Budgeting - Part 3

OK, so if you've followed step one and two (below) you should now have a list of how much all of your essential outgoings cost per month.

Add them up and see how much they come to, for me it's:

Anti-Virus Software for laptop = £3.57*
Breakdown Cover for car = £4.00*
Car Insurance = £33.00*
Car Loan = £122.60
Car Tax = £10.00*
Joint A/c payment (for bills) = £542.50
Mobile = £15.00
MOT & Service = £21.00*
Petrol = £15.00
Train Fare = £51.00

Total = £817.67

OK, so now minus this from your monthly take home:

£1396.17 - £817.67 = £578.50

That is the money you have left to play with. Now obviously you'll need to set some aside for everyday spending - for things you haven't included in your essentials list (e.g. hair cuts, meals out, gifts), but you can also set some aside for savings too. How you decide to do this will be personal choice, I sometimes go for a 50/50 split, other times I'll do a bit of jiggery-pokery if I know I've got an expensive month coming up, this month it'll be:

£387.50 into savings
£176.47 into the kitty for anything else

The kitty has to cover my monthly payments of anything that's not included in the essential items and also any potential over-spend. How do I ensure this happens? Well, I'll let you in on that little gem tomorrow.

Enjoy the sunshine!

xx

*You may notice that some of these items won't be paid for monthly, but I set money aside for them (it sits in my current account) nonetheless, then when it's time for the MOT (or whatever) the money is sitting there ready!