What savings do u have and what for.

[Paranoidmarvin]

Having the same discussion with my dh again. And it’s not something we agree on.
What savings accounts do u have. ( I’m aware I’m lucky to be able to do this )

I currently have ones for the car , Xmas and a general savings and long term. But I would like to have one for house costing a such as when the cooker goes etc. I’m worried I’m missing something with this.
Do you have a set amount for each account. So when say it has £1000 in it. You put the money elsewhere until you use it and it needs topping up again.

1052 in a help to buy isa
10600 in my normal savings for a house deposit
450 in my Plum app which will be used for Christmas.

I have a few savings accounts due to limits on those accounts ie reg savers etc. We have a spreadsheet with saving targets for short, medium and long term goals. We always have a set amount as an emergency fund, we aim for 6 months expenses but covid has hit this and we are now trying to build it back up. We have a chunk for the car (repairs or replacement). We can only overpay our mortgage by 10pc so most savings is for an overpayment when our fixed term mortgage ends.

We don't take out of these "pots" for non essentials as we then wouldn't reach the goals we have set ourselves.

After bills, funel money away into many different pots.

However, I must admit our car fund couldn't buy a new car (ie new second hand car) it just helps to cover unexpected car costs at the moment.

Main house savings but nothing split into appliances etc.

We have no cash savings (just got married) but we have equity in a second property that we call our retirement fund. And DH gets a cash bonus every year that could range from £5k to £25k so we use that for big purchases like cars, holidays etc. And we both have private pensions. But as I said, absolutely no cash savings. I think we are a bit weird.

kittykat35 do you mind saying whether you have a mortgage at the same time as having quite a lot in savings?

We both have circa £3k in our own savings and about £1500 in joint savings(house, appliances etc) we have talked about it and want to have £5k each and then add money to the joint account. The council tax for the two free months goes in there and anything left in our joint account at the end of the month.

I have a cushion of £1000 in my current account that I don't go under unless it's an emergency or for something really important (eg, both DC need EU passports)

Then a savings account towards a house deposit - under 5k atm but at least we are trying!

Then both DC have savings accounts towards university - £10 each a month plus Christmas/Birthday/Baptism money.

Various pots, rainy day savings, children savings, Christmas, holiday, annual bills so cost is spread. Grew up with very little so a safety net is of huge importance for me.

DH not working at the moment but we have out own accounts.
Have an ISA which I put £100 into every month (currently at £1100) which we have for emergencies (car repairs etc). It's also there if our landlord pushes us over the edge and we decide to move so its enough for 1st months rent and deposit.
Also have a joint account where I put money in for rent, council tax and other bills. I always round up the bills so there's usually extra in there if we need it. I put £200 fuel money in there every month as well, but as I'm WFH most if the time now, there's usually a nice cushion for treats etc.

We have enough to pay DC's school fees all the way through to 18. Which is lucky as DH was made redundant in November and it's looking like he won't work again. It was supposed to be for retirement but there for fees if necessary, which it will be.

Emergency fund, Christmas/birthdays, holidays, home/car, treats.

Forgot to say, Dh doesn’t ‘believe’ in savings so these are my personal savings accounts.
We have quite different views on money and I’m really proud of myself for getting out of debt and being in the position to save. I refuse to struggle again.
He’s never struggled but pays for everything on cc.

@Lamentations no I don't. We worked abroad for many years tax free and bought straight out when we returned, we were very lucky.

I have short term and longer term. I stick some in each every time I get paid. Short term is for odd things here and there, say a new appliance or clothing. Longer term is for the bigger things like holidays or larger house projects. I'd find it a faff to have lots of different pots, though I know it works for a lot of people.

I have a general savings account and also separately I have enough to take myself off to Dignitas at the first sign of me getting dementia.

Just got in from work. Will read all the posts. Thanks to those who answered.

@BarbaraofSeville yes. I’m more about the savings than he is. I like to have pots for all different things. Then have it set to a certain amount. When it hits that amount I don’t put anything else in. I would guess the pots would be being topped up over time. But if not the money would go into our long term savings pot. We have enough in there for three months to cover bills etc. But I would be happier if it was at least six.
My dh would just have a huge pot of just ‘savings ‘ but I don’t think that works. As then as u said the money is just sitting there needing to be spent. And I didn’t work this hard to earn the money to have it spent on silly things.

I think at the moment surrounding ourselves with as much money as we can is a good thing as you never know what will happen.
I want to have a house account. That has enough in it to cover buying a new cooker if needed. That to me would be a handy thing to have but he would spend it on updates around the house. I don’t mind updates around the house. But I think these should be saved up for. Not just taken out of the saving accounts

It’s hard to decide really. General savings that can just be taken out and spent to have some electrical work done that isn’t needed but wanted doesn’t seem to me the way ‘savings’ should work if that makes sense.
That should be saved up for hence why I wanted a house fund.
It’s hard to know what to do for the best. The rest of our money works fine. We have a bills account which all the bills come out from and put wages in there to cover that every month. We have food, petrol funds which get topped up to the correct amount every month to cover that month. And we have a car account that we put money in the pay for Tax etc etc.

We have a long term savings for job losses. And then a general savings. But I want to split it more

43k spread around in investment ISA's, some is in pension separate from my work pension to take advantage of the 20% tax relief, it all came from redundancy and what I have managed to save over the years

We have about 33k spread pretty evenly across three accounts - we never used to have any savings at all but moved abroad for work nearly five years ago and have been lucky enough to build this up since then. We’ll only stay here another 18 months or so so are trying to stash as much away as possible while we can.
I worry that we haven’t spread the money enough and that it’s not in mental ‘pots’ as such, but just savings, iyswim

Three savings accounts - short, medium and long term. The short one I regularly dip into (or I used to before Covid) eg if I'm skint at the end of the month, the medium one is for bigger purchases eg appliances or holidays etc. And the long term one I don't touch at all. I'm keeping that for when I'm old or have a major emergency. I like to have a cushion at all times as I just have me to rely on. If I lose my job I'll probably have to use it, but that's what it's there for. Otherwise I'm just keeping hold of it like the skinflinting miserly cow I am.

We keep enough for an average month in the current account at all times. Every so often I transfer any excess to our first savings account which we keep at £3-5k usually so we've got enough to deal with the car breaking down or something. Anything beyond that gets put in the second savings account as long-term savings for holidays/moving house/general future stuff.

We also have savings accounts for each of the kids for any birthday money they're given & we transfer a small monthly amount.

I have another current account that's just in my name. DH knows about it but has never shown much interest in it. I put a small amount of my pay in each month which, so far, I've used to buy Christmas/birthday presents for DH so he doesn't know how much I've spent but is actually my fund in case DH has a complete personality transplant & I have to get out with the kids. I can't see that ever happening but I've spent enough time reading MN to know the importance of protecting oneself, especially when one only works part time & gets a grand total of £450 a month, including child benefit!