Making the money last

[samsunzo]

Evening,

I have recently found myself single again at 41. I have two teens and work as a school teacher in a senior role. I am trying to get to grips with being a single income household.
I was paid last week and all of my bills have gone out. This includes my mortgage and all of the things that I have to pay.

I have £1400 left of my wages. This has to cover - food, savings, birthdays/christmas savings etc etc.

I am trying to be sensible with the food shop and aim for £120 per week.

Do you think this is going be tight?

So you have nearly £1000 left for fun money and savings and you're worried it will be tight??

We are two adults and a 16 year old and food is more like £70 per week. Lidl. We're not even strapped for cash. Not sure how people spend so much.

Lidl
Aldi
Freecycle
Ebay

So £350/week for food, haircuts, incidentals, petrol, car maintenance, broken washing machine, a takeaway, swimming & cinema.

Track every penny but I think you'll be fine. I spend £60 a week on food for me & 17yo ds. £120 a week for three should be plenty.

How do you do it? I can't seem to get it to less than £100

Do you do batch cooking? You should be able to get it down below 100 if you shop at Lidl or Aldi and batch cook.

I definitely need to meal plan and batch cook. My 16 year old DS seems to need 1.2 million calories a day - and remains as thin as a whippet

So all your necessary bills start from food are paid and your have £1400 left?

You’re living in a completely different world to me, that’s all I can say.

You’ll be fine. You may have to forgo luxuries.

I’d really recommend the budgeting system YNAB, you’ll know exactly where your money is going and can save for all the knowns (Christmas, birthdays) and known unknowns (car repairs, house repairs etc) systematically. You’ll feel like you have a grip I promise.

Moneysaving Expert also gives budgeting advice for free.

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

As for how tight it's going to be for you, that depends on what essentials you have over 'bills'. If you still need to pay for things like car & home insurance, car servicing & repairs, Christmas, DC clothes and shoes, emergency fund for white goods replacement etc etc, it won't go far as it first appears and that's before you have to account for any change in lifestyle and discretionary spending you're going to have to make.

Can I just say not everyone can use Aldi /Lidl?! I dont have one that I could get to without a car and I dont drive. Might not be the same for OP of course, but Im just saying its not always that simple.

I would suggest recording a weeks food use/expenditure exactly - so you can see whether you are spending on want rather than need. Growing lads may feel very hungry but that doesn’t mean the only solution is 3 bowls of cereal after dinner for example

This is a really helpful suggestion. I went through (with help from a friend) and did a budget and am now tracking the actual expenditure month by month against the budget - the level of detail in the MSE budget is very helpful.

It's not just Christmas savings and food; it's pension contributions, insurance, transport, prescriptions, dental treatment, boiler servicing, dry cleaning, opticians, haircuts, clothes, shoes, costs of sports/exercise, pocket money for kids if you give them some, savings for big things like an appliance breaking down, and longer-term savings if you are able to make them.

Trying to keep food expenditure to £100 a week rather than £120 is an extra £80+ a month, which is worth having. Also worth using the MSE advice to go through your regular utilities and payments, e.g. phones, internet, and seeing if you can cut further.

I would break it down something like this
600 food
100 Christmas and Birthdays
100 house repairs
100 car maintenance
150 holidays
100 clothes
250 save

You need Dave Ramsey’s baby steps.

This.

What is the problem here? Are you used to living a luxurious lifestyle because of your former combined income?

I mentioned Lidl for context, I don't know what it would cost at e.g. Tesco.

Definitely meal plan around evening commitments, so you're not caught out by needing something ready in 15 minutes. Have a few standard cheap and easy meals, like baked potatoes, cheese and beans. A few soups you can rotate through and have cheese on toast on the side. Bean chilli.

Avoid brands. We don't buy fruit juice or fizzy drinks. Convenience foods to an absolute minimum.

We only have meat or fish a couple of times a week. Years ago I decided to try one new veggie recipe a week. If you don't like it, never have it again. After a few weeks it's easy to have a week of just veggie meals.

We have Jack Munro's first book and a couple of Miguel Barclay books.

We got in the habit of managing the food budget carefully many years ago. Our finances have improved but we just stayed with it as it's a pretty healthy diet.

Can posters stop with the nonsense goady posts ?

The OP has posted asking for help with her budget in the money matters thread, a perfectly reasonable post, and commenting that she has more money than you so what’s the problem just makes you look like an arsehole.

Maybe you can stop with the childish name calling.

👏yup!

She didn’t say they are arseholes, just that their posts are making them look like arseholes. And she’s right. The money matters forum is for everyone, not just for those on the bones of their arses. If the OP suddenly has less disposable income than previously, it’s perfectly acceptable to ask for tips on how to make it work.

Honestly @Applewatch applauding someone’s rudeness isn’t a good look, didn’t your parents ever tell you this? And do you have anything worthwhile to contribute, btw, on a thread which the OP is asking for help? Or did you just want to stir?

No, that person isn’t. And neither are you for agreeing with them. In my post I was trying to understand what the issue was. I think that’s reasonable when the poster has almost £1K disposable to last them until they get paid in a few weeks’ time. And, with some empathy, I alluded to the possible reason why OP is asking themselves if things are going to be tight until payday.

You don’t think I’m right. That doesn’t make it true. To some of us, you (and others) came across as an arsehole.

Well, it’s called having an opinion. You know, like yours.

Do you have anything worthwhile to contribute to the thread?

Do you?