To never save anything every month and wonder what is the point of working

[Door12345]

I don't really know what I'm looking for here just a moan and hopefully some advise to get saving and motivated
I feel stuck in a rut and don't really know what to do ,
I'm 38 and bought a small 2 bed in 2015 , but used the government help to buy scheme , I'm paying interest on that loan at moment not much that's manageable but iv no really plan for paying this off
I'm on 41k a year iv nothing saved at all and debt of around 2300 quid , this is debt owed to parents, iv around 28k equity in the house so selling isn't an option as with the current market I would t have enough of a deposit for anything better than what I have

Could any body give me some advice re my outgoing and where I might be going wrong , I have detailed below best I can , I just want some motivation to get saving

DH works full time also and buys shopping each week and has his own bills like car finance and he has credit card debt , we have just finished paying nursry bills that was 140 quid a week so from this week DH is gonna save that

My wage as follows
Take home monthly £2498

Bills including car finance - £1080
Money owed to parents I pay back at -£400 quid a month
Trying to save 500 quid also to match roughly what DH saving
Leaves me with around 140 per week personal spends which also includes fuel
What should I be saving ? I just feel bad that I owe money and so does DH , he owes around 5 grand on a credit card , we both have car finances also
I feel in a mess

I take it that's an estimate as aren't they 20% of whatever the property is valued at when you pay it back?

Well it won't take you long to repay your parents then you'll have an extra £400 a month. That's good!

I get my hair done once a year £30 quid. I do take the ends off every once in a while myself. Gym is £23.40 (I get a work discount). I pick up most beauty stuff at Aldi in the weekly shop/ beauty advent calenders at christmas. I get books for free/ 50p at the phonebox library. Clothes I just spend the odd tenner on vinted. I do my own nails, tweeze my own eyebrows, epilate rather than wax

I use the MSE planner before getting paid and budget all expenses (bills, kids clothes, petrol, food etc) PLUS any planned 'nice' things like haircut (cheap, don't have it dyed) or dinner out (cheap, curry with friends BYO wine) BEFORE transferring money to bills and savings, to leave myself with £50 in my account for extras: charity shop books, the odd drink out, cinema, clothes etc.

It works for us doing it this way, instead of saving what's left at the end of the month, we save at the start of the month and only leave £50 each for unplanned spending.

There’s always a point to working, which is the pension you accumulate, the experience you gain can often can lead to promotion, the fact that you have been able to get on the property ladder, and the fact that an above average salary means you can have a nicer life than if you’re scraping by on benefits.

Think long term.

Yes that includes everything.

£140 a week for personal spends? Even if you spend £50 a week on fuel that’s an awful lot. I go out socialising a lot and could easily manage on that. Once you’ve paid your parents back you can save that £400 plus some

So you save £500 per month? Or spend that as well?

Or so you end up spending that as well as your £140 a week? Because that would be nearly a thousand pound a months just spent on, well you aren’t really sure what.

Or are you actually saving that £500? If you are saving that and your OH is saving a lot you can save up to pay the help to buy bit out quite easily.

and in 6 months you will have an additional £400 a month.

I don’t mean to be arsey but I don’t see the issue.

Where is the 500 a month you and DH are both trying to save going to if you have no savings to pay back the HTB loan?
That's 12k a year going somewhere.

I earn about the same as you. After bills are paid (and this includes the 'non-essential' bills like a cleaner and Netflix/Tv subscriptions etc), there's £1000 left. I save £400 and have £600 a month for random spending. If there's a big month, like a wedding or a party then I just save less that month and give myself £200 or whatever so I can buy present/outfit or whatever is needed.

For a couple of months I used the spending tracker app (its free) and I religiously noted everything I spent money on. It puts it into categories for you and my number 1 expense was 'popping into the shop on my way home'. 95% of the time I only needed to pop in because I'd had a tough day and 'fancied something' or couldn't be bothered to cook properly so wanted something easy.
If you do this for a month or two and write everything down in the app you'll very quickly get a picture of where your money is leaking to.

What's the point of working?

Well it enables you to feed and house yourself and your dependents?

You may or may not get a sense of achievement and personal satisfaction out of work depending on your job.

Working gives your life balance so you can truly appreciate leisure. If you get up and spend each day doing housework, shopping and watching tv and not much else then life surely becomes pointless?

I honestly don't understand your gripes. You earn a good salary and you don't even mention your DH's salary. So between you you must have a tidy monthly income. So what if you're not saving loads. Does it really matter?

Of course, there is the perennial question: what is the point of all this? If that is what you mean, then I suggest you take up religion!

Look at Moneysaving Expert. Go through all your expenses and see what you can reduce. Even a fiver here and there off a regular bill adds up.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/family/money-help/

What's the interest rate on your main mortgage and is that going to increase soon? I don't really understand HTB but I've seen comments about it getting more expensive after a period. So definitely read MSE about the implications of that and whether paying it off would be a good idea (or not), or remortgaging both onto a standard product if you can.

Also has information about being more mindful with your spending as the benefits can be huge over time.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/family/stop-spending-budgeting-tool/

But it seems that you do have a decent amount of spare money, so of course there's point to working, and if you focus your energies into getting out of debt and saving for large purchases so you can fund things like cars (also holidays, Christmas, moving house and home improvements) without borrowing, or at least borrowing quite as much, things will feel a lot easier, especially now that interest rates have risen and cheap debt probably won't exist so much any more.

So if I took my children to soft play, I would pay for entry. If I were feeling particularly well off then I might buy myself a coffee. I would not buy lunch unless there was some pressing reason to.

There is of course nothing wrong with spending on food out etc. But if you're feeling the the pinch, you could have saved £19 and still have gone to soft play.

My husband and I earn 163k combined and have £200 personal spend budgets per month. £140 a week is a huge amount on your income.
Could you ask work for a fuel card? Although if you're saving 500 a month, waiting a month for the £100 back from work shouldn't be an issue.

I'm confused (sorry if I've missed something) why you're saving when you have unsecured debts.
Your husband should only be saving if his interest rate on the savings account is higher than what he's paying on the credit cards.
Your debt is with your parents so presumably you're not paying interest, but I'd still want to get it paid sooner just for the mental strain it puts on you! Get that paid off sooner and then focus on saving.

Yes haircuts, gym, nails etc all from £200 a month.

If we eat out together, we pay from the shared card, if I eat out with friends it's from my personal spend.

Holidays we pay together unless it's a hen or stag in which case it's personal spend.

It's tight but I never feel like I can't do something I want to do and we're currently saving c. £4-5k a month, have paid off most of our student loans and now only have the mortgage, and are feeling more confident in the run up to the arrival of our first baby!

I could spend more than that a week on myself but I choose not to. It’s about changing mindset.

You need to communicate better with your DH and you just need to be more prepared. My days of soft play are over but the food was crap in our local one so I never bought it. It seems like you are just a bit haphazard when it comes to money management and unrealistic on what a personal spend should be. Go to Money saving expert, I was a member when Martin Lewis first set up shop a long time ago, it’s an excellent site.

Let me try to answer this as I love personal finance questions!

My salary is 80k and spouse and I are equal earners. We have two smalls in primary and nursery. After we have 1) saved 2) invested 3) overpaid mortgage and then pay ourselves £170 each a month. This means -

1. Two people at that pay each have learnt to cut their own hair. We have the right accessories and lots of YouTube learning.
2. We only buy clothes on Vinted. Our 3 rules for clothes are 1) Do we really need it? 2) If we buy it we buy a good solid brand 3) only off charity shop vinted or eBay
3. We have a fancies takeaways and going out pot from within that allowance. We use it each month. We never miss that meal out as a couple.
4. We don’t buy lunches and coffees.

I'd mostly be worried about the level of equity you have after 8 years and no plan to pay HTB, have house prices dropped where you are? Why is your equity so low?

Lunches out are what drain my finances I just can't organize myself to make sandwiches and bring them out so I always spend 15-20 on lunch and a coffee and water (so bad) my friends that are in the habit of packing food do way better.

How ever you asked how you can save- you are saving loads? Is your question really 'how can I save and also have more spending money?'

I think you can suck it up for 6m until you've paid your parents back then you'll have 400 per month more to either spend, save, or pay back car or any debts with interest faster if that makes financial sense to do (if the interest on debts is more than the interest you could get in a savings account)

You spend £15-20 on lunch on a single day? My mind has blown....

What happens if -

1. You sit down with an empty lunchbox at the dinner table in the evening and chuck leftovers in it? Are there never any leftovers or is there not a box you can take to the dinner table in the evenings?
2. What happens if you chuck in 5 x Soups or 5 x Ready Meals + 5 x snacks + 5 x fruits into the Online Shopping basket or the real shopping basket when you do the grocery shop?

I have never understood sandwiches as I do need hot food midday - but i cannot comprehend spending that much on work lunches...Money spent that way is LESS money for overpayments, investments, savings, holidays, lovely wool coats, tickets to the theatre.......

So £1480 is bills and debt repayments
£200 a month on fuel

What are you spending the rest on? This is the key question. Not just "oh I think it might be on stuff for the kids". Go through a month's spending if you do most things on card, and work out what you are actually spending on. Down to the penny.

And then budget for them. You're spending £50 a month on clothes for the kids - ok, let's set a budget and try and get it down to £40. £50 on days out, same. Monzo and Starling do good accounts where you can put things in "pots" so you can have individual budgets for different categories.

Annual expenses like Christmas need sinking funds which is where you save up throughout the year so it doesn't all hit in December.

@Combusting you're absolutely right!! Good ideas with the ready meals too there are some decent nice healthy ones available.

Sorry didn't make it clear i don't mean work lunches - I'm on mat leave with a baby and try to get out and about with him every day- by the time I've packed up all his stuff and got us out I usually forget everything for my self so often when I meet a friend with the babies we'll go for lunch and coffees, I have developed a very expensive habit of doing this a few times a week! - having to really stop myself doing that now though as my full Mat pay is finished! When I go back to work it will be leftovers or a meal deal sandwich for me at lunch!

The first few replies confused me because actually together you sound like you are in a position to reign it in and get on top of your debts. Money can just trickle away as you've found but you can both get on top of it with your combined income.

Why do days out only come out of your allowance?

We have a pots for all family stuff, including stuff for DD. She is both our daughter, so we both pay towards her costs.

DD's pot is allocated £100 per month and is used if she needs new clothes/school stuff/cinema with her friends etc. we have a 'days out' pot of £150 a month in case we want to go for a pub tea as a family, get a takeaway for tea etc

YNAB has helped me enormously and I would definitely recommend it. I was very resistant at first, (I resented the idea of paying for it), but I've been using it now for over 5 years and it is worth every penny of the £6.59 that gets allocated to it every month. I didn't sign up immediately when my free trial ended because at that point I was still getting to grips with it. I told them that and they extended it for me, after 6 weeks I was hooked!