Accountability thread.

[Methenyouplus4]

Would anyone like to join me? I aim to look ahead to potential spends (above planned for bills/petrol etc) and then cap a maximum 'extra'. So this would include things like trying to get bargain present or, if we are doing something that costs money at the weekend, trying to knock a tenner off the food shop to compensate, selling old clothes etc. Any extra I manage to save will be put in a separate account.

If you'd like to join in, feel free and we can encourage each other and ensure we're accountable for all those little extras.

Place marking, I’ve been doing ‘essential spends only’ but I do need to make some kind of a budget. I’ve been sick the past few days so not cooking but I’m itching to get back into the kitchen and do some batch cooking. Then I can map out the Christmas spends and try to see where I’m going with all this!

I'll go first:

Week view- extra costs

1. Parking for hospital appointment, potentially about £5. I have my disabled son with me so look into if I can get onto local buses for free as a carer (rarely get bus so never thought to do this before). Kids would probably love this too.
2. Aim for no-spend days for Mon/Tue (though already noticed I'm out of milk so that will be £2 to make up).
3. Around £5 on donations for snacks/drinks at activity morning put on by disabled charity. Take own snacks so just take £2 donation for hot drinks (money goes to charity so wouldn't feel comfortable not giving anything).
4. Present for nephew's christening- this will potentially be most expensive. Need to start looking now for a bargain. Will assume £12.

Total potential spend: £21

Today, I will revisit my disposable income (there has been a few changes) and work out exactly how much I should have left if I only spend £21.

Would like to join please.
We have done our weekly shop so will only need top ups of milk and cat food.
Aiming for no spend other than these so ideally under £5 for Monday-Friday.
I’m working every day so shouldn’t be too difficult!

Just realised I need cat litter too so that is another £6 (I buy a big sack).

I have items to sell which I think will totally about £70 but chances of them selling within a week are slim. Need to post them on local selling sites today to increase the chance of that happening.

Just checking in. I haven't had a chance to look at budget (doing it tonight) but wanted to tally spends here regardless to keep me accountable.
Spent
Milk -£2 plus £3 (was with mum who couldn't get her machine to work so paid with mine for her things-don't resent her £3 as she does so much for us).

Saved
£15- had bought Xmas present for DS3 but mum said she only had one gift for him so bought it off me.
Food save Mum brought over some quorn sausages and nuggets which will do for lazy lunch for kids on weekend.

Not bad as a first day. Defo to-do budget though as shooting in the dark a bit at the moment with new (lower) income.

Today is hospital visit so probably £5 parking and also going to buy cat litter so likely £10 spend. Going to see if I can scribble together parking money out of change in the house.

Taking packed lunch for me/kids and going to eat it in kids section of free art gallery (warm) and look at Christmas shop window with the kids (free). So hope to keep today £10 or less. Will check back in as sorted budget last night so want to set some clear targets.

-Today was £3 parking at hospital
-£6 on cat litter and £2 on food
-£1.15 of huge beautiful glass jar of pink Himalayan salt (going to add to mum's crimbo hamper)
-£5 charity spend (For charity that supports my son)
-car fuel £81 (covered by budget so not including that)

Total spend: £17.15

Tomorrow is work so hopefully can get away with no money spent.

Forgot to add, DH has negotiated a better deal from Sky to BT (will covet TV and broadband and land line), will save us £34 per month. Trying to be happy about that and mot annoyed that I have been asking him to do it for months!

I should like to join if I may.
Yesterday £29 at the supermarket. My freezer and food cupboards are fairly full so would like to avoid more than basic purchases. I have plenty of ingredients for baking too.
So far today, I made up a protein shake for DP from powder which works out at less than £1 a serving, rather than give him a ready made one costing £2. I cooked a piece of ham costing £6 rather than buying it in packets, so far it has made four generous portions including DPs lunch today. He takes a salad and cold meat daily as he dislikes sandwiches. I’m trying to give him the bagged salad which is 75p in the supermarket and lasts two days, rather than the boxed stuff which is £1 a serving.
I’m about to start three night shifts so hopefully low spending. I have taken some chicken from the freezer for dinner. I will pop to the shop for milk and some Diet Coke to take to work, so I don’t buy expensive cans from the machine.
I do like the idea Op of taking your own lunch to a charity event but buying drinks to support the charity, nice way of splitting it.

Re the Christening present Op, how about a lovely children’s book? I have found that these go down well, and it’s at the same time a more economical yet thoughtful present than yet another silver mug.

Great ideas Duchess, I am going to have to have a word with DH about lunches as noticed he spent £9 At Tesco Express (both cars filled this week so not on fuel), also noticed an empty Pink Ladies wrapper in car , about £4 for 6 apples at local Tesco Express!

So yesterday was a bit pricey:
*£11 christening gift (went for book colle tion and photo frame that I will put nice photo in)
*£11 presents/cards (£6 planned, £5 for present cupboard)
*£40 trainers for DH
Total- £66. Got some money back as DM ended up buying a couple of other crimbo gifts from me (That I had previously bought for our DC) as she was struggling for ideas. DH desperately needed new trainers ad he is type of guy who owns 4 pairs of shoes at any given time (trainers, wellies, leather work shoes, summer sandals) and wears them until they literally fall off his feet (which they had). New ones are New Balance so pleased as they have half decent ethics.

Today was x2 lots of £18 but both were planned crimbo purchases so come out of separate budget to the £80 per week for extras I'm trying to manage within.

Food shop was £105 (£20 less than normal) though imagine I may end up spending a bit more during week as Aldi didn't have a few bits in so may need to get elsewhere.

I need to do a proper tally at the end of the week. It's annoying that all our money (wages, child benefit etc) all comes in on different dates and same with direct debits. I'm trying to 'clear out everything other than enough to cover direct debits and food for each week so know exactly what I have 'left' but will need to start working out what of the money left over needs to go where (for example for one off payments like car insurance/MOT etc). Am sure if I was better at computers it would be easier to create some sort of spreadsheet to work it all out.

Hi, thanks for inviting me here @methen youplus4 I really want to hold myself accountable for my spending. My husband, who is a whizz on excel, has made a fancy spreadsheet but I must confess I don't really "get" it. I'm old school and yesterday sat with a notebook and wrote down all our fixed outgoings and necessary bills and tallied it up for the year, this evening I'm going to carry on with it and add on a gift budget, holiday budget etc.
Where do you all find you waste the most money? Mine is definitely the supermarket on unnecessary food. What makes it worse is we get cash back on a credit card when we spend in a supermarket or petrol station so I just get carried away as it doesn't feel like real money. The CC gets cleared in full every month by our food & fuel budget but it just encourages spending. I think I would be better off taking cash out and once its gone its gone. It might help my waistline too if I don't buy as many treats!

We don't have a CC and meal plan which really helps. I start with food I already have in and see what I can make around that e.g. x2 cauli=cauliflower cheese with tendersteam broccoli and chicken, some nearly past it mushrooms, peppers etc=tacos or wraps. So use up stuff we have and add to it to make complete meals. I plan meals but really think about busy nights and plan nothing that takes more than about 15 mins to cook e.g. pasta pesto, or have something I premade (double batch from previous time cooking it) such as fish pie that I can just bung in oven. However I always have at least x2 mega easy things e.g. tortellini or frozen pizza so that on nights I am shattered/plans change and get in late, there is always an easy meal option.

Would you be better off shopping on-line if you end up getting more?

Ours is all the little stuff e.g. day out/parking/gift etc. Always seems to be something and quickly adds up.

I did the same as you for the year with extras, it is quite scary when you actually add up all stuff like kids parties/household bills/school trips etc. I have never truly tried to stick to it before though so live reasonably okay then oil bill/car insurance cone up and it means floating near the overdraft for a few weeks. Just not much fun living like that, woukd feel much better to just have that money in a 'pot' ready to pay.

Today we only spent £1 on coffee at charity morning then picked up x2 immaculate pairs of trainers for kids from local pass it on site. Pleased with that.

We're saving for a house and are trying to cut back as much as possible. I'm a real fan of Dave Ramsay (although he can be a bit OTT) and I love his saying about living like no one else (saving now) so that you can live like no one else (in the future, hopefully mortgage free).

I'm being really mindful about what I am spending my money on. Have cut back dramatically on eating out and buying fripperies. I have been making a conscious effort to wear clothes I haven't worn in a while instead of going out and buying something new.

The other saturday evening we made spreadsheets of everything in our freezer and dried goods cupboards. It gave us a chance to put together duplicate packets, throw out things that were years out of date and sparked inspiration for meal planning. We made a fab blackberry and coconut traybake from items just kicking about.

I've also been taking all of the money for non-essentials (and a small budget for spends) and putting it in a savings account every month. It's much easier mentally for me to spend from a current account than a savings.

It's been a 5 week month and I am battling with just over £100 to get through. This would usually disappear with fuel, lunches at work etc, but now im battling to avoid it getting to 0!

My husband thinks the CC is a good idea but I don't. However although it gets cleared off in full each month it creates a cycle that we keep using it so I've decided to stop it, take £50 in cash out each week for food and then once its gone, its gone. We won't starve, the kitchen is groaning under the weight of my previous sprees!
I do batch cook, we have a huge American style freezer and it's so handy to have stuff in but I still find myself shopping. We went to the local wholesale butchers at the weekend to stock up on regular meat as well as the Christmas meats so the freezer is currently jam packed, unlike my bank account . I'm trying to see it as an investment as our grocery bill should reduce dramatically for the next few months.
I know what you mean about managing and then a bill/occasion comes up. I've just set up a savings account for birthdays/Christmas and worked out an average monthly amount so that the "pot" is always going to be available.
I've not heard of Dave Ramsay so I will take a look.

Today was quite a spendy day but they were necessary purchases so I don't feel to bad though.

Also going to have a nose at Dave Ramsey.

Personally we've only had c.c. when couldn't afford essentials (electricity, petrol etc) at really tough times in life. Always zero interest and swapping. All paid off now but just do not like having one and so, for me, any benefits of points/rewards just isn't worth that grey cloud of debt/feeling of owing (even if we paid it off). Only exception is things like tears ago I paid for sofa on 4 years interest free but had 1 kid then and much higher income so felt comfortable doing so.

Not a great week here:
*£30 towards eldest DH school shoes (ones he wanted were £75, £60 on Black Friday so went half). Did the same last time as refuse to pay that much for school shoes AND trainers AND basketball boots, but happy to pay say £40 and for him to top up (He actually takes good care of his footwear but feet growing fast so only gets about 7 months out of each pair).
*£45 last of remaining Christmas presents other than eldest DS (from present budget)
*£12.70- soft play and cake/scone today. This was not really required but struggled as planned to go for a walk with friend and kids but started to rain, fed kids before entering soft play but were still hungry so made do with cake/scone.
£5 medication for son (annoyingly not available on NHS) will last him a couple of weeks.

£48 spent so far of £80 weekly disposable.

Anticipated spend at weekend= £25 for Christmas tree (wil get £20 Ikea voucher though as part of their offer). Perhaps another £5 as DH will probably get kids Ikea ice-cream while there (though might miss that in interest of being frugal and promise hot choc and marshmallows when they get back).

Also going to friends on Sunday and will be taking some food so need to assume an extra £10 of 'disposable' might have to go towards food for that. Have some things in but will need extra ingredients to top up.

Next 3 days should be low/No spend as at work.

Have managed to start putting money in my 'other' pots for annual bills etc so pleased about that. Still could do better though. Be pleased if I can shave a bit off food shop again this week and get it in under £110 (rather than £125).

Hope you are all staying frugal.

Hi all

some of you may know me, I flit in and out of the monthly threads (usually when I'm anxious / panicking about money) only to disappear when I'm feeling better.

We were in loads of debt in September and I mean shit loads. We were making debt repayments of over £1,000 per month on debts (5 x credit cards and a loan (I only earned £1290) so it was almost as if we were coping on one wage (DH's).

We were only paying the minimums and interest on the CC's and were never going to pay it off, so we did what was frowned upon and remortgaged paying most of the debt off, but leaving the loan running (£350 a month, 3.5 years left to run), Our mortgage term increased by 6 years (which we can live with as it'll still be paid off before retirement age and we would never have got the cards all paid off in six years without doing this) and the mortgage only went up by £50 per month whereas the credit card repayments of £650 were completely wiped out.

So, you can see all of a sudden - we are £650 a month better off!

I have learnt my lesson in that I will NEVER use a credit card EVER AGAIN.

However I now think I'm a millionaire! I've gone from a strict £300 a month food shopping budget to just chucking anything I want in the trolley. I hardly ever cook from scratch now (used to make lots of casseroles, curries and slow cooker things) and now everything is convenience. I can't remember the last time I chopped any vegetables, everything is microwave packets now.

I want to start saving up whilst at the same time doing up our house but I keep spending money on stuff we don't need / want .

I know there's a saying "you can't take it with you when you die" but I can't take the 50 rolls of washi tape that I couldn't resist buying or the millions of kindle books I keep buying! (£38 last month)

I run a bills account, a family money / spends account (groceries and petrol come out of this) and both DH and I get £160 a month frittering money (mine has been supplemented by my overtime but this will come to an end next month).

I have only bought a couple of Christmas presents so far.

So I'd love to join your accountability thread

Blimey Scarlet, that sounds really tough and it seems that you are at a real turning point in your life. You could continue to fritter your money away and have nothing to show for it, or you could make a conscious decision to change and save to do your house up.

I've rambled on a bit about him, but why don't you look up on youtube some Dave Ramsay stuff- try the envelope system for a start. And find out about his baby steps. It's all quite loud and corny, but I find it impossible not to get passionate about saving for the futute when I watch him!

Also, would it be worth writing out an honest statement of affairs? Income, essential outgoings, frittering spends.

Hello 👋 challenge433 said you were over here 😊

I’m not being held accountable for my spending in what’s left of 2018 as my dd is getting married & having dropped this on me with just 3 months to plan... it’s a good job I have some savings stashed away! And that’s why I budget and over save.

I am stocking up my store cupboard ready for January and have picked 6 meals I like and have this week purchased enough for 3 meals for 4 weeks, next weeks shopping will purchase the other 3 meals and enough for 4 weeks. Simple easy cheap meals - curry and tomato based.

I don’t drink milk, but get more than I need and freeze one carton, this saves “top up” shops which cost a fortune - as the layout of the supermarket is designed like this, why else would the milk and bread be half way round the store?

Popping milk and bread in the freezer and buying yeast and bread flour saves me £££££ as I can make bread in the machine and get the milk out the freezer

Freezing milk a great idea. I really need to consider a second freezer as considering there are 6 of us, ours is pretty small. I think having a few bags of frozen veggies would also save money/waste.

Scarlett- I think you sound like you need/are asking for some tough love/a gentle shake.

You did a great thing addressing your debt, but the debt is still there. All the money you are mindlessly frittering (then having subsequent guilt for) coukd surely be put towards something better.

I would suggest planning out exactly what you want to use the money for in the house e.g. living room: new light £120, cushions, £70, shelves, £50 (or whatever). When you are spending on little things, consider what you want more- the home improvements or the thing you are buying?

I think taking the cash out would work for you so you can really 'see' it go (I find this so helpful). Also, perhaps you need a bit more 'play' money, enough so that you can enjoy little treats like coffee out, especially if you have had years of living close to the bone financially. I guess it boils down to how desperate you are for other things you want (home improvements).

Good luck!

I just buy two or three pint containers of milk- as that will keep us going until a supermarket shop. So they don’t take up much room.

I drink soya, oat or any non dairy milk and so it just sits in the larder as there’s no need to even refrigerate when it’s open.