My soa help please

Ninjaqueen

Feel like I’ve messed up somewhere as I definitely don’t ever have £900 spare a month

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 4
Number of cars owned.................... 1

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 2809
Partners monthly income after tax....... 900
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 3709

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 0
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 600
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 147
Electricity............................. 90
Gas..................................... 80
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 52
Telephone (land line)................... 0
Mobile phone............................ 90
TV Licence.............................. 13
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 60
Internet Services....................... 32
Groceries etc. ......................... 320
Clothing................................ 0
Petrol/diesel........................... 240
Road tax................................ 13
Car Insurance........................... 102
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 30
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 120
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 5
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 0
Contents insurance...................... 0
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 83
Haircuts................................ 0
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 100
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Business costs ......................... 600
Total monthly expenses.................. 2777


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 0
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 2000
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 2000

No Secured nor Hire Purchase Debts

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Credit card ...................4000......50........0
Overdraft Nationwide ..........2000......0.........0
Overdraft Halifax .............3300......0.........0
Currys.........................800.......40........0
Loan ..........................4000......127.......18.28
Little woods ..................1000......150.......0
Total unsecured debts..........15100.....367.......-


Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 3,709
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 2,777
Available for debt repayments........... 932
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 367
Amount left after debt repayments....... 565

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 2,000
Total HP & Secured debt................. -0
Total Unsecured debt.................... -15,100
Net Assets.............................. -13,100

Created using the SOA calculator at
Reproduced on Moneysavingexpert with permission, using other browser.

zippygeorgeandben

No entertainment? No haircuts in a family of six? How old are the children?

Business costs of £600pm?
You need to give some context to the amounts. This way, the advice coming your way might answer questions people may ask of you.

Ms_Chocaholic

What about child benefit?

Ms_Chocaholic

Mobile phone @ £90 seems a lot as does energy usage at £170 pcm
What are business costs, this seems a lot at £600 pcm and also other child related expenses @ £120 pcm, what's this?

Willing2Learn

Hi,

My thoughts on your SOA:

• Is your council tax spread across 10 or 12 payments?
• Are your water rates spread across 10 or 12 payments and are you metered?
• Mobile phone is expensive. You could save money with a SIM-only contract
• If you are saving £100/month on your holiday budget category, then why is there no cash assets?
• Why nothing for clothing? This must be an expensive category...
• Why nothing for entertainment? You have four kids...
• You need home contents insurance to cover your backside
• You need to be saving something every month toward an Emergency Fund as unexpected expenses will arise.

I think you need to go through bank and credit card statements to track where all your surplus is going. A spending diary might help you with that too.

Ninjaqueen

£90 for 5 mobile phones on contract
£120 a month is dinner money

Ninjaqueen

Business costs are our specific business advisor and room rental rates

Ninjaqueen

Also I accidentally included child benefit in income

zippygeorgeandben

So 3 children have mobile phones? Yet all still at school? They should be going around your house turning lights off and being generally more energy aware.

CakeCrusader

Calls on giffgaff to other giffgaff phones are free. £83 a month on presents is about £1,000 a year. It's often cheaper to buy in the sales and store. £53 a month on water's expensive, are you on a meter? £1200 on a holiday if you're struggling? £92 a month on broadband and satellite TV? When does your contract end? BT's cheaper than Virgin by the way, get rid of the movie package if you haven't already. £600 business costs? Do you really need an advisor? Your local chamber of commerce will probably help for free.



Write down everything that you spend over a week, right down to the last coffee, and you'll see where the cash goes.

monetxchange

As others have said, the utilities and mobiles are all sky high. Check you're on the best deals/if you can reduce them. Can your partner increase their earnings?

I think the reality is, your supposed surplus is disappearing into categories you have budgeted £0 for. £320 is very low on groceries for the amount of people - is this the reality? I'd bet it's much higher with top up shops. You're obviously not saving for things like presents as there's no cash saved - so I'd guess these are just spent on willy nilly when they appear. You must spend something on entertainment - even if a £2 coffee every few weeks. Nobody in the whole family pays for a haircut? You need to go through a years bank statements and get a realistic average on each and every category before we can advise on a budget.

Also, no contents insurance is the biggest false economy. What if your house burned down tomorrow? You might not think you own much, but think of every piece of clothing, toy and gadget you own. Tens of thousands accumulated all risked for the sake of maybe £15 a month.