2008 - Live on £4000 for a full year.

Burlesque_Babe

right.........deep breath......I've gone over my budget for the month......

£13.78 in Asda
£27.25 in the online John Lewis Sale (birthday present I needed plus a couple of bits to put away as presents)

Stupid pigsback........if they had given me all the points I'm due I wouldn't have spent the money with John Lewis. However, I don't now have a birthday to buy for until the end of March, so I'm hoping they are well and truly sorted out by then!!

wornoutmumoftwo

Thanks for offering to record it, sorry if I gave you extra stress will defo try that website later, am surposed to be leaving to take the kids to school but cant pull myself away from this computer:rotfl:

It was no problem. the computer knows....if it's something I really want to record, it plays up, if it's something I don't mind missing it records perfectly.

And I can't drag myself off this forum, I NEED HELP!:rotfl:

halia

yay! shoud eb in budget for groceries this month and have made £70 on ebay which offsets my clothes I treated myself to.

Treasure I think maybe you have missed the point. As far as I know this thread isnt' designed as a social experiment to PROVE you can live on £4k (or whatever amount) including all your bills/rent etc. Its suppoused to be for anyone who would like to set a budget for their spending this year which is below what many people consider to be 'normal' or necesary.

One of the reasons it doesn't encourage including your rent/ other housing costs in your budget is because if you have to manage rent/bills etc out of £4k a year you really are struggling and we wouldn't encourage anyone to voluntarily make themselves that poor.

Everyone has their own reasons for doing the challange, I've set my target for £5k this year as we normally spend about £8k so its a pretty big drop already!

Whats important for me is that we don't 'waste' money on unecsary spending. We have a lifegoal to downshift in a few years time and this is a way of a) saving some cash for the move and b) making sure we can live on less.

Some people are doing the budget/challange because they only have £4k, some are doing it to save money. The idea is to support each other with hints, tips, and encouragement!

georgiasmum

Well, thanks to my husband I have overspent by 27.00 this week!!!! I am disappointed in myself but am absolutely furious with him. I know 27.00 isn't the end of the world but he has let me down in such a way that we may struggle to survive this one. I am going to try and recoup my 'losses' next week as Friday is day one again. I need to remember that in the grand scheme of thing I am allowed to screw up and that I have blown 27.00 much more casually than this so I need to chill! Have a good day everyone.

Penny2myName

Georgiasmum, we all screw up now and then, and I decided right at the start, or though £4k is my target, if I go within £500 above it I haven't really lost anything, but I have gained better budgeting skills. One area I need to look into is lining up my weekly money with when the week begins (I get my 'budget' money on a Thursday) Also due to doing the spending dairy site, there weeks start two days earlier then this challenge started, and it can be confusing, so need to line everything up. Week one was 30th-5th, week 2 dates where 6th-12th this week will be 13th-19th. On first chance I get where it is financially viable, I will be changing my budget standing order to a Monday rather then Thursday.
And yes I have blown a bit myself:o

Frugaldom

TREASURE wrote: »

Im sorry but i may have missed the point BUT .. you are not living on £4000 then really are you ? Some ppl really do have to live on that much whilst paying rent and water ates and so on . I think its good to show ppl they can live on a lot less but its no help to the ppl who really have to live on that much.

You are correct in assuming that some of the challengers here are not actually 'living' on £4000 but the rules had to be adapted to allow everyone a fair chance of living within a tight budget in order to help pay debts or save extra money. There are, in fact, quite a few of us living on £4000 per year and that is for everything except rent & council tax.

You say that "some people really do have to live on that much whilst paying rent and water..." - do you mean that these people only have a grand total (including all benefits) of £76.50 per week coming into their budget? I find this very difficult to believe as anyone on such a low income would be entitled to benefits, they are not likely to be paying full rent / council tax / water and would have access to things such as free prescriptions, free dental care etc. Please can you explain more clearly how you arrive at your conclusion as I, for one, would be genuinely interested to know.

Janey51

Hopeless....can we afford a straitjacket? I could probably make one with all the fabric I've got around the house!

Carlsberg

Good news, we got a car! A really good one. 2.0 so good on fuel, cheaper road tax, its fuly serviced, its only got 31k on the clock. Think we've done well! Budgetted 5k, and stuck to it. So my finances have somewhat changed now. Ive worked out, that after all bills etc, and the new car repayment (which im paying for half in cash, 3k on my credit card, and then im going to transfer it over to a 0% and pay 250 a month to clear it in a year! Then we'll have £497 left a month. I will also be saving £460 a month to my ISA. Im hoping that after filling the car up on payday at start of month (full tank should last the month) we should be able to live on about £50 a week. I truely dont know how it is possible to live on 4k, if this 4k includes all bills, it leavs me with £31 a week for fuel, food, and living. So im gonna try and keep the costs as low as poss. My target is to be able to start renovating our house this time next year!

Hope everyone is doing well.

Have a good weekend.

C x :T :T :T

Janey51

So far have not set foot outside the house so no money has escaped my purse:j
Have been cooking things for my DH's Atkins diet.
Peanut butter cookies (mix together Tesco Value Peanut Butter, 2 eggs and 25gms sugar subsitute then bake)
Cheesy mince loaf (11/2lbs mince+250gm Philly Lite+2 Eggs+chopped onions+seasoning and herbs..put in loaf tin and cook)
Baked Garlic&Thyme Chicken (Mix together butter, 2 crushed garlic cloves,thyme,chopped onion + seasoning. Coat chicken with mix and bake til tender)
All ingredients in freezer and fridge. Some looking a bit manky as left over from Christmas but I'm sure he won't notice!

All cooking in oven together and smelling divine :beer:

elantan

i started budgetting this year as we are now debt free (although overdraft is creeping back up) and i want us to try and concentrate on the mortgage and savings ..our son left home so we only have our nephew left who happens to have a very well paid job and feeds himself so the only thing i have to spend money on is hubby and myself (we still give son £25 a week to help him out but this is stopping in feb) anyway i am blabbering on again what i am trying to say is i dont count all the bills i have to pay the gas electricity the diesel car tax insurance etc etc i just count the money for the week to get hubby and myself to work, chinese takeaways (hubby cooks chinese himself tastes so much nicer but he likes to have a couple a week still) alcohol ju-jit-su for hubby and any other spends and we spend £100 a week just for the two if us that doesnt even include food how on earth are you all managing?