where does it all go?

[banneran]

So DH and I have been trying to work out why we don't seem to have as much money as we should have. I have completed a statement of affairs (see below) and on paper we should have loads left, however in reality we only have about half of this. Where are we going wrong?

Household Information[/b]
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 1
Number of cars owned.................... 2[b]

Monthly Income Details[/b]
Monthly income after tax................ 2892
Partners monthly income after tax....... 2768
Benefits................................ 96
Other income............................ 0[b]
Total monthly income.................... 5756[/b][b]

Monthly Expense Details[/b]
Mortgage................................ 1148
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 143
Electricity............................. 68
Gas..................................... 150
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 34
Telephone (land line)................... 0
Mobile phone............................ 32
TV Licence.............................. 14
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 41
Internet Services....................... 36
Groceries etc. ......................... 450
Clothing................................ 50
Petrol/diesel........................... 300
Road tax................................ 2.5
Car Insurance........................... 68
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 50
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 10
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 19
Buildings insurance..................... 16
Contents insurance...................... 17
Life assurance ......................... 46
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 50
Haircuts................................ 10
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0[b]
Total monthly expenses.................. 2754.5[/b]
[b]

Assets[/b]
Cash.................................... 4500
House value (Gross)..................... 365000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 8000
Other assets............................ 0[b]
Total Assets............................ 377500[/b]
[b]

Secured & HP Debts[/b]
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 215000...(1148).....0[b]
Total secured & HP debts...... 215000....-.........- [/b]

[b]Unsecured Debts[/b]
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Barclaycard....................7000......70........0
HSBC Loan......................5000......130.......3.8
Virgin money...................2200......22........0[b]
Total unsecured debts..........14200.....222.......- [/b]

[b]
Monthly Budget Summary[/b]
Total monthly income.................... 5,756
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 2,754.5
Available for debt repayments........... 3,001.5
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 222[b]
Amount left after debt repayments....... 2,779.5[/b]

[b]Personal Balance Sheet Summary[/b]
Total assets (things you own)........... 377,500
Total HP & Secured debt................. -215,000
Total Unsecured debt.................... -14,200[b]
Net Assets.............................. 148,300[/b]

Do you only eat Groceries?
No top up shops, coffees out, takeaways, work lunches?

How old is your child? Do they not do any activities, clubs, days out, school trips etc? Mine cost me a fortune.
Would you normally pay off more against the debt maybe?
I imagine you're spending a lot more than you think, on things not in those categories.

0 - child related expenses? Do you spend nothing on your child? No activities, toys , days out? Pocket money?

2 things jumped out for me - you're servicing a reasonably large amount of unsecured debt, and I wonder how accurate your estimates of some categories of spending might be, e.g. £690 for clothes and shoes for a family of 3 for a year.

I don’t really understand why you’d list the house value/assets tbh, you need to look at just your income & outgoings unless you’re planning on selling the house & paying everything off with the equity.

I’d use your 4.5k savings to pay off the loan, then put the money you’re paying on the loan towards paying off the credit cards until they’re cleared.

Once that’s all clear put the £222 in savings each month to build the savings back up.

0 on entertainment or holidays? No days out/activities even? You must spend money on doing things even if not big holidays.

Sorry, ^£600.

Ours goes on random stuff. So we've had house maintenance stuff to pay for this month (likely to be around 2. 5k), big family birthdays, vet bill, trip home to see my sick mum and eating out. We spend far too much eating out. We earn about £6500 net per month, mortgage of less than £1k, no childcare and we still manage to spend virtually all of it every month. (do have savings from when we didn't eat out so much!)

The classic one when people track spending is they spend much more than they think on eating out. You haven't included anything for entertainment or holidays, but unless all you do is work and sit at home there will be expense there.

I also think that estimates like £120 pa for haircuts for 3 people is likely too low...

Your best bet is to get an app like money hub and it will help you categorise the last year's transactions. It's free for the first 6 months and you will be able to see where the spending has gone.

Childcare
Cinema
Prime or netflix
Hairdresser is very cheap at £10_for 3 people

Pensio or ni deductions?

Xbox subs?
Pocket money
Gym?

We pay for green waste collection
Bus/train?

Pay off one of the Cc that will save

I found it more helpful to have at least last month expenditure written down. To reflect more accurately on spending. Then you might see patterns you didn't realise were there, not a just one off purchase.

I would pay off loans, before having savings.

I would also write cost down to the penny. I recognise some people find this more stressful. If that is you, don't forget to round up.

Even basic school uniform is probably £100 (school shoes and trainers)
School dinners
Or school bus

Mine went to secondary this year. Its 800 a year for the bus.
£20 for swimming
£15 for d&t
£200-300 for trips

Even stuff like woeld book day could be £20. And some year groups do several dress ups or trips
For my youngest has school dinners at £2.70 a day
Even scouting is £13 a month year round
And swimming £30 a month year round..
X for milk at school every day

We spend a lot buying stuff off amazon or ebay

We use a CC for everything (and auto pay off every monty so would be easy to see where money going.

Do you have no hobbies or leisure?

Is 222 towards your debt per month?

No holidays? Days out? Lunch while out shopping? Scouts? Gymnastics? Childcare? Tv or magazine subscriptions? Takeaways? Boiler repairs? Decorating? Window cleaner?

Your hairdresser costs are extremely low. As is your medical (dentist, optician, hygienist, prescription). Groceries are pretty low too, as is your estimation of gifts (Christmas, parties, wedding, birthdays, etc)

A few things there don't seem quite right.
£50 per month on clothes?! I can spend your yearly allowance for the 3 of you just onto my DC for one season!
What about buying your DC toys, books, activities, days out etc? It's surprising how much everything adds up! Especially coffees, sandwiches out etc!

As others have said you haven’t listed anything you pay for Entertainment, National Trust membership, lunch / dinner out, take-away etc. What do you do at weekends that could cost money? There is also 0 for holiday.
Also what about shopping other than clothes? crafts, toys, house items, bed linen, house repairs etc. Also are there no swimming lessons, clubs? £50 for gifts is also low, have a real count of how much you usually spend on Xmas in total for everyone, birthdays for family members, friends, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, anniversary etc

if you get an app like Snoop or YNAB you can track all your spending and it’s broken down into categories which will help so much to track spending (you will need to do this with DH if you want full transparency!)

I would use an app like snoop/moneyhub to see if that picks up things you have missed.

i would also manually track all expenses for a 3 month period. Every time you/DH spend money, write it down. If you give a child £1 for something, write it down.

I did similar once and calculated an inexplicable constant £70 a week gap. Found out a few months later my bf at the time had a £10 a day drug habit. Hope there's a much nicer explanation for this one OP! Always a useful exercise to understand where money's going.