Need to save £31K by December 2006

nadnad

Big ask I know - we are going to be building our own house and thats how much we need on top of the mortgage for everything. I'm going to give our monthly budget - if anyone can see where we can cut down (or out) please tell - even if we can get to about £25K we should be ok and we have £6K.

Mortgage of persent house: £350 (I/O at moment to help us save)
Mortgage of new build : £200 (I/O for starters and thats the first drawdown - it goes up in increments)
Rates: £55
T V Licence: £11
Life Insurance: £26
house insurance: £20
NTL (phone, TV and net): £60
Electricity: £22
Loan: £193
Credit Card (0%) £40
Food: £200

My husband earns anywhere from £1500 upwards per month - commission based so it changes although usually around £1800 - £1900 (after tax) and I earn £940 after tax. We are going to try to save about £1200 per month - well on average - obvoiusly more when OH earns more and vice versa. We are also going to be living with my mother (lordy help us) from next May when the build actually starts so that we can sell our present house (hopefully making about £15K - although we want to use that a bonus money and don't want to rely on it for the bulk of the capital we need) - so anyway should hopefully save more when we live with her - I think we will be giving her about £350 per month (so should save another £200 per month) then.

Any other advice is very welcome!

Thank you

PeeWee

Seems Like a very small list, me and the OH did a list like this when we moved in totgether to work out splitting costs etc, the list got reviewed every month because we kept missing things off!!!

Have you included everything to start with?

What about car costs, or public transport to and from work etc?

Beer money? Goinf to the pub, days out etc??

I notice £200 for food.. seems reasonable unless you start counting bathroom and cleaning products, razors alone can be a bloody fortune!!

I notice you dont put down gas or water bills??

Window Cleaner (we missed this one but can add up)


I cant really advise on saving money, but I would suggest you spend a long time doing a really thorough budget, its tempting to miss things off to make your budget seem better, but in the long run your only kidding yourself

Tip on the food side though, is to use local markets and butchers etc, you get a lot more for your money, and its often better in quality than supermarkets!!

Also check out the Tesco Wrong prices thread, if you like bacon and cheese you could cut your food bill seriously

Anyway, enough waffle, quite envious about what your doing with the new build!! so best of luck!! I hope it goes well for you!!

nadnad

We don't pay for water over here (Northern Ireland)

But I did forget oil - we only put about 1350 litres a years - so at the minute I guess thats £450 - but we don't pay monthly - just take it out of our curent accounts 2x a year.

We don't have a window cleaner - do it ourselves -

my OH has a company car and gets fuel as well -

my car is paid for and the insurance is only £250 per year along with £110 tax - which I just pay for out of my "own" money. I suppose I could include £30 per month - petrol (i only drive my car to and from work).

The £200 includes chemist things - razors etc.

as for days out - they are off the schedule - its heavy duty saving from here on in - and neither of us smoke and don't really drink that much any more!

pug_in_a_bed

Empty your house and sell it on ebay! Or start doing some car boots.
I buy loads on ebay and sell a fair bit; I used to buy unusual items but now I use ebay for bulk toiletries I normally pay a fortune for, christmas pressies, 2nd hand clothes...and so on - basically stuff I used to spend a great deal more money on in the 'real world'. Some of the stuff I have sold, you couldn' believe people would buy; for example I sold a nice old collander for £3 t'other day which I hought would never go.

Since I've been in debt, for instance, I have become a great deal less materialistic. It just seems irrelevant. I used to be an avid collector of rare records, for example. It began to seem a waste of money, and stopped filling me with the pleasure it once had: not in a bad way, just that I realised there was little point to all these records sitting in their pristine sleeves for me to admire and never play.

So, I sold a lot last year (through collectors mags as well as ebay). Now they are making someone else happy and I owe my sister £250 less! Anyway, just my tuppence worth. As you're building a house I guess it might be a good opportunity to see what you can sell to help with the costs and start in your new house a bit less cluttered.

Keep it up!

johannamse

i've only come to put a message on here because i saw another posting of yours on another thread and you said you had only received one reply, and i felt sorry for you (I see you now have more).

I know your not in debt, but what about posting the same post on the debt free board, as that is where the most scrutenizing of budgets goes on.

Callisto

Good luck with the build!

Definitely agree with the selling of unwanted stuff on Ebay, it declutters the house and brings in extra cash.

Also, if it's feasible, what about getting a second job for a while, part time couple of evenings a week or weekend? (at least until you move back in with your Mum). I'm seriously considering a second job to raise extra money towards our wedding.

Other than that, do you already shop at the cheaper places (Aldi, Lidl, local markets etc) for food & toiletries and use money off vouchers?

Not sure if any of that is helpful/relevant to your situation, but can't sleep, so have to do something to keep myself amused in the early hours!

fairylights_2

What about ditching the ntl tv - assuming you can get the same package for just phone and internet for 2/3 the price, that'd be £20 a month saved. You might even be able to get internet and phone cheaper elsewhere. We combine bt and 18866 for phone, and currently use virgin for internet. They charge by the month so we're not tied to them if a good cheap deal comes up elsewhere ...