July 2014 Income/Expenses
It’s payday tomorrow which means time for the monthly report! This is the first time I’ve ever kept a record of my income against expenses and so we can use this month as the benchmark to measure all future calculations.
What a month this has been! The biggest thing has obviously been the start of this blog! Google Analytics tells me we’ve had over 1,500 pageviews from almost 300 different users. This is awesome and way more then I had imagined in the first month so thank you to everyone that’s stopped by! A big shout out especially to the regulars who keep coming back and commenting on the articles, it’s great to chat with you and please keep letting me know your thoughts. Anyway; on to the report:
For the purpose of these records I won’t be including:
– Investment Income: All of my stock investments are in Accumulation funds which automatically retain the dividends. Therefore it will be shown as an increase in networth instead of income.
– Pension contributions: Here the the UK we are extremely limited to when we can access our standard pension funds. Because of this, it isnt worth including pension contributions as a part of savings percentage as they are unable to be used for early retirement (< 55). Edit: Have since decided to include this
Income
Salary: £2060.85
Online surveys: £6
Pension Contributions: £444.84
Total: £2066.85 (£2594.85 with pension)
Salary this month was slightly higher than normal due to overtime worked in June. I’m hoping to create some additional streams of income over the next few months to help increase this current small list!
Expenses
Mortgage/Bills: £700
Groceries: £346.98
Petrol (Gas): £23.74
Maintainance/DIY: £37.16
Eating out: £47.69
Healthcare: £33.78
Entertainment: £45
Other: £136.46
Total: £1370.81
Unfortunately an expensive month this month. This was mostly due to one-off payments in Healthcare (Dentist visit), Entertainment (Partner’s birthday) and Other (Costs of setting up this website). I think we can work to reduce the Groceries spending as well for next month. It’s important to remember that the largest category (Mortgage) isnt going to be an expense in retirement as it will have been paid off and so this will make a huge difference to savings rate. This month’s difference of £1224.04 gives a savings rate of 47.2%.
Networth
House Equity*: £22,969.98
Cash in bank: £3205.03
ISA Investments: £2814.78
Pension: £14,549.42
Total Networth: £43,539.21
As i’m at the beginning of my journey, I’m hoping to see this massively increase in the next 10 – 15 years towards early retirement.
Calculated as: (21,500 deposit + 501 overpayments) + ((215,000 - deposit - overpayment) - 191,061.03 remaining)/2
8 thoughts on “July 2014 Income/Expenses”
Great first look at your income/expenses. a +700 pounds. A healthy cushion.
It will be fun for you and us to see the progress. Thanks for the update!
A healthy cushion but I think we can probably improve on it ;)
You are running a pretty tight ship by the looks of things apart from the groceries… where the hell are you shopping man?! If this is for two persons then fine but if that is your split bill then you have got some serious savings to get into, which is good news for you. The rest of your budget you are absolutely smashing though, and I am getting nowhere near that, so I better shut up :)
One other point, I would try to include your pensions savings into your savings %age. For a start, it totally affects your time to ER, whether you are near the 55 year age or not, and two, it’s part of your pay compensation package, whether you decide to save it or not (you have to of course) so it is technically savings.
The groceries is for two people; My partner earns slightly less than me and has a longer commute so I buy the food for the time being :)
My pension gets about £400 added each month so it would make quite a big boost to the savings % if I did include it. Hmm…
Howdy Mate,
Are you based in London? I was just there this summer for Wimbledon and it was amazing weather! I ate Bangladeshi food almost everyday b/c I love it, but also b/c it is so much cheaper.
Sam
Hello Sam,
Im in the South East of England but not London itself, far too expensive to buy a house there!
Enjoying your blog and having a back read through. Thanks for being transparent and listing income and expenses, it really helps to compare spending habits, and where I can improve too. I have to agree with Firestarter on the Groceries though, £346 for 2 people, yikes. I was obliviously shopping in Tesco (aka setting fire to my own cash) before the boyfriend moved in this year and he set me straight and we go to Lidl now. Last month we spent £185, between two, and believe me we weren’t being “tight” about it, and chucking steak and all sorts into the trolley. I reckon we’re saving 2k a year just by switching supermarkets with zero compromise on quality (improved in fact). I appreciate not everyone has a discount supermarket nearby but it really is worth it. That’s my 2p’s (2k’s) worth anyway :)
£346 was a particularly high month and I believe it has been lower every other month. I do also include almost all household expenses, pet supplies and alcohol into the grocery tab. If it was purely for food the figure would be alot lower. Still.. at least it gives us something to aim for ;)