To think £120 a week is not enough to live on?

[FedUp120028]

So, following an abrupt change in circumstances after food, bills and clubs for the kids I have £120 p/w to live on. I have a 2yo and a 7yo.

This needs to cover treats, Christmas and social life, holiday fun (either a trip or activities) for the next year.

Is this doable, aibu to think it's not? It doesn't seem like much at all. Tips and a reality check please!

I think that can be managed, op.

Thats fine.

But I wonder if you can cut costs in other areas, because £120 is actually a lot "spare" for many people (me included!) so I wonder if you are being as ruthless as you could be.

Have you changed your food budget for example? I remember when my ex was made redundant out of the blue. He was panicking because what we would have coming in wouldnt cover our outgoings, but he hadnt factored in any changes.

The first one is "go down a level" on your food shopping. So you drop the brands, drop the "taste the difference" or whatever. If you dont already, shop at Aldi or Lidl, their knock offs are really good and in many cases, better than the originals. Do you really need to buy half of what you buy? Are there a lot of expensive snacks aimed at kids for example, that with a bit of careful label reading you can replace with something without the branding?

Have you considered your diet? Do you eat a lot of expensive protein when cheaper protein would be just as good? Swap out salmon for chicken for example.

Have you cut everything in the "extras" list that you may right now think of as essential but you really dont need? TV packages, how many do you have and how often are they actually used? Work it out as "cost per use per month". I cancelled amazon prime when I realised that most months I was paying for something I was maybe using once, if at all. Do the energy bill check service to make sure you are on the best possible rate.

It really depends on what is important to you and where you want the money to be spent. DD and I are not fussed about food so we dont spend much on that. We eat well and healthily but it isnt a luxury to us. But a holiday once a year does matter so we prioritise that. You may see it the other way around and make your cuts appropriately.

Good luck! You will be fine.

If you're saving 780 quid a year for your partner and 2 kids birthdays, and that means 100 each for the kids, are you actually saying you spend £580 on your partner's birthday?!?!

Or have you not given AI the right information, and you're allowing for other family birthdays too?

Either way 120 quid a week to spend on whatever you want is quite a lot, what sort of thing would you normally spend 'fun money' on?

It's not too bad after bills are covered.
£480 monthly, it isn't great for covering Christmas, from January save 80 per month.
There is months that you will have to buy less food to cover other expenses or drop a club.
Harsh, but you can not spend what you haven't got.

Of course it's doable. You just have to limit what you have to what you can afford. 🤷

Even if you had zero spare, you'd still have food, bills, clubs (which are a luxury if we're talking sports or socialising, not necessary after school club for childcare reasons) etc paid for, which would mean you're doing ok.

If you've experienced an income drop you're going to have to adjust your expectations obviously, you're not going to be able to afford to have the amount of or level of everything that you used to have. But you have £500 approx spare disposable income left per month. Of course you can have some kind of a happy life with that. It's bizarre that you think you can't.

What's wrong with the AI budget (apart from the ridiculous birthday and Christmas spends which I would definitely cut down on drastically)? Emergency is covered. The trampoline membership is the children's fun. They've also got £20 extra for fun trips out or buying a birthday present for a party etc. You've got £25 a week for your own social life, which you could save up for one big night out with friends if you wanted instead of several cheaper meetups. Christmas and birthday covered (I recommend cutting down to £100 budget for your DC and DP so that's £6/wk not the £15-20 AI says, token gesture for anyone else you buy for and that comes out of your personal spends. Put the extra money towards yours and DC personal spends (or your DP if you have one and this is family money, as they don't seem to have a personal spends budget allocated).

When I had £6k/yr spare I spent it on a couple of horses, which then became my everything (fun, exercise, hobby, socialising etc) because there was nothing left in the budget for anything else. I didn't have holidays, fancy toiletries, new clothes, nights out, a gift budget (people got cards) or anything else you might be used to thinking of as essential but actually isn't. I had a fantastic time and didn't feel deprived at all.

You've got your £500/month OP, no need to feel hard done by, just spend it wisely on what is most important to you.

I probably wouldn’t plan a family holiday on that, tbh, but that’s fine. You can definitely give everyone a good Christmas and birthday. Start buying clothes on Vinted/charity shops, especially for the children as they grow. What you absolutely need is a monthly budget that you stick to properly.

80 a month for Xmas? I think that is an awful lot.

I would do £50 tops and make it clear I was buying for my kids only and didnt want gifts from anyone else as I couldnt reciprocate.

I have quite a few things that would make good presents for both age ranges - please DM me.

I'm including the turkey and trimmings in that budget. 😋
On 880, OP might squeeze in a pantomime too.
Plenty of nearly new bikes etc are sold for a bargain before Christmas.

Surely this adds to £99 and not £120 per week?!

Fair enough!

Joy of the age of her kids is that making the day a joy can mean far more to them than getting an expensive gift!

Is this budget based on 2015 prices?!

’Only’ £100? If you spend £100 or more on a birthday for a 2 year old then you’re completely nuts.

Are you and your DC used to a much more affluent lifestyle? You will all have to get used to more modest holidays & gifts.

You'll need to buy things like bikes second hand and buy cheaper makes.

Holidays might be camping or inexpensive uk self catering.

Christmas gifts will be things like books, games & crafts rather than expensive electronics (or again you might need to buy second hand).

Social life will need to be low cost like meals/drinks/movies at home with friends, visits to free parks or public facilities.

Shopping will need to be for things you need, not an activity for the fun of buying "stuff".

Your children will be limited to low cost extra curricular like cubs/brownies and free school choirs etc rather than expensive stuff like private music lessons/horseriding.

Perhaps the OP is thinking about parties, particularly for the 7 year old. They dont come cheap.

Then she'll have to stop thinking about them won't she, that's the point. She's got to live within her means in a realistic way. Parties will be low-cost at home and a sleepover for the older one maybe.

After bills food and clubs? Seriously. Many people have less than that after bills but befire food/ clubs etc

Why are you using AI for this 😭

You'll be ok.

Doable, and the biggest shock will be budgeting. However, if you have a quiet weekend one weekend, lots of home activities, then that gives you £40 the next. Use things like grouon to get cheaper days out..

Surely the 2 year old doesn’t need that large a Xmas budget as you will already have most basics in the house from 7 year old?

I mean when Ds was 2 we bought things like first crayons in stocking, or duplo but you must have stuff like that?

Buy secondhand for 2 ( and 7 year old) where possible this year. Think of it as environmental choice and it’s sounds better anyway. Charity shops are great for kids books, toddler toys.

I would just not buy your dh and him you any large or expensive gifts for any event this year. It’s only one year. Stocking only, max value £50. There can’t be that much you ‘need’ to have in one year as an adult who’s had a presumably larger budget recently. It’s just extras so a luxury.

Start doing cheaper things. Friends can join. Kids prefer hot chocolate in flask in a park in winter anyway that sitting still in cafe. Sure it’s colder, but wrap up and see it as a winter to get outside and fresh air. Have more play dates at yours, film and homemade pizza nights with friends ( they can bring own kids also so
no-one has expensive babysitter).

After a year im sure some habits you will actual keep

I think it’s very reasonable, you are forgetting things like TopCashback site or similar, yesterday I received cash back from a site as bought a good dishwasher (460), and received a fraction over £11, all free money!
I do save the change too, for me it’s about £30 a month, money I don’t miss from my current account.
Plan carefully, you won’t need stuff all the time, this year replaced washing dishwasher , and last year washing machine both 5 yr warranties.
Also I had a £600 vet bill, and a couple of other maintenance bills,luckily I do have savings too.
i reckon about £10 a month for saving to replace electrical items , big items.
Budgetfor school uniforms and stuff too

Do you have any savings @FedUp120028 ?

Adjust your expectations.

you are not going to have 5* luxury holidays to Mauritius on this budget but you might be able to camp or do a short break in uk

cheaper (supermarket brand ) rather than branded food.

meal plan for the week so you buy only the food you need.

adjust - rather than cinema and dinner out which is too expensive - you make it or buy a frozen pizza and popcorn and do a movie night at home

clothes - charity shop / vinted / supermarket - buying what you need not gimicky branded T-shirts etc. accept hand me downs from friends etc

birthdays - £100 buys a lovely big box of Lego or mechano , a load of play dough or loads of craft stuff.. check out deals in Argos and supermarkets - you can get a lovely present for far last than £100

library - new books every week for free.

never buy food out - invest in a good reusable coffee cup for you / make and take rather than buy . Buy good quality lunch boxes / water bottle for kids - if you go anywhere you take a picnic and drinks for them . Saves a fortune.

when mine were little we didn’t have £120 a week spare for ‘fun’ - we didn’t have anywhere near as much - think more £20 for all the things you mentioned… but mine always had everything they NEEDED (hugely different between need and want) and we had fun as we learnt to get by on what we had.

I did envy at times the people who went to soft play and for coffees and to big days out and had a car - but it just wasn’t within our budget and so I focused on what I did have - we are money poor - but I was able to research and find free / discounted things to do and set up activities at home that had minimal cost. We made going on the bus an adventure .

you can either get into big debt or just make the best of what you have and learn that ‘less is more’ and all that kids really need love and time not expensive clothes, holidays, stuff…

far better one present that they love and treasure and play with than a pile of stuff that sits and clutters up your house. Being less materialistic is a great thing to teach them as is teaching them to look after their things.

I never wanted mine to worry about money but I was honest with them about the realities of the world and that they couldn’t have everything they wanted instantly…

kids need to know the reality of life - make budget shopping fun.. show them the value of money and that you can only spend it once - ‘ we can spend £50 on pizza out’ - or we can buy pizza from the supermarket and still have money left over to have treats during the week and buy these multipack of crisps at and go swimming… you chose… mine now they are older are great bargain spotters and even at 5 knew the multipack of crisps from Tesco was better value than buying individually at the local shop…

it’s all about changing your mindset and making the best of what you have.

put it in perspective - some people are literally trying to feed and clothe and house their kids on your £120 ‘fun money’ per week - life really isn’t so bad when you look at it like that…

FFS OP you aren't budgeting to live on £120pw are you! Your thread title is total bollocks and if you can't see that having that much each week to save for Jollies is completely doable then I feel sorry for your kids.