How do people budget?

[TDSR26]

I’ll admit myself and my other half are both not great with money and have plunged into so much debt we’re drowning!
He’s currently working two jobs pretty much 7 days a week, I’m a TA so my earnings aren’t great but I do everything at home and I need to be there for the kids.
We try and budget each month but our money just seems to disappear and we’re often just cutting it fine by the end of the month or spent slightly over what we’ve earned.
We have three kids so everything is so expensive as a family of 5, they all do quite a few clubs outside of school so that does take up a chunk but they enjoy them and it’s good for socialising (some school friendships haven’t always been great). There always seems to be something they need / outgrown / for school, it just seems never ending!
I sell and buy so much on Vinted and I can’t even start on the food shop as that’s just ridiculous these days!
Neither of us socialise much with friends or go out together as we simply cannot afford too.
We hardly ever go out as a family to eat unless it’s an occasion i.e birthdays etc.
Day’s out are saved for school holidays, we haven’t been on holiday in two years and that was paid for by the in-laws as a gift.
We moved house four years ago and it’s so outdated and we’ve not had any spare money to do anything, not even the kids rooms!
It just feels like an endless cycle of just trying to get by and we’ve got to the point we’re both so miserable and stressed out!
How do people do it?! Any advice welcome 🤗

I don't have debt so I'm not much help there. Your kids are at that stage of becoming human dustbins. Teenage boys it a lot of food. Well mine do. 12 and nearly 16. It's tough! We have a bills bank account and personal bank accounts. We split the bills in half and what we have left is our own. So things like our mobiles, car insurance all come out of our personal money. I appreciate we are probably a bit weird though. All on a spreadsheet. We save around £80-100 a month depending on the gas and electric bill. We do a huge food shop when we get paid. Split the cost so weekly it's fresh stuff we buy.

How I manage my other money is for the year- add up everything!!! Christmas birthdays, hair cuts, dentist, car insurance and I make a pot in my Monzo account.

I give myself £100 a week to live on. Not saying you need that or have that but that's fuel and what ever I waste or buy food with like top ups of fruit, protein etc.

My kids do not eat the same as each other or us. Yes in an ideal world we would but sporting commitments, my gym etc you just roll with it. I do try and meal plan for the adults though.

Whatever is left after I've totted up my pots goes in savings (but this could be debt).

I honestly didn't realise how much money I wasted till I separated my accounts.

Round up is on my account too so there is pennies disappearing into a wee saver I don't notice.

My spreadsheet has a 3 month projection. You need to look forward and not back but literally giving myself a buffet that way each week stops me wasting it!

Cost of living has been tough!

I also make sure I phone everyone in contracts and get better deals. My partner cringes as he's a total pushover. But the worst they can say is no.

I hope you find some answers!

I think most folk on average salaries would be bankrupt with these expenses. £5K vets bills. £7k House repairs. Faints!!

I’m a civil servant and we employ term time workers. We have people who are part time and term time. If children are older some people collect kids from school on a late lunch break and log back on for another hour so can do full time hours. TA isn’t the only term time job. In a few years kids will be old enough to stay home alone so hopefully you’ll be able to bring in more income in a few years.

Are you married? As you’re sacrificing your career and pension for childcare, and your partner isn’t. Relationships break up all the time so you need to protect yourself too. If you split tomorrow, how would you manage long term. Woman often sacrifice a lot, and you see it daily on here how they are screwed when the relationship is over.

You need a budget for the month ahead. Save monthly for xmas and bdays. A little each month. Move money into savings on pay day. If you have nothing to save, look at food (as others have said) as you can make savings there. Fuel - can you walk a little more?

I’ve just remembered that our school’s after-school care had a separate babysitting service for weekday evenings. I’m sure it was staffed by TAs and staff from the ASC service. If there’s something similar in your area, you might get extra evening work with them.

Where is the debt? Credit cards? Make sure they’re all on interest free.

Write down all of your outgoings (and I mean everything), where is your money going? What can you cut down? Write a budget.

i opened a Monzo account so I could have pots to budget into so I save a bit each month for Christmas/birthdays/car maintenance/days out/ house maintenance so it’s there ready to pay for things when the time comes rather than having to go on credit cards.

I follow a few good Instagram accounts that are good at talking about debt and how they sorted it… That Girl in Debt is one of my favourites.

The way things are at the moment do think of job security. As a TA your job is probably quite secure and holidays off for the children. With the economy a bit “flaky” a new job may be more at risk.
When I was REALLY budgeting I found that the pilot light on my gas fire was costing me over 30 pence per day (ten years ago). Not a lot you might say but over a 31 day month it adds up to over £9.00, and I didn’t need to have it on. Turning your hot water temperature down on your boiler just slightly can save money too. Little tiny tweaks really do add up. Good luck. More of us have been there and come through and you will too.

we moved from a modest two up two down to a much bigger house to accommodate our larger than average family. It was crippling on the bank account. Overnight our council tax more than doubled, gas and electricity quadrupled it felt, I could go on about the children’s bedrooms being embarrassing etc but they did have their own bedroom each.

We had to look at everything

Mortgage
Council tax
utilites
you can’t change unless your house is freezing.

Food was bargain basement
sandwiches made up with reduced bread and frozen fir us to take to work/school, no crisps, just fruit.
breakfast was porridge and tea was generally “slop out of the slow cooker” the kids called it.

we left the car in the garage untaxed and uninsured for two months, we didn’t have a working cooker for five months, every last penny was accounted for. I remember the local market throwing fruit and veg because it was 4pm and bruised, the kids were so embarrassed that I was thrilled with it all I made so many veg lasagnes, buckets of vegetable soup, veggie chilli, and veggie shepherds pies. That saved so much money, and that fruit and veg man helped me out a few times. I did buy our stuff from him regularly though.

We left my husbands monthly paid money in one bank account, and my weekly paid money went into another. One night he found a twenty pound note on the bus and he hadn’t seen money for months by then. He hid it in a cd case and suddenly he didn’t feel so poor.

Every Friday when I got paid, I drew the money out, went to the post office, paid £25 on the gas, £25 on the electricity, £10 on the water, went to the school and paid the breakfast/afterschool clubs, did they need new uniform/shoes etc. food, I do enjoy gardening and I grew a lot of vegetables, I grow a lot of tomatoes so soups, passata, tinned tomatoes, basil for pesto, onions, garlic, potatoes, yellow courgettes.

You do get thru it, but my poor, wonderful, very caring, husband worked a good 72hours a week/6 day weeks, and another 12 hours travel by bus, and I worked a minimum of 60hours a week/7nights a week, for two years we spent one night a fortnight together,

I would recommend withdrawing your food/extras budget from the account and using cash.
I leave enough money in my account to cover my DD and then withdraw the remaining in cash so I have a physical reminder of how much money I have left, I find I’m more mindful that way of what I’m actually spending rather then card tapping!
We’ve got three children, one does 2 clubs a week (a grass roots football team and one other) and the other does a 2 hour martial arts club once a week, the smallest does swimming lessons.
Ive told mine they can’t do any other clubs, because I can’t justify spending anymore on clubs. The swimming lessons I consider essential so that isn’t something I would drop.
Food is our biggest weekly bill, I spent £180 last Sunday and we are coming up to the end of what was brought for the week, bar the store cupboard things ie pasta.
I now refuse to do top up shops during the week, I buy enough for everyone to have packed lunches, fruit and dinner etc for a week if they choose to eat all the crisps in 3 days I used to go and top up midway through and inevitably pick up more stuff whilst there so I was spending loads.
If they eat the soft fruit in a day or two they are left with the apples etc in the bowl.

Local to us we have a community larder that is open to everyone to reduce food waste, I pop by there on my way to work and pick up a few things that we use and give a donation so it may be worth looking at similar near you.
Does you school offer wrap around care, I used to be a TA but also worked in the after school club, my children could attend for free which may bump up your hours?
If you’re school don’t offer wrap around care would they frown upon you offering a service? if you’re looking after children for up to two hours you don’t have to be ofsted registered, and looking after one or two each day after school for a couple of hours would make a big difference to your income.
A lady that does pick up from our school 3.15-5.15 charges £6 ph per child.
When mine were smaller I used to clean in the evenings once my DH was home after the children had gone to bed, depending on your DH hours in his jobs you could pick up some evening/night work.
Good luck Op, lots of us are finding it tough right now x

See if you can get help to reschedule your debt.

I find lifting the budget for the week out as cash really helps to keep track of spending. Tapping your card all the time adds up from nowhere!

I don't know where you live but every club my son attends is around £40 per month. Martial arts 40 swimming lessons 38 football 40 if you add days out (one small thing a week) thats another 200 a month. I don't know how anyone can afford more than one child in today's climate. If they live where you do then maybe but midlands no way.

None of the clubs are put on credit, those have all been paid for.
As I said swimming will be ending in July and Guides too as daughter is outgrowing. Cricket is only till September then it’s down to 3 and that will be more manageable and time saving.

Yes three kids are expensive that has been well established and we all know TA pay is awful.
None of the debt has ever covered mortgage or bill payments, all that money is put aside at the start of the month and not touched.
It’s been built up over the years for various things.

I have a Monzo bank account and its great for day to day budgeting and saving. You can create 'pots' which are effectively little bank accounts within your main account. I have a holiday one, one for each of the kids birthdays, xmas etc. When I get paid I move a bit into each of these (even just £5 to £10 each) then a few pounds here and there when I can. It quickly adds up. For example its my sons birthday next month and so £10 a month over the past year plus odd bits here are there and I have £250. He is only 6 and we dont go OTT with presents so thats more than enough for presents, cake and a little party at home with his 3 best friends.

Use a budgeting tool.
Eliminate all unnecessary expenditure.

Buying other essentials like a cooker and a matress on credit is what I neant.
You cant afford leisure activities if you cant afford essentials first.
Its tough but this how you get into debt , spending first then wondering why you dont have any money.
Budget and put aside money for rolling expenses then thats what you have left for leisure,discretionary spending

It probably womt be much until your loan is paid off but at least you wont be adding to it.

Make a dent as in bring it down and not add to it at all anymore.
payments are set up and all going out monthly.
gold tips - thanks you.
I always look for discounts where i can and do have a blue light card.

Personally at this point I would just concentrate on not adding to your debt, and building the pots suggested

Yes we got rid of sky as it was ridiculous! Now have a fire stick and Netflix and Disney also. We constantly cancel and swap around.
Thanks for your understanding knowing you’ve been there yourself and it’s not great.

Have you looked into an AV its worth a shot

You only think you can afford it because you’re putting other expenses on credit though.
You’re convincing yourself of a different reality.

Could you do paid child care in school holidays to boost your income?

You could instantly save the Netflix and Disney subs and just have the firestick.

Cut 3 clubs next term

Thats saved you around £50 per club per month plus Disney £11.99 and Netflix £11.99

• Estimating here

Instant £175ish saved for very little effort
Now you have £100 emergency pot
£ 25 each for xmas, bifthdays and school uniform .

It might be that you just don’t have enough money.
If you write down all your income and then write down all your expenditure and you are in the red you have to cut something out eg kids club. If the numbers work then you just have to allocate money for things and stick to it. If you budget £50 for a birthday you stick with it.
We find it useful to write what we spend every single day. It’s really made us think about our spending.

Hi OP

I feel your pain. I’ve been in debt in the past and only just make ends meet now. Can’t afford to socialise much, other than meeting friends for a walk with packed lunch and flask of coffee/cans of ale.

Few things:

• First, it gets much easier as the kids get older. I have 3 kids and the years we had to pay for childcare were killers. Once they’re all teenagers and can come home from school on their own, and be left in holidays, it gives you far more options for work. You only have a few years to go.

• Start thinking amount future employment options now, where you can earn a lot quite quickly, in case you need extra qualifications you can study for now.

• Deffo get advice on the debt from a debt charity (e.g. Step Change). You may be able to reduce the monthly payments on that.

• Could you do a second job, even for limited spells so it doesn’t get too much, e.g. childminding after school or some weeks of holidays, babysitting, online PA, ironing, bar work, evening shifts in shops or cleaning etc. Anything to boost your income.

• Tesco is pricey. Is there any way you can get out of the online shopping? I shop in Aldi now.

• Could you reduce the amount of meat you eat as that adds up. We don’t eat meat and I batch cook stuff like lentil coconut curry with leek, cauliflower, and spinach and lentil bolognaise (to eat with pasta or baked spuds). If you have space to buy large bags of rice, lentils, sacks of spuds from farm shops etc, it should bring the weekly price down.

• I never buy chips to have with burgers but make potato wedges, with paprika, garlic and rosemary.

• Can you grow your own veg? Rocket is super-easy to grow from seed and great in omelettes, as a side etc. Plus tomatoes, berries etc. I grow all mine in pots (garden of rental is concreted). I also grow herbs (flat leaf parsley, mint, rosemary, sage thyme) in pots which really help flavour food and extra nutrients. They take no looking after other than watering in summer.

This is a good channel on sustainable living on a budget: https://youtube.com/@the whole home.