Money management and affording those luxury items

This post is some helpful tips and tricks for how I manage my money to be able to reach my goals and afford some of the luxury items on my Wishlist.  It has taken me many years to get to the point where I have the stamina, motivation and discipline to do this, but I am still not always perfect and I do make mistakes and give in from time to time.  This post is also coming from somebody who is currently child free and that does make a big difference, so if you are a parent you might have to tweak this.  Your financial goals and hobbies may be different to mine.  I love to travel and I also love my designer bags and accessories, but your hobbies may be cars and Lego!  You may not want to follow all of these tips, but if there are even two that you like then I will be so happy to have helped.  Money is always such a difficult topic and there are many people who struggle with it.  I am not perfect by any stretch, but I wanted to offer some free advice that has enabled me over the years to do the things that I enjoy in a world where we it is really difficult to financially do so.

1)  Low big bills - My husband and I have made the conscious decision before we start a family to live somewhere with a low mortgage and have a car that is very standard and cheap to run.  A lot of that stems from what we could originally afford, but as our careers have grown, we made the decision to stay put for now.  When the time comes when we want to start thinking about moving into a bigger house and a family car, then our financial situation will change and our savings plan will readjust to suit that.  Choosing to do this for 5 or so years longer than we could have, means we have had more money left over for disposable income.  We still could have done many of the tips below, but it would be a smaller pot to play with and we have enjoyed having a larger pot by keeping our bills as low as possible.  

2)  Memberships - As well as keeping your main bills such as a car and mortgage as low as possible, I also choose to be a road runner instead of paying a gym membership each month.  This is a personal thing, I understand some people need the gym to motivate them.  Both my husband and I road run and this saves roughly £80 a month.

3) Dinners, Coffee and drinks - We don't go for dinners and have takeaways often.  We do it for special occasions and if we crave one, we do a fake away.  Takeaway coffee is also the devil and as a couple, that can be a hefty amount of money.  Even if you just both get one a week, that's still £40!   Both my husband and I don't drink, which again even if you just go out as a couple once a month, that could also be anything from £50 to £100 maybe more.

4) Meal planning - Plan your meals for the entire week and stick to it when shopping. I can guarantee this will save you so much money and give you a routine when it comes to healthy eating.

5) Money pots - My biggest tip is to separate your leftover money into pots.  This is to ensure you have money for all of your hobbies and interests.  Lets say your hobbies and interests are to: 1) Save for your next house 2) Go travelling 3) Buy clothes and some luxury items.  This would mean you need three money pots.  Lets say you decide to start cutting back on the above points, so you save overall £250 from a month from cutting back on the gym, coffee, dinners and drinks.  This split into your three pots means you can save £85 in each pot.  The hardest thing about all of this is not touching the pots until there is enough for your item and not touching any of the other pots.  For example, if I want a pair of designer sunglasses, I might have to wait roughly 4 months for my money to build up before I can buy them.  When I finally reach that and buy them, it feels like a guilt free purchase as I still have the money in all my other pots building up to go travelling or towards a future house.

6) Money upfront spending -  My next tip is to only buy something if you have the money upfront. I know Klarna is really tempting, but  it's the worst thing you can do to have spending guilt.  Yes you may be able to afford to pay it in 30 days or in 3 payments, but you can get in a mess with it.  It is quiet addictive and you can end up getting carried.  I would always recommend you buying it upfront without the spending guilt.

7) De-influencing and over consumption - This is a big topic and one that I am not always great at when being spontaneous.  I love fashion and I love buying clothes and spending money on designer handbags and luxury items, but I do have to be strict with it.  I often go through my wardrobe and sell things on Vinted and use that money to buy more items, instead of letting my wardrobe get too cluttered with clothes I don't wear.  I always give myself a month to admire something before I buy it.  If I still like it after a month, then I will buy it, but it weeds out all the items that would be an instant gratification and then a regret later.  I'm only interested in adding items to my wardrobe that will last me for years to come.  Some trend items will fit into his category, but sometimes I need that month in order to fully absorb the item and decide if it is one of those pieces or not.  It's really hard to see something all over your social media and instantly want it.  If I'm buying a designer item, then chances are it has taken me a few months to save for it, so if I still love it once I have the money, then I will thoroughly enjoy buying it.  I always pull out my clothes every season and style outfits, this stops me saying 'I don't have anything to wear', as I have an outfits album on my phone ready.  The only pieces I should be buying then are key individual pieces or classic pieces that I feel I'm missing in my wardrobe that would go with lots of outfits. I used Pinterest to help me with this and discover my missing pieces. I save lots of money this way!