Chasing security, changing habits.

Annaharky

MORTGAGE £7500.00 LOAN £3500 CREDIT CARD £1900.00
SAVINGS £1750.00 PENSION £0000000

If you are reading this – hello. Thought I’d tell you a bit about me. Last year I joined the mortgage free in 3-years challenge and have found this a great incentive to make over-payments. After reading loads of diaries I have decided that the best way for me to make improvements to my spending habits would be to write my own diary with weekly targets that I would try to meet. I recently downloaded a spending app and although it shows me where my money is going in pretty pie-charts it hasn’t encouraged me to budget or stop impulse buys. Me and DH have lived together for 16 years. We share all our money (I think this works as neither of us are extravagant) and we discuss any big spends.
We are not rubbish with money but not fantastic either. I find getting the balance right a lot harder as the kids get older. When DD1 was a baby I carefully thought about any buy over £1 (remember this was 15 years ago) but DH was on a good wage and I didn’t work for a few years so was much more organised and had more time to shop around.
Our main overspends are on food (convenience, fast-food, lack of organising) and socialising (no filter). We don’t batch cook and throw away left-overs. Neither of us like to cook or shop and are not inventive either. I would also like to make healthier meals as DS doesn’t like fruit so I need to ensure he is eating plenty of veg. We have 2 vehicles. DH has a 2 seater van for work (rubbish for kids) and I have a saloon – we need something big in the back for leg room for our 2 teenagers and width for DD2 car seat. My impulse buys are never large amounts but I am mindful of the saying “Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves.” We bought our current house 13 years ago and I dread to think how much we have spent on decorating -3 bathroom replacements and an extension following DD2, landscaping the garden and a new kitchen wasn’t cheap. We are currently decorating our bedroom and the hallway…
DD1 and DS get weekly pocket money but have to do jobs as well as keep their bedrooms tidy for this. We also pay for their phones although DD1 never answers hers GGRRRRRR!! They walk/cycle 3.4 miles a day saving me £10 a week.
We don’t employ dog-walkers, window-cleaners, bin-cleaners or gardeners (unlike the neighbours). I would never use an ATM that charges. I shop at charity shops for myself and DD’s and cut DH and DS hair mostly at home. I hate paying for car parking and find you can usually find somewhere for free within a reasonable walking distance. I make sure lights are turned off when not in use and use generic brands. I have recently started a sealed pot into which I am putting new £1 coins and £5 notes. I mostly shop at Aldi, Lidl, Farmfoods, B&M and Morrisons (my walk-to supermarket). I seriously need to use a list at B&M as it isn’t a bargain if I don’t need it is it?
Financially as our mortgage is nearly paid we are now looking at building pensions and helping our children onto the property ladder in a few years. Our parents helped us and we are mindful of wanting to do the same. DH used to work in construction so we may do buy-to-let/doer-uppers in the future when DD2 is older. DH also wants to live on a barge in the future – we will see.
So thinking about where I over-spend I have magpied (teacher-speak?) some targets to choose from every week, some just to save money and others to hopefully change habits.





1 Meal planning week
2 Mend clothes week
3 Food inventory
4 Sort budget
5 Mindful spending / only D.D and food
6 Free days out
7 No decorating
8 Make soup for freezer
9 Make all snacks
10 Daily rounding of bank accounts to savings
11 Make £10 a day
12 Take lunch to work/school
13 Facebook selling
14 Eat from the cupboards
15 Coupon week
16 No ALCOHOL
17 Fruit from market
18 Low electricity
19 Boot fair
20 Meat free days
21 Week of new recipes
22 No heating
23 Batch cooking
24 Project 333
25 Shop around for insurance and D.D
26 Walk/cycle the school run
27 No car
28 Use survey sites
29 Drink water
30 No convenience food
31 Utilise day off (planning, cooking etc.)
32 Make own beer/win
33 Make own cleaning product
34 Free days out
35 What can I/we cope without?
This week I aim to;
1 Make all kids snacks
2 Make soup
3 Alcohol free week
4 Walk/cycle school run
P.S Watched Save Money- Good Food. Can’t say I was impressed. My kids hate fish-cakes lol ;

ada-or-ardor

Welcome! It sounds like you are doing all the right things already and have already identified your weak spots. How about the whole family does a little cooking class to get some excitement and enthusiasm into cooking and food? You'll know whether it works for you guys or not ;-) also on socialising, I feel your pain, it's one of my weak areas too. Have you actually set a budget for this and aim to stick within it? This might be an important first step.

Are your kids of an age where a good declutter and fleabay session might bring in a few pennies?

It would be a good idea to look over your bank statements and put together an SOA so everyone can take a look and give you some thoughts. It can be great to have an objective pair of eyes over everything.

I mainly wanted to say, please be conscious that your parents were of a very different generation and were better placed to be able to help with buying a house etc. It's great that you have that goal and I'm sure you'll smash it, but please don't be disheartened if you can't quite stump to the levels that your parents were able to offer you - things have changed so much, unfortunately. They will be grateful for every penny you can afford to give them, even if that's only the fees or a £500 voucher for IKEA!! Your pensions are equally important so your children aren't left financially responsible for you further down the line :-)

Best of luck, and do post up that SOA!!

Ada

enjoyyourshoes

Good luck on the journey.

Your list is long so sometimes less is more.

Know where you are financially every day by keeping a reconciled balance including everything you spend from that bank account, accrue monthly;y for annual expenditure.

ReadingTim

Errr....no pension?!? You don't say how old you are, but from the ages of the kids I reckon late 30's, early 40's. You need to sort that out as a matter of priority, ensuring you'll have enough qualifying years (via NI contributions) to receive the full state pension (pitiful though it is), and (if you're working), join your works one. You know you need to change your spending habits, but you also need to establish some saving ones, otherwise you're looking at post-retirement poverty, which doesn't sound like fun.

MallyGirl

Hi

the pension is now a must sort!
I also focussed on paying of the mortgage until recently - we could pay it off now but the money to do so is earning more interest than we are paying on the mortgage so we haven't actually done that. Plus it is a flexible mortgage and we might want to fund something big.
I have now turned my attention to retirement planning. We both turn 50 in the next couple of months so the clock is ticking. We both have a variety of work / personal pensions collected along the way and contribute to current company ones via salary sacrifice to get the max contribution from the employer - in our case we put in 5% and they add 10%, plus we both do AVCs by sal sac. We have also started S&S ISAs as I hope to retire early and want some easy access funds in case we need them.
Our daughter will be off to uni in 3 years time and then we will want to be able to help her out a bit as she starts out in life. It all costs.
We have dropped ready meals entirely, cut down a lot on alcohol, cut down on eating out, walk when possible instead of taking the car, shop around.
Good luck

enthusiasticsaver

I would say starting a pension is a priority for you as the later you start the less time it has to grow. Is there no company pension for either of you? Overpaying the mortgage is a good idea if the rate is higher than the loan or the credit card but if you are paying interest on either of these at a higher rate you would do better to overpay on those first.

We also helped our daughters on to the property ladder after University and yes it is expensive but by then we had paid the mortgage off, had no debt and had been overpaying into our pensions since our 20s. Leaving pension provision until your 40s is reducing the length of time it has to grow. This has meant we have been able to retire at age 58.

All other aspects of budgeting you seem to have under control. As you say recording every penny you spend and looking for ways to economise are critical. I keep a spreadsheet with all budget categories so I can see where our money is going.

datlex

Hi OP I noticed your savings are very close to your credit card bill. What interest rate do you pay on the card? Could you get an extra £150 and add it to your savings to clear the card bill?