So as my traditional view of disposal income – real cash left over/not needed or bills at the end of the month – starts to dwindle (new house, second child about to arrive), how do the rest of you STW’ers find some “disposbale income”?

I mean, if I add up my virtual shopping basket of MTB / Road “wants”, some of which in reality will soon become “needs”, it comes up to a £bag o’ sand :-/

Do I need to mentally adjust to Credit Card use, browsing Superstar instead of CRC (whimpers) – how do you all cope?

OH HOW THE OTHER HALF….

real cash left over/not needed or bills at the end of the month

Does not compute

I stopped riding – saved me a fortune in repairs and upgrades!

Not bad now the kids are grown up and the mortgage paid but in the past I simply did work for cash or took a part time extra job to pay for something I wanted

Of an evening, my name is ‘Precious’ I’ll leave the rest to your imagination.

Also, I tend to sell stuff I dont need/want/use, or have a cheap food month(s) but I live on my own so dont have to convince others to go along with me!

For bigger stuff 0% finance is your friend

philconsequence – Member
OH HOW THE OTHER HALF….

… used to live, indeed.

C’mon now, I never see you lot say “ooh look, I’m going with deal extreme instead of Hope/Trout cause I don’t have the cash – or perhaps you just don’t tell everyone eh? 8)

browsing Superstar instead of CRC (whimpers)

Browsing superstar is impossible,
CRC is still being a cheapskate

What is your conversation like with your LBS?

I spent a shed load of cash on shiny stuff at the start of the year ahead of moving home and getting sprogged up/ going down to one income, after which I knew I would be brassic.
It is not until now that I am getting the itch but haven’t recovered from these big two life events yet, so disposable cash is non-existent.
I keep trying to think of stuff I can sell… but all I’ve got is bike stuff which I refuse to get rid of.

mikewsmith – Member

What is your conversation like with your LBS?

I dont have an LBS – where I live there are two with poor reps and one is a 30 min drive away…

I can’t speak for others but for the past year i’ve gave myself a budget of £20 a week for food and £5 a week for so called luxurious goods – this included going out/socialising etc – it’s been frekin hard to stick to my budget but the savings i’ve made with being miserly and living off a diet of soup and cheap veg (i’m a vegi) has allowed me to save enough for a £3k+ bike build. I earn minimum wage and out of that comes all the usual stuff that comes with living on your own such as council rent, council tax, electricity, car expenses, telephone bills etc, it’s not been easy this past year as cash is tight at the best of times but it is possible to live on practically nothing when you are single.

£5 a week for so called luxurious goods – this included going out/socialising etc

£3k+ bike build

Glad to see you’ve got your priorities straight!

some of which in reality will soon become “needs”

Care to elaborate on that…

Welcome to strappedforcashworld….
I recommend the following,

Give up cycling
Ride till everything simply falls appart
or do as I do and by stuff you cant afford then argue with the missus when it arrives.

Disposable for me is anything I manage to spend before my other half spends on clothes, haircuts and baby stuff!

Of course that’s after the necceseties are paid for.

teasel – Member

some of which in reality will soon become “needs”

Care to elaborate on that…

Hello teasel. Hows things?

Yep, I need an Autumn jacket / Gilet for the road bike, I need some brake fluid for a bleed, I’m running out of Stans juice / tubes for t’other bike, I will soon need a new rear road tyre…. I could go on….

£5 a week on yourself and a £3K bike?

You are under 20 yes?

Hello teasel. Hows things?

All good, thanks.

Aside from the ‘needed’ gillet surely the other items are easily obtained by refraining from the odd bottle of plonk on a Friday night…?

🙂

Disposable income is the amount of money I can get past the Mrs without being noticed.

“discressionary spend” is a better term….. your £50 a month sky tv package, whist it is a monthly bill, is really a discressionary spend item, unlike say: electrickery or gas.

I guess it depends to what degree you are giving up other discressionary spend items (holidays? drinking? pets?) in order to fund your *insert name of expensive bike” habit

teasel – Member

….refraining from the odd bottle of plonk on a Friday night…?

😮

Do not read mountainbike mags, they just make you want stuff and you wouldnt have any more fun with this “better” stuff, do not read the bike forum here same as above.

What about tyres – tried Gatorskins yet…?

Mine are still going strong after a fair few years of abuse on and off-road. They grip better than some will give them credit for IME.

I think this is the point at which most people turn to road cycling in the dry only and get fat.

Fraid not al, just hit 40 this year and worked an average of 60+ hours a week in two jobs, not surprised i managed to save enough as i’ve been too fecked to do any socialising or owt else.

£20 a week for food

😯

Be satisfied with what gear you have, or accept you might not be able to afford the latest shiny parts.

If necessary, downgrade from your current £3k bike to a £600 one (and keep the difference for future repairs).

You suddenly become much less of a bike snob…

Fair enough, somafunk, I got expensive bikes out of my system in me yoof.

+1 Taff

Any money left after the mortgage, utility bills, council tax, food, daughters university subs, fuel, road tax, insurance (Buildings, house contents, life cover & car), house/car maintenance 🙁 … … and my singletrack subscription 😀 have been paid.

After tax I try to live by the 30% rule i.e. 30% on rent/mortgage, 30% on bills (inc Food), 30% on savings/pension and 10% to spunk at my leisure.
Sometimes its not easy to do but I find that when I get this balance right then life is good.

Do not read mountainbike mags, they just make you want stuff and you wouldnt have any more fun with this “better” stuff

+1

I’m a student, I spend the government’s money… for now.

If I strip out “luxuries” from our monthly spend i.e Sky, gym membership, Spotify etc and include them under the disposable income banner, then 70% of our income is disposable.

umop3pisdn – Member
I’m a student, I spend other peoples money (via taxation)… for now.

Ftfy 🙂

Taff – Member
Disposable income is the amount of money I can get past the Mrs without being noticed.

I went with this – new winter bibs & base ordered from the wiggle sale. I did compromise and didn’t order the Gillet / jacket I asked about in another thread, I’ll cope with a old Gore phantom with old Montane Velo over if necessary this winter…..

Packages delivered to work, Just don’t tell ‘er indoors… 😀

Money I don’t need so it gets left in the bank. The bank then does its best to dispose of it for me.

Is there any correlation between those who hide their spending from their partner and those who claim that their partner isn’t their best friend?

Wow, heavy. FWIW my last post was an attempt at laddish humor, before I am summarily judged by STW.

Kryton57 – sorry, wasn’t specifically aimed at you. The thought had passed through my head on that other thread and it just popped out after your post.