Any tricks to help me stop spending?

Geworgie

Hi all,

I was wondering if anyone could tell me how they stop spending money!!

I am not awful with money but I'm pretty bad. For example I was just thinking about how we've done really well over the last 2 weeks and we've barely spent anything and that was such an improvement... Just worked out we've actually spent almost £300 on 'luxuries' - takeout, speeding fine, and a couple of birthday presents for family. :eek:

We only had £200 in disposable income for the whole month.

We're in a fair amount of debt as well. I just don't know how to keep on top of our spending.

MallyGirl

Maybe withdraw the amount of cash you have to play with and once it is goone, it is gone?
Keep a spending diary for a month to see where the money goes - sometimes seeing it written down as a monthly total can be the wakeup call you need - magazines, coffees, etc.
Set yourself a realistic budget and stick to it.
Cook from scratch to make the food budget go further.
Don't speed!

EssexHebridean

Spending diary is a good shout. Also when was the last time you revisited your monthly budget - getting a full and clear picture of your entire financial situation might help here?

The birthday presents - this is something that should be within your budget rather than coming from your remaining discretionary spending - are you budgeting the right amount for presents from your monthly income? Allowing that you're having to take money for presents from that discretionary spending now, what plans do you have in place for covering the cost of Christmas?

Try "disincentivising yourself" as well - so let's say with have a £20 takeaway once a week - over a year that is over a THOUSAND POUNDS. Dropping that to a once a month thing turns it into £240 - quite a difference, no? work out hiow often a spending habit appears - then multiply up to work out the real annual cost. Coffee is always a great one - an average coffee grabbed on the way to work as a habit will cost in the region of £650 a year. Add a muffin of something similar into the mix and that's going to be pushing it towards a four figure sum each year.

If you're now at the stage of being concerned about your spending & debt levels, then take that as a warning sign that now is the time to tackle it before it gets worse - and worse it WILL get if not checked now. How does your debt now compare with when you posted back in 2017?

Poppy1984

Hi,
I'm in a high amount of debt and until I decided to stick to a strict every penny is accounted for budget I just kept getting into more debt, is pay a bit back then get back into more and moving the debt around etc.
I have now stuck to a budget for nearly 2 years and paid a significant amount of my debt down and have not taken any more debt on since jan 2018.

I use an app called spending app. All income is recorded and EVERY single expense is recorded. I HATED doing that at first but now I'm used to it and it's second nature.

I have every regular bill recorded, I put money aside each month for bigger spends e.g holidays, car tax, mot &servicing, birthday presents and Christmas.

Any money that's left over after all bills are paid and all savings are accounted for is my disposable income. I split this into two categories, groceries which I put aside £200 a month this covers all food, cleaning household products. And "spending money" this covers EVERY other spend that's not a bill, grocery or saving.

I record every time I do food shopping so I can tell if I've spent a bit much one week and need to pull back a bit or there will be nothing left to buy food towards the end of the month.

I record every other spend, this has definitely helped me to stop spending (I used to be a shopaholic clothes mainly) but not because I know I have to record it sometimes that will be enough to put me off buying it in the first place. Or if I look at my "spending money" budget and I know I've only got £30 left for the month but I've got a meal out with friends booked next week I won't buy the widget because I'll think I want that £30 for my meal and drinks.

It took me a few months to get used to this but once I was used to it I felt so much more in control of my money and feel more relaxed because I know everything's covered.

trailingspouse

Here's a quick way to work out what your extras are really costing you -



- Coffee every morning on the way to work? Assuming you work 5 days a week, that's 10 coffees a fortnight. Coffee is £2.50? You're spending £2.50 x 10 = £25.00 every two weeks. Double again for the monthly figure = £50.00.
- Takeaway once a month? Multiply by 10 (yes, I know there are 12 months in a year - this is a quick and dirty calculation). So - spend £25 a month, that's £25 x 10 = £250 a year.


I'm really strict about spending on gifts - £10 per person per occasion. And I've pruned my list of people I give gifts to quite considerably (no-one's noticed...). Instead of buying something cheap for £10, I buy something expensive, if that makes sense. So - a really fancy box of chocs rather than a cheap piece of jewellery, for example.



I also find it useful to think of 'weekly shop' as a unit of measurement. So, if you normally spend about £50 on the weekly shop, and you're looking at something that costs £100, that's '2 weekly shops'. It sort of helps you to put things in perspective and decide what your priorities really are. 'Tank of petrol' can work the same way.


I also keep a spreadsheet that gets updated twice a month (once when I get the credit card bill and again when I get the bank statement). I put everything on my contactless credit card and pay it off every month - the statement then acts as a spending diary, and I can see where I need to make changes.



I think mindset is also vitally important. If you don't want to spend money, don't go looking round the shops. Or decide before you go 'I'm not spending anything today' - but then you have to stick to it, which can be hard. Best not put yourself in the way of temptation.

halogen

I have a problem controlling spending as well. My thing is online purchases. I live in a small town and somethings that I need are just not available so I can't completely block my amazon account but trying not to make unnecessary spends on it is very difficult. In the average month my only offline purchase is the weekly groceries.

aimeemum

I simply don't have a 'discretionary' budget. Every penny has a job......make your money work for you rather than the other way around.
- Make use of your diaries and calendars so you are not taken by surprise by anything.
- Use pots of money - allocate a budget for gifts, holidays, Christmas as well as funds for car maintenance, pets, hobbies and sports if you use a gym (you may need new shoes etc) for example.
- Make sure you have an emergency fund to cover things cropping up.
- Meal plan, shop to a list and stick to a budget for food.
- If you feind yourself tempted to spend, tell yourself to 'leave it for now'. If you still need/want it later in the week then you can work it into your budget. Otherwise you'll have forgetten and saved the cash.

My last pointer would be to see it as a challenge. See what you can keep in your account and how little you can spend. Maybe join the NSD challenges on here and join in the friendly competition.

BabyStepper

When I was first trying to stick to my budget and failing (regularly) I started keeping every single receipt, organised in date order. I would review my purchases the day after and decide what I wanted to return. Which was sometimes quite a lot.

It works if you're impulsive and buy 'stuff'. It won't work if eating out, drinks etc are your main difficulty.

Good luck. You can figure this out.

monetxchange

Great tips here on how to shock yourself into realising what you're spending!

What has helped me is an 'every pound' budgeting approach. On payday, budget how much you will have left after all bills go out. Also be sure to include in this putting aside savings for 'one off' expenses that will crop up constantly - stuff like car insurance, dentist, presents, etc.

Then budget a strict month's worth day to day spending amount (for groceries, travel, entertainment etc) and transfer it over to something like a Monzo account, or a savings account in your current bank. I personally split mine into the four weeks of the month and transfer it in every Monday, to stop me spending the whole lot early in the month.

Then use every other pound which is left over to overpay debts - immediately, at the beginning of the month. That way, when the spending money is gone, it's gone. There's no scope for overspending because it simply isn't there available. Check out EveryDollar and YNAB which I believe are the same approach. Good luck!

theoretica

Sometimes spending sooner can help prevent spending more - if you have a plan for a meal (and you can plan for something fast and easy if you know you will be late) and already have the ingredients in then you don't get takeaways, because you have already planned and bought something else. If you think well in advance what someone would like for their birthday you have time to find something that they will really like and isn't so expensive, or at least time to look out for special offers.
My current personal marker for not spending is the potential freedom to retire early. I think I could live reasonably well on £12k a year if I had to, so every £33 saved buys me a potential day extra of retirement if my work becomes unpleasant.

suki1964

Spending diary for at least a month is a must. You need to see where your money is going.

Its so easy to break a £20, and before you know it, the £20 is gone, a magazine, bar of chocolate, a coffee - gone and no record of it

The second thing is to get a budget. The SOA calculator is a good place to start. Fill it out as you see it now and then start juggling the figures about to make sure every eventuality is covered, Most people don't budget for gifts, dentist, opticians etc and just spend when they pop up. Which is fine if you have savings , wrecks the budget and gets you in debt if you don't

What I also do myself, when Im tempted to spend on stuff I don't need, is think about how many hours at work it will take me to pay for it. Being on NMW, it galls me to think I need to work near on an hour to pay for a coffee and cake when out. Id rather not have it, and keep part time thanks very much