Can you help me learn to be thrifty

[missnotsomoneypenny]

I've name changed so this isn't linked to my usual name. Please be kind, I am not on my arse, nor is this a begging thread. Think of it as how you'd teach your teen child to budget their pocket money.....

Execept... Im 33. Ive cleared off my overdraft which was £400 with some good slogging. I'm proud of that.

I underbudgetted and overspent during Jan forgetting it was a 5 week month and have had to ask my Mum to come to my aid and fill my car with petrol as I get paid Friday and my reserve light was on.

Whilst she was happy to help out, I feel shit because I'm already £60 down (I lent £30 from her over the last 2 weeks) before I even get paid. Fortunately I get a bonus this month which will cover that £60 but it's not the point.

Regardless of rights and wrongs, mine and my husbands finances are separate. That's how we've always been and how we function. As such, I don't talk about my money with him and vice versa. We have a joint account with a chunk of savings in and investments too.

So I guess it's not really a major issue to some but i find myself short at the end of each month.

I get say £1,100 as a salary. from that I take out approx 150 to cover my own direct debits which come from my bank such as car tax, car insurance, fuel. I then take £200 for myself for the month. This money is to do what I like with but more often than not is spent on bits for us as a family (wine, bread, milk etc) and I find myself short.

I often don't have anything to show for the £200 and I would like to get myself out of this cycle I am in.

I'm proud I've cleared my overdraft and would like to nail this spending habit I have.

I may pop to the garage for milk and I will spend £5 on stuff - treats for my son like fruit, and pop for myself.

My husband spends barely anything - he's not tight but just doesn't fritter it like I do. He went to the shop for milk, got milk and 2 small cakes that probbaly came to a total of £2. I would have spent more...

So, if you can help me and lead me in the right direction, I;d be really grateful.

The mortgage could be pretty low tbf, especially with a good sized deposit. I'm in northern England and know plenty of people paying well south of £500 a month. And holidays can be had cheaply, especially if you've previously been able to go outside school holidays which with a 5 year old they probably could. But if we're talking south east and more high end breaks, then I'd have no idea how it would work!

Vesta they have a kid. If you can’t be bothered to read the thread, at least highlight OPs posts and read them.

I earn a similar amount to you. I put £400 a month into a separate a account straight away for household billls, another £200 goes into a separate savings account. I don't drive so have no car related expenses. I give myself £200 a month to spend on myself and the remaining money does not get touched. I rarely spend the £200 tbh each month.

I would not be asking my mum for money if I was short, access the savings or ask your husband. Your mum is not responsible for your finances, as you are an adult. Your dh and you are jointly responsible for household expenses and you should really be having this conversation with him. My dh and i keep our finances separate as dh is still paying off debts from before we were married however we still talk about out household Bill's and would bail each other out before asking other family members! Not sure why it would hurt your pride to ask him and not your mum! I would be the opposite.

Shop weekly for groceries but do a meat shop separately and freeze it. Make meal plans and look in your cupboards before going out to buy food. Freeze anything you don't finish as it can come in handy to make another meal at a later date. Reduce your personal expenditure, you don't have to spend £200 on yourself or the house every month. Expenses for the kids eg. softplay and clubs are family expenses and come out of joint account.

The mortgage could be pretty low tbf, especially with a good sized deposit. I'm in northern England and know plenty of people paying well south of £500 a month

Even with a small mortgage, once you've paid home insurance, car insurance, car tax, petrol, food, gas, electricity, water, phones, broadband, I still can't see how you'd have enough change from 2k to put into savings, accumulate investments and even go on cheap holidays.

@former

Our mortgage is £177 a month.
Electricity is £90 a month.
Water £50
Council tax £90
Home insurance £10
Car insurance (lets assume his is the same as similar cars) £46
Fuel for us both £120
Shopping £150
Internet/Phone £38
Mobile phone(s) £50
That's £821.

Leaves £1379...

Leaves £1379..

That's a decent amount yet you each only allow yourselves £200 extra a month and are getting your mum to lend you money for petrol

If someone asked me to lend them money, I'd assume they were skint with no savings to fall back on...I'd be pretty pissed off if I found out they had savings they could have dipped into instead

Shopping £150 a month for two adults and a child?
Electricity including heating £23 pounds a week?
Car tax?
House maintenance/repairs?
Child’s activities?
Toiletries?
Personal care and grooming x 3 people?
Christmas gifts for people other than your child?
Home insurance?
Medical costs?
Tv/Internet package?
School contributions?

Why are you saving so much?
What is the point of going on a holiday for two weeks a year when you are scrimping for the other fifty weeks.

Well, im fortunate my mum understands.

Well, im fortunate my mum understands.

Understands what exactly?

That i got myself in a pickle and will be out of it this month by her helping me out.

I'm trying to get myself straight and she gets that. From payday this month I will be and that's why I'm also asking budget advice.

Thanks all for any advice you have shared.

You don’t spend only £150 on shopping. You spend £150 every 2 weeks + top-ups.

By all means work on being thrifty with the top-ups and not buying too much impulsively, but do the tops-ups from the joint account.

£150 per fortnight plus £10 a week top-up = £368 per month.

Your list of expenses can't be accurate. Especially with you doing top up shops. You've listed the petrol which is one reason (IIRC) that you do the top up shops.

I doubt you spend £150 per month on "shopping" especially with top up shops.

You'd be best to go through statements (maybe 6-months worth) to really work out where your money has gone. Statements will show cash withdrawals too.

Do that for your personal account and the joint account

As for frugal tips. Use the library! Get treats from the library for your son. ie borrow books or films.

Treat saving money as a green lifestyle, once you stop buying, you cut done demand which means you are saving money and doing a bit towards green living.

Buy son treats from charity shops. BHF we're doing a great thing with bags of toys for £1. I got loads of Lego for my two.

Given that you DH earns less but is able to save more you should definitely talk. He might have tons of top tips to share with you.

Are you both saving into a pension?

My DH and I have regular finance updates with each other, boring but important. (It's one way I know I'm definitely a grown up!)

If you are in insta there's loads of frugal living hashtags you could follow. There's loads of blogs.

Remember you can only spend each penny once. Once it's gone. It's gone.

Drat. Two autocorrects. Cut DOWN and were not we're.

Why does his hobby come from the joint account, and your swimming come from yours?

I tihnk it's a good idea you don't keep asking your husband for money nor take money out of the family savings, even if you need a bit from your mother for petrol. If you were let loose on your husband's money and family savings there might well end being none of those at all. Some people just do spend a lot more money than others so keeping it separate as you do probably works best for your family.

May be do fewer trips out as it seems to be those that cause the spending. perhaps just draw cash out and use that - I take out £500 a time and then use that for food shopping, petrol etc. I know that is unusual these days but it works for me - mind you except when I save receipts I then don't have a trail of how it is spent so probably that would be a bad idea for high spenders.

We both worked full time when we had babies etc and also at times had a second weekend job - may be something like that might help you more than trying not to spend a bit too much at the petrol station. Also if you work 6 full days a week you tend to spend less!

Me and DH have semi-separate finances like you both which we will continue until both our debts are paid off or we have DC, whichever comes first!
What's really helped with our budgeting is having a second joint account just for household expenses so we're not short for petrol or food at the end of the month. We got it through Monzo which is completely free and can be set up online/by app in a few minutes.
I don't know your household spends but we put £200 each into that account and it covers all our food and petrol and we budget to it. Week 1 is steak and wine and week 4 is beans and beer but its better than before when we were borrowing from savings and parents for the last week of petrol.

Should probably add mortgage and bills are split to % salaries from a different 'proper' joint account which also has our emergency savings and we put into this account for our holidays.

Leaves £1379..

Well then, I’m sorry but you have no business borrowing from anyone. You HAVE money, you just can’t it won’t use it. Dare I ask how much you’ve built up in savings? Do you even know?

NRTFT ... I can’t get my head around you’d go cap in hand to your mother and won’t discuss money with your husband. You don’t only have financial problems ....

My DH and I maintain a spreadsheet to track our joint outgoings. Everything goes in there. Everything. Our car. Our kids. Our cats. Our commute to work. Our insurances, our memberships, every single kid expense. Every single bill that we have agreed is a joint bill. We maintain another spreadsheet for things that fluctuate and then update the cost to joint frequently.

Our joint expenditure is £3,098.97. Groceries are £591. (Two adults, two kids - though one eats as an adult, includes everything. Even our milk delivery)

I don't think you have as much detail as you need yet. Get into the detail and be frugal.

The MoneySavingExpert website has a budget planner spreadsheet you can download. Do that and fill it in and fill in everything, including estimated monthly spends for things like Christmas, birthdays, haircuts, car maintenance, etc.

Depends on how much in the way of savings and investments I guess! Huge portfolio, no, but when we were on similar to that with no childcare, we did have £100 or £150 a month surplus. That was with only one car and was about 4 years ago so things were a bit cheaper then, but with two kids. We spent probably £200 a month more on shopping than OP says she does (and her figure sounds wrong) and £200 more on housing. So I can see how there could be a few grand put by.

I don't find the gas and electric too crazy, I run a two bed not very well insulated end of terrace and mine comes to £45 a month.

I do think it would be worth doing a proper "statement of affairs" which is something that's recommended on money saving expert, as they have a template which really forces you to think about all the random things you buy or the costs not budgeted for.

Because either, you have £1,300 a month left over in which case you don't need to be buying groceries out your pocket money, or you spend significantly more than you currently think, in which case you need to know where it's going.

Money for this house ends up vanishing on:

Days out, esp not taking our own hot drinks etc.
Car repairs and MOT
House repairs - hard to even enter B and Q without spending £30
Birthday presents, cards, wine if i go round someone's for dinner.
Books!
Clothes, even second hand they still add up.

So I would just have a ponder and work out which budgets those come from.

Are you really saying you save £1000+ pcm and borrow money off your mum?!

Jeez

I think what's happening here is misattributing costs. They may well spend £150 per month on the main shop, two lots of £75, but are then also spending on top ups that are coming out of a different pot. OP talks about frittering money, but in the example she gave, she bought fruit for DS and a fizzy drink. The latter is obviously not essential but the former, is there not sufficient fruit in the main shop already? It should be counted as part of the food budget. And shopped for somewhere cheaper than the garage. Obviously it's not likely to last for two weeks but that means making plans to buy it weekly, somewhere reasonably priced.

OP I wonder how much of this money bleeding and tenners that just seem to escape from your purse when you get milk is buying essential stuff for the house that hasn't been purchased in the fortnightly shop? It does make sense to allocate a few pounds in the food budget for treats too, if you know you're prone to buying them. Just make sure they're from Aldi not the garage.

You also sound like you're buying wine fairly often. Again nothing wrong with that but could you save money by planning ahead, using bulk offers? If it's a quick dash to the offy every time you fancy a glass with dinner you're probably spending more than you need to.