Aren’t energy prices shocking? When the oil price rocketed, energy companies put up the prices to unprecedented levels, now oil prices are falling again, have the energy companies reduced their prices? Well yes they have, but not by the same amount as it went up by! It is nothing more than pure profiteering by the energy companies, how else do they explain their billions profits?
But what can we do? Us mere mortals? Not a lot really, except to vote with our feet and make sure we change our supplier to the cheapest available and also to reduce our energy use to the lowest level possible, thus cutting our costs and their profits.
Here are a few ideas on how to cut the costs:
Make sure all bulbs are energy saving, last longer and save masses of energy.
Only switch on lights when needed and never light an empty room.
Turn central heating on only when absolutely necessary (unless you have small children and/or elderly living with you).
It’s never really necessary to have heating above 20oC, if cold put a jumper on.
Draw curtains when it gets dark and put them behind the radiator or else the heat will escape up through the window.
Don’t block radiators.
Reduce hot water temperature to no more than 60oC.
Always be on the look out for wastage – it’s a constant battle.
Friday, 30 October 2009
Thursday, 29 October 2009
Water, water, water – Check out the Savings
Don’t we pay enough for our water not to waste it? Water is the only utility that we can’t swap supplier; you’re stuck with the one serving the area where you live. Fair enough! But the cost also depends where you live as all the companies seem to charge different rates? There’s not a lot you can do about that, but there is a lot you can do about usage!
We are on a water meter so its obvious when our usage clocks up on the dial, I’m constantly aware of water usage, “turn that tap off” I need to shout every morning when kids are brushing their teeth, I puzzle over the kids today – aren’t they supposed to be the ones learning all this stuff at school, the need to save resources (and my money)?
We simply cannot live without it, so we have no choice, but we can lower the costs:
1) Take a shower instead of a bath.
2) Don’t use ‘new’ water for washing the car; use it from the water butt.
3) Get a water butt, check your water company they sometimes have subsidized prices. I fitted some guttering at the side of my shed leading to it, works a treat and the rainwater is free - great.
4) Don’t water the lawn, although not a problem at this time of year, it may go brown in a hot summer but mine always recovers shortly after a quick downpour, hardy stuff – grass.
5) Don’t waste money buying bottled water either, in my opinion its only tap water anyway. If you’re concerned about the stuff from the tap get a filter jug (it’ll cost a bit of money but will be far cheaper than bottled stuff) or just fill a jug with tap water and put in fridge for a bit and will taste just like bottled water (just like tap water too!).
Keep the money in my pocket I say!
We are on a water meter so its obvious when our usage clocks up on the dial, I’m constantly aware of water usage, “turn that tap off” I need to shout every morning when kids are brushing their teeth, I puzzle over the kids today – aren’t they supposed to be the ones learning all this stuff at school, the need to save resources (and my money)?
We simply cannot live without it, so we have no choice, but we can lower the costs:
1) Take a shower instead of a bath.
2) Don’t use ‘new’ water for washing the car; use it from the water butt.
3) Get a water butt, check your water company they sometimes have subsidized prices. I fitted some guttering at the side of my shed leading to it, works a treat and the rainwater is free - great.
4) Don’t water the lawn, although not a problem at this time of year, it may go brown in a hot summer but mine always recovers shortly after a quick downpour, hardy stuff – grass.
5) Don’t waste money buying bottled water either, in my opinion its only tap water anyway. If you’re concerned about the stuff from the tap get a filter jug (it’ll cost a bit of money but will be far cheaper than bottled stuff) or just fill a jug with tap water and put in fridge for a bit and will taste just like bottled water (just like tap water too!).
Keep the money in my pocket I say!
Wednesday, 28 October 2009
How to be Debt Free, Live Within Your Means and be Happy
It’s a great feeling, knowing that you don’t owe anyone anything, and that whatever you have is yours!
One thing debt does is to deprive you of choice, choice gives you freedom to do whatever you want (within your financial limits of course). So debt deprives you of your freedom! And if you don’t have freedom you are a prisoner, so debt keeps you a prisoner – I didn’t want that, and I’m sure no one else does either.
I managed to get out of debt, and stay out of debt, by making a plan, a financial plan (sometimes called a budget – but don’t let that put you off).
First, I looked at all my expenses, what was I paying for each week, month, year; gas, electric, telephone, water, clothes, food, car, holidays, and so on, the list goes on. But the trick is to identify every single item that costs you money.
Keeping a record helped, but only for the day to day costs that happened without noticing sometimes, the odd paper, the odd cup of tea, etc. then you need the regular monthly items, direct debits and so on, the ad hoc yearly payment, insurance etc. I checked out bank statements, cheque book stubs for full details.
What I was after was a monthly figure for each item, or a monthly equivalent if I paid yearly, so that I had a monthly amount either that was due to be paid and was what I needed to cover bigger bills.
Then I listed my debts, in descending order so that the highest interest ones would be paid first, so I listed the minimum payment for each and added this to my expenses total. At the time I had a personal loan and three different credit cards with total debt of around £5,000, not a huge amount, but too big when you cannot pay! And that was my worry that I wouldn’t be able to make a payment and will lose the house!
Then I listed my income…….
I took away my monthly expenses and debt repayment totals………
No surprise result:
Income less than outgoings = debt increasing each month!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Result MISERY
Solution: live within my means and cut outgoings to less than income.
First, I looked at each expense – was it vital?
If yes, was this the cheapest price I could pay for this item?
If no, I cancelled it.
By doing this exercise I was able to free up some extra cash to take my outgoings to below (not by much, but below) my income, which allowed me to increase slightly the payments to the highest interest rated credit cards and continued until all were paid off.
I was amazed to read recently that if you only ever make the minimum payment and are charged around 17% it will take about 40 years to clear the debt! Astounding! And think of all the interest wasted too.
So after four years of sticking rigidly to my plan, not only did I manage to pay off all my debts and build a small savings pot, I managed to stay debt free for when redundancy did strike last year, the worry wasn’t as great and I was so thankful I had done so too.
Result HAPPINESS
One thing debt does is to deprive you of choice, choice gives you freedom to do whatever you want (within your financial limits of course). So debt deprives you of your freedom! And if you don’t have freedom you are a prisoner, so debt keeps you a prisoner – I didn’t want that, and I’m sure no one else does either.
I managed to get out of debt, and stay out of debt, by making a plan, a financial plan (sometimes called a budget – but don’t let that put you off).
First, I looked at all my expenses, what was I paying for each week, month, year; gas, electric, telephone, water, clothes, food, car, holidays, and so on, the list goes on. But the trick is to identify every single item that costs you money.
Keeping a record helped, but only for the day to day costs that happened without noticing sometimes, the odd paper, the odd cup of tea, etc. then you need the regular monthly items, direct debits and so on, the ad hoc yearly payment, insurance etc. I checked out bank statements, cheque book stubs for full details.
What I was after was a monthly figure for each item, or a monthly equivalent if I paid yearly, so that I had a monthly amount either that was due to be paid and was what I needed to cover bigger bills.
Then I listed my debts, in descending order so that the highest interest ones would be paid first, so I listed the minimum payment for each and added this to my expenses total. At the time I had a personal loan and three different credit cards with total debt of around £5,000, not a huge amount, but too big when you cannot pay! And that was my worry that I wouldn’t be able to make a payment and will lose the house!
Then I listed my income…….
I took away my monthly expenses and debt repayment totals………
No surprise result:
Income less than outgoings = debt increasing each month!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Result MISERY
Solution: live within my means and cut outgoings to less than income.
First, I looked at each expense – was it vital?
If yes, was this the cheapest price I could pay for this item?
If no, I cancelled it.
By doing this exercise I was able to free up some extra cash to take my outgoings to below (not by much, but below) my income, which allowed me to increase slightly the payments to the highest interest rated credit cards and continued until all were paid off.
I was amazed to read recently that if you only ever make the minimum payment and are charged around 17% it will take about 40 years to clear the debt! Astounding! And think of all the interest wasted too.
So after four years of sticking rigidly to my plan, not only did I manage to pay off all my debts and build a small savings pot, I managed to stay debt free for when redundancy did strike last year, the worry wasn’t as great and I was so thankful I had done so too.
Result HAPPINESS
Monday, 26 October 2009
Living within My Means – Being Debt Free and Happy
"Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness.
Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery."
Mr. Micawber – David Copperfield – Charles Dickens
Never a truer statement made I feel!
Think on this for a minute, if you have £20 a week to live on, but you spent £21, you will have to borrow £1 to pay for the shortfall – ok not a big deal you may say!
But the following week, you have £20 but you have to pay back the £1 from the previous week, so you pay it back and are debt free – great! You now have £19 to live on for the week, but you still spend £21, only now you are £2 short and have to borrow again (all this borrowing by the way is ignoring any interest that would need to be paid). The following week you pay back the £2 but are left with £18 to cover spending of £21, so you borrow £3, then £4, then £5 and so on, and by about week 20 you would need to pay back £20 borrowed from the previous week so you would be skint before you start, all this just by overspending by £1 per week!
The answer? Simply don’t spend more that £20 (or however much you have available).
When I was threatened with redundancy five or so years ago I did have quite a few debts and the prospect of losing my job scared me, I worried that I wouldn’t be able to pay them off, would my house be repossessed? And would we face being homeless? All these questions whirled round my head for weeks.
Fortunately, my job was saved and I breathed a huge sigh of relief, but I had had such a scare that I never wanted to be in that position again. So I vowed to be debt free as soon as possible so that if, or when, the next round of redundancies came around I would have no need to worry as much.
Sure enough they did, last year in fact, and this time I wasn’t so lucky, my job disappeared and after 20 years with the same company I was out, just like that!
Fortunately, due to the previous scare I was, and still am, debt free, I have no consumer debt, and all had been achieved by simple adjustment to my lifestyle and to ‘live within my means’ over the previous years and gradually I made it and paid off all the debts, it wasn't always easy, but I kept focused on the end goal.
Until next time: What would it mean to you to be debt free?
Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery."
Mr. Micawber – David Copperfield – Charles Dickens
Never a truer statement made I feel!
Think on this for a minute, if you have £20 a week to live on, but you spent £21, you will have to borrow £1 to pay for the shortfall – ok not a big deal you may say!
But the following week, you have £20 but you have to pay back the £1 from the previous week, so you pay it back and are debt free – great! You now have £19 to live on for the week, but you still spend £21, only now you are £2 short and have to borrow again (all this borrowing by the way is ignoring any interest that would need to be paid). The following week you pay back the £2 but are left with £18 to cover spending of £21, so you borrow £3, then £4, then £5 and so on, and by about week 20 you would need to pay back £20 borrowed from the previous week so you would be skint before you start, all this just by overspending by £1 per week!
The answer? Simply don’t spend more that £20 (or however much you have available).
When I was threatened with redundancy five or so years ago I did have quite a few debts and the prospect of losing my job scared me, I worried that I wouldn’t be able to pay them off, would my house be repossessed? And would we face being homeless? All these questions whirled round my head for weeks.
Fortunately, my job was saved and I breathed a huge sigh of relief, but I had had such a scare that I never wanted to be in that position again. So I vowed to be debt free as soon as possible so that if, or when, the next round of redundancies came around I would have no need to worry as much.
Sure enough they did, last year in fact, and this time I wasn’t so lucky, my job disappeared and after 20 years with the same company I was out, just like that!
Fortunately, due to the previous scare I was, and still am, debt free, I have no consumer debt, and all had been achieved by simple adjustment to my lifestyle and to ‘live within my means’ over the previous years and gradually I made it and paid off all the debts, it wasn't always easy, but I kept focused on the end goal.
Until next time: What would it mean to you to be debt free?
Sunday, 25 October 2009
Be Debt Free – Clear Your Debt Burden
Debt is the one thing guaranteed to keep someone in poverty. Debt is something most people cannot afford, yet the vast majority of people are in masses of debt, why?
Following the austere years of World War Two, people were fed up with the ration books, with the make do and mend mentality.
The 1950’s saw a big increase in the buy now pay later sales tactics, leading to mounting debt and burdening families for years to come.
Escalating through the 1960’s, people saw their neighbours getting new furniture, all the latest new fangled mod cons, not really knowing how it was to be paid for, they just knew they had to keep up and have these things too.
But the 1970’s saw some pay back for the ever increasing debt balloon – the balloon burst. Escalating oil prices, miners strikes, led to three day working weeks, unfortunately I’m old enough to remember the regular power cuts, reading by candle light (if you could even get candles), no television or radios (games consoles and the like hadn’t even been invented then so we didn’t moan we couldn’t use them), we didn’t even have the luxury of a battery operated radio.
Then, ‘BOOM’, the 1980’s were upon us with all the excesses of the rapid rise in wealth, share ownership, but very soon - ‘BUST’. It soon fell apart and everything went into freefall, mass riots, repossessions, another miners strike (although this time there would be no victory) mass job losses. But, who was to blame? Lenders wanting to make a quick buck? Or the borrowers for over extending themselves with debt without really having a clue of how they were going to repay it?
That last paragraph related to the 1980’s, but could equally apply to today, the 2008/2009 period is equally, if not worse, bleak and we find ourselves again in recession. But whoever you blame, whatever the cause, we are here, we are in it and no one is coming to our rescue, we have to find our own way out!
The answer is simple: we have to ‘Live within our means’
Until next time: what does living within my ‘means’ mean?
Following the austere years of World War Two, people were fed up with the ration books, with the make do and mend mentality.
The 1950’s saw a big increase in the buy now pay later sales tactics, leading to mounting debt and burdening families for years to come.
Escalating through the 1960’s, people saw their neighbours getting new furniture, all the latest new fangled mod cons, not really knowing how it was to be paid for, they just knew they had to keep up and have these things too.
But the 1970’s saw some pay back for the ever increasing debt balloon – the balloon burst. Escalating oil prices, miners strikes, led to three day working weeks, unfortunately I’m old enough to remember the regular power cuts, reading by candle light (if you could even get candles), no television or radios (games consoles and the like hadn’t even been invented then so we didn’t moan we couldn’t use them), we didn’t even have the luxury of a battery operated radio.
Then, ‘BOOM’, the 1980’s were upon us with all the excesses of the rapid rise in wealth, share ownership, but very soon - ‘BUST’. It soon fell apart and everything went into freefall, mass riots, repossessions, another miners strike (although this time there would be no victory) mass job losses. But, who was to blame? Lenders wanting to make a quick buck? Or the borrowers for over extending themselves with debt without really having a clue of how they were going to repay it?
That last paragraph related to the 1980’s, but could equally apply to today, the 2008/2009 period is equally, if not worse, bleak and we find ourselves again in recession. But whoever you blame, whatever the cause, we are here, we are in it and no one is coming to our rescue, we have to find our own way out!
The answer is simple: we have to ‘Live within our means’
Until next time: what does living within my ‘means’ mean?
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