What are your monthly outgoings/are mine crazy?

[tinyviolinforme]

I feel like every month I spend hours looking at a spread sheet. We do have a good income at £5,500.
we pay

mortgage and council tax £2046
phones incl device plans £96 (5 people)
utilities £498
tv and broadband incl extras like Disney £196
insurances (cat, cat, house, life) £166
gym £40
ring £8
milkman £151

im thinking that the milkman wasn’t as cost effective as I hoped. It was to stop me going to buy milk and eggs and then adding extras but I wonder if it’s a false economy.
tv is another one - it includes two tv licences as one of the kids is at uni and has some additional needs and I was worried they might unknowingly watch something that needed a licence. Maybe that’s me being over protective.

yeah, I pay virgin £30 for 350MB and then £5.99 for disney, we also do 6.99 netlix

£120/motnh for dual utilities

our mortgage is insane though

If you are frequently running the dishwasher 3 X a day, is it definitely completely full each time?

I think someone else has also pointed this out - they are in a flat type thing but I didn’t really know what they could/couldnt do so played safe.

Oh do you mean wait until the cheap hours? I will check if it’s for all things not just charging. That is a brilliant idea.

This is the rate, I feel really stupid for not thinking this before. I will tell dh as well.

We cycle through streaming services: watch what we want for a couple of months or so then cancel and pay for a different one for a bit and so on… so you aren’t paying for them all at once!

I really really want to cut back and look at this. I feel like everything has crept or I haven’t understood the charges.
I can’t change things like some contracts, or the mortgage/council tax etc.

utilities is way high so you need to break that down

and if you are are octopus you have the app that will let you see exactly when your usage is high - is it gas or electric, is it a dodgy fridge or everlasting showers …

The tv aspect is insane. Broadband as well, just ring your broadband provider and tell them you are leaving and they reduce the payment to the absolute minimum for the same service.

TV at uni may make your child more isolated unless he took the games console and in such case he would surrounded by people but possibly not studying as much as they should.

Is your mortgage on a fixed rate and is it worth changing?

Your phones are really expensive, you can get SIM only with loads of data for under £10 pm with no contract

Utilities are very high, what on earth are you using?

We have fast fibre broadband for under £30 pm and rotate round the streaming services, costs under £50 pm

Good that you've already cancelled the milkman, it's just so expensive.

Moneysaving Expert will walk you through setting a budget and cutting costs. Also need to account for planned and unexpected annual costs like Christmas, holidays, insurance, car repairs etc. These will all add up to a significant amount so need to be accounted for in your budget.

Do a money makeover and potentially save £1,000s - Money Saving Expert

You need to use the Comparison sites for gas, and electric. We get a dual fuel discount and one for paying monthly by direct debit and consider a water meter if you don’t have one, and then do the same for all insurances. You can save a fortune by choosing cheaper suppliers.
looking at spreadsheets is good, but you also need to look at the suppliers and do the sums. The milkman totally proved this.

we freeze milk and bread so never do a top up shop.

and if I have understood right that you don’t have a pension you need to start one tomorrow, a SIPP is easy to add to and soon grows.

Thank you for the link that’s really helpful.
we are on a gravity fed system so heat the water three times a day. In summer there is no heating on (all that is gas). Electricity there’s a car, and then the tumble dryer, dishwasher, washing machine, oven, hob etc plus tvs

This is the bill from EE. So the rest is Disney, 2 x tv licence, some expensive sports thing dh wants, prime and Spotify.

I guess try and eat less meat. Do a few meals a week without.

Use minced pork and beef when you do and watch a video to show you how to butcher a chicken. Or get your kids to do it.

Pulses, chickpeas, couscous, bulgar etc are good. And plenty of starchy things like potatoes and rice. Eggs for protein.

We have a Sky package with TV & broadband, Netflix & sports for the football. We have most channels & it’s nowhere near what you pay?

Do you just accept the renewal price at the end of your contract? You have to call them, say it’s too much & you’re going to cancel & be prepared to go through with it.

Within days you’ll be sent offers to reinstate everything for a much lower cost.

Are you on an EV electric tariff where it’s cheaper to charge your car overnight? Was a game changer for us!

it's not 2008, pretty much any half decent broadband will be fine for wfh. Most of them just use BT infrastructure anyway.
I'm on teams calls all day with the bog standard vodafone and have never had an issue.

£151 for the milkman is insane. Just do online delivery if you get so tempted by popping in the shop!

Is cat insurance really worth it? Everyone I know says that when the cat gets old enough to actually need regular treatment the insurance plus initial payment is still very high, and vet often suggests PTS anyway. You'd be better off saving the money in an account with decent interest, that way if you need it it's there and if you don't it's a bonus.

extra license is also ridiculous. If they are able to live away at uni independently then they can take responsibility of not watching the BBC. How many young people these days watch live tv anyway?

the TV licence is paid per property not per person so it's likely that that needs to be cancelled

We bring home a bit more and our mortgage is a lot less (about 1,200 - and we overpay).

I earn £1600 per month and DH earns £1050 per month. Outgoings each month are approximately £1200 incl food so it’s like comparing apples with oranges what my income/outgoings are and the OPs figures.

I’m sorry, I know this is a me problem, I hope this hasn’t been too sensitive. It’s been really helpful just to get some perspective, I really want to cut costs as much as I can.

I can understand why that’s tight - we are on slightly more money with one less person and don’t have much left each month. Uni costs are a big factor for us - it’s several hundred a month all-in (particularly paying a lot over the summer on rent on her empty house 😡) - it’s almost like another mortgage.
£800 for food for 5 adults isn’t too bad. I think unfortunately everything is just really hard at the moment - sorry, not very helpful but just that I sympathise as we are very similar.

Oh no apology needed, I other people’s budgets fascinating.

Ours is over £1k for 5 as well, DC are early 20s

Maybe it’s not so bad 😱 I’ve done my meal plan though and told the kids/adults. They are up for it and have suggested things like bourbon biscuits and digestives as snacks so that’s better. We always have apples and satsumas but I’ve been buying berries and I’m going to knock that on the head and stick with grapes.