Stopping the backsliding… a family of four no longer living beyond their means

Bluegreen143

Hope everyone has had a lovely Christmas.

Red bought me a refurbished laptop for Christmas so I'm sat playing with it just now and thought I'd drop by! 

The financial review is going well, and we have had our second session. To recap what we've discussed in sessions one and two:

Financial review:

We reviewed last year's spending in each category and began thinking about whether we want to spend more or less in each category next year.

"Wants" spending priorities:

• New kitchen within 3 years

• Target amount £10k or £277 p/m

• First step - price up IKEA kitchens as a baseline

• In spring/summer 2025 we will begin keeping our eyes out for second hand kitchens as suggested - if we cut costs in this way we can replace this year 

• Saving for car repairs and replacement (target 3 years for replacement)

• Target amount for replacement £10k (£277 a month if aiming for three years)

• Holidays:

• Abroad holiday - 7-10 days in Italy, Portugal or Spain (short city break followed by few days at pool/beach resort) - late June/early July. Budget TBC - currently saving £400 p/m for holidays and have £1,475 in the pot

• Scottish lochside holiday - week in late July/early August (booked) - Budget £1,300 plus the grocery budget for that week (this is realistic, as we have stayed here for four years in a row and we always spend about this)

• Weekend away with MIL- 3 nights in April - Budget TBC as MIL is contributing

• Replace both our wedding rings - target amount £1,000, timescale TBC

• Time together:

• Have plenty of family time - mainly free/cheap (walks, swimming, games nights, garden fires) with one monthly paid outing/adventure (e.g. cinema or zoo trip)

• Couple time - weekly date nights at home with a monthly out of the house date (split from our personal budgets) 

Financial stability & security:

• We reviewed the impact of pension and mortgage overpayments and agreed that it’s more important to overpay pensions investments from our regular budget for now especially to catch Red's pension up - target £150p/m this year TBC

• We agreed we may overpay the mortgage in the future from unexpected income but won’t do so on a monthly basis this year.

• Emergency savings - monthly contribution TBC.

Next steps:

I have a blank copy of our spending plan (i.e. with the categories but no amounts), which we will fill in with the help of last year's spending figures and all the priorities outlined above. This will be when everything doesn't fit in and we will need to decide together what to priorities.

I've planned in a monthly catch up to follow on from this, where we can review both the finances and the calendar as a couple to make decisions and divide up responsibilities for holidays, celebrations, projects etc. I've also started a document for future agendas and noted in things I already know about e.g. discussing Christmas in our start-of-October meeting.

The January catch-up will follow on from the annual review in a few days and we have loads to talk about - planning our annual leave for the year, Red's birthday and starting to make decisions on our June holiday. Really hoping we keep this going as it's been surprisingly bonding and non-contentious, and I think we will be so much more organised and less stressed if we continue a regular monthly planning and finances meeting.

Other notes

Erm, the diet has fallen by the wayside (rather predictably) since Christmas Eve. Tomorrow won't be great either, as we have guests and are firing up the pizza oven. I am hoping to go full slimming world on Saturday, Sunday and Monday before we have some treats again around Hogmanay, but it will be tricky as I got lovely chocolates and truffles etc for my Christmas...

Floss

Remember that anything Red puts into his pension will be topped up by the tax rebate he will be due, that goes in automatically. If he pays higher rate tax I think he has to claim the difference by tax return.

Bluegreen143

Had part three of our money meeting tonight. My DH was slightly reluctant but rallied well! He did bow out before I had finished messing around with the figures but I think 45 minutes was long enough for him.

It was a really valuable exercise to fill in a blank spending plan together and I think it helped it hit home for him how it will be tricky to meet all our goals with the money available. He even suggested reducing his monthly allowance, which I didn't go for as I don't think he could stick to it, but I did point out that if he quit vaping I would be happy to put the funds saved from this towards the kitchen (his priority area).

New spending plan below:

NET INCOME, £4,874
INCOME inc pre-tax pension contributions £5,474

INVESTMENTS £800
Pre tax pensions £600
Post tax, additional contributions £200

SAVINGS £1,152
Emergencies £375
Holidays £450
New kitchen £277
Wedding rings £50

FIXED COSTS £2,496
Home £980
Utilities £201
Insurance £85
Car £375
Groceries £625
Kids' clothes £50
Subscriptions £105
Miscellaneous £75

WANTS £1,025
Me £280
Red £400
Family £170
Gifts & celebrations £175

Actions
- Change Spotify subscription to annual (saves £45 over the year)
- Cancel printer ink subscription (saves £4 a month)
- Set up recurring automatic payments to savings pots - done
- Set up automatic payment into Red's pension each month - done (he's not a higher rate taxpayer so the tax rebate happens automatically too)

Agenda for next meeting
- Sit down with DH to brainstorm ways to actually achieve the fairly substantial grocery reduction planned!
- Ditto with planning in gift/celebration spend for the year, as this is a slight reduction
- Still need to agree what happens when we get extra/unexpected money in and how this should be allocated
- Plan out annual leave for the year, especially for our abroad holiday
- Decide on plans for Red's birthday in Feb

Moneywhizz

That sounds like a really worthwhile exercise. It is good to be realistic about how much you can afford to assign to each category and helps you to prioritise what is most important to you. Look forward to seeing how it all works out this year. No matter what at least you know you won't be getting into any more debt and will have an emergency fund in place so no more difficult months to get through. Happy New Year when it comes. 

KajiKita

This has been really impressive to read about and like the penny is starting to drop a bit for Red - offering to reduce his allowance. I understand why you think that’s not a good idea, but perhaps he could set *himself* the challenge to save a bit from his allowance himself? That might shift his perspective on that money to being a finite resource and worth nurturing, rather than spending the lot (and a bit more) each month? 

I will just say, it’s has taken YEARS (20 or so) before Mr KK finally set up a savings account … I don’t know how much is in it (he won’t tell me! 😂) but he is quietly proud of having it now …. 😊

As for extra monies coming in - I like the idea of thirds that someone, somewhere has mentioned on MSE.  One third to something long term and fixed e.g. pension / mortgage, one third to short term savings e.g. in your case probably the kitchen or holidays or topping up the EF after something unexpected happens and the final one third to fun, whatever that looks like 😊 I like this as a balanced approach as you move steadily towards long term goals, avoid using CCs for forecastable spends but also get some ‘here and now’ benefit from windfalls and opportunities. 

KK

Bluegreen143

Couple of bits of admin done this morning:

- Paused Audible subscription (this comes from my own pot) for three months, as I have four credits built up so am not using it quick enough. Once I have used these I may cancel my subscription for a bit.
- Paused printer ink subscription for six months as this means I can still print 10 pages a month for free. I will diarise to either cancel then or switch to the 10 page a month plan (£1.49 versus £3.99 for my current 50 pages) as I currently have 150 pages rolled over, meaning I'm not using a lot of the pages in my plan.
- Ordered the £99 Spotify voucher from Amazon - this buys you a year's membership, saving £45 over the monthly cost.

zcrat41

Sounds like you’ve been doing great work on the budget review and setting. Have you come across BorrowBox? I find it very good if I’m organised and saves on Audible 

Bluegreen143

My library does have that - I didn’t find it great when I tried it before but I can check it out again as I probably didn’t give it much of a chance. Most of the Audible books I get are for the children and I didn’t find the kids’ selection that good, plus I couldn’t figure out how to make it play on Alexa so they could listen to it - but they do most often listen to audiobooks in the car tbf so I could play borrowbox books there via my phone if I find titles they’d like to listen to. 

Bluegreen143

Happy last day of 2024 everyone! A bit of a random brain dump here today.

Family fun and date nights

One of my goals for 2024 is that we set aside money for some kind of family outing once a month - obviously we'll still do free walks and museum visits most of the time, but as the kids are getting older I'd like to occasionally do things which cost money.

With that in mind I've booked tickets for us to go and see Mufasa on Sunday at the local independent cinema. It was £41.75 but my kids went through a massive Lion King phase a year or two ago, so I think it should be enjoyed by all.

I also want to plan in one 'out of the house' date a month for Red & I (probably not in December, but the other 11 months) but I think it would need to be this weekend too TBH as our January is booked full already... and there is a lot of pressure on my personal budget next month so thinking I may start this resolution from February.  Unless I persuade him to pay this time and I pay in Feb...

What'll be hitting my personal budget in Jan:

- I'm going to the comedy club with my mum and sister next weekend - tickets bought already, but will have drinks/taxis

- Then the following weekend I'm going to see a ballet in Edinburgh, again with my mum and sister. Tickets bought, but I'll have the train, dinner and drinks to buy. 

- Then the following weekend from that I'm away to visit a friend, though she lives in the middle of nowhere so I probably won't have many costs, but we did go for lunch last time I visited and I'll obviously want to bring something.

- Red's birthday is in Feb so I'll probably start buying birthday presents in Jan, though I suppose I could wait until Feb if needed.

- I'm going away for the weekend with my mum and sister in March so I know they'll be keen to get an airbnb or hotel booked soon, which we might need to pay for on booking.

Eeek! I think I need to be realistic and put myself on a book, clothes and craft buying ban in January so I can allocate all personal funds to the social pot. I have a stack of books to read anyway, include Ramit Sethi's new book, Money for Couples, which I preordered and has downloaded to my kindle today as it's just been released. Plus access to the library. I have three knitting projects on the go which is breaking my personal rule of never having more than two open projects. I could also do with getting back into walking in January. I do not need money to entertain myself! And I got clothes in December/for Christmas so don't need those either.

If I put the clothes/hobbies budget toward socialising then I'll have £200 in the social pot and I have about £150 in my personal savings which can pay for Red's birthday gift. So it should be OK, fingers crossed, but I think I need to wait til I get paid again to let my mum and sister start looking for our weekend away accommodation.

Meal plan

Yesterday - carrot, butternut squash & coconut milk soup with sandwiches (I had a pastrami & lettuce wholemeal pitta, Red had a pastrami sandwich, kids had tuna sandwiches). There's a small portion of soup left for my lunch today.

Today - planned meal is chicken & veg stir fry with rice.

Wed - steak pie as per usual tradition, think Red is making this.

Thurs - tomato pasta - I have some leftover roast chicken in the freezer from Sunday to bung into this.

Grocery plan

Must go and rejoin the grocery challenge. I think I will aim for £600 on four week months and putting aside £50 towards the three five week months a year. So on a four week month my budget would be £600 but I'd have £750 to spend on a five week month. 

I think I can achieve this by sticking to 2x £70 deliveries a week, leaving £10 p/w for if we need to pick up any milk/fruit or forgotten items. Red and I have gone through the budget carefully and agreed that reducing the grocery spend is a must if we are to save for a new kitchen and afford the holidays we want, it's as simple as that, the other categories don't have enough flex in them to reduce them (except his personal spends, which he doesn't want to reduce). So I'm really hoping we work as a team on this and it will be achievable.

Thinking ahead to problem solve...

I think Red finds it really hard when he raids the fridge and there's 'nothing to eat'. He doesn't eat breakfast and often doesn't eat lunch, then is ravenous on returning home. 

I think if I want to have a really good chance of success, a good tactic will be to make sure he has sandwiches made and in the fridge each day. He will then either take them for lunch or eat them when he returns home, but either way will be less likely to complain if there is something easy to eat around for him.

He likes olives, pickles, hummus and cheese to snack on too, as well as cold meat, so making sure we have some of these around will help too - olives jarred in brine and pickles aren't that expensive, I can make my own hummus and if I keep crackers/breadsticks around he'll like that too.

For the kids it's easier, as they get most lunches at school and mainly snack on fruit/veg, and if they are particularly hungry in the afternoon I just make them a slice of toast. I certainly won't be restricting fruit as part of the budgeting, but we can do more apple/banana/carrot/cucumber and slightly less soft fruit which will help the budget.

I also think I need to book in a little time in my routine 2-3 times a week to check the fridge and prep/pull to the front anything needing used up as I'm not consistent at keeping an eye on all that just now.

LadyWithAPlan

Well done with the review - looks like you are building a solid plan for 2025 

great Red is seeing the finiteness of his money - I am feeling permanently‘YNAB poor’ which is where there is lots of money in my accounts but it’s all earmarked for something already eg taxes ! 

Hope you are still taking pics of your meals - research shows how helpful it is - I am currently having a Dec 31st packet of crisp eating