The hardest challenge yet

elantan

euronorris wrote: »

Well, I think it depends on what is important to you then. If buying local and supporting the smaller shops is important to you, then by all means do it, but sadly it does usually come at a higher price.


That doesn't mean that you can't make savings elsewhere though. And I do think that meal planning and batch cooking can help provide the biggest savings there.


With regards to Costco, have you double checked that it is cheapest to get some of your items there. ie, my brother used to rave about buying pampers nappies in bulk from there, as he believed it was cheaper. But when I compared their price, with those available elsewhere, I was always able to find a better deal. That probably isn't the case for everything, but it is always worth checking. And of course, eventually we swapped to Lidl's own as they were fine and much cheaper again lol.


When I have looked at our shopping, one of disproportionately large costs is fizzy pop and treats (ie crisps and chocolate). So I try to limit those now. Just wondering if you have a similar vice? If you're working shifts, are you taking (or buying) snacks to keep you going when you can't get a break on time? If so, I wonder if making some treats in advance to take in with you would save you some money?


x

Thanks Euronorris,

maybe the buying locally needs to go on hold for a while till we can get on top of everything, I recognised also that not all of Costco is such a bargain, so I checked the prices of things I bought and went with a specific list and disnt allow myself to deviate, we dont go often but do use it for the oils and nuts, although I should've maybe checked online for nuts and oils, I just compared costco to the supermarket prices,

I deff think making some treats would be handy especially when I'm nights, it's far too easy to eat rubbish on nights, husband drinks alot of ginger ( fizzy pop) I rarely drink it but he can drink a few litres a week, and he has a very sweet tooth so biscuits and chocolate appear far too often, I'm thinking a note of everything we spend and what in will really help us pin things down

lessonlearned

Just popping my head round again to discuss the mathematics of FIRE. I think using 10 year multiplier really helps us to see how even small savings can stack up over time.

FIRE seems to be still a concept not really discussed much here in the U.K. although I think it's starting to gain ground. There are loads of US based blogs and of course, things are different there in regards to pensions, investing and health care so a lot of the nitty gritty doesn't really apply here. Although I would say the principles and some of the basic maths can be applied here too, especially the 10 year multiplier.

As I mentioned before a saving of £200 a month off a grocery bill will, over a decade, add up to an additional £24,000 plus interest towards your pension pot....even £100 gives you £12,000.

So in your case if you can get your grocery bill down to £500 you would have an additional £36,000. I think once you get into the swing of it £500 would be doable.

Maybe show your husband those figures and it might help him focus on the longer term of FIRE rather than the short term pleasure of being a Bon Vivant. Although I still maintain you can eat like royalty on a budget of £500 for two if you put your mind to it.

And of course, it doesn't stop there, anyone looking for FIRE needs to look at where else they can shave the budgets. Even a lowly £10 a month, will, over a decade, come in at £1200. Not to be sneezed at.

And tbh a few little tweaks here and there shouldn't be too painful.

No hair shirts required. :rotfl:

elantan

lessonlearned wrote: »

Euronorris......I am an ex Costco member too. In the end I gave up my membership because my family size had shrunk. However I agree, I too did find that their prices weren't always as competitive as we might think.

elantan......I would agree with the suggestion of keeping a spending diary....it will show you exactly where you might be able to cut back.

£800 is a staggering amount for 2 people, even just cutting down by 25% would give you an extra £200 a month to boost your savings, that's £2400 a year. That's £24,000 over a 10 year period which could significantly boost your pension pot.

And tbh that really shouldn't be that painful.

One you've got it down to £600, stay at that level for a while and then try and reduce it again....£400 to £500 should be plenty, you can still eat organic and still enjoy a tipple and the odd takeaway or restaurant meal.

For eating out.....do you have the Meerkat 241 deal. Also lunch or early bird menus are cheaper. Many restaurants do their own half price days or have loyalty schemes.

Alcohol......Aldi and Lidl are both famed for their great alcohol deals. Their wines often win awards and outperform many other more expensive brands, for example Lidl's Prosecco has won an award this year. I shall be stocking up.....Aldi's own label Irish Cream is just as good as Baileys, one of their gins also scooped an award this year too.

Also places like Asda and Sainsbury's also do some great deals, branded spirits are often reduced by as much as £6 or £7 a litre and they both have regular 25% off promotions for wines.

Tbh you really don't need to be spending £12 a bottle on everyday wines. Save those for really special occasions.

Do you have the likes of B&M or Wilkinson's - great for tins, dry goods and cleaning materials. Look at the £ shops.

It's really is all about shopping around, a bit of a faff sometimes but once you get in the habit you can work out a rota. So Asda one week, Aldi another....even if it is a fair drive to Aldi, it would be worth it say once a month.

As a yardstick for you........

I eat a largely paleo diet for health reasons, so no cheap carbs for me. I reckon I spend an average of £150 to £200 a month for one person and that includes entertaining a couple of times a month. I love giving dinner or supper parties for friends or having my family round for a feed and I do like to push the boat out when entertaining.

My family call them feasts :rotfl:

(That figure includes cleaning materials, toiletries and OTC meds, the odd newspaper, bunch of flowers or houseplant etc).

I too only drink Filter coffee (Aldi Italian blend, gorgeous), indulge in good chocolate and enjoy a glass of something.

I know I could cut back more if I had too but it would mean eating more carbs and I'm not prepared to do that because they don't really suit me. (IBS and need to keep a close eye on my blood sugars).

I do that think you can cut costs quite a bit without compromising your lifestyle.

Good luck.

Thanks Lesson learned

it may not be totally obvious but i try as much as i can to eat paleo myself, i am not always successful but it is by far my most preferred way of eating, hopefully we can share recipes

we would've made the £600 this month if we hadn't done the Costco shop, but i needed nuts and oils etc, it generally is pre theatre and early bird meals we have, we just have more of them than most people. this is deff going to be a painful learning curve, but if we can even cut it down to £600 a month well then wow that will really help and is far more sustainable going into the future.

We dont get deals on alcohol in Scotland, we have minimum pricing which does away with it. I also want to not have sulphites etc which is why we tended to buy better quality wines, ( i know wine isnt exactly paleo, and neither is pernod etc)

Thanks for the help and i look forward to sharing meal ideas

elantan

PurpleJay wrote: »

£800 sounds an awful lot for food, alcohol and takeaways for 2.

I think the best way to work out how to cut spending is to keep a tally of how much you spend for a month and break this down into food, cleaning/toiletries, pet food, takeaways and alcohol.

For instance you say you spend £250 on alcohol but I cannot get to this figure with the amount you say you both drink..
£12 wine x 5 = £60
£3 beer x 25 = £60
£20 baileys/pernod x 1 = £20
That comes to £140 - forgive me if I am misunderstanding. I wonder if you are including food or drinks out? If so, you need to separate these out and look at them apart from food. For instance if you are spending £200 eating and drinking out each month, you can look at reducing that. If you are spending £200 on takeaways, you can look at reducing that.. do you see what i mean? It is easier to tackle the individual elements.

I know you husband wants to think he is working for something and I get that but he is getting high quality food, wine, lots of takeaways and meals out. Once you have a breakdown, you can decide together where you want to cut back. Eg if you eat out in a week, you don't have a takeaway as well. Have one or the other as your break from cooking.

I would be inclined to get my alcohol at Asda most weeks and save the wine shop for special occasions but its great you are supporting your local shop. Maybe the compromise there is buy beer at Asda and wine at the local shop.

How much do you spend on a takeaway? Do you have favourites that are more expensive? Have those once a month and choose a cheaper option on other occasions or get some really nice pre-prepared food which you can make with minimal effort instead. M&S, Sainsburys and Tesco do meal deals round here which are great value.

You have had loads of good advice about doubling up meals, this works especially well with things like pasta sauce, curry, stew, chilli soup etc.

What do you do about lunch at work?

Join in with the grocery challenge to track your spending.

Hope some of this helps. Good luck.

Thanks for joining in, any and all help is much appreciated,

The £250 is for takeaway and alcohol so that isnt too bad i spose ( i know it is ... it needs to change)

I did join the grocery challenge before and this was where i decided to take a note of the spending, the note of the spending looks something like this

£5 Asda
£12 Asda
£2 Co-op
£5 Asda

etc etc, maybe what i need to take a note of is what we are buying i.e vegetables, cheese etc

will rejoin the grocery challenge for December and try again

lessonlearned

elantan wrote: »

Thanks Lesson learned

it may not be totally obvious but i try as much as i can to eat paleo myself, i am not always successful but it is by far my most preferred way of eating, hopefully we can share recipes

we would've made the £600 this month if we hadn't done the Costco shop, but i needed nuts and oils etc, it generally is pre theatre and early bird meals we have, we just have more of them than most people. this is deff going to be a painful learning curve, but if we can even cut it down to £600 a month well then wow that will really help and is far more sustainable going into the future.

We dont get deals on alcohol in Scotland, we have minimum pricing which does away with it. I also want to not have sulphites etc which is why we tended to buy better quality wines, ( i know wine isnt exactly paleo, and neither is pernod etc)

Thanks for the help and i look forward to sharing meal ideas

Well tonight I have got home cooked Boef Bouginon, just a couple of roast potatoes, (technically not paleo of course) green beans and carrots. The boef bouginon was some that I had batch cooked a week ago, so I just had to take a portion out of the freezer. I do this with all casserole type dishes.

Brunch was a cheese and tomato omelette (again cheating with just a bit of dairy) and then snacks will be fruit. I rarely eat puddings but i do enjoy a couple of squares of dark chocolate with my after dinner coffee.

Ps. How interesting they have minimum pricing in Scotland for alcohol. Many moons ago I lived in Scotland and worked in the wine department of "Fine Fare" lol.

Would you be able to buy online from a wine club, would that work out cheaper.

lindens

elantan wrote: »

Alcohol wise, 1 bottle of wine approx £12

hope that helps

That is an expensive bottle of wine and stands out for me
There are 2 things here:

1. try downgrading that wine - lets say its a Merlot, downgrade to eg M&S finest type Merlot and see if there is any difference. I bet that is max £8 and that saves you already. OK it's not loads but it's all a help

2.If 1 above fails, only buy that £12 wine when its on offer, and get 6 or 12 bottle in

elantan

Pollycat wrote: »

Elanten
Have you done the 'downshift' supermarket challenge?
https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/shopping/cheap-supermarket-shopping/#tips-3

No i havnt will give it a wee look

Wednesday2000 wrote: »

I was having this same discussion with my husband over the past few days. We are debt free and mortgage free (we paid our mortgage off in 15 years instead of 25) and we want to be retired in a few years. My husband is aiming for retirement at 53 at the best or 55 if something goes wrong! He had cancer and wants to leave work as soon as he can to enjoy life. I'm 43 years old and he is 49 years old.

We have seriously overspent on concerts, nights out, takeaways, clothes etc... over the past year and we need to get back on track if we want to retire so early.

This week I have only ordered groceries like loo roll and cat litter and not bought any food at all apart from bread. I am going to run down our fridge, freezer and cupboards before I buy any more food.:)




I'm really sorry to read that.xxx



I was going to say the same thing. I looked on the Aldi website the other day and was amazed by how much cheaper the alcohol is on there.

Maybe we can learn together ? get that early retirement we both want

elantan

I have a lot to think of and much to plan, I am going to start in earnest on Sunday (new month, clean sheet so to speak)

I hope you will join me and encourage me and kick my backside as required, this is deff a harder challenge than paying off a mortgage or debt for me but i think it will be more worthwhile in the long run.

Thank you all for your help and support so far, now i need to head out to pick up Mr El from work, then i may just come home and check a few cupboards in the kitchen to see what is in there, still wish i could do spread sheets

Thanks

lessonlearned

I am already retired - I retired st 56 to look after my late husband - but I still read quite a few FIRE blogs, partly to keep learning how to make my budget stretch but also to encourage my sons.

One is definitely up for it, and has completely revamped his spending habits, the other hasn't quite grasped it yet.....:rotfl:

One thing I have found is that when you are no longer having to commit so much time and energy to working for a living then your spending habits seem to change quite naturally.

I was pleasantly surprised to see just how far my money can go.

unrecordings

If you're feeling you want to renegotiate your relationship with alcohol here are a couple more little booze tricks I figured out back when I was climbing out of the classic drinking wine at home trap:

1) use a smaller glass
2) top up from another room (say the kitchen) rather than having the bottle next to you on the coffee table.
3) make a little ruler out of paper or card so you can see how many units you've had out of that bottle, you could even get creative and add a monetary value depending on what your motivation is