£2500 a month, with 2 kids..budget ideas?

[momlife2021]

Hi,

Monthly income is £2500.. that's including child maintenance/benefits etc. I work full time and have 2 kiddies.

I've got £200 a month on car loan, school dinners are £100, and kids activities are £200 a month.

Out of interest how much would you budget for: mortgage/rent?
Internet
House insurance
Council tax
Water
Gas/electric
Food

Anything else I need to consider? It's scary when I see so little left over 😬

Ooo, petrol I spend about £40 a week

I don't fully understand the question. Surely you budget enough to cover whatever your monthly rent/mortgage costs, which will differ enormously depending on where you are in the country and on what kind of property you live in. Same with council tax.

Gas and electric - again, depends on the size of the property, usage etc.

Or are you about to split and trying to work out what you will need? If so, you probably need to look for local info as housing costs vary enormously.

Christmas/birthdays, uniform, kids parties, white goods, holidays, hair cuts, clothes

Normally you do the expenses first then work out what’s left for pleasure.

Rents vary in different regions so that’s what you need to look at first.

School dinners are the immediate unnecessary thing to save on.

Go onto the money saving experts website and download their budget spreadsheet.

It gives you all the categories so you can't miss one (like petrol) and you just fill in the amounts, whether they are weekly, monthly or yearly expenses. It then tells you how much you do/don't have left over each month and where you spend the most money. Well worth the 15mins it takes to do.

Much better than asking people on the Internet who don't know your circumstances

Your question is the wrong way round! You've listed the luxuries of school dinners and activities first. Work out the essentials first.

Start with the essentials, the MSE budget planner is good as it lists everything you might not have thought of.

Unless you are planning on moving house, anyone else's rent, council tax, bills etc are irrelevant to you.

If you have anything left over after essentials and debt payments, then see how much you can afford for kids activities. Could they have packed lunches? Do you meal plan and food shop to a list? If you have Netflix, Prime etc, can you do without?

Sorry, should have said that I'm newly single, separating at moment and trying to work out rough idea of what's what. A 3 bed in my area rent wise is about £900/month.
Obviously activities aren't a need but hoping I can try and keep the kids as stable as possible so they don't have too many changes etc x

Well yes I would start out with essentials, and school dinners and activities I guy have to go if you don’t have £300 spare. Packed lunch and cheaper activities could be done for £100

rent £900
car £200
find out what council tax is
electric/ gas/ water
Food for 3 - £100 per week (£400)

To give you a rough idea this is our bills for a 4 bed, 2 adults 1 toddler:

Morgage 1100
Gas/electric 150
House insurance 10
Internet 35.50
Council tax 266
Water 35
Food - 400

We do need to shop around for the internet again as I'm conscious we could get this cheaper elsewhere

We’re a family of 5 (2 adults 3 kids) and currently live off 2500 a month.

I work out all our fixed bills (which of course no one can tell you because they vary depending on area and supplier) once that’s worked out I know how much money we have left to cover food, nice to haves, savings and extras. I also try and look ahead at any fixed bills I know come out annually (like DH car insurance) so I can plan ahead for more expensive months. That way I can cut back on the nice to haves and luxuries on other months to make sure we have enough to make up the extra needed.

i meal plan and budget to keep shopping reasonable. Do one big shop at the start of the month to stock up pantry / food cupboard essentials and then just do small shops for fresh meat and veg each week.

if you can try saving a certain amount a month or week towards birthdays and Christmas so it’s not a big hit on your months budget.

we live fairly comfortably on that but are lucky our mortgage isn’t too extreme

Who is insuring your house and contents for £10.month, I need some of that!!

Do you need a 3 bed, can the kids share for a bit?

Rent
Council tax
Utilities
Car - assume PCP?
Fuel
House and buildings insurance
Life insurance unless covered by work
Food

Extra curriculars / classes for kids
Clothes
Shoes
Haircuts
Presents
Christmas
Birthdays

Pets?

You'll chew through 2.5 quickly. Are including maintenance in that figure? Do you get child benefit?

Forgot are you paying for gym / broadband / sky / mobile phone etc?

Also look for ways to make things cheaper. I shop at tesco so earn Clubcard points anyway but I convert the vouchers to their Disney plus 3 months subscription deal it’s £8 worth of vouchers for 3 months Disney plus

I would definitely look at 2 bedroom places to save a bit each month v 3 bed. With utilities and food all rapidly increasing, that couple of hundred potential difference will give you a bit for flexibility for essentials as well as maybe allow for spare for luxuries like activities

Im on my own with 2 kids (19 and 8yrs )and earning around 35k. Ive found loads of useful tips online to save money and cut costs. There are tons of things you can do and lots of people writing about it. Just seen this one this morning on twitter beamoneypro.com/10-easy-ways-to-save-a-packet/

As others have said, essentials first. Have you already moved or are planning to move?

Re Christmas and birthdays, tell family and friends that this year, or permanently, you cannot spend on presents. Only buy for your DC.

we regularly do the no presents thing.....me and my ex actually bought each other a window for the house one christmas....2 birds one stone lol