Very high spending - where to cut down?

[AguaMolePedraDura]

NC for this so I can be frank. My spending is a mess - DH high earner and great with sharing as needed so it’s not leaving us broke but I’m just losing my mind every month at money seemingly vanishing. To compound the mess some of my expenses are actually work expenses that I claim back in arrears, so I battle to get a handle on my actual domestic spending. Hoping writing it down will help (and what's here is my actual spending, not work stuff).

My income: £1,700 pt work + £600 net rental income from property + £1,000 DH transfers to me for shared costs - £3,300.

Expenses in September:
£1,165.00 - childcare + holiday club for half term. I think there's another £84 for after school care for the month that I paid late
£551 - groceries (bigger shops at Ocado + Lidl, then about 20 tiny top-up shops)
£283 - car finance
£250 - credit card - mix of airbnb costs from during building works + £100 in food shooping + takeaway
£211 - loan repayment, taken out during building works
£150 - eating out (various small meals/coffees with kids or alone)
£145 - swimming lessons 1:1
£80 - one-off physio appointment
£20 overdraft interest
£283 - car finance

£100 - withdrawn at cashpoint. Can’t remember this at all, wonder if it was to buy something 2nd hand for the kids off Marketplace etc.
£60 transport (£23 fuel, £7 Uber, remainder on TfL buses/tube)
£22 - Entertainment (Netflix, Apple cloud storage, bookshop)
£13.00 - app subscription DD
£3.80 - charity subscription
£45 - car insurance
£95 - SumUp - no idea what this was substantively
£48 - critical illness insurance
£4.60 x2 - google cloud - no idea why x2
£36 - gift for friend following surgery
£3.60 - booking for Halloween activity
£20 - new bin

= £3,743.60.

Childcare is about to get marginally cheaper (by about £100 pm) but as I have toddler twins + older child that will be expensive for at least another year.

Groceries doesn't even reflect our total spend because DH tends to "pop in" (doom) to M&S and buy things, plus will get lunches out. But it already feels high, because I often have food home from work (not exactly, but imagine I work in a kitchen and on a weekly basis get £30ish of fresh produce or similar that is surplus to requirements). So should be lower really. I've no idea why it's so high and wonder whether groceries + meals out is the thing to clamp down on. We don't drink at all so groceries is only food + nappies + household things.

Obviously there are other expenses (mortgage, bills) - these are with DH so I haven't included them.

Where would you start?

So he's paying £4k plus £1k to you.

You're paying £1500

I don't think he does need to be paying more to you tbh.

You need to get a better grasp on where the unaccounted money is going, do fewer top up shops cos they're expensive and accept that you're choosing your lifestyle. I'd work on sorting out your debt - is in interest free? Can you move it if not.

Is your husband not able to just pay off the finance and loans completely.

This will free up some of the income.

801 on food is excessive so start with the food. Have 2 set amounts for food, 1 for takeaways and eating out, and 1 for day to day food. Identify how far the first amount will take you (1 takeaway and 1 meal out a month), knowing once it’s gone it’s gone. For the second amount start doing a weekly shop that actually gets everything you need and ban yourselves from popping to the shop in between. Make sure you meal plan but also get in a few options you could use for days that get away from you when you can’t be assed to cook. Frozen pizza, beans on toast, anything quick and easy really.

I assume you are putting away money to cover the tax on the rental income.

Your DH is not contributing enough.

Pool the money or split by the ratio of what he earns and what you earn. He needs childcare as much as you do. It's not your expense.

For any work expenses get a separate credit card which you only use for those and it keeps it all separate from personal expenditure.

The budgeting tips on this thread are great but I don't think this is a family that needs to switch to own brand baked beans to keep their heads above water. Their joint income is £10,800. Their joint expenses can't be more than £7-8k a month (we don't have all the info about energy, council tax, etc on this thread so that is a toppy guesstimate). If they want to cut down on day to day expenditure that is fine but they are not on the breadline. Their finances are just poorly organised.

it would appear from OP that DH pays mortgage of £3500, the council tax, gas and electric house and car insurance holidays renovations etc easily another 1500 -2000 total 5000-5500
of the money the OP spent around £500 could be classed as personal the rest the rest equates to £3200
so it appears that there is at least £8200-8700 plus going on accounted for bills and stuff then if her DH spends £500 too each month thats £9300
despite high income they are almost living paycheck to paycheck

in all honesty you need a meeting with DH to look at spending the bills may only be £6000 but there is a lot of extras creeping in on the base you have a large income but you are counting them all as one offs, when there is a different one off each month
the fact that you are high earners doesn't mean you don't need a budget OK so it doesn't matter if supermarket bill is £525 instead of £500 or if your gas bill is an extra £50 in the winter but you can't just do £5000 holiday £ 5000 decorating etc each month when your surplus each month is only £1000-1500

either you cut your spending so you save more for the important stuff to you like holidays or

You may have bought the flat, but the longer you are married, the more it'll be subsumed to become part of joint marital property.

Honestly, your financial arrangements with your husband are just bonkers. You are working part-time but seem to be carrying most of the financial burden apart form the mortgage and things like home improvements and holidays..

You really need to think about how this is going to work long-term, and also consider how you'd fare if you ever get divorced. You may think this will never happen, but the fact is that nearly half of marriages end in divorce, so you have to plan for all eventualities.

By working part-time, you are sacrificing a lot of career progression and pension contributions, as well as other ways of saving such as ISAs. Given the disparity in incomes, your husband has to contribute to these investments so that you are not disadvantaged. You also ought to be aware of how much of his income is in the form of shares, and what degree of risk this may entail.

And you need to have a plan for your career.

So your DHs money goes on paying for his DPs holidays and expensive lunches whilst you're so concerned about your spending you've produced a line item monthly expenditure and paying overdraft interest .
It's simple really, DH should be contributing half of the expenses at the least, and it should include enough for you to have some modest luxuries such as the occasional haircut or new pack of knickers. £2000 a month would be a start.

As a family you should both aim to have
Equal leisure time. If you gave more free time than him, then work to kae this happen
Equal spending money by pooling it

Oh and the critical illness amount seems high, I'd probably just scrap that and take my chances.

Hi OP, I can see that there are a lot of comments about your DH's contributions etc and I won't add to that. But just by looking at your September expenses you could do the following:

Expenses in September:

£1,165.00 - childcare + holiday club for half term. I think there's another £84 for after school care for the month that I paid late

Childcare is a temporary thing - not much you can do about this

£551 - groceries (bigger shops at Ocado + Lidl, then about 20 tiny top-up shops)

Why are doing 20 tiny top up shops? You need to buy more during your bigger shops and use the freezer/food cupboard more. Think batch cooking, homemade treats, longlife milk etc. This could cut your food outgoings by about £100.

£283 - car finance

Can you get a cheaper car?

£250 - credit card - mix of airbnb costs from during building works + £100 in food shooping + takeaway

More food shopping??

£211 - loan repayment, taken out during building works
£150 - eating out (various small meals/coffees with kids or alone)

Reduce eating out - take thermos for soups or coffees instead. Or just buy things from cheaper places i.e. McDonalds. Waitrose do free coffees for Waitrose loyalty card holders.

£145 - swimming lessons 1:1

Do swimming lessons have to be 1:1? Can they not be in a group? And are the kids now competent enough to no longer need lessons - take them to your local pool and do family fun swims together instead.

£80 - one-off physio appointment
£20 overdraft interest
£283 - car finance
£100 - withdrawn at cashpoint. Can’t remember this at all, wonder if it was to buy something 2nd hand for the kids off Marketplace etc.

£60 transport (£23 fuel, £7 Uber, remainder on TfL buses/tube)

£22 - Entertainment (Netflix, Apple cloud storage, bookshop)

Can you get rid of any of this?

£13.00 - app subscription DD
£3.80 - charity subscription

£45 - car insurance
£95 - SumUp - no idea what this was substantively
£48 - critical illness insurance

£48 seems quite high for Critical Illness insurance - perhaps look at other providers

£4.60 x2 - google cloud - no idea why x2
Take your card details off Google Cloud/App Store!!

£36 - gift for friend following surgery
£36 is generous... even £10 flowers would have been fine, or homemade cookies!

£3.60 - booking for Halloween activity
£20 - new bin

I don't think you're overspending in many areas except food. For any other subscriptions/insurances - call them up and say you're thinking of moving to a new supplier - they'll hand you over to their retention team and give you a discount!

I also find the Money Saving Expert weekly emails are quite handy!

Why are there 20 top up shops. That's nearly every day you're shopping.

The other thing is I'm not sure why you are so self deprecating about your spending. Apart from a couple of unknowns - Sum up and google cloud, and a couple of expensive insurances- car and critical illness, it doesn't seem like you are mindlessly frittering money away.

I don't think the grocery cost is ridiculous for 4 people, food is expensive these days and if it stops you eating out or buying lunches then it's not wasted money.

The other thing is I'm not sure why you are so self deprecating about your spending.

@rookiemere tbh I know our combined income is high (hell, there are plenty of families for whom my solo income would represent a big uplift) so I feel like going into overdraft every month should happen when if we blow out at Christmas or go nuts in a high end store. Actually other than private swim classes (which we have some reasons for, even if they are absolutely a choice) we’re not eating caviar and dressing in Burberry, or even Boden. It just seems like very high spending for what isn’t a big lifestyle.

And I genuinely have no idea how we spend so much on food, especially given my work. Others are being more generous about it than I am; I think it’s nuts.

As in, I do actually care how much baked beans cost (no one gets Heinz here!), the car is a mid-market sedan, I traipse to Lidl rather than buying the more expensive nappies. I don’t see myself signing up to much of a lifestyle here.

Thanks everyone for comments. There are a few concrete actions to get on with.

You seem incredibly generous to others, but ever so hard in yourself.
I bet your DH isn't doing a clinical analysis of his - unnecessary- M&S costs, or wondering why he is paying for his parents flights when you have an overdraft and a loan. Ditto your lodgers are probably delighted that their rent hasn't increased for a number of years in a period of high inflation, but you really should put it up even a nominal amount.

Costs are high these days - we are both higher rate earners (Scotland so not as exciting as it sounds) and have paid off the mortgage, but our monthly outgoings seem ridiculously high without much of a lifestyle to show for it.

You need to get rid of this notion that you are somehow hopeless with money and your DH is the parsimonious one, from what you have written here it's patently not the case, and both of you need to look at your finances together.

Agree you are not to blame.

But agree with posters it's impossible to address these costs this way. You both need to talk about essential outgoing that can't be changed.

Then look at the joint surplus.

Once you have that have bank accounts with different pots like a joint monza or somewhere where you can put money for annual expenses like Christmas and birthdays. Another for holidays, long term saving.
Have a budget for weekly spend s and food is generally 100 to 150 for 4 so work around that on weekly food shops.
Food is our biggest weekly expense.

Then whats left after everything you want saved it put away... Is free money.

He him to transfer you another grand.

£30 a week on food per person? Sorry I just don't ever believe that when I read it, much less these days, it's just bunkum.

You're an adult not a dependent. You should have a joint approach to family finances not you going cap in hand when money runs out (and I say that as the spouse who is the higher earner)

I don't understand why so many people over-complicate family finances. Both salaries go into a joint account. From this account all essential households bills are taken (including childcare). Then what is left over is split between savings and 'discretionary' spending where each person gets the same amount.

There are so many posts involving one person paying for this, the other for that, money transferred between them based on a ratio...honestly it's ridiculously complicated and in many cases, unfair.

Agree.

@Autumnunmasks 'Sorry I just don't ever believe that when I read it, much less these days, it's just bunkum.'

No it isn't. £60 is my budget each week. I cook from scratch and buy seasonal. It's not difficult., although I don't buy alcohol.

I’d set up a meeting with your bank manager. Hand him divorce papers.

@AguaMolePedraDura you need to rethink. You need to sit down together and work this budget out. A joint account just for household expenses where both of you transfer enough money into to cover everything will help if you don’t want to pool everything. You can’t do this alone it needs to be together.

Work out total income
Work out outgoings, debits, etc
Work our remaining debt totals.
Make a plan going forward, set a budget, look at our food costs, snowball debts if you can.
Plan savings instead of relying on credit cards for holidays etc or if you use a card you can pay it back next month.
Seperate account for your work expenses.

I don’t think your husband is deliberately withholding money from the family, not sure why some are giving him a hard time. He may need to reign in the spending in M&S etc for a bit while you sort this!

With what you e said. I think you’ve moved house/ Reno project and haven’t adjusted after paying out so much. Your budget will have changed and cost of living has risen. Even with that crazy mortgage people earning over 10k a month should be living a comfortable lifestyle.