LJ's Mortgage free road to early retirement

Jorgan_2

Thats fantastic Louise. I must sort myself out for 2009.

SmlSave

Congratulations on reaching the OPing target LouiseJ :j :T :beer:

gallygirl

Well done Louise :j

setmefree2

Well Done Louise:T

LouiseJ

Post Mortem of November Budget

Food - £200 £303:eek: Total madness
Work expenses - £30 £36
Petrol - £180 £183
Treats - £27 (days out or OH cigars:rolleyes: ) £28
Take aways - £15 (We can have 1 a month just for a treat) £15.50
Nights out/Drinks in house - £80 £132 We look like bluumin alcoholics:eek:
Lottery - £8 £8
Kids Pocket Money - £40 (£5 each per week) £40
Clothes - £30 £4
Other Stuff - £40 (Includes £13 every 2 weeks for guitar lessons) £112 a complete misjudgement as I forgot about the extra guitar lessons needed leading up to DS exam and fireworks night and my new Slimming club membership, even so YIKES:eek:

So thats £650 for the month............surely we can manage to stick to it!!! No we couldnt and the total was a scary £864:mad:

This complete overspending thankfully did not make too much of an impact on the overpayments as I did make over £300 this month from extra income such as mystery shops and private work. I wont be able to keep that up constantly though so I really need to get to grips with a decent budget, any ideas greatfully received.

StuartGMC

LJ
Sometimes these things happen...
Only suggestion I can give is to be collating spend into spreadsheet which can then return the monthly averages etc (I do this on petrol, groceries and clothing & shoes) from actual values not estimates.

I have a pub allowance (£50 per month) and know that there's about £12 per week in the groceries and presently we have £150 which is the ancillary spend (presents for DD's friends, allowance towards B'days and Christmas, unforeseen bits like school items but not the main annual trip). I can't believe you only need £30 per month on clothing and shoes, wow!!

Food and drink seem to be the main issues, so if these are taken into your average spend it will reflect the true situation which you can then monitor over time (e.g spirits will I assume last more than one month?)

The oversight on the lessons can happen to us all, but put this into the 2009 budget assuming they will recur again?

Don't let it get you down though!
Good luck

LouiseJ

Thanks for that Stuart, I keep track of all of the spending via a spreadsheet and lately I have found myself constantly going over budget on the food and drink.

I guess I should make it more realistic in terms of what we actually spend rather than that elusive "like to spend". OH is not 100% on board with this and shows some resistance to cutting down on the alcohol budget:rolleyes:

The lessons will be back to once a fortnight from now on but I do intend to continue with my slimming club.

December budget is alot more forgiving with the planned festivities:D

LouiseJ

My luxury December budget is as follows:D

Food - £300
Work expenses - £30
Petrol - £230 includes trip to Lancashire to see OH sister
Treats - £20 (OH cigars:rolleyes: )
Take aways - £20 (We can have 1 a month just for a treat)
Nights out/Drinks in house - £130 It is Christmas
Lottery - £8
Kids Pocket Money - £40 (£5 each per week)
Clothes - £80 we all need something new for Christmas Day;)
Other Stuff - £42 (Includes £13 every 2 weeks for guitar lessons and SW group fee)

This comes in at a whopping £900 for December.................:eek: :xmassign:

skint_spice

Hi Lou, you know you could cut down further if you really had to but you need to live a little (IMO) or the mortgage free thing will seem like a drudge and not positive and fun. It's not bad debt (like wot I have LOL) and it's xmas! are you sure the clothes is realistic at £80 for something for each of you?

LouiseJ

Yea £80 is more than enough, Asda do some lovely things and the boys like the stuff in Peacocks:D I also have a 20% off card for there;)