S.O.A Any Help Much Appreciated!

FingersofFish_2

Okay, so i'm new to the forums but have been an avid MSE follower for a couple of years now, the site has been great and has managed to get me through 4 years of university debt free (apart from student loan) with 2 children and a partner! Yippee!

However i'm now stuck searching for graduate employement and in the meantime my budgets just cant stretch far enough. My most recent full years budget is currently running at a £416 a month overspend!! and thats living quite frugally in my opinion.

Everything is accounted for in my S.O.E so please take a look and tell me where I may be able to slash costs!

**NOTE** Transport is a huge cost but is really a must unfortunatley, we are quite isolated from family (grandparents etc.) and so need both vehicles for social, work and fetching/dropping off my son from my ex-partner who lives 40 miles away.

** I also have access to a £2000 interest free overdraft until September 2017 but currently have nothing on it.

Thank you moneysavers.


Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Household Details

Number of Adults in Household: 2
Number of Children in Household: 1 Resident (+1 living 3 days per week)
Number of Cars: 2


Monthly Income Details
Income from Employment (after tax). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 693.90
Income from Self Employment (before tax). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
State Pension . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Private Pension / Annuity Payout. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Benefits (Inc. Child Benefit/Tax Credits & Income Support). . . . . . . . . . . 363.26
Income From Savings & Investments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Gifts From Family / Friends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Monthly Expense Details

In Your Home

Mobile phones . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30.00
TV licence. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12.13
Internet. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9.85
Home phone. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Cleaning products/Cleaner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Garden maintenance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Household maintenance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Oil . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Electricity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55.00
Gas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35.00
Water . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18.83
Council tax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.64
Overdraft cost. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Bank account fee. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Home insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11.67
Mortgage/Rent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425.00
Plumbing/Boiler cover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Mortgage life insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Mortgage payment protection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Life insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.75
Food and household shopping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195.00
Drinks for home . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Motoring & Public Transport

Petrol/Diesel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143.00
Parking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Car tax . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.42
Car insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108.33
Car maintenance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114.67
Rail/Buses/Taxis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Breakdown cover . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.83

Debt Repayments

Credit card repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.75
Hire purchase repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Personal loan repayments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Car loan repayments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Savings & Investments

Pension payments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Buying shares . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Investments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Cash ISAs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Lump sum saving . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Regular saving. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Kids Savings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00

Family

Pet food. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
School trips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
School meals. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Pocket money. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Nappies/Baby extras . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Laundry/Dry cleaning. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Children's travel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Baby-sitting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Childcare/Playgroups. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Pet insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Travel insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Entertainment

Satellite/Digital TV. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Family days out . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86.67
Cinema/Theatre trips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Books/Music/Films/Computers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Big days out. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Shopping for fun. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Pet costs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.17
Hobbies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
IT/Computing (antivirus, etc) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
DVD rental. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Drinking out. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Eating out. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40.00

Clothes, Health & Beauty

Complimentary therapies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Optical bills . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Haircuts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.67
Dentistry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Beauty treatments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Healthcare cash plans . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Dental insurance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Private medical insurance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Fitness/Sports/Gym. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Work clothes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
New children's clothes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33.33
New clothes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33.33

Education & Courses

University tuition fees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
School fees . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Your courses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00

Big One-Offs

Funeral expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Wedding expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Sofa/Kitchen/TV . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Birthdays . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.83
Winter holiday. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Summer holiday. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Christmas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16.67

Odds & Sods

Newspapers and magazines. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Tax & NI Provisions (self-employed only). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Regular charity donations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Meals at work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Smokes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 0.00
Coffees/Sandwiches/Snacks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15.00


Total monthly income. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,057.16


Total monthly expenses. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,473.53

sourcrates

Hi,

Your budget is fairly modest to be fair, I'm assuming the current overspend is been funded by credit ?
Think the simple fact is you don't earn enough between you, only way to solve that is to get a job, again I'm assuming it's your partner that currently works.

I'd take whatever I could get in order to bring in some money.

getmore4less

Can you format it better. use a format for MSE button on the SOA calculator

http://www.stoozing.com/calculator/soa.php

The bigest issues are doing things you can't afford.

these need to go

Family days out . . . . . . . . 86.67
Eating out. . .. . . . . . . . . 40.00
Coffees/Sandwiches/Snacks .. 15.00 (up the food bill a bit for this and above)
Birthdays. . . . . . . . . . . . . 20.83
Christmas . . . . . . . . . . . . 16.67
Kids Savings . . . . . . . . . . . 10.00

these are too high
Mobile phones . . . . . . . . 30.00
New children's clothes . . . 33.33
New clothes . . . . . . . . . . 33.33


Looks low
Council tax . . . . . . . . . 5.64

THe rest is car.

Biggest problem is income with only one part time(24hr on min wage) wage coming in.

HappyMJ

Why are the earnings so low?

Are you both in further education?

I would still have expected more income anyway even if you were. £6.70/hour multiplied by just 21 hours a week (3 days at 7 hours a day or 6 days at 3.5 hours a day) then multiplied by 2 is £1,219. I would be looking for more work to fit around your childcare responsibilities and your education commitments.

Are you getting all to which you are entitled?

For one child child benefit is £20.70/week and child tax credits pay £63.95/week. You could even get working tax credits if you could work enough hours between you.

You are also able to claim for housing benefit due to the child that lives with you.

Claiming what you're entitled to should balance the budget.

triple_choc_chip

£1300 a year for car insurance? Have you just passed your test and started with a 2-3 litre car? And £1400 a year maintenance so an old one at that which would mean low miles per gallon? You would be better buying a brand new hatchback with servicing included - it would cost less.

andyfromotley

Hi FoF,

as already suggested your only real solution to this one is to increase income. There is a very small but of tinkering withthe SOA as listed above but that wont solve it, you must find some sore of work asap.

DrivingMissDaisy

You've got 2 cars and one income ? Or have you only listed your income and left out your OH's income ?

matchboxfull

I think this SOA needs more clarification.

If it is indeed the case that there is only one earner in the household, earning a very low amount, then I'm afraid you can't afford to run two cars.

Can family drive to you? Can your ex-partner do the drops offs/pick ups of your son?

FingersofFish_2

Thank you for all the help given so far, certinally a lot for us to consider.

I have hopefully produced the S.O.A in a better format through the stoozing site and will post this one below - this should clear a few things up.

Just to answer a few of the questions.

Work: My partner, I have just finished university and will receive my degree classification shortly (marking period).

I am searching for graduate employment but need to at least tread water in the meantime (as is the purpose of this budget) to avoid debt building up.

Income Calculation: I had unfortunatley calculated my partners income slightly wrong (I have since updated it and it is slightly higher).

Cars: Unfortunatley the cars are a must at least for now. None of my partners family can drive and as previously stated we are a fair way from family.

My ex-partner cannot drive either meaning we are fully responsible for picking up and dropping off.

Also there are few job oppertunities or public transport links meaning we both need to commute and I feel losing the car/cars would seriously affect job prospects and future income (Given I am searching for graduate employment).

In response to the economy/age of the vehicles, one is 14 years old but low mileage, the other is only 2 years old and also low mileage. Both do fairly good economy (one is 39 MPG/£215 Tax) the other (60-70 Mpg/£30 Tax). Prehaps I have massivley overestimated servicing and repair costs but took these from the Parkers estimates.

Anyway here is the updated S.O.A in MSE format:

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 2*
Number of cars owned.................... 2

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 0
Partners monthly income after tax....... 856.21
Benefits................................ 362.7
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 1218.91

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 0
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 425
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 11.27
Electricity............................. 55
Gas..................................... 35
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 18.83
Telephone (land line)................... 0
Mobile phone............................ 30
TV Licence.............................. 12.13
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0
Internet Services....................... 9.85
Groceries etc. ......................... 195
Clothing................................ 67
Petrol/diesel........................... 143
Road tax................................ 20.41
Car Insurance........................... 119.16
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 114.6
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 0
Contents insurance...................... 11.6
Life assurance ......................... 5.75
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 37.5
Haircuts................................ 6.67
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Meals Out/Take-Out...................... 40
Credit Card Fee......................... 5.75
Coffee/Drinks Out....................... 15
Days Out................................ 83.83
Kids Savings............................ 10
Total monthly expenses.................. 1472.35


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 0
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 10100
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 10100

No Secured nor Hire Purchase Debts

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Total unsecured debts..........0.........0.........-


Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 1,218.91
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 1,472.35
Available for debt repayments........... -253.44
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 0
Amount short for making debt repayments. -253.44

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 10,100
Total HP & Secured debt................. -0
Total Unsecured debt.................... -0
Net Assets.............................. 10,100

getmore4less

The SOA is unrealistic till you up the income,

make some cutbacks.

You have prioritized the car/travel so something else has to give.

My previous posts still stands the remove list needs to happen till you up the income you don't have over £80 for days out and £40 for take outs and you need to find another £130 you need to start making choices.

OK the others can't drive but they can pay you to do their shares of the carting around.

2y old car should be under warranty and no MOT for another year
If the other does under budget at next service/MOT you might get a a day out and a take away

you need to preserve cash for maintaining the cars as they are the most important to you.


No debts what have you been living off?

You may need to review where you live if you both have to commute might be worth considering a move to somewhere one of you can use public and drop to one car.

FingersofFish_2

You're right, cutting those things would reduce the shortfall until I find work. I suppose i've been holding off on that because its difficult not to be able to take the kids out to do nice things and i've always wanted to pay some money into their savings every month.

I guess I have also overestimated car costs as you're right first MOT on the newer car isnt due until August and it also remains under warranty until then.

As for having no debts, I do have a massive student loan but repayments are based on income so nothing to pay until working. Last 4 years were managed as I had student maintenence loan+grant also but that has now run out.

Thanks all anyway I can see that I can probably balance the books even if it means paying for nothing except the most basic household bills/motoring costs... Clothing 4 people is a bit of an issue though!.