To be struggling on 3k per month?

[Strictlyskint]

I am a single mum and really don’t know where I am going wrong. I am usually fine until there is a week to go until payday. Christmas is coming up and I am really stressing

Have a list of all (and the key word is all) of your income and expenditure -use an app to track spend, sometimes it’s a load of small things that add up

Should I be managing though? I don’t think I am very good with money and quite frivolous

Maybe you aren’t going wrong. It’s simply that every time you buy something, the price has increased and that adds up over a month. Gas, electricity and everything else just keeps on rising. It’s a good idea to really track what you’re spending though.

Depends on what your expenditures are really. If your mortgage/rent and utilities alone are coming in at £2000-2500 pcm, then it wouldn’t be unreasonable to be struggling towards the end of the month. But if you’re left with a a couple of grand after paying all your bills then maybe yes, you are frivolous.

You might not be going wrong - it depends how much your mortgage / rent and bills etc take each month and then how many kids you have. You could be spending 70% of your income on rent and bills for example, and then whatever is left has to cover all your food, which with kids we know can be super expensive. Plus any clubs they participate in etc.
It doesn’t sound crazy to me that you’d struggle on £3000 depending on how much the basic cost of living is for you.

my parents make me feel terrible as they said I should be absolutely loaded. Im
not

List all incoming and outgoing.

Parents don’t always help!

A single mum on £3k and someone who has nothing left a week before pay day can’t afford to be frivolous.

IME, it's quite hard for older people, if they bought years ago, to fully understand what a massive proportion of salaryis taken up by mortgage/rent these days. Don't let your parents' views make you feel bad. But if you go to the MoneySavingExpert website forums and are thorough and truthful about your spending, they'll offer you good budgeting advice.

Seriously, list all your expenses.

You don't need to do it here, but do it and hopefully you'll see where you can make savings

So I have,

mortgage 550
council tax 170
phone bill 60
car insurance 70
water 150
gad and electric 200
petrol 70 pw
cat food 50 pm
food 150 pw
sky 70

But my parents say I earn more than some couples and should be fine. It makes me feel so rubbish

Phone and sky stand out there. Any way of getting a cheaper phone and cutting back on your tv package?

Make 3 lists -

1. necessary payments (rent / mortgage / energy bills / council tax, etc)
2. things you think you can probably spend less on (food / clothes / going out)
3. things that are absolute luxuries which you can do without

From your monthly earnings, take all of list 1 off, you can't avoid those. Then look at what you've got left and allocate enough to list 2 to get you by. If there's anything left either save it for a rainy day or treat yourself off list 3.

Hope that helps!

Is that 3k after tax.
How many kids? What ages?

£150 per month for water?

Altogether this comes to just over £1500. Where’s the other £1500 going? I’d be putting at least £700, if not £1000 straight into savings as soon as I got paid if I were you.

Yes, I earn 3k after tax. I have 2 children

I really don’t know.

All that adds up to 2262 a month. You have over 700 left on 3k net. You're fine, or should be.

Yes, I am not on a meter

Your banking app/online statement shows you what you’re spending, have you looked at it? Do you have childcare costs?

It’s more like £2,300 - some is quoted weekly rather than monthly. But even so, there should be £700 left over for saving and spends.

There is your answer.

So work it out? It's not impossible, just take a look over the last 3 months worth of bank statements and see for yourself where it's going!