Please help me with a budget

[Lifeonabudget]

DH gives me £600 per month (living in London)
2 DC (5 & 18m)

currently I am struggling to get through the month on this and am already down to my last £40 and we’re barely halfway through. It was ah expensive month due to last week of the summer holidays and DC heading back to school so had to buy some them lots of bits and Pieces that added up quickly.

Out of the £600 I need to buy all food, all toiletries, household items, clothes for both dc plus anything they may need etc. at present I’m spending about £80 per week on an online food shop, but probably spend an additional 40£ on top ups through the week.

dc5 is autistic and possible adhd, I spend £70 on supplements for her, this unfortunately is non negotiable as the supplements have improved her behaviour significantly plus she has a very limited diet.

and additional £50 for pull ups (dc5) and nappies/wipes for the baby. That leaves me with £480 a month for everything else. I already get all their clothes off Vinted and don’t buy myself anything ever (not even a takeaway coffee). I’m not at work presently due to sabbatical but start back at the beginning of feb so things will improve then and I’ll have my own money. It’s just now life feels so miserable! I know this is a lot more than other people have, I just can’t seem to make it stretch! I already batch cook as well. I think that’s everything!

Obvious question - can your husband afford to "give" you more?

I think he probably could on any other month but this, however had to pay out a lot for work this month. He does this I should be able to manage on this though.

We'll keep receipts for everything, show him, say you need some more.

I'm sure you could cut your food bill. Buy shops own groceries all the time. Also, question everything you buy, ie instead of a family cake, you can buy a packet of biscuits for 50p which act as a treat, shops own tortilla crisps are half the price of normal crisps etc. Work out which meals you do that are cheaper and eat more of those. I'm sure you know beans and lentils are good cheap fillers - great for adding to onion, canned tomatoes and whatever else you have in terms of herbs, spices, peppers, sweetcorn (some veggies work out cheaper if they're frozen.

I appreciate you don't want to be driving everywhere for bargains, but do your research - some shops might be cheaper for the pullups, nappies and wipes.

When you are back at work you will 'have your own money'.

Ok

But DH is only able to work because you are at home and looking after his children, so it's not reasonable for him to be withholding money from you.

Do you get child benefit? Where does that get paid into? Does your husband 'give' himself any money? Is he also buying from Vinted and foregoing a takeaway coffee?

You need to have a conversation and revise the budget between you. What he's giving you clearly isn't enough. Do you have a joint account that you both contribute to? Whether you are on sabbatical or working you should still have access to all the family money.

Your numbers don't add up.

You say you spend £80 + £40 a week on shopping. So that's £520 a month.

£70 on supplements
£50 pull ups and wipes

That's £640 so you're over budget before you've had any outings, clothing or incidentals.

If you can't reduce your food spend then you really don't have any room to cut.

I don’t get child benefit as DH earns over the threshold. He doesn’t shop on Vinted although he doesn’t really shop often (when he does he does buy expensive clothes, but as I say it’s very infrequent). I think he probably does get takeaway coffee but he works in the city so commutes most days and I guess it’s on his way.

I know, I seem to always end up in a negative, but how do other people manage? Some on far less than £600?! Food is just so expensive now it’s hard to get the food shopping down, and then the mini top ups always end up in buying other things as well.

Also I should mention the food shop includes stuff for dc5’s packed lunch. She can have school dinners but won’t eat them.

Do you know how much is take home pay is vs your outgoings? Or does he just give you what he thinks you need?

His take home after tax is £7000. Household bills/CT/ rent come to just under £3000 I think. He also has a company debt he is paying off at £1200 a month but this comes to an end in the new year.

I'm not sure if I've understood this properly, but he takes home £7k a month, with around £3k left over and he gives you £600 to cover all child related costs plus food shopping for 4 people!? What is he doing with the rest of the money!?

What is he likely to say if you said it's not enough?

£7000
£3000 housing
£1200 loan
£ 600 food

£2200 so what is this spent on?

Either this is not real or your husband is financially abusing you.

WTF?!

As usual with these threads it sounds like your issue is not the budget but the husband. Was he on board with being the sole earner? What was the agreement when you went on sabbatical? Surely the only reasonable way to manage as a one-salary family is for all money to be shared, not have one party doling out ‘housekeeping’ money to the other.

He sounds like a tight arse

I fully understand that it probably sounds a tad dodge, but my thought process was that he is paying all of the bills/rent etc, so is already covering a large portion. I have always covered the DCs stuff (and childcare). I work in the NHS so have crazy shift patterns, he also travels a lot for work and finding someone who is able to look after the DC was very tricky. He asked me to take a longer maternity leave 2 months before I was due to go back. I’m not sure what else he spends money on, although he does pay for his public transport etc. he definitely has money left over but I think it’s also my own stubbornness that doesn’t ask for more because I’m used to earning my own.

I do agree though that in DHs ideal world I would be a SAHP so then he wouldn’t need to worry about the DC. Sometimes I feel like he wants me to think we are worse off than we are so that I stay home.

@Spottytoddler I can believe it, lots of posts similar to OP. For a minute I thought you was a single mother saying you get £600 ad CMS from your ex not your actual DH.

Grocery shopping needs to be classed as a household bill not disposable money OP that you have left. Can you go back to work?

You know that this is nuts? Right?

Where is the 'other' £2200 per month going? Do you/would you have access to it if necessary? Or is it 'his money' and 'his savings?'

This really isn't right at all OP, £600 is just too tight when your DH must be earning £100K+

I can never understand why some married couples don’t just pool all their earnings, it’s joint income and you should have just as much available to spend as him. However if the set up previously was that he pays for rent and bills and you paid for groceries and kids stuff, surely something had to change when you went on maternity leave? Unless you were previously only earning £600 a month (which I doubt) then you have gone from having whatever you were earning available to spend on these outgoings to now only having £600. How would that ever have worked? Did he expect you to supplement your maternity leave with savings of your own? How does he think you’re paying for all the stuff you have to cover?

As is often the case you have a DH problem not a budget problem.

He has £2200 a month for personal spending and you have literally none, but all the money you have is going to pay for joint expenses. You need to set up a joint account so that all joint expenses come from that, and then you need to sit down together and go over your budget to work out how much money needs to go into that joint account at the start of every month to cover your joint outgoings, plus personal spending money for you, if the agreement is that you will not work at the moment to cover childcare.

I suspect he doesn't realise how much meeting the needs of 3 people costs and has lived in comfortable oblivion. My dh, bless him, he is lovely, but he doesn't often look at our joint account - he has his personal account and a business account to manage - and he can sometimes be like, but where has all the money gone? Because he isn't the one spending it (I sort all the food shopping, kids activities, school uniform, shoes, etc.), he doesn't actually realise how much it costs. He will stop at the local shop and buy stuff to make sandwiches for lunch, but doesn't really think through that £20 worth of bread, ham, crisps and drinks for 4 people, multiplied by 3 meals a day plus snacks, does in fact add up to be our weekly shop cost (obviously, we are not spending £20 per meal from the local shop all week 😂but what I mean is it's easy to think food doesn't cost much when you only spend a little on it here and there, but when you are buying in bulk for 4 people, it's going to cost £100-150).

It's not hard to work it out, but when you are blissfully ignorant of the actual numbers and the actual things that need purchasing, it's easy to think life isn't as expensive as it is. Dh was shocked the other day that a bottle of Heinz ketchup from the petrol station cost £4, because honestly, he's not bought a bloody bottle of ketchup in a few years. 🙄The difference is though, we both have control over our joint finances, we both pay in, and if ever there isn't enough, dh will gladly pay in more as he is the higher earner.

But no, that's not enough money to live comfortably. We are a family of 4, and I'd say we spend £1000-1500 maybe a bit more on expenses beyond mortgage. So that includes food shopping (£100-150 a week), kids clothes/shoes, lessons/activities/birthday presents for friends, childcare during school holidays, days out including drinks/lunches/snacks when out if needed, fuel, other essentials like medicine, etc.

Also if he is happy to see you and his DC (one of whom has special needs) scrimping around for every last penny and whittling a food budget down to the bare minimum while he’s earning £100k+ then not only is he financially abusive to you but he’s also a terrible father.

£600 “housekeeping” per month for a family of 4 is pretty tight. We spend more than that and our household income is less than half of 7k per month!

You are saving on childcare costs as a household by you not currently working. plus making his life so much easier by dealing with all child and house chores etc (I assume!). You need to have equal access to family money and a realistic budget that you both agree on.

This is bizarre.
You need to say that you’re going back to work tomorrow, unless all money left over after essential spending (including food, nappies) is split 50/50.
Bet you’d be entitled to more than £600 in maintenance if you told him to get to fuck.
You don’t need a budget you need to assert yourself.