20 Financial Milestones to Reach in Your 20s (ish)

Posted by louisa on Wednesday 9 February 2011 in personal finance | 1 comment

A list of “20 Financial Milestones You Want to Reach in Your 20′s” has been circulating around many Generation-Y-ish personal finance blogs recently. I’m not quite in my 20s any more – I’m 31 – but it feels more like a stage of life thing (no kids, first steps on property ladder, student debts etc) rather than an exact age, so it would be interesting to see how I’ve done.

(The original list is from the USA but I’ve UK-ised it a bit to make it more relevant – but stuck to similar sentiments. The bits in italics are explanations from the original list.)

# 1 – Finance a dream vacation…in cash – done
We went to Russia in 2005 when we were 26 – somewhere I’d always wanted to go. We had a week split between two of the top hotels in central Moscow & St Petersburg, with a night in a first class sleeper inbetween. It was lovely, expensive but lovely.

We paid for the hotels & our flights on credit cards for security reasons but they were paid off in full the same month so I guess that was paid for “in cash”.

All our other holidays in our 20s – mostly city breaks around Europe or weeks in shabby-chic cottages on the coast – were actually paid for in cash or the same credit-card-then-immediate-pay-off arrangement. They were all dreamy :)

# 2 – Pay off your student loans – done
I came out of university with about £8,000 in debt – £1250 in an interest-free (for two years) overdraft, the rest as actual student loans. I paid off my overdraft within two years of graduating and finished paying off my student loans in the March before my 30th birthday. (I could have deferred payment after my salary dropped when I became self-employed at 26 but decided to keep paying.)

# 3 – Automate paying your credit card bill in full – done
Yes, but only when I was about 28. Before then, I only paid off the minimum automatically so, in theory, I could manage my cashflow better in lean months but I pretty much paid it off in full every month anyway so finally fully automated it.

# 4 – Get rid of all bad debt – done
A good way to see what bad debt and good debt is is by asking yourself if the underlying asset appreciates or depreciates in value. If the asset appreciates, like a house, than categorize it as good debt. If the asset depreciates, like a car, etc… then it’s bad debt.

The only debts I had were my student overdraft/loans and my mortgage. I’ve still got the mortgage but at the moment, that’s not “bad debt”.

12 in 11 clothing challenge: savings jar motivator

Posted by louisa on Monday 7 February 2011 in anti-consumerism, less than 12 clothes challenge | 1 comment

Taphophile has come up with a great idea for staying motivated during the “12 in 11” clothes challenge.

An artificial limiting-yourself challenge like this can feel like self-denial for the sake of it, which isn’t exactly a good motivator — but Taph has decided to flip that on its head.

How do I keep motivated and show results? While the seven things challenge is partially about reduction, there is a cumulative total that helps measure progress. It is the external indicator of inward progress.

Enter the “savings” jar. Each time I overcome the temptation to buy clothing which pre-challenge would have come home, the value of the item goes into a jar. This creates a visual reminder of progress and ensures there will be cash on hand when the perfect garment appears or to pay for repairs I can’t make myself or buy materials to transform already owned garments (there are some tops and shoes which need dying).
Unravelled: This challenge is, well, challenging

As I say in her comments, I’ve been avoiding looking at things to avoid temptation but if I do struggle over something in the future and decide against it, I’m going to start a savings jar like that — I might use the proceeds to fund an expensive, good quality item that’ll last, something I’d find it difficult to spend so much money on in normal circumstances.

It’s a similar to what I’ve done for funding our automatic chicken pophole door at Alice‘s suggestion – amongst its other advantages, the automatic door lets me sleep in late, which I like, and I’m paying for it in retrospect by consciously denying myself other little treats which I like (eg random chocolate bars/cans of pop) when I get a random, passing craving. Admittedly I’ve only got about £10 in my fund for that because I’ve got out of the habit of even wanting that stuff most of the time but it’s a start :)

Anyone got any other motivation tips?

Meal planning: our lunches & dinners this week

Posted by louisa on Monday 7 February 2011 in cooking, eating, frugal, weekly meal plans | 6 comments

We’re not very good a meal planning. We usually manage it for the three or four days following our monthly big trip to the supermarket. I know they’re a really good idea – saving money, reducing food waste etc – but we’re quite quite rubbish at anything that involves personal organisation.

Often we’ll not even think about what we want for dinner until it’s already 8pm and we’re both blood-sugar crashing. When that happens we’re more likely to turn to ordering take-in or running to the (nearby, expensive) shop for something quick – which invariably means buying something junky for dinner and spending extra money because we’re hungry and everything looks sooooo good.

Our lunches are the same – we usually don’t think about them until we need to eat and they have to be ready quickly so we can take the dog out and get back to work in good time. Lunches are a lot cheaper for us now we both work from home than they were when we were similar disorganised and worked in offices – but they rely on what we’ve got in or another trip to the expensive shop. And I think they generate the bulk of our food waste – loaves bought in or made for lunches and not finished before they go stale etc.

So here we go – my first attempt at a week’s meal plan:

Monday lunch – boiled eggs & toast (I had food poisoning or a tummy bug over the weekend and am still feeling a little delicate. This is our favourite poorly tummy food)
Monday dinner – pasta with herby sausages & peppers in a tomato sauce

Tuesday lunch – spicy butternut squash soup (to be made this evening) with bread (which will need buying/making), & cheese
Tuesday dinner – spicy sausage & lentil casserole (the last of the sausages that need using up) with veg

Wednesday lunch – more spicy butternut squash soup with bread & cheese
Wednesday dinner – a difficult meal slot as I’m out until 10pm – keema achar curry (made by John last week, now in the freezer) either with rice or chapattis & naan (depending if he can be bothered making them fresh)

Thursday lunch – John will probably be out so probably just more soup & bread for me
Thursday dinner – leftover sausage & lentil casserole and veg (will need to buy something green)

Friday lunch – our random version of a ploughman’s lunch with samosas (from the petrol station … yes! I know! but strangely they’re some of the best samosas we’ve ever eaten and only 60p each!) and pickles
Friday dinner – homemade pizza – tuna & chilli, and chorizo & peppers (need to buy mozzarella)

Saturday brunch – scrambled eggs & muffins/crumpets (to buy, whichever are on offer)
Saturday dinner – spicy marinaded chicken pieces (need to buy the chicken) & rice

Right, let’s see how much we stick to it!

January – end of month review

Posted by louisa on Monday 31 January 2011 in goals, less than 12 clothes challenge, meta | 13 comments

Just a quick post reviewing my progress on my various goals/spending, and about tracking other stuff that I may or may not have mentioned.

(I mentioned this on Twitter – I’d had this bunting for a while and John surprised me by putting it up in our dining room. Pretty!)

Goals in 2011 progress

I haven’t really achieved any of my goals for 2011 yet – early days, early cold days. I think we’ve baked something every week so far though and I’ve also started tracking of usage of more consumables (FYI – but possibly TMI too – it takes us 6 days to use a toilet roll), so that’s a start. I also built some things from wood for the garden, which will help me with my piece-of-furniture making goal.

Buy less than 12 items of clothing in 2011

I haven’t bought clothes this month so my tally for the year is still at zero. (More info about the challenge…)

I did look at stuff in the sales online at the start of the year but wasn’t persuaded by anything. And last week, I went into a few shops that sell clothes amongst other things (mostly charity shops) – but I put my blinkers on and went straight for the other stuff – homeware things – instead of looking at clothes. It’s quite a poor area so the vast majority of the clothes are cheap makes – I don’t mind buying some of my items from charity shops but I want to avoid poor quality clothes wherever they are sold.

Growing stuff & the chickens

Since it’s still chilly winter, not much is happening on the growing front. I sowed some winter gem lettuce near the start of the month and they’re still tiny, but getting bigger by the day. We also had some fruit trees delivered – six apples and two pears – and John’s planted those out now. I also bought two blackcurrant bushes – I feel like we’re making good progress in the perennial fruit situation now.

The chickens have enjoyed the factionally longer days and the mostly warmer weather – and the two black rocks both started laying mid-month. Lime is still moulting and Buff is still refusing to give up the goods, but we’ve had a solid five eggs a day from the other five nearly every day for the last fortnight. We’ve had 109 eggs in total for January – not bad going since it was just one or two a day at the start of the month! (Also, in late breaking news, some of the chickens are currently grounded – I let them out to play again yesterday and someone, Ginger I think, led the parade into the wooded bit of our garden – it took me about half an hour to catch them all again!)

How I line dry clothes in winter: my top five tips

Posted by louisa on Thursday 20 January 2011 in frugal, meta | 24 comments

Line drying clothes outside has been a near impossibility this winter – but aside from a load of bedding (including a duvet) that got vomited on (thanks Lily-dog), I’ve line dried everything else inside.

Here’s some of the tricks I’ve used:

1) Get lazier – leave stuff to wash later when the weather is better

Aside from when there have been sick dog incidents, I leave stuff like towels & bedding in the washing basket until they really need doing because our stash of spare clean ones are running low – or until it looks like it’ll be a nice enough day to dry a load outside. Our bedding really needs to line dry outside to blow out the animal fluff.

If heavy things like throws and cushions/pillows get dirty, they just get taken out of use until it looks like there will be a run of decent drying days (even if that means waiting until spring).

If I can’t see myself wearing an item of clothing until much later in the year – some piece of occasional wear like a nice dress or skirt – then they won’t get washed until later in the year either.

I’ll catch up washing everything eventually but in the meantime, it means there isn’t as much congestion for my limited airer space.

2) Get more organised

That congestion on the airer is my main problem so I make sure I wash loads regularly, without too much needing doing at once.

If I do get a backlog – for example when I was ill at the start of the year or when our washing machines pipes froze (then unfroze all over the kitchen), I separate by both colour (light/dark) and by weight of fabric – all coloured t-shirts etc in the first load, then heavier stuff such as jeans & hoodies in the next. The t-shirts will be dry in a day or so, emptying the whole airer for the heavier stuff, which takes three days or so to dry – rather than two mixed loads which would both take a 3+ days to dry. (Another reason to batch wash’n’dry towels rather than doing some in each load.)

Socks & underwear etc are used to fill up space whenever there is a bit of empty space. They get dried on the peg airer thing (see below).
 

Cheap treats

Posted by louisa on Thursday 13 January 2011 in frugal | 0 comments

Earlier this afternoon, I got an urgent missive from my dad over Yahoo messenger: according to my mum, my favourite, ridiculous, childish breakfast cereal – which is NEVER on offer – was on offer at the supermarket – half price!

John and I were supposed to be having an “us time” evening tonight as we’ve not seen each other much lately – buying huge amounts of breakfast cereal is a dream date activity for me ;)

We bought 12 boxes! They should keep me going for about six months (the expiry date is in 2012 so plenty of time).

We also bought some other cheap treats:

• John likes Innocent smoothies but they’re pretty expensive usually – they too were half price though.
• And so were Party Rings (not pictured) – another of his twisted little addictions ;)
• A reduced to clear trifle – from £2.70 to £1.15
• A reduced to clear chocolate cake – from £3.00 to £1.45
• A bag of hazelnuts (not pictured), discounted from £2 to 50p – not many but hopefully enough to make a small quantity of my own Nutella – or just to toast and nibble.

We bought some real food too – including a reduced to clear loaf (down to 15p from £1.20), which we’ll have with soup for lunch tomorrow – but that’s not as fun or exciting as cheap treats ;)