Giving every £ a job

Blackcats

Thank you everyone from your gift suggestions.  I'm going to get a nice outside planter - they are planning to sell their house next year so it will be useful and pretty whilst adding to kerb appeal.  It's so nice using these diaries for ideas and inspiration.  

Blackcats

It's approaching a year since I started my diary - an interesting milestone as in some ways it seems like not much has changed but I know that I am profoundly different in terms of my lifestyle and consequently my spending.
Undoubtedly COVID has stopped my crazy eating out habit.  I went to restaurants, coffee shops and pubs without planning or even looking forward to it as a treat.  Often the food was mediocre, the wine was expensive and not always very nice and the spend of around £40/£50 always unbudgetted. I started setting a monthly eating out budget but I treated this as a target to aim for rather than a maximum spend.  If (when) I went over budget it didn't bother me at all 🥺.
i can't imagine going back to that again.  I've had a takeaway each month and really enjoyed it.  I did one "eat out to help out" in August at a local favourite family run restaurant.  It's fish and chips takeaway this month and I'm really looking forward to it.  

joedenise

Absolutely agree @Blackcats - I set a budget each month too and quite often don't use it.  In fact we never have takeaways so it's always for eating out but as we go away for a lot of weekends in our motorhome we often eat out in places like 'spoons just because it's cheap and if we're out and about we don't always want a picnic, or want something hot.

Even during lockdown I've still been putting something int the Eating Out budget but of course apart from the summer when we were allowed to we haven't eaten out including now because we're currently in Tier 3.  Think I'm going to really enjoy my first meal out once we're allowed again!

savingholmes

I felt you hit a real milestone when you were a month ahead with your money. Lovely position to be in.

Sarahwithlove

I think it will be a while before we will start considering eating out to be normal again and that can only be good for the budget I think. 

Blackcats

JoeDenise - that's a good tip to keep building up an eating out fund.  At the start of lockdown ..... months and months ago ..... I used a pretty jar to put slips of paper in with a "when this is over" activity on each.  The idea is to pick them out and enjoy that treat.  I expect most of the treats involve eating out as part of the activity so I will get myself a kitty ready for when we can start doing some of these things again.  

Sarahwithlove - yes it will still be a while before eating out becomes feasible and pleasurable again.  It has given me lots of money saving and also a new found pleasure in cooking and baking.
savingholmes, yes the month ahead is a real milestone.  My way of managing it now is to keep that money in a savings account attached to my current account.  It's almost like my own personal overdraft funds.  I haven't dipped into it yet.  I need to think about 2021 savings strategy so will decide whether to keep it as 1 month or increase it or save money into other categories.
im SOOO happy today as I've paid my council tax bill off a month early in 9 months instead of 10.  I paid around 10% extra each month which was a bit of a squeeze but it means I've got jan, feb and March council tax free.  As my council tax is so extortionate (at least I think it is) that means nearly £1000 can go towards boosting my end of financial year savings.  🥳.  I'm very proud of myself.  In the bad old money days I was often in arrears or just about keeping up with council tax.  That never stopped me spending my money on other things though 😕

savingholmes

Good you are managing so well. A good year financially.

Blackcats

Thanks savingholmes - at long last,  I've become focussed on doing better with money and my motivation is early retirement.  I do know though that I'm very much a work in progress and have to work hard at it ..... I keep reminding myself that being better with money now will help me have the opportunity to be able to stop working.  

savingholmes

I keep having to say the same thing. I want the freedom to retire early even if I choose not to

foxgloves

Early retirement is a great motivator, Blackcats. When I gave up work (I took VR as part of an endless series of austerity restructures), I had already been able to go part time 18 months earlier than planned simply because we were no longer paying off so much debt. We still had some. The final loan was paid off when I received my redundancy settlement. Like your early retirement plans, the only way we were able to contemplate living on one salary was to make lifestyle changes around the whole financial agenda.... I budgeted harder, became better acquainted with the concept of saving, we stepped up fruit & veg growing, meal planning etc & I gave up my car. It's been worth it for our quality of life but like you, it's our reformed attitudes around money which have facilitated the lifestyle changes.
F x