What cut backs have you made recently?
Discussion
I’ve got rid of Sky TV, BT Sports and Disney+, replaced with a cheaper alternative that cost £1 per week.
The central heating has been off for a couple of months now, already seeing reduced bills. I used to pay £140 per month before the recent hikes, it shot up to £340 per month but is now back down to £215 per month. I also have two electric oil-filled radiators in the conservatory, these went off a couple of months ago also. Even in winter I think one will be enough.
I work from home so the RS6 doesn’t get much use (so not feeling the rise in fuel prices yet) and my commuting costs are zero anyway.
Eating out has stopped. My wife suggested we go out to my favourite pub/restaurant for dinner but I said no, a card and some chocolate would be perfect.
Takeaways we used to get quite regularly, now it’s less than once a week so still room to cut back further.
Great topic for a thread!
Edited to add:
I also changed my SIM only contract to £15 per month with even more data.
And I changed from Virgin high speed broadband to Vodafone at half the price and I haven’t noticed any difference
The central heating has been off for a couple of months now, already seeing reduced bills. I used to pay £140 per month before the recent hikes, it shot up to £340 per month but is now back down to £215 per month. I also have two electric oil-filled radiators in the conservatory, these went off a couple of months ago also. Even in winter I think one will be enough.
I work from home so the RS6 doesn’t get much use (so not feeling the rise in fuel prices yet) and my commuting costs are zero anyway.
Eating out has stopped. My wife suggested we go out to my favourite pub/restaurant for dinner but I said no, a card and some chocolate would be perfect.
Takeaways we used to get quite regularly, now it’s less than once a week so still room to cut back further.
Great topic for a thread!
Edited to add:
I also changed my SIM only contract to £15 per month with even more data.
And I changed from Virgin high speed broadband to Vodafone at half the price and I haven’t noticed any difference
Edited by Percy Cushion on Friday 17th June 16:44
Not specifically cutting down to save cash but my lease came to an end and I just didn't need another one. WFH 5 days a week as standard so having £4-500 a month going out for little benefit seemed insane. Bought a 15yo MINI S instead to potter in.
The Mrs changed her Co car to an iPace, massive BIK saving and of course no petrol.
My kids were both in Private school that ended for one last year and the other finishes in a couple of months.
Fitted a smart plug to the wine fridge and scheduled it to be off most of the time.
Trimmed Now TV and Apple+ and checking what other subs don't get enough use.
Trying to get her to cancel her Gym, its not the cost its the fact she never goes.
We can get FTTP now, I'd probably have gone for 400 or 900 before but even the 150 is better than the 35 we get now.
The Mrs changed her Co car to an iPace, massive BIK saving and of course no petrol.
My kids were both in Private school that ended for one last year and the other finishes in a couple of months.
Fitted a smart plug to the wine fridge and scheduled it to be off most of the time.
Trimmed Now TV and Apple+ and checking what other subs don't get enough use.
Trying to get her to cancel her Gym, its not the cost its the fact she never goes.
We can get FTTP now, I'd probably have gone for 400 or 900 before but even the 150 is better than the 35 we get now.
NewNameNeeded said:
Started using Hello Fresh. Our.portion sizes are healthier, our vegetables intake much higher. Supermarket shopping could be much cheaper but we found we ordered way too much, struggled to decide what to cook, and there was A LOT of waste. So whilst Hello Fresh is not cheap it's saved us a fortune on food waste and takeaways and the meals are extremely tasty.
I plan my meals for the next few days in advance BEFORE going to the supermarket. Together with creative use of leftovers, we hardly have any food waste. Surely the supermarket is cheaper than Hello Fresh.Good thread!
Sold the BMW M2 late last year for pretty much what I paid for it 3 years earlier - it was costing over £2k per year in warranty, tax, insurance and servicing before driving it anywhere. Considering my mileage is low it didn't make sense to keep it. Instead opted for a 10 year old VW Up, 50mpg, £100 insurance, £20 tax, so quite a substantial saving! Have a new motorbike as a toy though
Lucky enough to WFH 2 days per week but when I do go to the office I will normally cycle being it's just a 25 minute ride. So the commute costs me relatively little (if you excuse the amount spent on bikes that is!). My partner works about 25 miles away, she is complaining of the increased fuel costs (even with a Toyota Auris Hybrid).
Heating has been off since April - our house is an old cottage so temps can drop to below 15c in January/February. Oil heating but managed to only use 500L in past 12 months, helps that we have 2 wood burners for our main living areas. Hot water is only heated when we need it, shower is electric but in summer I prefer a cooler shower anyway.
Food wise, always have a list of things we 'need' and try to stick to it, still don't go without though. Takeaways we've only ever done once in the 7 years we've lived in our current house - not because we don't want to, but because we never feel the food justifies the cost and do find it's relatively unhealthy (we can make a decent curry ourselves for a 3rd of the cost. We tend to go out for lunches every now and then but evenso the costs are low.
Hard to see where we can make additional savings. We can cut Netflix and Amazon Prime and probably cancel the TV license, but it feels unnecessary when things aren't that tight for us! Oh, have a gym membership that I could probably get rid of... I should probably do that!
Sold the BMW M2 late last year for pretty much what I paid for it 3 years earlier - it was costing over £2k per year in warranty, tax, insurance and servicing before driving it anywhere. Considering my mileage is low it didn't make sense to keep it. Instead opted for a 10 year old VW Up, 50mpg, £100 insurance, £20 tax, so quite a substantial saving! Have a new motorbike as a toy though
Lucky enough to WFH 2 days per week but when I do go to the office I will normally cycle being it's just a 25 minute ride. So the commute costs me relatively little (if you excuse the amount spent on bikes that is!). My partner works about 25 miles away, she is complaining of the increased fuel costs (even with a Toyota Auris Hybrid).
Heating has been off since April - our house is an old cottage so temps can drop to below 15c in January/February. Oil heating but managed to only use 500L in past 12 months, helps that we have 2 wood burners for our main living areas. Hot water is only heated when we need it, shower is electric but in summer I prefer a cooler shower anyway.
Food wise, always have a list of things we 'need' and try to stick to it, still don't go without though. Takeaways we've only ever done once in the 7 years we've lived in our current house - not because we don't want to, but because we never feel the food justifies the cost and do find it's relatively unhealthy (we can make a decent curry ourselves for a 3rd of the cost. We tend to go out for lunches every now and then but evenso the costs are low.
Hard to see where we can make additional savings. We can cut Netflix and Amazon Prime and probably cancel the TV license, but it feels unnecessary when things aren't that tight for us! Oh, have a gym membership that I could probably get rid of... I should probably do that!
GT3Manthey said:
MitchT said:
No holiday since 2019.
Eat out a max of about four times a year.
Take-away a max of about four times a year.
Drink a modest amount of alcohol about once a month.
Don't do nights out. Introvert so don't miss it anyway.
No pay TV whatsoever.
Cancelled gym membership.
Walk everywhere I can. Car only did 280 miles between its last two MOTs.
Boil kettle to wash up - 3.5 minutes to boil instead of immersion heater on for 20 minutes.
Two out of a possible eight light bulbs installed in the lounge.
Heated 150w fleece throw instead of using electric storage heaters.
Just need to get the OH to cut down her time in the shower!
Impressive and makes myself and my family look excessive wasters Eat out a max of about four times a year.
Take-away a max of about four times a year.
Drink a modest amount of alcohol about once a month.
Don't do nights out. Introvert so don't miss it anyway.
No pay TV whatsoever.
Cancelled gym membership.
Walk everywhere I can. Car only did 280 miles between its last two MOTs.
Boil kettle to wash up - 3.5 minutes to boil instead of immersion heater on for 20 minutes.
Two out of a possible eight light bulbs installed in the lounge.
Heated 150w fleece throw instead of using electric storage heaters.
Just need to get the OH to cut down her time in the shower!
anonymous said:
[redacted]
I suspect you've thought of this but is the insulation as good as it could be? I stopped letting in Jan - Mar 10 years ago as when I did, plus some decorating, I got a £500 gas bill, on a 2 bed. Interesting ideas. I've never been one for subscriptions, other than gym, which I use, and SIM only @ £12pcm. When I worked in the office I'd take milk and make coffee, which cost very little. I use off peak electricity for washer and dryer, which is on until 8.30am in BST. LED bulbs. Kitchen has 7 down lighters which were 50w each, now 4.5w.I pay for everything with a credit card which gives rewards, and pay it off every month. In the past two years that's added up to more than I expected.
If you use Tesco, note their special offers are linked to having a Clubcard now. Some products like tea, coffee, are on offer every few months.
- Groom the dogs myself (was £80 every 5 weeks)
- Using Costco a lot more than I used to (especially for meat/fish)
- Batch cooking, using slow cooker etc
- Given up alcohol (I reserve the right to change my mind on this one)
- Downgraded car to an e-up on PCH (£185 a month amortised) and making as much use of the free charging at work as I can
- Cancelled a few subs (Adobe Photography Plan, NOW Entertainment)
- Hanging washing up rather than using the tumble drier
- Started using Honey app
- Downgraded my O2 SIM (using less data since WFH so was easy saving)
mike74 said:
Another vote for always having be so tight/frugal and non-materialistic that I'm seeing no impact whatsoever on my cost of living.
(Watch some big, unexpected bill come along now to bite me on the bum)
Same. The only thing - I'm trying to take shorter showers rather than standing there for ages just thinking about work or whatever! (Watch some big, unexpected bill come along now to bite me on the bum)
NewNameNeeded said:
Started using Hello Fresh. Our.portion sizes are healthier, our vegetables intake much higher. Supermarket shopping could be much cheaper but we found we ordered way too much, struggled to decide what to cook, and there was A LOT of waste. So whilst Hello Fresh is not cheap it's saved us a fortune on food waste and takeaways and the meals are extremely tasty.
There’s loads of meal kits now too, so you can do hello fresh till the discount run outs then use gousto, and if you complain to say something is missing, they instantly give you credit, I had £9.50 one week for saying something was missing when I actually had it. Suckers.As with others, we're already pretty frugal so it's difficult to be even more so.
We have however recently moved house so quite a few things to go at there:
Central heating on less and bought some heated blankets for the bed.
We have to go through the kitchen to get to & from lower ground toilet and up and down stairs which meant we were leaving the 4 x 50w halogen lights on in there on an evening. I've recently fitted a plug socket on the central island and stuck a lamp there with a 5w bulb in so a decent saving in the course of a year.
We have one low wattage lamp each by us in the living room.
Next on the list is insulation in the roof spaces.
We have however recently moved house so quite a few things to go at there:
Central heating on less and bought some heated blankets for the bed.
We have to go through the kitchen to get to & from lower ground toilet and up and down stairs which meant we were leaving the 4 x 50w halogen lights on in there on an evening. I've recently fitted a plug socket on the central island and stuck a lamp there with a 5w bulb in so a decent saving in the course of a year.
We have one low wattage lamp each by us in the living room.
Next on the list is insulation in the roof spaces.
richardxjr said:
Sold the third car Boxster, trimmed everything so I can salary sacrifice as much as poss into pension. It helps that I can start drawing down the tax free bit from March though if necessary.
I thought if you draw on your pension, the maximum you can save into it afterwards would be £4,000 a year, I'd certainly look into that before drawing on your pension unnecessarily, especially if you are trying to put in as much as possible and ?company is doing the same.Jon39 said:
droopsnoot said:
... I don't like leaving the car too many days without running it, ...
No need to be too concerned about that.
I have a sports car, that hibernates every winter (450 bhp can be a little too exciting on damp roads).
Using a battery conditioner, full tank of ethanol free fuel, higher tyre pressures (push car every couple of months), mouse prevention measures, and cotton sheets cover, everything has been fine for years.
My classics sit in a shed for several weeks at a time without running, they have solar panels connected up which may or may not help keep the battery topped up, and some covers I bought from a car show that don't keep the dust off. I don't mind them sitting because they don't seem to mind, and I know how to sort them out if they put up a fight when it comes time to run again. It's more the "modern" (only 22-year-old) daily driver that can just seem a bit rough, in that disconcerting way where it might sort itself out, or it might just stop. So far, though, it's been fine after a mile or two, so it might be mainly in my mind.
Reading here does remind me that I should look at the times that the immersion for the hot water is on - I think at the moment it's 8am to 10am and 4.30pm to 10pm, so that wants dropping down a bit especially as the shower is electric so doesn't actually use hot water from the tank.
Jon39 said:
Interesting.
You have hit on exactly the reason, why very fortunately, I no longer need to reduce expenditure.
Even have a hedge against rising petrol costs.
The only problem with it, is that compounding took an extremely long time to gather pace. Not everyone is prepared to wait.
Being very careful about expenditure for me, was earlier in life.
Did not even own an iPhone 1, let alone the latest iPhone 14.
Looking back, one of my big mistakes was not buying Apple shares in the 1980s. I could not believe people would buy iPods, because they cost 10 times more than a generic mp3 player. How to misjudge fellow citizens! Did they not know about mp3s and free digital music, or perhaps it was the attractive, sleek Apple designs?
Not keen on fixed bonds and cash though. Cash and cash equivalents, come with a guarantee to lose money long-term (inflation).
Over winter I turned the thermostat down from 21 to 18, we have big old 1970's windows, so sat near them is cold regardless of the thermostat temp.
Dropped Virgin TV down to just internet.
Dropped Netflix/Disney/Amazon and we're password sharing across our family now.
I now drive as little as possible, but my wife hasnt quite caught on and is constantly nipping here & there
Dropped Virgin TV down to just internet.
Dropped Netflix/Disney/Amazon and we're password sharing across our family now.
I now drive as little as possible, but my wife hasnt quite caught on and is constantly nipping here & there
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