Annual expenses

[Stripybasket]

Trying to budget thoroughly for the new year and wondered if anyone could share their annual expenses so I can see what I have missed. So far I have

Car and associated costs
Tv licence
Home ins
Boiler service
School uniform
Haircuts
Birthday parties

What else am I missing?

Christmas

Housing costs - rent/ mortgage / maintenance/ refreshing decor/ new soft furnishings etc
Food??
Phone / internet
Clothes / shoes for adults & children
Holidays?

Mobile phone
clothing / shoes
contingency for emergencies (white goods breaking down)
gardening expenses
hobbies - regular school clubs
school trips?
any pets? Vax, insurance and food
subscriptions eg Netflix

Im assuming you’ve got utilities covered already in the budget? Everything is going up next year, not by a huge amount for me, but when I tot it all up it’s about another 130 a month I need to try and find. I can set heating any lower without house feeling damp so will need to try and carve this off the food shops.

Dentist costs
Opticians
Toiletries including skincare/makeup
Magazine subscriptions

Birthdays
Pet inoculations
Pet insurance
Subscriptions
Rent/mortgage
Service charge
Council tax
Gas/heating oil
Electricity
Water
Sewerage
Broadband
Clubs
Footwear
Public transport
DC pocket money
Life insurance
Mobile phones
Union membership
Professional fees
Holidays
MOT
Car insurance
Tyres
Servicing
Road tax
diesel/petrol
Virgin/Sky
Contents insurance
Buildings insurance
Savings
Prescription charges
Dental costs
Opticians costs
Clothing

Groceries
Eating out

Fuel
Road tax
MOT
Car insurance
Public transport
Parking

Council tax
Grounds fee
Energy
Water
BBC licence fee
Landline
Mobile phone
Home insurance
Cleaner
Window cleaner

Eye checks
Eyeglasses
Dental checkups
Dental hygienist
Dental plan/insurance

Pet insurance
Pet food
Pet supplies (e.g., cat litter)
Veterinary checkups and vaccinations

Entertainment (e.g., Netflix, Disney Channel)
National Trust, English Heritage membership or similar

Haircuts
Barber
Facials
Massages
Toiletries/makeup

Kids activities (e.g., Scouts, swimming, fencing)
Kit for kids activities
School uniform
School trips (e.g., skiing)

Private health care
Other insurance (e.g., critical illness personal accident)
Financial services

Technology and phone or TV contracts.
Clothes and shoes
Holidays and school trips/activities
Home and garden purchases

Oh yes, also:

Childcare
Internet
Gym membership
Fitness classes
Travel insurance
Holidays (accommodation, tours, food, flights/travel)
Pet sitter
Charities
Lottery

Moneysavingexpert.com has a complete list that you can pick what's relevant to you from. Also has hints about reducing the cost where possible to free up money for saving, spending etc

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/banking/budget-planning/

Lots of people listing what I would consider regular monthly costs that I budget from monthly income (and often are debited monthly).

Things that I budget separately as 'one-offs' are;
Car insurance
Birthdays
Christmas
Holidays
Boiler service
House items (not necessarily essential but usually I'll spend a bit of money on the garden in Spring for example)

And then a 'float' for surprise items like vets (although do have insurance), house emergencies/repairs etc.

My annual budget lines are:
Car Insurance
Road Tax
Christmas
DS birthday
Holidays
Memberships (for us this is the Zoo, National Trust, Merlin, and a couple of museums we like that you pay once and the membership covers the year)
Amazon Prime/Disney+

I also put money in sinking funds every month for the following, but I work it out based on what I spend annually:
Birthdays
Car repairs/maintenance (Inc MOT)
Kids Clothes
My Clothes
DS classes and activities (because these are rarely available to pay monthly, with so many at 6 week/termly fees I just add it all up annually and have it ready to pay when due)
House Maintenance

I think all of ours they are covered above but we also budget for our window cleaner who comes monthly £15

I'm an accountant so our personal finances are run like a business 😊. I do P&Ls, cashflow forecasts etc.

I track all spending. I have a cashback spreadsheet based on everything spent by card and cash. My spend categories are broken down into:

• Food (supermarket groceries)
• Going out (pub, takeaways and meals out)
• Alcohol
• Household (things like cleaning products, batteries, diy stuff)
• health and beauty ( toiletries and medicines, loo rolls)
• Beauty appts (hairdresser, wax, nails)
• phone and tv (subscriptions and payg)
• gifts
• holidays
• decorating (for all refurb work weve had done)
• school (lunches, uniforms and trips)
• insurance
• pets
• car
• fuel and parking

Then I account for all other income and outgoings per month, mainly fixed.

• mortgage payment, overpayments and monthly interest paid
• council tax
• utilities
• net salaries in
• all other income received
• bank fees paid, rewards and cashback received
• broadband

I'm sure I've missed something but it's early.

I've been doing this since 2015 so had 10yrs to tweak categories for what we need, when we need it. Eg. We've just started camping and I wanted to track the cost of supplies we've bought so that is a sub heading under holidays.

I don't have a budget per category but note averages per month over the years. I can see that we used to spend around £260pm on food and now it's £460.

I try to keep insurance the same or less than last year.

I budget my monthly spends, so everything on the credit card, ideally less than £1000pm but things crop up that don't always make it possible.

https://www.moneyhelper.org.uk/en/everyday-money/budgeting/budget-planner

this is a great budgeting tool and it will allow you to put in bills either monthly, weekly or annually and calculate it for you at the end

I have pocket accounts with an online bank that give me interest on my money - so every month on pay day the money gets allocated into all the pocket accounts. Then when the car insurance needs paying, the money can be taken straight out of that account or the same with car tax. I also put monthly money into pocket account for fuel and shopping.

council tax 10x payments divided by 12

utilities, electric and gas - paid into packet account and pay bill monthly for exactly what I use with meter reading

Water bill on water meter rather than water rates

rent/mortgage

internet and mobile phone

house insurance and building insurance

gym

car tax, car MOT, car servicing, car insurance

fuel for car

Christmas and birthday presents

Christmas food this really adds up for the week, not just the day. So I put £20 a month in a pot

hair cuts we all got to the same hairdressers/barber and its the same price

annual holidays

savings

the money that is left in my account after all the bills are allocated for is mine to spend, any money not spend is swept into savings or xmas presents

The great thing about my pocket accounts - they pay interest and each account - so 12 accounts over about 2 banks so each account interest at least buys me one cup of coffee a month.

No way am I letting an energy company use my money any longer for free loan, when I can get interest on the monthly amount winter and summer and pay them exactly what I owe them

@MikeRafone which bank does this? I use Monzo for the pots but getting frustrated as there are a maximum of 10.

Great tips thanks. General month to month stuff is already budgeted for so it's just the big ticket things like insurances and Christmas that I'm thinking of.

I don’t have all my accounts with one bank

chase bank offer interest on there accounts - at different rates. And one percent cash back up to £15 per month. 3.5 % 4.5% in one account and 5% on round up account

i have Amazon prime which all my family use / so they transfer the money to me and then I order 😉 so the money in helps qualify me for next month, I get 1% if there Amazon purchases and I’d have prime anyway as it saves me money on postage on 61 orders this year

If you use YNAB software (34 days free, and a life changing methodology), it has preset categories. You can redo them for your own situation and set targets weekly/monthly/yearly/eventually