Budgeting.... am I being unreasonable?

savetosave

Hi

It looks good to me but I would also budget
£100 birthdays and Xmas
£100 car fund
£200 emergency fund
£100 misc

That will mean you have plenty put aside for emergencies and yearly needs and still leave £1000

natlie

Your budget is really generous and if you wanted to you could cut it back a lot more. I have a family of 5 children are 18, 12 and 7 my budget is as below. We do also have pots for annual spends - insurances/christmas/school trips/bus fare for middle daughter/ car maintenance etc

Food Shopping & Eating Out - £450 Mine is £210 a month
Petrol - £70 Mine is £50
Family Days Out - £150 We don't have a family days out budget we go to free places like for walks etc and take picnics
School Meals - £70 have started sandwiches as its too expensive
Health & Beauty - £130 - (includes haircuts and gym) I haven't had my haircut since 2016, my eldest pays for her own, my son has a shaved head at home and middle daughter has hers cut once a year. Ive cancelled the gym
Clothes - £100 I budget £40 a year for school uniforms and the kids have clothes for christmas - I rarely buy clothes for myself, usually get one nice dress the beginning of summer
Summer Holidays - £250 I save change over the year and we go on holiday when we can afford it, we haven't been this year but had a big holiday last year

sammyjammy

How much more debt do you have to repay?

Mumoffourkids

masonsmum wrote: »

Do you meal-plan to stick to your grocery budget?

Sorry missed this question. Yes I meal plan each week and have about four weeks worth of meals that we rotate depending on how much other stuff I have to buy. So if I have to buy washing powder, then we tend to have some of the cheaper meals that week.

enthusiasticsaver

How much debt do you have and are you paying interest? This would have an impact on how much you spend monthly. The food bill could definitely come down by shopping in Lidl or Aldi and meal planning, bulk cooking etc. If you are paying £130 really just for your hair that is huge.

The thing is if the debt is manageable then spending on whatever is a personal choice. What is manageable depends on circumstances which of course can change at any time. Spending £720 a month on debt repayments would be too high for us though. Do you save for an emergency fund, annual bills, car maintenance etc?