moving out of home & budgeting (1 Viewer)

[glycerine]

a question for the people who've lived/do live out of home
i've been considering the move out of home for a while now, and today something happened that's nearly made up my mind. it wouldn't be for at least a month though as i don't have very much money saved.

i know about the basic costs - ie bond and rent which are easy to add up. but i've never really had to budget anything for myself before because i've always had plenty of money, either from my parents or from working.

my question is, how much money should i aim to have saved up to help me through the first few weeks of living out of home? ignore the initial costs of bond etc as that depends on where i live and i consider that an extra cost to save up.

if rent is say $150/week (my maximum i think), whats a base figure to be shooting for in terms of my weekly pay? right now i'm getting between $400-600 a week but that's for 30-50 hours a week which considering my uni timetable and the hours they apparently want me to work when i switch to parttime rather than casual, i'm not sure how i can keep that up, especially considering i'm exhausted enough as it is.

 

[kalli]

i live out of home and heres my costs (for 2 ppl):

food: 120 per week
water: 60 per 3 months
electricity: 300 per 3 months
gas: atm i dont pay gas but i used to pay about 80 per 3 months in prev residence
phone: 110 per month :-O
internet: 50 per month
foxtel: 53 a month

so thats the basics... add onto that transport and entertainment... and a contingency and u should be OK...

of course the initial costs of moving out are more... furniture + appliances, moving costs and the inital bond are a pain in the ass

i live with my BF and currently we make approx 620 a week (270 a week goes to rent) and we barley scrape through... although we are not good at budgets LOL

so yeah hope that answers your question or at least helps you out a bit... i dont own a car or contents insurance so that might have some extra costs for you that arent included here...

 

[glycerine]

thanx

 

[MzbLaZeIT]

stay at home till your old n grey! LOL

umm most rental places have upfront bonds aswell!

 

[kimi]

Glycerine, are you moving out by yourself or with others? Because im moving out soon with my two close friends and we know that by doing that, its so much easier and cheaper in every way. Cos technically, we only pay like 80bucks each/week on rent, and we share the costs on the phone, water, electricity, furniture etc. But its hard too, cos we've all just recently gone unemployed and its just hard to know how much of our saved money is enough to make sure we dont struggle. With Uni, its hard cos of the timetable and the extra costs that come about like textbooks etc- so having room for a part-time job is just going to be so difficult. I dnt know, but im so screwed when i move out- i can feel it.

 

[Collin]

I'm huge on budgeting and even without assessing your finances, one could easily atleast conclude the basic fact that if you're gonna move out (as a uni student), then definitely share the rent with a few other people. If you're just moving out by yourself, then you'd be totally screwed on an average uni student's income. If you were on a basic award-wages level job and renting a place with reasonable rent whilst studying, the problem isn't necessarily paying off rent, it's the fact that after rent and other maintenance spending is factored into the budget, you'll soon find yourself hard-pressed for additional spending money or money for saving/investing.

So after going through the whole 'decisions' stage like you are going through now, I concluded for me personally that it's just that much easier to stay home at the moment, where you don't pay rent (or as much) and don't need to pay for food/bills etc. My plan is to bum off my parents till I finish my degree and find a job that doesn't actually pay shit.