General expense

Why the chuffing hell is everything so damn expensive these days. Had a few bits done on the car £200, wasn’t anything serious even, shopping for the two of us comes to at least £70 a week without booze, just grabbed some pub food with a drink each (steak granted) £35, half tank petrol £25 etc etc could go on but Jesus why does everything cost so frigging much!? We take home an above average amount for our area, god knows how other people manage.

Trying to save money to go on Hols as well. It’s a nightmare. thankfully don’t run a car, don’t think I could afford to.

Edit: Yes, don’t even start me on my outgoings before I even start spending.

I think £70 is a lot, I know we shop at Sainsburys but where ever you go it’s just bloody expensive 🙁

£70 is loads! I can feed myself for about £20.

£70 for 2 people? Bargain.

emsz – you are tiny though!

We take home an above average amount for our area, god knows how other people manage.

well, up until recently people were managing by suplementing wages that have been steadily lowered in real terms with readily available lines of credit.

but that didn’t really work out too well.

I don’t do credit :-p never really have done either so is not like we go without but just noticed that More dosh has to stay in the debit account with much less in the savings 🙁

£40 per week for 2 of us here (west midlands), were big eaters too. The key we’ve found is to write a menu at the start of the week and stick to it. We do shop at Aldi though.

lunge – what is the quality of food like at Aldi? Do you buy free range etc? How much fruit and veg do you eat?

Real wages for the working and some of the middle classes have been squeezed for the last 10 to 15 years as the top 2% of the population became richer and richer.

We were then sold the dream that houses would continue to rise and rise in value forever and boom and bust was over so we could keep drawing down on the increasing through more and more equity releases. However, the credit crunch and the Great Recession ended all of that.

We, well the 98% who have not become steadily richer over the last 10 to 15 years, are going to go through a big period of correction and reduction in our living standards and the public services that we have become used to because the borrowing that was funding all of it was not sustainable.

Deleveraging will continue into the medium term, austerity is going to be a buzzword and it isn’t going to be much fun.

20 quid for a week’s food for one? 70 quid for 2?
My weekly food bill is about 65,00€ for 1!

£5 per person per day for food – tht isn’t bad really – but you could eat cheaper if you tried harder.

shopping for the two of us comes to at least £70 a week without booze

Are you dining on gold bars?

More dosh has to stay in the debit account with much less in the savings

So basically you’re not saving quite as much as you’d like to be, well the government did warn us that it would be a tough road ahead…….although it does seem particularly tough for you 🙁

nah I don’t mean it like that, I fully accept that we are still much more financially secure than others potentially and I know truly we are lucky but we are finding everything extremely expensive. Just a general moan really.

Inflation innit

And the Tory VAT bombshell

emmas shopping trolley yesterday 😀

we still spend the same on food as we did 2 years ago- just less of it …. im not training so im not eating huge ammounts like i used to …

damn it i give up ….

just mental image a mcvitties gold chocolate bar

lol, you having a moment trail_rat?

£70 for two is about what we pay.

Unfortunately it looks like things on are the way downhill for many financially. Wages aren’t rising anywhere near as much as inflation. Utilities are rocketing too.

one of those days !

ha, I’d rather have the biscuit than the gold. For someone who gets into a very tight fitting, clingy wedding dress in 8 weeks I have a surprising big appetite! 🙄

My wages don’t even stay the same any more – they go down each year.

I spend about £90-100 a week on food for one and do not consider myself to be particularly extravagant. I am lazy in so much as I buy my lunches at work, but don’t feel that would save a great deal. Teetotal as well so no booze in that.

I really don’t know how you can feed yourselves on £5 a day

it’s probably due to the Bank of England’s quantitative easing programme which effectively devalued the pound and caused price inflation for imported goods / services.

Or the cumulative effect of inflated commodity prices impacting the entire supply chain…

ernie_lynch – Member
And the Tory VAT bombshell

That chap on the left (as we look) seems like he could do with a drink…

My weekly bill at sansbury’s, for just me, must average 35 to 40 quid these days. Nothing special, I cook for myself so no ready meals, just fresh veg, meat and fish, often ‘basics’ brad stuff, the rest is sainsbury’s own brand..no brand names or ‘taste the difference….I just eat a lot. But then food is my fuel as I cycle to work….bloody glad too as a tank full of petrol for the car is now 85 quid (mondeo)

I’m grateful my parents taught me the valur of money, spend only what you can afford, don’t borrow if you can do without etc….means I’m okay …notice the price rises thogh and worry for many with less well paid jobs or kids to bring up.

lunge – what is the quality of food like at Aldi? Do you buy free range etc? How much fruit and veg do you eat?

Most of the stuff is as good if not better than your “standard” supermarket. Certainly the fruit, veg and cooked meats are as is the wine if you know what to buy. The raw meat is no better or worse than Asda or Tesco but I try to buy that from the butchers anyway. You struggle to get some specialist items as the range can be a bit limited but this is not the end of the world.

I’ve saved on average £20 per week from shopping there and have felt no real drop in food quality so it certainly works for me.

lunge – when i lived near an aldi/lidl i used to shop there alot – i liked alot of there stuff tbh – lacks variety in fruit and veg though 🙁

£90-£100 per week at Lidl. Less variety, better quality.
£140-£150 at Morrisons. More variety, lower quality.

Family of 5.

We spend on average £100-£125 a week for 2 adults and 3 children (1 a baby). We have really noticed prices/food shop increasing significantly and despair about it as everything else is also rising unlike our wages, she has had no wage rise in 3 years will be 4 years if none this year also, i am still waiting for my payrise to be finalised that should have been in effect on Jan 1st FFS.

We now try and shop at Aldi/Lidl with the odd supermarket trip, the value at Aldi is surprisingly good with quality being good also, however we can’t get a whole shop there as choice is a little limited. If the wife goes to our local store Sainsburys she will spend £40 and have hardly anything to show for it.

We were then sold the dream that houses would continue to rise and rise

Lolz. People will make up anything to support their world view aye.

Point me at one single quote of someone in authority saying ‘it’s okay, your house will rise in value and bail you out, you can rely on that, this is your dream’ and I’ll accept your description.

30-50quid a week for both mrsconsequence and I. usually feed a friend or 3 with main meals each week too. that includes buying bottled mineral water which we dont really need but prefer to our tap water, and home delivery.

Good point there Molgrips, people invented that ‘dream’ themselves

Good point there Molgrips, people invented that ‘dream’ themselves

It wouldn’t be the first time that people invent something to justify their position or view, would it?

I used to spend about £70 a week between 2, but more recently I’ve been hitting the £100 a week mark, with occasional booze and a occasional bbq’s though.

I am currently earning more than I ever have before, but feel about as skint as I ever have.

New washing machine, cooker and fridge needed, all since I moved into a new house in November though so it’s to be expected.

Saving has taken a back seat for the last 3 months, but hopefully by payday at the end of the month things will come bak into line again, but you never know!