Gaging opinion £400 pw

[Toomuchtrouble4me]

Simply that. Family of 4. Is £400 a week reasonable to live in? This is without any bills so includes:
food for 4
household shopping (detergent etc)
clothing
treats (coffees etc)
household essentials (lightbulbs, batteries etc)
medicines and beauty products
Basically mortgage, bills, large expenses are separate, but thus includes all bits and bobs that are bought weekly plus funds for kids outings and buying gifts if they are going to a party etc.
Is it enough?
we’re trialing how much we need to spend on these things in a week and I don’t seem to be able to manage in £400.

I misread this at first as £400 per month and though wow that would be right but doable and plenty of people do! £400 per week is more than plenty but then I guess it depend on how many “extra” things you have.

So my shopping bill for the four of us is high at around £150 but it includes £27 a week on formula and about £10 on nappies. But, I buy Prosecco and wine with this and we regularly eat things like steak and joints of meat and other things that some would deem luxury food products. So based on that, your have £250 per week left. For us, I spend about £25 per week on classes for the children so £225 per week for takeaways etc…£that’s around £900 a month for just bits and bobs! I think you know that that I more than doable!

If you eat out once or twice a week that can easily be £150.

I think posters are being very polite and nice to you, I’m not going to be: your taking the piss.😡

@Hankunamatata Today 11:34
Tbh I can see how £400 per weeks get sucked away for us it would be
£200 food shop
£40 top up shop over week
£20 coffees out just me
£40 takeaway for family
£40 petrol

So that is £300 a week on food . Plus your ciggies.

Are you spending that or imagining how you could spend it?

Of course that's fine if all bills are covered

I started giving it some thought as I initially
read it as £400 p/month then realised you said per week..
yes of course it’s manageable but it depends what you’re doing and what you’re spending your money on. Takeaway coffees are complete rip off for a start.

I also can’t remember the last time I bought a lightbulb…

Some people on here have 1500 a week spare after bills

just strange this post…..

What is the point of this thread?

Of course it's reasonable for a family of 4 to manage on £400 a week. Anyone who can't work that out is, at best, financially inept.

What is unclear is whether the OP really wants to know whether the lifestyle she wants is manageable on £400 a week (in which case it stating what lifestyle she was hoping for would have been basic common sense), or whether she just thought she'd start a goady post knowing it would upset those on much smaller budgets.

Who knows, but either way, the OP doesn't come out of this looking good.

Evidently you spend a lot.
Go through all your spends in the last two or three months - on your bank app or even better one of the apps that tracks and categorises spending for you.
You might be suporised how many 'treats' you are having etc.
It seems like you don't track what you spend at the moment and that's why you're now finding it hard to do within a budget - and that's a decent one. It gets easier and many of us enjoy the challenge.

I think @Toomuchtrouble4me that most people would include laundry products in their weekly or monthly food shop and average it out (because you aren't buying them every week.)

Maybe your post needs to be reworded as 'How could I manage on less than £400 a week for food and essentials.

I think the average food spend for a family of 4 is something like £75-£100.
Maybe a little higher now with inflation.

Have you tried doing a spread sheet of expenditure?

1 Essential food per week (not takeaways or treats or coffees out.)
2 Laundry and cleaning products - per month
3 Annual cost of gifts (birthdays and Xmas)- divided by 52 (or 12)

OR look at it the other way and allow yourself £100pw for food/household essentials and see what you can do with it.

Write down everything that you spend your £400 on and itemise it. I’m sure once it’s there in front of you categorised you will see where you can make savings.

we’re trialing how much we need to spend on these things in a week and I don’t seem to be able to manage in £400.

If you are trialling this, the best thing to do is give yourself a limit for spending.
And start writing down all the things you buy including the non-essentials.

Has their been a change in your circumstances so that you are saying you now have only £400pw?

If you cannot manage on £400pw, you are doing some very silly things, surely?

I wish there was a like button for your post!! I have to make £400 last force tea bills and food a month, a week I’d be jumping for joy

Extra bills

I would take socialising and treats out of that budget as well. I have a separate Monzo account for eating out and socialising etc.. it helps keep a handle of the costs of a grabbed sandwich or a couple of drinks after work.

Depends how you want to live, but I wouldn’t manage our current lifestyle on that (nothing flashy but we have a large mortgage, holidays, eat out once a week, pop to the movies when we feel like it etc).

Should be OK I think. Can't you break it down, in particular look back at previous supermarket bills?

I reckon OP was being provocative.

It’s more than my teachers’ pension.

I have to pay all bills out of this but there is no mortgage now. State pension hasn’t kicked in yet.

We are in a very similar position, and exactly the same, on paper it seems a huge amount of money but it really doesn’t go very far, towards the end of the month we’ve nothing left and then I look back at the month and think what the hell have we spent it on.

This makes me laugh 😂 it’s like when people say I can’t afford new underwear…. Who are these people buying new underwear every week 😅

I think the typo is appropriate. Gagging indeed

Are you eating out every meal? 400 per week is ample and I can’t see why you would struggle to budget this?

Well I suspect the OP lit the blue touch paper and retreated, but just in case:

food for 4
Cut out any waste. Meal plan. Cook from scratch. Go to cheaper supermarkets.

household shopping (detergent etc)
See above.

clothing
Buy it if you need it. Since it seems like you've got a lot of money you're lucky that you can buy stuff that lasts (Vimes Boot Theory) although if you've got kids who will outgrow stuff quickly that's not such an issue. Buy what you need, not just what you want or fancy.

treats (coffees etc)
Easy thing to cut out.

household essentials (lightbulbs, batteries etc)
Find cheaper shops.

medicines and beauty products
Cut out what you spend on beauty products. They're a con anyway.

funds for kids outings and buying gifts if they are going to a party etc.

Again, you're just going to have to cut your coat to suit your cloth.

Is it enough?
Yes. Learn how to budget. Buy what you need, not what you simply want.

It's a bloody fortune!