How do I work out how much money we actually have??!

[Blazing88]

Right. Basically, used to get paid monthly. Easy peasy. Direct debits out at the start of the month, what was left we had to live on. We were never in debit.

Had 2 babies, fastforward a bit, sold a house, now renting, so a lot of money gone out.

Husband gets new job. Is now paid weekly. So different dates each month. Also gets varying amounts each month. We also get some CTC's weekly too (and that can change days due to bh's etc)

I also work (evenings) but get paid cash normally. Is it all declared. Not very much, about £50 a week and we use that towards the food shop.

Anyway. I've worked out how much goes out on DD's and SO's. And I know in theory roughly how much husband is bringing in. We should be able to make ends meet. But we are literally haemorraghing money and I have no idea how!

Some days I can log on and we're £240 in credit. The next day, we're £500 in debit because say, eg the rent has gone out.

Am I being a bit thick here? Should we basically have ZERO at SOME point in the month and if that's the case, we're fine? It feels as though I need to whack £1000 into the account from savings (which I really really don't want to do) just so that we always have money in there.

We do have an overdraft, so I guess in theory it's not an issue. But I hate seeing the account constantly shifting from OD to in credit. Feels out of control.

Spent a bomb selling/moving..lots of upfront fees etc. I just don't feel things have settled down at all since then.

DD's are all over the place, different dates, different amounts so that they don't all come out on one day (that would be worse obviously, as the money wouldn't be in there to cover it)

What would people suggest I do to work out how much money (or not) we actually have??

[MrsNextDoor]

It's tough getting paid weekly sometimes as most things seem to be arranged to benefit those who are paid monthly.

What you need to do is to work out your bills on a weekly basis....do you only have one account? If so, arrange for enough money to come out weekly to cover the large bills like rent and any utilities....have those come out on the same day every month from an account meant only for those.

When your DH gets paid....into his account I assume...make sure the cash to cover the big bills comes out the next day...so if rent is eg. 400 per month...make sure 100 come out for that...straight into the account from which the rent is paid....same with Sky bill money....if that's for eg. 80 pounds per month...you need 20 to come out towards it.

As you say things vary a little, you need to work out the max variation and add some to those weekly payments to cover that. Once you've arranged the DDs to come out on one day...then get things in place so they're covered.

[annielostit]

If you've paid in cash, use that for food as you do.

Write down your incomings and outgoings and what dates dd, leave.
put some cash into your bills account, enough for amonths bills.That way your not going into an overdraft. As your next round of CTC and wages come in you will build up for next months DDs.
Eventually it will work itself out.

Does that make sense?

[Blazing88]

Right, Good plan. I'll get another account set up and put money aside.

It's a joint account at the minute, everything comes out of it. I do sideline the ctc's into a separate account as they go towards nursery fees (which get paid once a month and obviously I have to make sure I have money for that)

Rent is £700 and he only gets £360 a week, so that week that comes out that's when it all seems to go tits up!

I'm wondering whether to just work out how much we have left spare (!) at the end of the month and split it 4 ways and take cash out at the start of the week. And that's it.

[QforCucumber]

Dp and I both get paid weekly now, I worked out our monthly bills - times by 12 and divided by 52 to find out what the bills etc needed a week. and then added £20 (just in case)

we then set up a separate joint account and put the weekly amount into there and all bills come out of there, that way bills are covered and anything left is for other stuff.

was the only way, after years of monthly pay, that i could get my head around it all!

[Blazing88]

annie. Yes, I think I need to sub it initially. It's like going back to when I first started work, except then I was living at the bank of Mum and Dad and it didn't matter that I had bills the first month..they paid!

I'm also behind because child 2 went into nursery, so the first month's bill was £800...but ctc's obviously didn't pay all that upfront, they pay weekly! So I've paid out the £800, and they're paying it back (if that makes sense) and then when I've got £800 I pay the next lot.

If/when they both stop at nursery, the last month I would pay £800 and then still get enough to cover that but no more bill to pay. So that's when I'd get my money back so to speak.

I'm not sure how much money to sub though, because I don't know how overdrawn we actually are :S Can't work it out! Do I just pick the day in the month when we're the most overdrawn and that's how much to whack in?

I just want to get back on track and start to save again

[Want2bSupermum]

I like to use cash in jars plus write all spending down to get spending under control. The concept was learned from Gail Vaz Oxley in Till Debt do us Part. Great program from Canada. It's probably little spends here and there that is adding up.

[Blazing88]

Q That sounds brilliant, will have a look at that tonight.

[Blazing88]

want Yes, I think/know that it is.

Two lots of petrol, a couple of impromptu shops to Sainsburys, a coffee/cake in Costa and I bought DD a pair of pyjamas. All that, a quick £150. On the same day £150 went out for gas/elec and 3 lots of Amazon buys that I'd totally forgotten about (bought ages ago)

I think I actually need to freeze the debit card so it's only direct debits that are coming out of the account!!

[QforCucumber]

it's quite easy now we have had about 8 months of it, both accounts (the one we get paid into and the new one for bills) are with barclays and we both get paid on a Friday so one of us just logs onto the app on a Friday morning and does the transfer, knowing that we are slightly overcompensating each week means if we ever are short one week we have made up for it previously

it works for us.

[KatharineClifton]

I like to have a month spare in the bank. Sometimes have to dip into it, but do try to put money by for big one off expenses such as on the car. Most spending I do is on the credit card and I make sure I already have the money for that in lieu so I can pay it at the end of the month. I allocate each heading such as groceries, fuel etc a certain amount of money. Also, after getting into debt year before last I have an Excel spreadsheet with all the known outgoings and ingoings. Things I can't be sure of are in a different colour until firmed. Gives me an idea of what is needed each/week/over the year.

Plus I sell everything un-needed on via ebay and FB so try to keep that money for buying similar needed things, so it's in my Paypal account when needed. They do a debit card for paypal accounts now too, but I can't seem to make mine work. Amazon is the devil's own for impulse purchases though. I find it best not to have a payment stored on there. So if I can't be bothered to put a payment method in then I really don't need whatever it is. The £20 minimum for free delivery is also helping with this

[Blazing88]

Q The bit I think i'm struggling with though is say this...

week 1 - Rent goes out £700..Council Tax £120

Week 2 - Gas/Elec £150...Broadband £20

Week 3 - Nursery bill £800

.......

So some weeks the bills are £800, some weeks only £170 comes out. So yes, in theory over the course of the month the same amount comes out, but bigger amounts each week.

So if you say only put £400 in each week, one week is surplus, but the next is way short. Fine if the surplus week is before the short week

BUT how do you work out initially how much to put in.

Because if you start afresh, you'd be overdrawn fairly soon?

[KatharineClifton]

So that is £1790 - if you have this in savings then put it into current account. At the beginning of each month you should have a balance of £1790.

[Blazing88]

Well, that was just an example. Our outgoings are £1900 ish. I've already worked out we have about £90 a week to live on - which includes food.

[QforCucumber]

We started out with knowing what the full months bills would be and opening then new account with that amount (stole it from our savings, but has been replaced now)

that way the first month was covered, and everything that went in weekly was preparing for the 2nd month. its taken me making a spreadsheet with dates of outgoings and making a formula on it to remove the outgoings and add on the amounts put in so i know there is always enough in there.

i hope that makes some kind of sense.

[Moreisnnogedag]

As others have said, I'd place £2k in new separate account and transfer all direct debits to that account. Then Every week transfer £500 into bills account. This will provide you with a buffer within the account and mean you're never in overdraft. At the end of the month transfer anything over £2k back into savings account.

[Want2bSupermum]

I would have direct debits come out of the account and then do the jars for your disposable spending. Do only one supermarket shop a week with a list. If it isn't on the list do not buy it. Write down every penny you spend. The thought of having to writing down everything stops me from mindless spending.

[specialsubject]

jars are for pocket money only - I hope you have tenant's insurance but it won't cover much cash lying around.

suggest also stopping visits to Costa, especially if you've just been to a supermarket where even if you need cake it is much cheaper!

[lougle]

Can I suggest you try YNAB?

We have some income that is paid monthly, some four-weekly, some weekly. We have bills going out throughout the month.

We never have an issue because we use YNAB. We set out our categories under several Master Categories. So:

'Week 1 bills' -that's all the bills that go out between the 1st of the month and the first Friday (we get our tax credits on a Friday).

'Week 2(3, 4&5) bills' each follow the pattern of week 1 bills.

Then we have categories for each and every variable expense: groceries, fuel, birthdays, pet food, haircuts, etc.

Each week we look at the money we'll get in the week and start by allocating money to the fixed costs. Then we go by priority from essentials (groceries, car fuel, etc) and keep going until we run out of money.

By separating the bills according to week, we're not trying to budget for a bill that goes out in week four with week 1's money. Having said that, if we did have a big week 3 bill, we'd look to chip away at it with a bit allocated to it from each week's income until there was enough to pay it.

Try it -you won't worry about your finances again.

[lavenderhoney]

YNAB is awesome. Seriously makes a massive difference:)

Attend via webinar a class and you might get a free download- otherwise download the free trial. It works on an app too, and you need free Dropbox to run it. Both you and your dh can link to it.

[Blazing88]

Yes, we have tenant's insurance. The most cash we ever have lying around is about £60, so not huge amounts.

The budget thing looks great :D Going to download the free trial and have a go tonight, thank you :)

Agree I need to knock Costa on the head lol..it was honestly a one=off, thought I would treat my daughter! But it is the little 'oh it's only a fiver' that seem to make a huge dent weirdly!

[Grumpyoldblonde]

As others have said, tot up your monthly absolutes, rent, council tax etc, x that by 12 and divide by 52 then you know exactly how much you need to have for bills each week (don't make the mistake of thinking there are 4 weeks in a month as so many do) your bank balance will never reflect the true story as it will change day by day not taking into account what bills are due out in the next day or so, so you cant rely on that, nevertheless, regardless of your husband being paid weekly, if you do as I advised above you can "act" like he gets paid monthly as there will always be that weeks money to cover the bills, so say rent is 700, 700x12=8400 so your weekly rent is 163.50 and so on. I would also get my direct debits going out on the same day where possible, most companies will change the date for you (apart from credit cards)

[lougle]

The thing with YNAB is that there is nowhere to hide. Set up a category for 'treats'. Every coffee, magazine, bar of chocolate.....gets allocated to treats. You suddenly realise that you've spent £100 on treats this month (wild example). Next month, you decide to allocate only £50 to treats. If you stick to your budget, you've saved £50 without even trying that hard.

[Blazing88]

Great advice..keep it coming!

grumpy only problem with setting all the DD's to the same day..I would definitely have to sub the account £2k, or else we'd immediately go way up to our overdraft limit (although it's not really that big a deal I suppose)

[lougle]

Honestly, don't change anything yet. Get the 34 day trial of ynab and go from there. Spend the next few days going through your bank account to see when each bill gets paid and roughly how much it is (if it's variable you can either set it at the highest it's been, to give a worst case scenario, or average the last 3 months).