26, no savings feel stuck

PasturesNew

I always say "live like you're on the dole" and you'll see where the money's going.

You earn £1100.
Rent £400

On the dole you'd get £73/week = £316/month. And you'd not be paying that £80/month council tax.

£400+£316+£80 = £796.
Allow yourself travel to work costs, you say £6. So that's £804 to "live like you're on the dole".

So, you could, by thinking in this way, put aside £300/month.

Houseplant26

PasturesNew wrote: »

I always say "live like you're on the dole" and you'll see where the money's going.

You earn £1100.
Rent £400

On the dole you'd get £73/week = £316/month. And you'd not be paying that £80/month council tax.

£400+£316+£80 = £796.
Allow yourself travel to work costs, you say £6. So that's £804 to "live like you're on the dole".

So, you could, by thinking in this way, put aside £300/month.

Thank you for this. At the moment I'm trying to live off £50 a week to see how this goes and make headway into paying overdraft off.

Flowers123

Hi Houseplant. Hope you're having a lovely weekend. I can see you have been given lots of really good ideas. If you aren't with Halifax already you could consider switching to them and you get around £100 for switching and then £5 a month as long as you stay out of your overdraft. I have a few current accounts and I end up switching them around to get the best deals. As you have an OD you could open another account that allows you an overdraft and then use the Halifax account for all your direct debits and you would then get your £5 reward which is always useful. Flowersx

badger09

Flowers123 wrote: »

Hi Houseplant. Hope you're having a lovely weekend. I can see you have been given lots of really good ideas. If you aren't with Halifax already you could consider switching to them and you get around £100 for switching and then £5 a month as long as you stay out of your overdraft. I have a few current accounts and I end up switching them around to get the best deals. As you have an OD you could open another account that allows you an overdraft and then use the Halifax account for all your direct debits and you would then get your £5 reward which is always useful. Flowersx

There are T&Cs involved in obtaining £5 per month, in addition to 'staying out of your overdraft'.

However, I'm sure OP will read and understand them before siging up for a Halifax account:cool:

Houseplant26

badger09 wrote: »

There are T&Cs involved in obtaining £5 per month, in addition to 'staying out of your overdraft'.

However, I'm sure OP will read and understand them before siging up for a Halifax account:cool:

Thanks Flowers and Badger. My joint account is with partner is actually the Halifax one that gives you £5 which is good. We also checked today as we were aware we were overpaying into it slightly to give us a bit of a buffer and we think our household buffer is currently at £130 ish. So that's good news if that's right!

I'm sadly not feeling well at all tonight now I've come down with some sort of cold or virus feel shivery and achey and totally out of it! I've just come round from a long nap. So feeling a bit down. I had lots I wanted to get done on day off today and all we managed was food shop and buying some cleaning bits I needed. Intended to do the bathroom and haven't. I'm in work tomorrow, and doing 5days rather than 4 as I've signed myself up for overtime which is good money and workload wise but not ideal now feeling rubbish!

Wanted to look into savings account tonight and re-do budget but not sure I'm with it enough.

Houseplant26

Hoping on Aug payday overdraft will be more like £200 than £500 and cleared in September so proper saving can begin. Just about managing to live off £50 a week for food and anything else non DD apart from the money I spent on bits for my side business persuit.

Eponym

Well done on taking some positive first steps! My only observation was that £100pm each for food sounds like a lot, so good to hear that you're cutting down.

Houseplant26

Eponym wrote: »

Well done on taking some positive first steps! My only observation was that £100pm each for food sounds like a lot, so good to hear that you're cutting down.

I think I wrote that down wrong! I think I meant like £100 between us. I reckon we actually each spend more like £15 a week or £60 a month

Houseplant26

I need to redo my SOA more properly but I'm feeling really really rubbish tonight just completely washed out. I was up in the night caring for a drunk partner who woke me up and now I'm in a right strop after being at work all day and having had very little sleep. I feel so lousy I have so much life admin and cleaning and sorting myself out to do and I just can't muster any energy at all. Partner has been very apologetic and at first I was fine about it but I've been in a foul mood at him tonight! I guess tomorrow is a new day.

newfoundglory

Hi Houseplant26

Have you decided where you are going to save your money each month?

Unfortunately interest rates aren't looking too good at the moment, but, there are some good bank accounts which pay interest as well as 'monthly' saver accounts where you save an amount each month for a period of time (eg a year).

Who do you bank with?