing for our upcoming trip to Iceland so it is much needed!

I don't do resolutions, however, I have set myself a target of losing 6lbs by May. It might not sound like much but it is for me as I have such a sweet tooth and I am a real snacker. Lets see...

DH and I are also planning a trip up to Norfolk next week to see some seals so we'll need a hotel room plus other associated spends but it will be worth it!

Hugs to all that need them!

bexster1975

Hello again all.

If I may be so bold, there are a lot of people already apologising for spending.....

This was not the idea of the thread last year, nor do I believe is the idea this year. Slowdown I believe meant they were " not buying it" as in not buying into the idea of needing this or that to make your life better. I think the consensus last year was this meant unnecessary sepending on carp we neither want or need, just sucked into buying by advertising and marketing.

So to all who have planned spends/ experiences etc. enjoy them! It's kind of the point really. If you are struggling more with cash, maybe not buying it is more literal. As far as I recall all comers were more than welcome last year and hope this will be the case this year.

If not, I shall be the first to walk the plank!...:rotfl:

Bexster

Towser

I don't "do" debt as it is too costly but I am frugal with my money to keep the wolf from the door. Some people don't understand this and I really wonder why?

In my budget the top three most expensive categories are Disposable Income, Food and Entertainment.

So to keep in budget for 2016 my challenges will be to spend less on each category as I did in 2015.

The way I will do this is to limit my spending as much as I can to Charity Shops, Groupon, Aldi, and Iceland.

I will be buying quality not quantity from the Charity Shops, make the most of Groupon, Meal Plan the best offers from Aldi, and Iceland. I will rather eat in and spend less in coffee shops.

Money manager with my online bank account really helps me do this to keep on track. I can also export the statements into a spreadsheet to do all the analysis one could wish for.

These threads help me to focus by asking me valuable questions.

Cutting down, Not cutting out altogether.

kittydfw2012

Delurking to join in on the new thread for 2016. It's so true whoever said that not spending is like dieting, you do really well for a while and then whoops, madness sets in for a few days and the purse comes out. Reading this thread helps to get back on track and overall, I'm sure we're all saving pennies by being more conscious of what we do buy or not.

JackieO and Nurse Maggie - love your posts

sammy_kaye18

Evening all,
Is there space for another little one please?? I have just finished my Christmas placements and so my income has taken a hit of about £400 a month.

I've worked out what income I do still have and it should work but I have to be careful with it!

I find boredom kicks in though, that's when I end up going shopping and buying crap I don't need.....so that's one of my main goals for this month. So I have planned my mini goals for January....

• Make a cupboard inventory and a shopping list of anything we need to get us through
• Use the library as much as possible for internet/books
• do not go to town unless absolutely necessary and don't take taxis home!
• homemade lunches for kids and hubby and also make sure they are up in plenty of time for breakfast
  
  Seems a good starting place.

pm2326

bexster1975 wrote: »

Hello again all.

If I may be so bold, there are a lot of people already apologising for spending.....

This was not the idea of the thread last year, nor do I believe is the idea this year. Slowdown I believe meant they were " not buying it" as in not buying into the idea of needing this or that to make your life better. I think the consensus last year was this meant unnecessary sepending on carp we neither want or need, just sucked into buying by advertising and marketing.

So to all who have planned spends/ experiences etc. enjoy them! It's kind of the point really. If you are struggling more with cash, maybe not buying it is more literal. As far as I recall all comers were more than welcome last year and hope this will be the case this year.

If not, I shall be the first to walk the plank!...:rotfl:

Bexster

Totally agree with this, my attitude to buying 'stuff' totally changed last year with the help of this thread.

I used to think that I "needed" to buy things to make me happy, but when I sat back and took time to consider the purchases I realised I didn't need it or actually want it. By summer last year I realised I wanted to experience things, visit places etc whether that be at the other end of the country or right here on my doorstep.

So I stopped bringing tat into the house and started going places, I discovered you can go to the cinema on your own if that's what you want to do without being sniggered at....I also discovered a love of theatre.

I visited local places that have been ignored in the past as I was too busy looking for things to buy.

I now save my cash by not buying tat and buy experiences instead...for instance I'm planning a visit to the local sea life centre this month, it's only 20 mins away, been there 15 years, never set foot over the doorstep

And I've already got tickets to see the Riverdance show in April and Cats in September...I would never have been able to buy these had I not changed my spending habits last year.