WELCOME TO HOW I Spend My Money, a series on TheJournal.ie that looks at how people in Ireland really handle their finances.
We’re asking readers to keep a record of how much they earn, what they save if anything, and what they’re spending their money on over the course of one week.
Are you a spender, a saver or a splurger? We’re looking for readers who will keep a money diary for a week. If you’re interested send a mail to money@thejournal.ie. We would love to hear from you.
Each money diary is submitted by readers just like you. When reading and commenting, bear in mind that their situation will not be relatable for everyone, it is simply an account of a week in their shoes, so let’s be kind.
Last time around, we heard from a loan officer on €34K who had moved back to Wexford. This week, a finance company employee living in Kildare and hoping to save for a mortgage.
I’m working as a Customer Service Associate for a Finance company. My boyfriend and I are living in Kildare for a while now. We are both working from home since last year mid-March because of the current restrictions. I really don’t mind working from home. I’m saving money on petrol – I use to average €80 a week on petrol driving to Dublin – no joke, my car chops petrol like crazy. It’s now only €20-40 a month.
We have only started saving from September 2020 as we are looking to get a mortgage by the end of the year or early 2022 and hope to have €20,000-€30,000 saved by then. We don’t have any loans or overdrafts, thankfully.
As we’re under restrictions this is the perfect time to save, hey, we have nowhere to go so why not save for a house. My boyfriend saves €1,000 I save €400 standing order I usually have €300 left at the end of the month the night before I get paid so in total I save €700.
Since we can’t go gym nor out to eat and drink we are mostly at home. We have a big garden so we exercise in the garden and go out for long walks and runs.
Occupation: Customer Service Associate
Age: 27
Location: Kildare
Salary: €24,530
Monthly pay (net): €1,936.54
Transport: Insurance (€70), petrol (€40), car tax (€79 every 3 months)
Rent: €950(475 my half)
Household bills: Sky TV (€27), Vodafone broadband (€45), Bin (€40), Energia (€150 for electricity) (€70 for gas) each paid every other month
Phone bill: €20 top-up per month
Health insurance: None. I have a full medical card. Life insurance covered by work.
Groceries: €150- €170
Subscriptions: None
Current saving: €400. Whatever is left over the night before I get paid goes into my savings.
***
7.00 am: I get up a bit early to brush my teeth and wash my face. I go for a quick run before getting ready for work. This is my every weekday routine.
7.40 am: I come back take a quick shower then make scrambled eggs and toast for us all to have.
8.30 am: Around this time I set up my desktop to have everything ready for the day.
10.00 am: I take my small break and check through my personal emails and make a call to my car insurance to change a few details.
1.00 pm: I take my lunch we do a little exercise in the garden. Afterwards, make a chicken and bacon sandwich with tea for me and my boyfriend.
5.30 pm: We have finished work and I start on dinner which is leftover lasagne and fried rice. I don’t like wasting food. Whatever is left in the fridge has to be finished.
19.00 pm: I have a few projects going on back home in Angola so most evenings I’m on the phone with my team as during the day it is difficult to talk about the work I’m doing.
20:30 pm: Since lockdown, we genuinely don’t really do anything exciting at all. This evening we stayed watching a couple of programs on TV and went to bed at 10.30 pm
Today’s total: €0
7.00 am: I get up a bit early to brush my teeth and wash my face. I go for a quick run before getting ready for work.
7.40 am: I come back take a quick shower then make an omelette and toast for us.
8.30 am: I turn on my computer and log in to work.
11.00 am: We have a team Zoom meeting just to talk about how our week is going so far and finding anything difficult.
1.00 pm: For lunch, I make stir fry noodles with beef as it’s something simple and quick.
5.30 pm: I finish work and go out to Supervalu to get a few things and had to top up my car with petrol by €20.00.
6.30 pm: For dinner, we have white rice and chicken stew I had cooked over the weekend.
8.00 pm: I have a call with my supervisor in Angola. The rest of our evening is spent on TV catching on some programs. We go to bed at 10.30 pm.
Today’s total: €20.00
7.00 am: I get up a bit early to brush my teeth and wash my face. I go for a quick run before getting ready for work.
7.40 am: I come back take a quick shower then make an omelette and toast for us.
8.30 am: I turn on my computer and log in to work.
10.15 am: I take my small break and just check through a few things on my phone.
1.00 pm: For lunch, I order fish and chips meal from our local takeaway which was €10.50.
5.30 pm: Finished work and we do a bit of exercise in the garden as we won’t be going for a walk this evening.
6.15 pm: For dinner, we’re having the remaining white rice and chicken stew. The rest of the evening is spent on TV and we go to bed at 10.00 pm.
Today’s total: €10.50
7.00 am: I get up a bit early to brush my teeth and wash my face. I go for a quick run before getting ready for work. This is my every weekday routine.
7.40 am: I come back take a quick shower then make scrambled eggs and toast for us all to have.
8.30 am: I set up my desktop to have everything ready for the day.
10.15 am: I take my small break and put some sausage rolls in the oven to eat while we work.
1.00 pm: For lunch, my boyfriend went to Supervalu to get us a chicken roll in the meantime I got a few ingredients ready to lay to make a spaghetti carbonara for dinner after work.
5.30 pm: We have finished work and I start on dinner which I had all my ingredients ready from earlier.
7.00 pm: We watch some YouTube videos and head to bed at 10.00 pm
Today’s total: €0
7.00 am: I get up a bit early to brush my teeth and wash my face. I go for a quick run before getting ready for work.
7.40 am: I come back take a quick shower then make scrambled eggs and toast for us all to have.
8.30 am: I set up my desktop to have everything ready for the day.
10.00 am: I take my small break and sit in the garden and check through my phone.
1.00 pm: We take our lunch and have stir-fried noodles – my go-to as it’s quick and done within 10 minutes.
5.30 pm: We have finished work and so most Fridays I go straight into Dublin. Today I went to buy a few items to cook this weekend. I spend €40.00 in the African shop and I also went to the Asian shop and €14.00 on few items. I went to Boots and got body lotion and a face cleanser which came to €9.50.
8.00 pm: Since lockdown, it’s a 45-minute drive to Dublin and 45 back before with work I could spend to 1hr 30mins in traffic this is one reason we need to find a place closer to work and family and friends. I get home and we have fried rice and chicken.
I also have a call with my Supervisor in Angola.
8:30 pm: A movie night we watch Palmer on Apple+ we head to bed around 11.00 pm
Today’s total: €63.50
8.00 am: I’m up and get into the shower and get ready for the day lot of cleaning and cooking to do. For breakfast you guessed again we have an omelette and tea. Any breakfast ideas will be appreciated in the comments.
9.00 am: I head to Lidl to get a few things to cook for the week. My shopping comes to €16.35.
9.45 am: Today I’m making jollof rice(my absolute fave), chicken, beef stew and spinach stew with assorted meats.
1.00 pm: Finally done cooking and decide to watch a movie (The United States vs Billie Holiday) as my boyfriend went out to get a few things in Laois.
2.00 pm: I realise I haven’t eaten anything in a while so I make quick bacon and chicken toasted sandwich and go back to watching the movie.
5.00 pm: My boyfriend is back and I make stir fry noodles with chicken. We sit out in the garden as we have an eating area and the weather is a bit nice.
7.00 pm: We go out for a walk. To be honest, I’m tired of this level 5 lockdown can’t even visit my parents as they don’t live locally and are elderly, restaurants aren’t open, can’t go for a night out or anything. Hopefully, things ease soon.
9.00 pm: We have fried rice and I put on a movie Carlito’s Way never seen it before and we head to bed at 00.40 am
Today’s total: €16.35
9.00 am: I wake up and do the usual quick shower and brush my teeth I didn’t feel like doing any running today so I make some pancakes for breakfast and we have it with fruits.
10.30 am: I cut the grass in the front and back garden as it hasn’t been cut in a while.
11.45 am: The weather was so nice today we spent most of our afternoon chilling in the garden.
2.00 pm: I make homemade pizza. I already had ingredients at home really doesn’t take that long to prepare and cook.
6.00 pm: We head out for a long walk and meet a few of our friends out also and have a quick chat about how cases are starting to go up again and we can’t work out why.
7.40 pm: For dinner, we’re having African dish fufu with spinach stew with assorted meat I had prepared yesterday.
8.30 pm: The rest of the evening we spend watching YouTube videos about properties and head to bed at 10.30 pm.
Today’s total: €0
***
What I learned –
I need to reduce the number of eggs I eat.
This week I really didn’t spend that much so I hope to continue this way. Really it is just grocery’s and petrol.
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