spending – Frugirl Finance

The end of the month has come upon us, particularly after having announced my financial goals for 2020.

Unfortunately, things weren’t always so peachy for me this month. These were January’s biggest offenders:

Buying clothes

I spent £77 on clothes this month, bearing in mind that I was supposed to be on a low-buy 2020 and trying to avoid fast fashion for sustainability reasons and all that.

I bought two pairs of jeans, hair ties and a pair of shoes. I didn’t really need to, but I had coveted these pieces for so long that when I found these, I couldn’t stop myself from reaching out for the credit card.

Here’s the funniest thing … I couldn’t “afford” the clothes under my pre-allocated budget, so I ended up purchasing the items either on credit or via a pay later scheme, to be borne by future me next month. I could have dipped into my emergency savings to pay for the clothes this month… but it works out better for cash flow this way.

(Nearly) losing my Oyster card

Last week, as I was heading to my monthly volunteering session, I realise that I had misplaced my Oyster card. You know, the pay-as-you-go card that I stupidly hadn’t registered on the TfL website and that contained a full £19.90, ripe for the picking. In the event I needed to hop on the Tube in fairly short order, so I had to cough up multiple journeys during London’s rush hour … full fare. Ouch.

Luckily for me though, the next day I approached the concierge at my firm and was told that someone had found a stray Oyster card by the entrance of the building. I couldn’t verify that it was mine, but thankfully he gave it to me anyway. When I tapped it on the machine at my local station, the balance seemed about right.

This brings me to a sneaky expenditure that I never properly budgeted for: lost Ousters. I lose my Oyster card a few times a year, which needlessly sets me back £100 or so a year.

I’ll check back in with solutions once I find a way to deal with my habit of lost Oyster cards. Stay tuned.

Overspending on treats

Because I have started restricting myself on buying stuff from Amazon and clothes and skincare shops, my shopaholic tendencies ended up shifting to other things. Like food, for instance. And “gifts” for others. It’s an especially potent combination when it’s a gift for others that happens to be food.

This month I massively overspent when buying gifts for colleagues. I wanted them to eat the sweets that I really enjoyed, so ended up blowing my entire allocated budget to do it. Eep.

FEBRUARY AT A GLANCE

Not going to lie, Feb is looking a bit steep money-wise …

Important birthdays in February mean that I will be set back £200 or so (taking into account gifts and going out)
I will be heading to Vienna for a weekend to see friends – that would take a sizeable chunk of my budget
I will pay off my clothing “debt” next month, which means my actual purchasing power will be curtailed. Is it too late to return those items now…?

With love

Frugirl

My financial philosophy in life is simple: live below your means and save the rest.

But I am not one of those people who ascribe to a completely monastic lifestyle by scrimping on basic necessities. On the contrary, I am a fully-fledged person with (sometimes expensive) hobbies, interests, and a penchant for high quality food and life’s best pleasures.

But I am also cognisant of the fact that I am saving for retirement at a rate that is perhaps far more aggressive than that expected of my contemporaries.

How best does one reconcile living life to the maximum on the barest of minimums in this situation?

I don’t know how best one should do it. But I know how best I do it … and that is through a well-thought out budget that makes provision for what will truly add value to my life and eliminating everything else.

Below is a breakdown of my monthly budget, which I will stick to to achieve the goals that I set for myself in 2020, but which, I hope, will allow me to live the life I deem valuable, meaningful and intentional.

You will see that I have not attempted to economise on many things: my rent, for instance, could be lower than the 36% of my income that it already is. And I have been quite generous with my provision hobbies and productive activities like language learning.

MONTHLY BUDGET 2020

FIXED INCOME
Monthly take home pay (net of tax and pension deductions): £3275

OUTGOINGS
Monthly auto-savings and investments: £1500
Rent, council tax, bills: £1180
Phone bill: £10
Contact lens: £20
Physiotherapy and massages: £110
Chinese and Japanese lessons: £90
Transport: £30
Ice skating: £15
Hiking: £20

Left to spend: £300
Of which the breakdown is roughly as follows: £150 on groceries, £100 on socials and eating out, £50 on other discretionary spending.

All in all the breakdown looks like this:

You will see that there are a lot of unusual categories in my budget. Language lessons, massages, skating, hiking take up a massive portion of my non-rent spending. I could easily cut those out and funnel the extra change to going out or shopping.

But the idea behind an intentional budget is to spend only on things that add value to your life. These activities add value to my life: massages are a great way to condition my body, skating/hiking is a great way to spend time on physical activity with others, and language lessons have been such a great way to engage in productive hobbies. The £235 I budgeted for these activities alone bring far greater rewards to my life than their monetary worth.

And you? What do you deem worthy in your life to add to your budget?

With love,
Frugirl

Tag: spending

Frugirl Fails: January

Creating a budget that works for you