Struggling to budget

loey93

Yes I will try and up my savings eventually but I won't be able to afford a house anytime soon. I think £200.00 a month soon adds up.. in 4 years time I will have £9,600. This should be enough for a 5% house deposit.

loey93

My car tax is £20 a year and I don't pay for MOT or servicing as it is built in my finance and my car is brand new

System

I wonder if HP sauce is bought in installments

Katiehound

Is £90 pm for car insurance not expensive? or is a reflection of your age? - when I understand premiums are exhorbitant....
but still maybe worth trying a shop around.....

and £100 pm for clothes seems a lot too. Buy good basics and then look in charity shops- some of them have great labels at hardly any cost at all. Also check because some towns have more upmarket charity shops which are therefore dearer. We have some where clothes are well under a fiver.

loey93

This is the cheapest I can get it, I am 23 and I have been driving for 6 years but I had a claim about 3 years ago so I think this is why it is quite costly .. :-(

I could probably reduce £100 clothes .. I have been looking at clothes on eBay and I was overwhelmed with what bargains I can get!!

I spend a lot on beauty as well that I haven't included in soa .. i think it's time I cut back on that as well... this month I have spent £100 on beauty already

DCFC79

Look in charity shops for clothes, you can find some still with labels on.

B_G_B

loey93 wrote: »

I spend a lot on beauty as well that I haven't included in soa .. i think it's time I cut back on that as well... this month I have spent £100 on beauty already

I see no mention of this on your SOA. This is where the honesty comes in. Without getting all of your spending on the SOA it is pointless doing one. If done honestly I have found an SOA to be a brilliant tool.

Livelongandprosper

Sorry but that is not a SOA

It's fantasy

Get the spending diary started and account for every penny for a month. Then do the SOA

LabRatty

Hi,
I think your problem is being able to distinguish between wants and needs. This is important if you hope to be getting a place of your own with attached maintenance responsibilities. Beauty and clothing spends definitely come into the 'want' category and you need to recognise this and rein in the splurging..

As already suggested, keep a spending diary and then learn from what it tells you - also I've found that knowing you're writing down every penny spent is a great incentive not to buy stuff in the first place.

Another factor in making a budget work well is discipline. Once you've worked out what you are able to spend on non-essential stuff each month, divide the total amount by 4 (weeks) or 30 (days) so you learn to pace yourself through the month. As you've found, being skint for half of every month is no fun, but it should be something you can fix relatively easily.

Remember, a little self restraint can make a big difference and good habits learnt now will make a positive difference to your life for the next 50+ years.

All the best,
LR

EachPenny

You might be feeling a bit deflated by some of the posts so far loey93, but don't be. It isn't nice to have people you don't know questioning what you spend your money on and its easy to become defensive, feeling its your money and what right does anyone have to tell me what to do with it. Hopefully you won't feel like that and will see that people are making constructive suggestions about how you could reduce what you spend.

Because reducing what you spend is the beginning and end of how to budget, and how to save, and then to be in a position to buy things that other people will have no hope of ever owning. Aiming to own your own home is a great target, but one that will need a lot of effort.

The advice about the SOA is good advice, and looking at everything you spend your money on will help you understand why you have a 'luxury' two weeks, followed by two weeks of 'pittance'. Think about how you feel in the two weeks where you don't have much money, and compare that to how you feel just after being paid.

Life is much more enjoyable when you find a balance and what you have and what you spend through the month is much more even. You may miss the buzz of spending £100 on some new clothes, but equally you won't have the negative feelings that come with not having enough left to enjoy the rest of the month.

As you go through life the things you have to spend your money on increase, the money left to spend on what you want goes down. Get things right now and when you have much larger bills to pay (mortgage, council tax, gas, electricity etc) you will still have something left over each month to buy some things you want.

Hope you manage to sort your budget out and get the home you want.