Living on your own.....

ellerose

....as some of you may know, I've recently become single again and will soon have to look for somewhere to live. I've no idea how much it really costs to live on your own, since I've always house shared. Can anyone shed some light on this? I've a feeling I'm not going to manage it......

carrottopsuk

ellerose wrote: »

....as some of you may know, I've recently become single again and will soon have to look for somewhere to live. I've no idea how much it really costs to live on your own, since I've always house shared. Can anyone shed some light on this? I've a feeling I'm not going to manage it......

Can you find anyone to share a flat/house again to reduce costs?

Good luck!

ellerose

I think I will have to, but I think it would be best to live by myself if I can. Reality bites though.....

ZTD

First attempt:

Rent - only you would know how much that will be. Alas 1 is usually as expensive as two.

Council tax - again, only you know how much - you will get a single person's discount of 25% though.

Electricity - this is as expensive/cheap as you want it to be. I paid £35 pcm in my last house and got a large refund twice. Choose what you think is realistic, but you don't need to accept what the electricity company say. They wanted to charge me £70 pcm... :eek:

I'm obviously not as consumer electrical orientated as I probably should be.

Gas: Again, depends on how you like it. I was paying £15 pcm, and used about £5 per quarter (it was summer and I had a wood-burning stove anyway).

Living on your own, you at least know everyone in the house has had a LBM, and hence closes doors and turns off lights etc.

Insurance: One as cheap as two alas. If you're just renting, you don't need to get buildings insurance, which is a saving. My contents insurance just came for renewal as £94. Go through quidco - the cashback can get you it for virtually free.

Water rates: depend on the area you're in, and whether you have a meter or not.

Hope that helps.

carrottopsuk

Are you hoping to rent or buy? If you buy you will need to factor in the costs of maintenance etc.

Are you looking for a house or a flat?

Check the local websites/newspapers to give you ideas of prices

Find out how much the local council tax is for those areas. If you're on your own it will be reduced by 25%.

Don't forget water bills. If you are on your own and the property has a meter, you may be able to reduce water consumption which will be cheaper.

Don't forget you can shop to suit yourself, try and get cheap bread, yellow sticker items from supermarkets at the end of the day. Make food from scratch, maybe freeze half to use another time. It will be cheaper than ready meals. Look on the old style board for suggestions on food & cleaning products.

Check the forums and see how much single people are budgeting for for food, household bills etc.

Can you use freecycle to get items you still need for your own home?

Gas/electric. Are you out all day so just need the heating on in the evenings?

Mozette

Believe me, the saying 'two can live as cheaply as one' is spot on. 25% off the council tax, and every other bill will be just as much (or strangely, even more )
So please don't bargain on being able to live more cheaply just because there is only one of you. Costs as much to heat & light & rent/mortgage a place however many folk live there.
I found my food & drink bill went up, though I think that was down to the 'drinks' part of food & drink :rolleyes:
As others have suggested, you might want to consider sharing, or you might be a bit anti social like I am, and would rather struggle on alone!
Best of luck with it anyway.

Sammz

I'm in Scotland in a small one bedroomed flat. I pay:

Mortgate - £364 but rent would be £500 or so
Council Tax - £93 (single person discount included)
Electricity - £60
Factor - £20

Then my phone, TV licence, mobile, broadband brings my monthly "essential" outgoings to £590.

Home and Contents Insurance is £90 per year

redsquirrel80

I live on my own and can give you a few figures, although I don't know how typical I am! Obviously a lot depends on where you live - town/ city, and the area of that city, nice shiny new build house/ flat or older one, and whether you strike it lucky with rent.. I'm assuming you're going to be renting? Personally, I prefer to pay a bit more in rent to live in a decent flat in a nice area - too many cold damp ones when I was a student, and I want to feel safe coming home at night! My electricity/ gas is included in my rent but I did ask on here a while back for typical figures when I was thinking about moving - see here - http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=470656

Remember that you'll get single person's reduction for council tax, I currently pay £63 a month for a one bedroom flat fairly close to a city centre (payments spread over 12 months), but you should be able to check your local council's rates on their website.

Have a look round on here for phone/ broadband packages, I use T-Mobile's 'Web & Walk Plus' which gives you a mobile with 1000 mins of calls and unlimited internet (you can plug it in to computer as a modem) for £42.50 a month.

Groceries - I usually spend £50-60 a month on food, cleaning products and toiletries, but get a few extras through vouchers from surveys etc. I'd say you could get all you need for less than £100 comfortably. One of my big expenditures used to be lunches at work so I've made a big effort to cut down on that and take my own. Having a freezer has been a godsend!

Other than that, it'll depend on if you have a car, have to pay for travel to work, etc, and of course any debt payments you have to make. What I did when I was planning to move was to do a mock SOA with everything in to work out if I could afford it. It's not easy, and some months things are very tight.. if you think you'd be happy flat-sharing then that may be the way ahead. Personally, I love my own space and it's worth every penny!

Hope that's been helpful and it all works out for you x

redsquirrel80

ZTD wrote: »

Insurance: One as cheap as two alas. If you're just renting, you don't need to get buildings insurance, which is a saving. My contents insurance just came for renewal as £94. Go through quidco - the cashback can get you it for virtually free.

Who is your contents insurance with Z? I need to sort mine out!

MissEyre

Just to give you an idea of my monthly costs-

Mortgage - £600

Council tax inc. discount - £90

Water (assessed usage-can't have a meter) - £20

Gas - £25

Electric - £25 (just has the latest gas/electric bills through-they owe me money!)

Contents and buildings insurance - £15

Groceries inc. toiletries, cleaning stuff - never over £120

Phone and broadband inc call package - £25


It's expensive, but I think it's worth it! Good luck x

ellerose

Thanks for these really helpful replies! I think I'm going to have to just find a room in a shared house for a while, as I'm not sure [EMAIL="I@ll"]I'll[/EMAIL] be able to afford to rent on my own, especially in Leeds which ain't exactly cheap.