Sensible September

[HowDidThisHappenDinesh]

Back to school and back to budgeting… a thread for us to keep each other accountable in sensible spending.
New posters welcome :)

Well done everybody and congrats on your new job, @IDontHateRainbows - must be a relief to have some money coming in again - i hope they make it permanent, especially if you like it! 🎊 👏

Checking in, I had a solid October with no major overspending in different budget categories or overall, and am on track so far in November.

I agree with what a few others have said about frugality becoming a good habit. I saved a bit here and there each month, including round-ups/ save the change and altogether it has given me almost £750 saved for Christmas related expenses. This is essential for us because rent often goes up for us in December, plus MOT and car insurance renewal happen this month/ early next.

For the first time I think, I feel good (not stressed) about having 'enough' savings for Christmas and other essential ish spends that seem to crop up this time of year. And that's despite our expensive holiday this summer (which I'd also saved hard for).

All the focus on NSDs and staying on track really have helped me. Fingers crossed I can keep it up into the future, too!

Spends so far (as of 9 November):
£145 on Christmas gifts 🎁
£20 uniform and pants for ds (next size up)
£6 misc business costs
£150 big grocery shop + top-up Veg and fruit
£30 takeaway 😋
£25 gift for nephew's birthday

My bank app says that is £70 less than this time last month, which is great considering we're about 1/3 through November. Oct seemed like such a long month in comparison!

Good luck with your frugal goals everybody, especially now, at the weekend. 😊

Very proud of my planned spending this weekend! The only thing I bought that wasn’t planned was a protein bar.
Thursday: £15 in Iceland, bought enough meat for at least six meals (plus the protein bar after the lunch I packed for work was not sufficient enough).
£30 on socks & a weekender bag at Primark for my weekend away next week (and all my socks have holes in them!)
Topped up my oyster with £20.
Went to a gig and spent only £26 on the whole evening! Normally that would be at LEAST £50 so I’m super happy with that. We had a drink on the way with what we had in the house, one beer each when we were there, we got a small snack out and ate freezer chicken and chips when we got home.
Friday: £10 top up shop plus £4 on a bottle of (n/a) fizz for a girls night. There were so many good yellow sticker deals, again, that I had to resist because we actually have too much food at home at the moment, the freezer is literally packed. If it’s a good deal but you don’t really need it it’s not a good deal and all that.
This weekend we are going to the inlaws so I booked those train tickets. Also the cold motivated me to finally order my coat. DH ordered a takeaway when I was out but as there was food in the house I’ve told him he’s paying for it himself!
Yesterday/today bought flowers and a card and wine for the inlaws and a coffee for the train, I packed us sausage sandwiches but ran out of time to make coffee. But we both had americanos instead of fancy sugary lattes and were surprised at how much cheaper it was 😂
Overall not a bad weekend. I’m particularly pleased about Thursday, think we did well for a gig at one of the biggest venues in London. Cutting down on alcohol has really helped in this journey. Saying that we’re not home yet so the weekend’s not quite over… hopefully we stay on a good streak.

Away to see a friend with my daughter this weekend, usually this means very spendy but as the child benefit lands on Monday ( £170) had a goal to keep it under that and succeeded.

(Not including train ticket of £97 for the two of us)

Fri: food £10 charity shops £3 chocolate £5, coffee £4 £22

Sat: tickets to art gallery £32, food and drinks out £20, souvenirs from shop £10 contribution to evening meal/ drinks £10 tot £72

Today
Breakfast £13, food and chai tea from Indian deli.inc cakes for everyone and picnic for train, £30, taxi £12, sweets at station for kids £3. Tot £58

Grand total £152
Daughter spent £17 pocket money

Bought flask of tea and will drive at thd other end. Enough Indian Picnic food to probably not need much dinner either.

Total £169 which is £1 under budget
Not bad for a weekend away

Good morning and happy Monday everyone. Just checking my bank balance and budget categories after the weekend and I’m still feeling proud. Budgeted £50 per weekend of fun money, we have £170 left for three weekends. £100 per week for groceries, we have £250 left, gone slightly over when I did a big shop the first week and should even out with only a top up shop last week and this week. Everything else is on track. It’s really taken a few months to get into these habits and feel this in control.
Need to buy rice today for future meals, finally came to the end of the 5kg bag 😂
Tomorrow and Thursday should be NSDs.

I’m feeling super proud of myself - payday on the 25th & still have £550 left overall. Need to food shop out of this but i know I’ll be able to send a healthy amount to the savings on payday.

Accidental NSD today, DS wanted a little toy from Asda (I said I would take the pounds out of his money bank) but whilst there I spent £4 feeding him at the cafe. Mondays are usually a strong NSD. So feeling a little guilty about today.

Had my first £30 hit my Zing account today for joining - very exciting but I’m going to ignore it until it’s all been paid (£210 overall) and then decide what to do with it.

Happy budgeting all!

Well done everybody!

I've only had one NSD so far this week, but I'm hoping for another today. It's been relatively low spends on the other days (£11 top-up of groceries, £3.50 on snacks for ds) after a very spendy weekend. We went to local city for a winter coat for ds (almost £50!) because he has outgrown his from last year, and ended up spending £25 on lunch out while we were there.

My budget overall is still healthy due to being very careful last month. DH is going to look at the car insurance renewal today. Should be OK as long as it hasn't gone up loads. We didn't make any claims etc. so fingers crossed.

Have a good Thursday everyone!

I'm really struggling at the moment - just don't have the time to work out my budget and how to stay on track with it - and am dreading Christmas next year HAS to be better! I mean today has been a NSD but they are few and far between...

@moimichme you have just reminded me that our home insurance is due soon, I had completely forgotten

Hope everyone is doing well, half way through the month already and it feels like it has gone so fast, especially after last month dragging.

Financially things are going well. I haven't counted my NSDs as I've been buying bits here and there to finish the Christmas gift shopping (I am definitely done now).

Few wins, £5 under budget for petrol this month. Spent £2.80 on Vinted for nativity costume instead of full price brand new Had suitable gifts for the baby shower, so no additional spend. Mobile contract ended, and issued me a £4.99 refund. Great discounts on Christmas gifts, saved a small fortune. Spent £21 on makeup using offers, glitches, points etc about £100 less than I would have normally spent at this time of year when I do my annual stock up. I say £21.00 but there are items in there that will go in DD15's stocking/advent

Not so great, DHs car written off. Setlement is not enough to get anything similar, not sure what we will be doing yet. We will probably have to downsize which means we will have to use two cars when visiting family/trips away etc. Have had to budget more petrol for the Christmas visits.

Looking ahead, I should make my savings target by the end of the year. I need to start totalling up the Christmas spend so I can start on next years budget.

Well it’s been a spendy week… had an accidental NSD on Monday, meant to do a top up shop but stayed home all day instead and made do with what we had at home for dinner.

Tuesday, £4 on a takeaway coffee (unplanned because I ran out of time to make a flask of coffee in the morning). Got my lashes done, new technician is doing a cheap intro offer and I really feel so much better about myself when I have them done.

Wednesday was a £15 top up shop (planned and in budget).

Thursday I felt really ill in the morning and didn’t pack lunch as usual, I wanted spicy soup to fight the pressure in my sinuses but decided to get a cheap supermarket ramen instead of a proper takeaway - ended up spending £10 in Tesco on that and snacks but then a takeaway soup would’ve cost that on it’s on own anyway.

Then went away this weekend and spent everything I had put aside for it. Had a lovely time though and wasn’t worried about overspending nor too cavalier and having to pay the price later. That was the last of my personal spending though so I am on a strict no personal spends until the end of the month now.

Today was a no spend day again and tomorrow I’ll do a mini top up shop for fruit and veg, I skipped our veg delivery again to just buy stuff I know we will use. Joint account is looking good still, for the first time I am fantasising about having money left over at the end of the month…

How is everyone getting on with the countdown to December?!

I spent around £60 in B&M at the weekend on smaller gifts and a few food items; also about £30 on Vinted for tat toys for the DC. Just dreading trying to find the higher ticket items the DC want!

@ElizaBalfour It sounds like you are making great headway with the Christmas shopping, I can't believe it's 30 days until Christmas.

I have had a great week 7 NSDs, not for lack of trying though. Numerous reasons, BF offers ended at really weird times, wouldn't let me use paypal etc.

I do need to get some hair toners, but the cost will be negligible as I have £15 off £30 amazon spend and a £10 amazon voucher to use.

Just quickly looked at my accounts, and it's all looking on target for savings goals. DH asked for ideas for birthday and Christmas so I've sent him some links to things that have almost made me spend. So I'm thinking I can't buy anything on there now as he 'might' have bought any of them. I shouldn't be tempted by anything until after Christmas now.

I've switched an old account I don't use to Santander, which should make me a cool £150.
I also had to pay in £1,500 and switch 2 direct debits.

I'm falling out of love a bit with Vinted. Sometimes it's great but I ordered some kids books and they took 10 days to get here (amazon prime would have been next day and only a little more expensive).

I used my weekly free coffee with Octopus this morning and they've got a few Xmas offers this week; free popcorn if you've got a Co-op near you and some Greggs offer too.

I'm wanting to eat healthier but organic veg is soo bloody expensive 😫 May have to stick to the budget friendly veg for now.

Having a mixed bag since my last update. Last Monday NSD. Tuesday top up shop, £27 including a couple of treats for the weekend. Wednesday not so good, my watch strap broke so I ordered a new one, £14. Bit annoyed as I have no personal spending money left and will have to pay it off next month. But that’s my fault for spending everything I had put aside on one trip. Wednesday also had a work emergency so stayed late and suggested ordering in instead of cooking and eating late. We had enough in the budget to do this comfortably, it wasn’t necessary but it was nice to just come home and eat and go straight to bed!
Thursday took advantage of some black friday deals - protein powder, floradix, and a milk cooler thing for the milkman. None of it planned but none of it unnecessary.
Friday was £5 in Lidl, was very happy with that.
Saturday is where I feel things started going wrong, went out for a drink and spent £3, fine. Bought cinema tickets for £5.50 each for Sunday, didn’t even end up going but not the end of the world. Then popped into Aldi and spent £11 on food and £30 on wine 😳 which was not needed, hasn’t taken us overbudget but I’m still just wondering why I did that! Sunday £13 in co op on yellow stickers. I don’t need to do a ‘real shop’ this week, we’ve done really well eating out of the freezer and can stretch til December now with me only needing to buy butter and eggs. So the joint account is doing fine and I didn’t spend anything from there yesterday or today. My personal spending has just gone mad though, I bought a cookbook, three takeaway coffees, and two takeaway wraps as well as an expensive train ticket. The train ticket was unavoidable but the rest definitely wasn’t and is completely my fault for not being organised enough. I’m so annoyed to go into December owing the credit card money but I’m also determined to get back to my frugal ways despite the craziness that is the holiday months!

Not doing brilliantly, mainly due to Christmas shopping. I'm trying to keep food costs lower, I'm vegetarian so most dinners have been veggie for all.
Car is due MOT next month, it's only 4 witu low mileage so hopefully nothing drastic!
I'm meeting a friend on Sunday and have two other meet ups planned with another possible if we can find a date.
All in all, not good!!! Need to relist some items for sale.

@Vinorosso74 my car has just passed its MOT, thankfully <breathes a huge sigh of relief> - however the tax is due in January

Thank you for the Octopus tip @Italia89, I've downloaded the app now, had no idea! For anyone who lives near a Cineworld, they are doing Christmas films for £5 which DTS2 is very pleased about

Did anyone read the Maisie Bovingdon - Year of No Spending article? (I've tried to link it there but please Google if it doesn't work!) I think it's a bit misleading as the writer goes on a (pre-booked) holiday during the year and doesn't mention being frugal then, but the 'mindset shift' was interesting. I'd have liked a bit more info about how she actually budgeted - for example, did she have so many clothes already that she didn't need to replace a single item? - but I guess it's only a short article...

Guys, have a watch of the new Netflix documentary Buy More!
Total eye opener on buying unnecessary crap, why we do it, how they manipulate us and the toll on the environment. Also, a very easy to watch documentary, I quite enjoyed it.

Thanks @Italia89 , that sounds interesting! I remembered that I read The No Spend Year too to get some helpful ideas. Obviously it didn't help

Going slightly insane here, DP's latest contract (he's self employed) ended last week and he hasn't found any equivalent work yet. He did know that it would slow down over winter and he's been offered work in a related industry which he could do - it doesn't pay quite as well but he's in a massive huff because he DOESN'T LIKE IT and he WANTS TO DO THE OTHER JOB and WHY ISN'T THERE A JOB HE WANTS TO DO?? So now I have him simultaneously moaning that (a) we don't have enough money coming in and (b) he's not taking the new job because he'll hate it. I don't have overtime available with my job but I thought blimey, if I got made redundant now I'd go out and do something, Christmas temping etc, just to bring in a bit of money whilst I looked for something better/ more permanent. The other annoying thing is that he doesn't do anything extra around the house - no cooking, cleaning, childcare etc - he expects me to cope with everything as if he's at work as usual, but with the added benefit for him of him being able to sit around and watch TV for hours. I am so fed up!!

@HowDidThisHappenDinesh Boots have up to 50% off some vitamins and supplements with Black Friday deals, in case it's useful to you

Sympathies Eliza that sounds really tough. You'd think your DH would do something in that situation, rather than moan at you about it! Poor you.

Good to hear from others and I hope you're all still more or less on track!

I've been paid at last for November so I'm checking in. This month I have done pretty well overall on personal and frivolous spending, but I have spent around £200 of my Christmas budget for gifts and stuff for the house that will make it all a bit nicer for the holidays (organising stuff from IKEA that we have been needing for a while). I don't feel as organised as usual gifts-wise, but equally by being frugal all year I do have money for it. Mostly nice consumables I reckon.

We're still deciding what to do re: visiting family for the holidays this year, but I have some money set aside if we do need to book a hotel for a few nights, and DH will pay for the petrol!

Set aside money to savings today, paying myself first, and the only other money I've spent this week was on groceries £15 and £5 ish twice to treat different co-workers to a coffee at work.

Good luck for the weekend and start of December, everyone!

Managed a NSD on Saturday. Met a friend for a pub lunch and wine yesterday so spent then.
Christmas shopping is done (apart from some chocolates/sweets).
I have a dental bridge which has moved/loosened so would like to get that looked at soonish. I'm hoping they can just refix it for now. I am a NHS patient but still it's money I'd rather not be spending!

Hey everyone, I hope everyone did well in November without too much unexpected expense.

Black Friday was as expected a downfall but nowhere near as bad as I had expected. Most of my spending was essential and justified like dental costs, but I did spend on perfume, which of course is a non essential, but a treat for reaching personal goals, which I feel is important too.

I've looked back over my finances tor November, and set the budget December. All looking ok financially, although my kids do have a habit of making requests after my budget is done. I should make my savings target for the year, if I am strict going forward.

Unexpected spend today on some loop earbuds, although I'm counting it as necessity for my sanity. I'm just hoping they live up to the reviews.

I've got a £650 dental bill on it's way for a new bridge as I've broken my existing one. It's about the same age, if not older than the dentist I saw. Paid £100 today, then have two other installments 😥

Happy December everyone ❄️ usually an expensive month but my November went pretty well, the first month where I didn’t feel completely offtrack with everything, so I’m hoping to keep it going this month.
Had a good weekend, stayed in budget even though we got a takeaway on Sunday. Monday and Tuesday, did a big shop that came in under £45 which I was pleased with. A friend was in hospital and all her family is abroad so I was in and out helping her out and spent a bit on that, she gave me money for some of it and the rest came from our ‘generosity fund’ which is £50 or so we put aside each month for gifts etc that catch us off guard. Don’t regret that but now I’m in bed with a bad cold and we spent £50 on takeaway yesterday as I can’t cook and didn’t fancy anything from the fridge! Oh well, it will be a quiet weekend with me recovering so might even go for a no spend Saturday.

Dental costs are the most annoying unexpected expense, commiserations @Vinorosso74. Thanks for tips and recommendations @ElizaBalfour @Italia89 I’ve also been recommended ‘Less’ by Patrick Grant but haven’t read it yet.
Still waiting for my Zing payment @Disneyland2022 it’s been over 30 days now!

Any chance it was paid today? @HowDidThisHappenDinesh
it will be paid £30 after you spent money on it? Pm me if needed & I’ll help you out

I made the qualifying payment on the 4th Nov so expected the payment today at the latest but nothing yet