All change for 2025

Sunshine_girl2

Happy New Year Jwil and family. Apart from your water bill and school spends I think you have done really well . 

satchmo1

Happy New Year! I lasted til 10pm then couldn't stay awake. Was woken at midnight by fireworks, then at 3am by dog jumping on the bed!

I noticed in your decluttering there were mags. As you have Prime, have a look at their magazine offerings. and some are free online (e.g. Slimming World's mag).

Justcrackingonwithit

I can’t help with any ideas to cut down @jwil but will follow with interest, I need all the help I can get!!
miserable day here too so not gone far x

jwil

Today's PAD - £2

Jan - £15

jwil

NeverendingDMP said:

jwil said:

Spending in 2024.

This is the first year I've tracked all my spending.  I didn't make any particular effort to reduce spending so this is a true reflection.  These are the results.  Let me know any thoughts on where I can cut down.  I want to be more frugal this year.

This is everything I spend and that which comes from our joint account so all joint bills.  It doesn't include anything that DH spends from his accounts, including any groceries he buys.

Monthly spends:

Groceries: £522 (includes delivery saver payment, and anything I buy from supermarkets/food stores including toiletries, cleaning, non food).  I'd like this closer to £400

We definitely spend more than this as a family of five so I think you are doing well, I also want to get our costs down too though. Such a big chunk of the expenses isn't it. 

Entertainment: £148.88 (includes NT membership, 2 weekends in Cornwall, all days out, meals out etc)

I don't track all my categories but tbh you enjoy going out as family time so it's worth it.

Mortgage: £600 (includes c.£35 overpayment)

Council Tax: £176.08 (actually pay £214 over 10 months) 
We are pretty similar. 200 a month for ten months.

Water: £84 (Rated value, actually £102.22 over 10 months - I still haven't done anything about moving to a water meter)

Family of five and we are on a water meter. We are paying £70 a month but we haven't yet hit the kids wanting to shower continuously stage which I'm dreading as it will then go up probably. The house had a meter when we moved in so we had no choice. My parents recently swapped though and they have halved their bill by now being on a meter. I've found the shower to be a bigger culprit than the bath

Electric/Gas: £137.08 -

i need some tips, are you in a well insulated house or are we just very wasteful. Our d debits is currently set at 235 a month and we have no spare credit!

School: £125.59 (This was an eye opener!  Includes lunches, clubs, after school club, trips, all the random requests for money)

Again I haven't tracked but if I had I'm at least that maybe a fair bit more. 3 kids compared to two though. Crackers isn't it. I've reduced ours by not doing the hidden things that school have now moved online. Eg raffle tickets. 

Clubs: £45.09 (Swimming, brownies etc.  Should be less this year as both have given up swimming). 

We used to be 23 each for swimming 10 a month each for brownies type groups so v similar. We have recently quit all of them though they have asked about new stuff instead. I think you are paying an expected price.

Mobile phone: £12.17  (mine and little jwil's phone credit) 
Seems fair
 

Telephone and internet - £82.39 (Out of contract at end Feb so will haggle. Also includes Prime membership and various streaming sites)
I reckon if you haggle you will get this down a bit. Ours is sixty odd for internet, films on now tv and the dreaded amazon 

TV Licence: £13.25

Clothing and shoes: £70.61 (Me and the kids including school uniforms.  More than I'd like it to be)


Health: £39.85 (Includes dentist for me and the kids, opticians, new glasses this year and any other prescription/medical costs)
I budget similar. Paying for glasses is so unfair budget wise isn't it!

Gifts: £147.28 - (birthdays/xmas for DH and the kids, plus 16 family/friends, also any kids parties etc) 
I upped my budget to 160 when I went full.time so pretty similar. Again I also wish it was lower


Car: £137.12 - (Insurance, fuel, MOT, Service, repairs, also new windscreen this year)


Insurances: £36.91 - (Home, life, dog's trust membership)
I'm in awe. 36 a month for home insurance here.  Life insurance 21 each dog insurance about 18. 

Pets - £81.29 (This stopped after April when we lost the cat, mostly the costs of the vets bills when she was ill (£917).  DH covers the dog costs)

Miscellaneous - £913.44 (This is my general spending, pocket money for little jwil, but also includes all the work we had done on the house - electrics, new taps in kitchen, replacement bathroom, plastering.  Also replacement TV, sofas etc.)  Without those big spends it is around £206 per month - still too much! 

I'm going to carry on with this in 2025, but will replace the 'pets' category with a 'house' category so I can keep any of those jobs separate from general spends.

I've commented but overall I think you are doing well. Have u tracked it yourself via spreadsheets or statements. Just being nosey. I'm pretty sure my eyes would be wide open if I did similar. The grocery challenge is a good one to motivate reduced costs as some of the ideas on there and the budgets people keep to are amazing. 

Thank you, I've found your comments really useful, and we're not too far away with a lot of things.

In terms of our gas/electric, I don't know.  I don't feel like I restrict it at all,  but we are strict on turning things off and not wasting it.  Our thermostat is set to around 16 during the day and night, with 19 in the morning, and evening.  I turn it up whenever I feel cold, but often I just use a hot water bottle in the day and then in the evening if we're just lazing around turn it up to around 21 for a couple of hours.  We have cavity wall insulation, but all the windows and doors are very draughty.  Our bathroom window is almost permanently cracked open as we don't have an extractor fan.  There are air bricks in the kitchen and no heating in there.  The radiators in the bedrooms are kept low as I don't like sleeping in a hot room.  Honestly, much as I whinge about all the stuff, I do wonder if it helps insulate - particularly the loft which is rammed!

Today I've put it up to 19 for the day as we are all home.  I find if I'm too cold I don't do anything, and the same if I'm too warm.  We were in credit yesterday of £170 and the monthly payment today will have gone in so around £400 in credit now.

Our home insurance was £192 including legal cover, that was down from £214 last year.  We don't have pet insurance, just Dog's Trust membership which is £25 a year and includes 3rd party liability insurance.  Vets bills we cover as required.  Life insurance is just me, and £18.60 pm.

I have a spreadsheet to track it all.  I got it from here somewhere.  All the categories along the top, and the date along the side.  I go through my banking roughly weekly and update all the spends.  It totals each day and each category and I added a tab to summarise the whole year.  I've never kept up a spending diary before but this has been really useful, and I will keep it going as it will help me with my plans for early retirement.

jwil

Sunshine_girl2 said:

Happy New Year Jwil and family. Apart from your water bill and school spends I think you have done really well . 

Thank you   Happy new year to you too.

I definitely need to sort the water meter, I'm sure we would save.  School spends I'm sure will increase now that little jwil is at secondary school, and I'll need to add some childcare for little miss.

satchmo1 said:

Happy New Year! I lasted til 10pm then couldn't stay awake. Was woken at midnight by fireworks, then at 3am by dog jumping on the bed!

I noticed in your decluttering there were mags. As you have Prime, have a look at their magazine offerings. and some are free online (e.g. Slimming World's mag).

Happy New year!  The mags are mostly DH's, and ones he's hoarded over the years. I rarely buy them now (except SW), as I use Borrowbox from the library.  I just had a look and SW is on Kindle Unlimited which I don't have, but it's worth knowing for the future, thank you!  Once I've got through my (huge) to be read pile, I would consider it then.

Justcrackingonwithit said:

I can’t help with any ideas to cut down @jwil but will follow with interest, I need all the help I can get!!
miserable day here too so not gone far x

Thank you   It's always useful to get other perspectives.  Hope you had a nice day.

jwil

Happy Thursday!  I can't believe the week is nearly over.  It's flown by.

Today we have a day where we don't  need to go anywhere, heaven!  I've tidied and hoovered through this morning, got the towels and the sofa blankets in the wash, and cleaned out the hoover.  Tomorrow little miss's friend is coming for the day so I need to ensure her room is reasonable.

I've started going through the big bundle of SW cookbooks I bought, and have so far identified 3 to go.  I've kept a few and I've still got several to go through.  I'll try and do that so that I can list the ones I don't want and get rid of them.  I've also got a few other bits to list, so I should try and do that.

beanielou

Enjoy your day. 

NeverendingDMP

jwil said:

Happy Thursday!  I can't believe the week is nearly over.  It's flown by.

Today we have a day where we don't  need to go anywhere, heaven!  I've tidied and hoovered through this morning, got the towels and the sofa blankets in the wash, and cleaned out the hoover.  Tomorrow little miss's friend is coming for the day so I need to ensure her room is reasonable.

I've started going through the big bundle of SW cookbooks I bought, and have so far identified 3 to go.  I've kept a few and I've still got several to go through.  I'll try and do that so that I can list the ones I don't want and get rid of them.  I've also got a few other bits to list, so I should try and do that.

Do you sell the books on fb or eBay or use a selling site?. Wondering whats the best way

jwil

beanielou said:

Enjoy your day. 

Thank you, hope you've had a good one.

NeverendingDMP said:

jwil said:

Happy Thursday!  I can't believe the week is nearly over.  It's flown by.

Today we have a day where we don't  need to go anywhere, heaven!  I've tidied and hoovered through this morning, got the towels and the sofa blankets in the wash, and cleaned out the hoover.  Tomorrow little miss's friend is coming for the day so I need to ensure her room is reasonable.

I've started going through the big bundle of SW cookbooks I bought, and have so far identified 3 to go.  I've kept a few and I've still got several to go through.  I'll try and do that so that I can list the ones I don't want and get rid of them.  I've also got a few other bits to list, so I should try and do that.

Do you sell the books on fb or eBay or use a selling site?. Wondering whats the best way

I'll use eBay.  It seems to get the best results for me.  I have nothing but timewasters on FB.  I haven't tried selling on vinted yet.