Budgeting

[shedidwhatnow]

I want to work on our budget and have a monthly amount for everything.

We currently budget weekly.

How do you budget monthly when some months are longer than others? £75 per week food shopping works out at £325 a month but if one month has an extra week it’ll be a struggle.

Apologies in advance if this is a daft question!!

If you want a weekly budget then you multiply by 52 and then divide by 12

So if your food shopping is £75 weekly
It’s a total of £3900 per year
£10.68 per day
£325 per month

If you divide £325 by 31 days it equals £10.48
And there are never more than 31 days in a month

Ahh how easy was that!!

Had a complete mental block. Thank you!!

Would anyone critique my new budget if I posted it?

Yep!

Thanks! Ive done it on a spreadsheet but will summarise here. It’s all a figure for the month but some of it will be paid for weekly if that makes sense eg kids clubs and food shop.

Income including child benefit: £3508

Monthly Expenditure:
Mortgage 500
Car HP 341.32 (ridiculous I know! It’ll be paid off soon)
Council Tax 134
Gas/Electric 93
Kids Club A 32
Life/Mortgage Insurance 29.37
TV Licence 12.83
Mobiles for two adults 35
Home Insurance 10.90
Pet Insurance 12.46
Broadband 28
Now TV 10.29
Spotify 9.99
School 20
Childcare 80
Coffee 20
Total = £1369.16

Weekly Expeniture (monthly amount):
Food 325
Fuel 195
Kids Club B 16.5
Kids Club C 11
Entertainment 100
Total = £647.5

Annual Expenditure (monthly amount):
Christmas 83
MOT 41.67
School Uniform 300
Birthdays 41.66
Kids Club D 18
Car Insurance 41.67
Holidays 100
Haircuts 30
Clothes 50
Total = £431.01

Ok so total in is £3508 and total out is £2447.67.

I’m not necessarily looking to reduce things because I’m quite happy with what we’re paying for things. I think our fixed outgoings are reasonable.

It’s more the last category (not including kids club) I’m looking for advice on. Do these amounts seem ok? This is my proposed budget but I don’t know if it’s reasonable. Is there anything else I should be planning for?

We have credit card debt of £4550.65 and paying that off is an absolute priority. It’s 0% but I just want rid. I haven’t included my current credit card payment as would like to be ploughing most if not all of the surplus into this. We’re also getting married this year and I don’t know how much to be saving for this! So where should I be directing this leftover £1000? At the moment it doesn’t seem to be leftover at all but if we stick to the above I don’t see how it can’t be.

Thanks!!

You both need weekly spends?

School Uniform 300

Surely not per month? Haircuts and clothes seem low for all of you.

Oh jeez!! Made a mistake typing it from my spreadsheet to here. So it’s £300 in total for school uniforms which is £25 per month!! Total spend still correct.

Weekly spends I was kind of classing there as entertainment. Tbf we don’t do much! We have one day together as a family and would spend some money that day but maybe £25 or so isn’t enough for this?

Haircuts again we probably don’t do often enough! I think July was maybe the last time me and the kids had ours done and OH gets his done maybe once every 2/3 months. We sound like rights scruffs here!! But should I up this allocation amount?

Definitely think 300 pm for uniform is unnecessary, maybe just create an annual sinking fund of 600 for that, that’s what I do and I have to pay for books as well as uniform etc

Also 41.66 is random for birthdays I would just make it 40.

Didn’t see uniform update 🤣🤣

I'm planning to check this against my budget later - it might be helpful for both of us 😄.

Can either of you change mobile phone contracts? I thought that your mobile phones looked expensive.

I track my budget using Excel, and show the yearly, monthly, and weekly costs for everything that I include. I then sort by cost, from most expensive to least. It can be eye opening to compare the relevant cost of different things.

Funnily enough before I even read your reply I had called EE to ask about leaving because you can get some cracking sim only deals now. So I think I’ll have a shake up with the mobiles and broadband too. I really really fancy sky which I know isn’t very money saving but if I could get that too for the total cost of our mobiles and broadband now I think I could justify it. Possibly

I totally agree that writing it all down is eye opening.

So weekly spends isn't just "entertainment" it's that "I fancie a coffee" "I need paracetamol" "fuck we forgot bread" "whip around at work" moment.

Do you track every penny? I do. Every three days or so I log on to my bank and then wrote into Excel.

The money I have at the bottom is formulated to decrease with every additional spend, it's eye opening to see where my money goes.

£10,140 on fuel 🚗 😮

@ivykaty44 she means 195 per month so 195 x12 which is 2,340

Oh that’s somewhat better, but still high. It’s worth looking at alternatives

I have an old Astra estate 1.8 on duel fuel and can do 300 miles for £10/12

Imagine that being your fuel bill. I don’t drive a tractor

I’m not sure what we could even do about the fuel tbh. Any thoughts on that? I drive 35 miles a day to work every day then we’re back and forward 4 nights out of 7 to clubs with the kids then my partner does 90 miles one day at the weekend and we’re generally out somewhere on the other day. It’s a 1.6 diesel family hatchback, nothing fancy. An extremely brief look on the train line website tells me I’d be £41.50 for a weekly ticket to commute by train to our nearest major city - which I’ll probably do one day unfortunately

So sad I’ve just done this but worked out we do approx 350 miles per week allowing for 20 on a Sunday (could be more or less depending on what we’re up to). Possibly the fact that most of them are multiple short journeys in a day isn’t helping fuel economy.

I really should do that! Must definitely help to keep you in check.

So you’re doing 35 miles per day which is 245 every day

• 90 + 20 and clubs =?

That’s costing you £50 in fuel per week

I got a dual fuel as was doing many miles for clubs etc so it cost £12 for 300 miles

Electric car
Car sharing and someone helps with cost

Combinations

Yea we tend to put about £40 in per week but we always run out so I put it as £45 in the budget.

Is a dual fuel petrol and diesel or what? I’ve never heard of one!

I’d really be interested to hear how much fuel others use in a week because this is something I’ve not given much thought to before if I’m honest.

Posted from wrong username and reported so it may disappear.

Intrigued by this electric car malarkey!

1058 remaining each month - for starters do you actually have that leftover each month? Check your bank statements

I know you said you’re not looking to reduce outgoings BUT you have debt to pay off and a wedding to pay for so it seems silly to pay more for things if you don’t need to. Especially if you’d still be getting the same thing for a lower amount.

Monthly Expenditure:

Mortgage 500

Car HP 341.32 (ridiculous I know! It’ll be paid off soon) - I know you’ve noted it’s high but how?!

Council Tax 134

Gas/Electric 93 - do you shop around regularly to keep as low as possible? Reduce usage where possible?

Kids Club A 32

Life/Mortgage Insurance 29.37 - again have you shopped around?

TV Licence 12.83 - mines gone up to £13.20 hasn’t everyone’s?

Mobiles for two adults 35 - assume this is phones AND call plans? When do the contracts run out? If call plans only there are many cheaper plans out there, combine with properly planned use like only downloading stuff at home on WiFi and you can reduce this to as little as £7.50 per month each. Have you insurance for the phones? It’s the one thing I consider worth spending a little extra on to get a good one.

Home Insurance 10.90 - shopped around?

Pet Insurance 12.46 - shopped around?

Broadband 28 - I’m 18.99 for this who are you with?

Now TV 10.29 - must admit this is an area I also spend on as I have amazon prime AND Netflix but I’m housebound so it’s my one pleasure and helps my anxiety

Spotify 9.99 - never felt the need to go premium on this I don’t mind the ads. Also I like listening to radio do you ever listen that way? I also need to take advantage of prime music which I haven’t got around to yet

School 20

Childcare 80

Coffee 20 - seems cheap if you’re a coffee on the go person is it what you’re actually spending though?

Total = £1369.16

Weekly Expeniture (monthly amount):

Food 325 - would need to know family size for this one

Fuel 195 - tough to call as depends on work location etc

Kids Club B 16.5

Kids Club C 11

Entertainment 100 - again is this what you’re actually spending, it’s one many people underestimate

Total = £647.5

Annual Expenditure (monthly amount):

Christmas 83 - again family size? You might make savings by actually buying certain items in sales rather than saving to buy in nov/Dec when there are rarely sales on

MOT 41.67

School Uniform 300 - I hope you’re not spending this much a month that’s a hell of a lot! Ah £25 per month seems more reasonable.

Birthdays 41.66 - again family size?

Kids Club D 18 - why so many different kids clubs?

Car Insurance 41.67 - do you shop around? Implement things that can reduce?

Holidays 100 - is this for honeymoon or do you always have holidays? I would say this is very much a luxury at least until the debt paid off

Haircuts 30 - every month? I’ve cut my own and dds hair for years but occasionally treat to a professional tidy up

Clothes 50 - again family size?

Total = £431.01

What type of wedding are you thinking of? What’s the family dynamics there? I used to work in the industry and it’s entirely possible to have a fun, beautiful day without spending a fortune but no of guests definitely a factor.

I Googled dual fuel car, and it seemed to be normal fuel + LPG.