The "Save 12k in 2021" Thread!

Suffolk_lass

Billycock said:

premium-bonds-calculator
Expected £25 per month with average luck

Ooh thanks, I had not seen this. Average luck for me. I put £10k in from June and won three £25 prizes, then the last three months I have put £250 in and nothing; nada.

I might try putting another £10k in (cash ISA just dropped to 0.1%) to see if that starts it again as my premium bonds wins record demonstrates I have only ever won on the most recent bond I have bought (I realise that is not how it is supposed to work but that is the evidence of my meagre wins). It did not take long to check with only two previous wins in my whole life (over 60 years of PBs!)

delta13

Hello all! Signing in to declare £1324.28 for April. As usual this has been split between my HTB ISA, Regular Savers, Sharsave via work and my emergency fund.

Really chuffed with this total - I've managed to continue to save despite the temptations that come with easing of lockdown!
In May I'm due quarterly energy bills, I have a few birthdays coming up and hoping to finally go visit my family properly since last summer. My OH has also landed himself a decent job after being unemployed for 12 months, and will be moving in! We'll need to spend a bit of money on storage and a few bits etc to ensure we're all living together comfortably, but after June he'll be contributing to the bills and rent etc which should counter-act what I expect to be a drop in savings for the next couple of months  

I'll update the form in a sec x

juststuff123

Hello Savers

#53 reporting £3538 for April (Good S&S situation) And this takes me over my £150k by Sept 2021 goal. So now I need to think about a new goal...

Sandyra

#32 here, form posted. £1000 for April please. Thanks slowlyfading 

EeeJay

£1350 for me in April...

I’ve done a bit of a budget makeover so I now have a number of savings pots for new car, gifts, Christmas, new sofa etc. Not counting those in my total because the money is earmarked for various things, so feeling quite pleased with myself as I’m managing to put more away overall, with a better understanding of where everything is going. 

Merlin's_Beard

£1253.62 for April for me - could have been better but with the shops opening I had a list of things that have built up over the past year that I needed to buy in store. On the bright side, I have some clothes without holes in now.

CavendishWobble

Been away for a few months so updated for the last couple months! change in circumstances means I can save a lot more which will be great whilst it lasts!

Keep going everybody! you're doing great just being here and focusing on saving!

george4064

george4064 said:

#27 reporting £5,383.94 for March.

Another strong-ish month - which I'm really delighted for. I am really preparing to jig things around in the near future as I have several regular savers/fixed account maturing in the next few months (2 in April, 1 in June and a Fixed Account maturing in June) which I don't intend on opening new Regular Savers as the rates as so poor now. 2.75% is bearable but 1.00% rates really are terrible!

I filled up the £4,000 LISA allowance in these last few months, longer term I'm contemplating how much contributions I should divert to my employers pension vs LISA (LISA is not for house purchase). I tend to sacrifice any earnings that tip me into higher rate band into my employers pension, so I think things are quite evenly balanced. Welcome any other people's views/thoughts on this!

Form submitted.

#27 reporting £1,444.39 for April.

Two regular savers matured this month (HSBC @ 2.75% and Halifax @ 2%), those funds are sitting as cash at the moment and will be deployed in S&S LISA and S&S ISA during May's regular investment cycle.

New HSBC RS would pay a measly 1.0% whilst Halifax RS pays just 0.75%, so have decided against opening new ones and instead the plan is to simply keep a few months expenses emergency fund in Premium Bonds and the rest all go into Stocks & Shares. Not quite at that stage with a further 2.75% Regular Saver and a 1.2%(!) 1 year fixed account both maturing in June. So those funds will eventually form the PB emergency fund with everything else being invested in various ISA accounts.


I also produced a fancy line chart comparing the performance of S&S ISA vs Vanguard FTSE Global All Cap vs Vanguard LifeStrategy 100% from April 2019 to April 2021, including signs denoting when I added or removed cash from the portfolio (2020 onwards). Size of the signs is relative to the size of the cashflow. Fund prices are all rebased to 1.0000 for comparison purposes.

Green = new money, Red = Withdrawal.

Not particularly surprised by the results, however worth adding that S&S ISA has had around 15% to 20% in UK Equity, whilst FTSE Global All Cap is about 5% and Vanguard LS 100% is about 25%.

Also, on a lookthrough basis I estimate my US equity exposure to be about 30% compared Vanguard LS 100% of circa 33% and FTSE Global All Cap's of c. 56%.



Form submitted. 

Moneybear

#20 reporting £1655 for April 2021 and submitted the form. Made up from the usual ways - Salary and anything on the side such as overtime and prolific. 

I feel much less overwhelmed this month with my finances so felt more on track. 

This puts me at £6500 for the year. I thought I would be a bit higher but I am still very happy

A_Random_Man

#44 A Random Man
£1098.13 Saved in April
Spreadsheet Updated