Put away your purse & become debt-averse

foxgloves

@Four_Seasons, Ducklings, how lovely! I am the first to admit my geography is hopeless, but I thought for some reason that you lived in Sussex........& this was confirmed by your mention of a village which I actually thought was on the Sussex coast.....so you can imagine my surprise on googling it, that it is in fact in a neighbouring county to where I actually live! Duh!
F x

Sun_Addict

It makes me so angry when companies/people cash in on price hikes, pure greed as you say 🤬 A cottage in Cornwall off peak season should be next to nothing, bearing in mind the weather will probably be awful. The last time we went there it was early September and so cold and wet we had to buy our daughter a winter coat. Such a shame as Cornwall is a lovely place. 

foxgloves

@Deni_debt-free_dreamer - Yes, cat food keeps increasing in price, doesn't it? We are doing quite well for loyalty vouchers from W*itr*se (or rather Mr F is)....£5 discount on a box of 40 pouches last week, which is a big saving.
Re house prices....yes, on the whole, Suffolk is more expensive than our current region but we could do the move atm. The worry is that prices there will be pushed up by wealthy incomers buying 2nd homes. If that happens, we will make other plans, we won't stretch ourselves beyond what is sensible. I do have a look online now & again just to see what the market is like. A dear little vintage-looking bungalow for sale atm. It's priced at more than we'd get for our house.but it's within an amount we could theoretically make up with savings. It's all completely theoretical, of course, as Mr F is nowhere near retirement age yet.
Oh....& that birthday you mentioned? Yep, that's the one!
F x

foxgloves

Hello Sunday Savers,
Oh my days, it's been hot! Both of us wilt in the heat & I've just had a freezing cold bath, which was lovely. Been quite lazy - knitted most of a sleeve, changed bed linen & did this week's laundry - all line-dried for free in less than an hour. Ate leftover BBQ for dinner with a bowl of salad & new potatoes and still some left for Mr F's lunchbox tomorrow.
Today's pickings: 2 courgettes, a bunch of spring onions & a lettuce.
We did manage to book that cottage for my Big Birthday in a couple of year's time. We had a look over all the figures I'd worked out & made a joint, informed decision that it's doable.
This morphed into a more general chat about the state of the economy & doubtless more shovelfuls of austerity heading our way, given that the leadership shenanigans so far seem to consist of who will cut taxes the hardest. We concluded that we have spent a lot of money in the last couple of years on our house renovation project & it's time now to pull back & consolidate. It is important to me that we continue to save as much as we can for as long as the current economic situation allows, so I've decided to step up with some proper classic thrift.
You have my permission to administer a virtual ear-holing if you think I'm slipping from my renewed thrifty path because I plan to step it up from tomorrow.
Love it when there's a plan.
F x

Cheery_Daff

Can we administer a virtual ear-holing to anyone, or is it just you? 😁

Sun_Addict

If that’s where you’ve got your heart set on for your big birthday then it’s worth it. No virtual ear-holing from me 🤣 I love how your OH is so on board with you, makes all the difference. 

QueenJess

This isn’t entirely related to the price of holidays, but I’ve been thinking about prices of everything going up so much and it all being over the media all the time.

So if I’m in a food shop (or elsewhere), how do I know whether the price of something is a fair price or whether it’s been hiked up because everyone knows we all expect prices to keep increasing and they’ve jumped on the band wagon?

marionmgcars

Love the thrift push Foxgloves.  It will hopefully inspire me.  Just had a birthday and everyone seems to let thrift go out of the window.  It just makes me uncomfortable, and I hate to seem ungrateful.  A small thoughtful gift is always appreciated more.  Looking forward to getting the thrifty hat on again (and loosing a few pounds in weight too).  Too many chocolates and cake 🤣

foxgloves

How nice, as always, to pop onto my diary & find comments. 
@Sun_Addict - Yes, I think there's a fair bit of this going on with price increases. We all know inflation is higher than it's been for decades & still rising, so I think this makes for a situation where big companies, for whom the sole motivating factor is shareholder profit, can easily sneak extra price rises under the radar. We all know that many of the things we buy have risen by significantly more than the UK inflation rate - i.e the 25% increase on the cat litter we used to buy. Also as discussed, holiday accomodation. To use the Cornwall cottage I mentioned as an example......we stayed there for a week in November in 2017 & the rental was about £520 (slightly more, I might add than we usually paid back then, when most of the cottages/apartments we booked were still under £500). OK, so 5 years later, I checked to see what it would cost to book this cottage for the same week in November 2023 & the price is now £1099 !! I fully accept that some costs have risen  - energy bills of course being the biggest factor -  so I would completely expect rentals to rise to cover this, but a rise of over 100%? My friend says we'll soon find out if greed has played a part because we will be able to see if the prices start to come down after a year or two of the UK economy being in freefall & everyone struggling. ......including people who generally get by OK. I will be interested to see if this happens.
Yes, Mr F & I do work well as a team on the financial front & have done for years now. I had the LBM first & the initial few weeks were tricky - I recall us having the most horrible row in the car (I was so upset, we had to turn around & come home!) because he said he was sick of me going on about money & debt all the time. However, he saw my debts going down & soon wanted in on the act & we haven't looked back since then. He always says now that budgeting enables us to do things - it isn't the destroyer of joy that he feared.

@QueenJess - Yes, that's the problem, isn't it? We don't know. If you go to the supermarket & a jar of branded yeast-based spread costs X much more than the one you purchased the previous month, you would assume it is the inflation everyone is talking about, & much of the rise probably would be.......but I think it's an easy time for brands to stick an extra couple of pence on now & again to massage up their profit margin (esp as many people are having to cut back on day-to-day shopping). You'd expect me to be cynical being a confirmed lefty, wouldn't you, but I do agree with you that there just isn't any way we can know when we are standing in the shop looking at cat litter priced at £5 which was £4 until very recently. A few extra pennies snuck onto a popular brand doesn't sound like much, but given that these are very frequently bought products, I'm sure it all adds up to a nice bit of 'Ker-ching' in the company coffers.
F

foxgloves

@marionmgcars - I too woke up with a dual 'hat' on this morning - the thrifty one AND the one which made me get on the scales........Oh my giddy trousers (metaphorical trousers will soon be the only ones I can fit in!).....so now of course, I have obviously also donned the 'must shift some kgs' hat!
F