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End of tax year ‘to do’ list

/ Gracie Sunderland / Leave a comment

The clocks changed last night: this is how British people refer to daylight savings. I realised it is not universal, but since this is a post focusing on the UK tax year we can just start there.

So, the clocks changed, the snowdrops are out, and its raining rather than snowing. That can only mean one thing: the end of the tax year. I’ve been talking about this – like all of it, the flowers, the weather and the financial planning – over on my IG page. Do come and join me, a lot of this is more fun with pictures.

Since 1753, for various nefarious reasons, the UK tax year runs from 6th April-5th April the next year. That means there is a week until the 5th April deadline for the 2022-23 year ends, and since the 6-10th April are also public holidays (quaintly referred to as Bank Holidays, honestly I didn’t appreciate how idiomatic British English is until I moved away) there are just eight working days to put in play any transactions relating to this tax year.

There are a couple of big things to be aware of in terms of the tax year:

  • If you self assess for tax, you will need to get ready for the end of the year and for doing your tax return;
  • There may be changes announced which will impact you from 6th April which you should be aware of; and
  • Each tax year you get tax-free allowances which mean you get to keep more of your money through savings, pensions and other approaches. It’s all very simple but if you don’t use the allowances you lose them.

Of these, I will come back to planning your tax return (clue – I *love* doing mine). As more of a global blog I won’t go into the details on the second point but key things to look into are a raise in minimum wages for 21-22 year olds, but also a raise in national insurance in order to pay for social care. For this post I want to talk through some of the allowances, just in time for you to put them into play.

  1. You can max out tax free savings vehicles. The main one for most people is an Individual Savings Account, or ISA. There are multiple different types in the UK, but your money grows tax free. You can invest up to £20,000 per year. There are tons of benefits here – you don’t pay tax on any of the growth, ever, and since you can place it in a stocks and shares ISA you have a decent chance of it growing a lot. There are other options including Lifetime ISAs (though these are open only to people below 40, and are closing out). ISAs need to be opened or rolled over each year and money needs to be paid in before 5th April. If you don’t reach the £20,000 contribution allowance you just get it again next year – and it’s totally worth setting one up however much or little you can put in.
  2. This is also true for savings vehicles for your children. Junior ISAs (JISA) have an allowance of £9,000 per child per year and with stocks and shares JISAs and the power of compound interest, this can make a huge difference in financial planning for your children.
  3. Also thinking of savings for kids, there is the option to open a Self Invested Pension Plan (SIPP) just as there is for adults. The allowance is £3,600 per child per year and whilst the account moves into their name at 18, they cannot access the money until age 57. Again, the power here is from compound interest so even a tiny amount can be worth it with the tax benefits thrown in as well.
  4. For adults, the SIPP allowance is also worth investigating, especially if there are limits to your workplace pension or other options. This year you can pay in up to 100% of your gross annual earnings up to a maximum of £40,000 which will increase in 2023-24 to £60,000.
  5. If you are married then there are tax free allowances you can take advantage of. It’s possible to ‘share’ a tax allowance with a spouse depending on your different earning levels. Doesn’t apply to me so have not looked into it deeply, but it’s worth noting.
  6. Finally, check your tax code. It is your responsibility to do this – whilst there is a tax free allowance for income tax each year, the wrong tax code can mean that you’re paying too little or too much, and that can come back around when you least need an extra bill.

I hope that has been useful! Remeber – with the time left, you could open a new account and max out the allowances before the end of the year.

Reminder on the disclaimer: I am not a qualified financial planner or advisor and none of this blog or post constitutes ‘advice’. Treat is as seriously as if you were chatting to someone super interested in a subject at a bar. So you might find out something intersesting but you definitely wouldn’t act on it until you took other advice. Cool? Cool.

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What a week (in finance)

/ Gracie Sunderland

Blimey. This week has been far from relaxing if you are in any way interested in finance – or indeed interested in having any money!

The world shaking news about the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) was quickly followed by the potentially much more impactful possible collapse and subsequent bail out of Credit Suisse. Those of us who remember 2008 perhaps quaked a little in our boots, since fallout from failure in the banking sector has wide ranging consequences on ordinary people. Indeed, the failure of SVB is the biggest bank failure of a US Bank since that financial crisis.

Credit Suisse is one of the most important global wealth managers, and is in the top 30 financial institutions who are considered ‘systemically important’ and whose collapse would impact across the financial ecosystem world-wide. Unfortunately with that in mind, Credit Suisse shares have lost more than 75% of their value over the past twelve months and their bail out by the Swiss Central Bank might not even be enough to shore them up in the medium to long term.

So, what does it mean? Clearly as someone who doesn’t work in finance I have only the vaguest idea. In general though, commentators seem to agree that whilst the impact will be felt, the regulations put in place after 2008 mean that they will be felt as ripples rather than a tsunami. However, if SVB was impacted for example by rising interest rates and inflation, then there might be a lot more to come.

The knock on effect has of course been a downturn in the stock market, with share prices reducing and the banking sector in particular – unsurprisingly – hard hit. As we get to the end of the financial year in the UK and I am preparing to max out my stocks and shares ISA I am trying to view this as buying shares on sale, rather than freaking out and hiding my money under the mattress.

The final thing was the UK budget, as announced by Jeremy Hunt. Aside from the cost of living crisis in the UK (and I could say more but I’m trying not to be overly political here…) he is focused on ‘prosperity with purpose’ without seeming to make any meaningful movements to support people’s ability to live whilst the supposed magic happens. Hunt committed to keep the energy cap as well as increasing support to get people into work. What jobs there might be is a different question.

The main news seems to have been the reform around childcare, also based on ensuring people can work more hours, meaning parents of children aged nine months to three will be offered 30 hours a week of free childcare in term time – as long as both parents are working at least 16 hours a week. Let’s see if the issue of childcare places and the under payment of many places under the free hours scheme will get resolved.

How will the budget – or the issues with the Bank – impact you? I’d love to hear from you!

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So I sold my rental: part 1

/ Gracie Sunderland / 1 Comment

Welcome to this blog post – if you’re new, do have a poke about the other posts, and if you’re an old friend, thanks for sticking with me. Also do come join us over on Instagram for frugal food and adventure ideas, reflections from the Barbies (those girls don’t play), and some inspiration.

So, I was banging on mysteriously in my financial review of 2022 about some major changes in my portfolio, and the biggest one is that I have sold my rental property in the UK. This was something under consideration for a long time – indeed, it’s a year ago that I made the first call to an estate agent to get a valuation. During my portfolio valuation in March 2022, I realised that 60% of my net worth is in property. Since around 30% was in pensions, it meant that there was very little liquidity.

Whilst I don’t need a ton of liquid cash, I am at a point where I need more flexibility. That might mean having more accessible money for investing in a side hustle, or a smaller property in Kenya as I plan my transition there. So it doesn’t mean putting it all under the bed in a cardboard box but it also doesn’t mean hosting so much of my net worth in one property.

I write about housing and home ownership a lot, especially recognising the tensions where structural inequalities impact people’s ability to own a home and how this affects generational wealth. I also recognise that the UK rental market is an absolute catastrophe, with rising rents and rising uncertainties holding back a huge number of people from fulfilling their potential. It isn’t just about whether people can buy a home of their own: spending huge amounts on rent means that it’s harder to save for a future, and lack of stability in the market is impacting the sense of living in ‘permacrisis‘ which is impacting mental health for so many.

All of which are critical conversations. But this post is just about the decision to sell my rental property, and how it is working out so far.

One of the main challenges with having such a heavy lean towards net worth invested in property, is the level of risk. Whilst owning a house to live comes with a certain amount of risk, it is very different to owning property as an investment. If my house that I live in goes down in value, all the other houses locally will likely go down in value too meaning that I haven’t lost out substantively: the market has changed for all. Plus if I want to live in that house, as long as I can pay the mortgage (hello rising inflation), it balances out.

With the uncertainties in the housing market in the UK, I felt that the risk was too great and that I would be stuck with the house forever. I had bought the house planning to live in it with my kids, but then I got a job overseas and now I really don’t see us moving back any time soon. Whilst it was a good house for us when my children were smaller, I had planned for it to be a ‘five year home’ and we are past that point – even if we wanted to move back, the size and layout of the house, and proximity to a decent secondary school, means it doesn’t work for this season in our lives.

Whilst the rental income was covering costs, it wasn’t enough to make the locking up of all other assets worth it. In fact, choosing to rent out a house that I had bought as a family home only made sense when I was thinking we might move back to it. Many FIRE podcasts talk about this – basically, what you look for in a rental property and a home for yourself are different. Which is not rocket science, but good to remember.

Paula Pant has some useful guides to working out whether a rental property is worth it. You can have a read for yourself to get into the complexities of it, but my property fails at the first hurdle. Paula’s ‘one percent rule’ recommends that you only consider a property where the rent equals one percent of the purchase price. So if you have a house like mine where the acquisition price was £360,000 it should rent for £3,600 per month. Whilst the rental markets in the UK and US are totally different, by the time of the sale (noting that the value had increased, and I had frozen rents at the same amount since 2016), rent for my property equaled less than 0.25% of the market value.

So I decided to sell. I wanted to treat my tenants well, and gave them six months notice that I would not be renewing their tenancy in September. I agreed a price and put the house on the market. Since things are so strange at the moment, I had no offers for some time, then an over asking price offer which I accepted immediately. There was a lot of negotiation trying to get things done as quickly as possible on their side so they could be in for Christmas, and my recognising that just after my dad passed away, I was really not capable of dealing with very much. So, with help from the estate agents, we muddled through and completed on the sale 10 days before Christmas.

And that’s it! It feels like a long post but it was a decision which took so much thought, and one where a lot of the thinking was basically crystal-balling in terms of what would happen with housing market, mortgage rates and so on. And in the end, I had to make a decision based on the information that I had at the time, and what season of life I am in right now. I am finalising the financial assessment of how it went and will share in a future post (including all the joy of Capital Gains Tax woohoo) but for now, I am excited about what’s next for that money, and hoping the new owners had a great Christmas in their new home.

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2022: Financial year in review

/ Gracie Sunderland / 1 Comment

I like to start the new year with a stocktake of how my finances are doing and whether my savings and investments went according to plan, then using this as a prelude to setting some plans and goals for the coming year. This isn’t the only focus for the year, so check out future posts to find out more about setting intentions, vision boards and the like. But it is a good way of gathering some baseline data to see where I am starting from.

To say 2022 was a tricky year financially is a massive understatement. Whilst the economy globally seemed to be strengthening post-COVID at the start of the year, the invasion of Ukraine in February turned a lot of the world’s certainties on their head. Prices started to go up for petrol, food, energy, leading to massive cost increases in the basics for most households.

This trend has continued throughout the year, with supply chain issues as well as scarcity in some areas leading to a crisis with the soaring cost of living. I feel like I’ve been writing about this all year: 92% of adults in the UK have reported an increase in the cost of living, with 60% saying they are ‘very concerned’ about their ability to cope with additional rises. Food banks in the UK had to distribute more than 1.3 million food parcels in 2022, an increase of 50% since pre-COVID figures. I recognise that whilst financial freedom remains a critical goal in my life, so many people are getting closer to the financial precipice that they really need to get support, and get it now.

Inflation also grew at a significant and rapid rate, hitting almost 11% in the UK by the end of December. For many people, including me, this had an immediate impact on mortgage interest rates, biting even deeper into the daily costs of getting by. Whilst the expectation is that inflation has now hit its highest point and will start to reduce in 2023, the impact (and uncertainty) of these shifts are real.

It has also been a shaky year for the markets. Again an understatement, with the Financial Times headline for the end of the year reading Stock and bond markets shed more than $30tn in ‘brutal’ 2022. Markets in the US had their worst year since 2008 (and we all remember what a brilliant year that was). Whilst I love FIRE and the focus on both balancing for risks, and keeping your head in the event of a downturn – and I have definitely moved on from panic selling in 2020 – it has felt like another rollercoaster ride which just hasn’t been that fun.

This has also been the worst year in terms of growth for my own portfolio. I made some major changes this year (more about this in future posts) to rebalance away from being over-invested in property, but continued to invest throughout the year in mutual funds and my pensions. I added in kids’ savings here which I don’t normally do, but as they are starting to get older I need to come back to my financial planning for them, and make sure I am adjusting as needed depending on their age and stage.

My investments this year came to almost £80,000, though some of this came from my property sale meaning that my investment from salary alone came to £50,000. I am extremely proud of this figure and what it represents in terms of prioritisation and tenacity. Since I have been working on myself over the last few years, I can feel that pride at the same time as recognising that my salary and privileges mean that I am in a very unusual and blessed position.

2022 Contributions
Personal pension (SIPP) £                   8,600
Savings (stocks and shares ISA, emergency savings) £                 31,000
Work Pension (pre-tax) £                 18,444
Mortgage capital overpaid £                   5,000
Kids’ savings (JISA, J-SIPP) £                 16,000
Contributions £                 79,044

Next steps for me are to do a review of my net worth (and realistically to not compare it to a US$ amount as I traditionally have – with the recent forex issues, this is a pathway to sadness) and set out some plans and goals for 2023. Whilst I do that, I will just continue to save and invest as usual, and get ready for what is hopefully an easier year for us all.

Look forward to hearing about your 2022 and how able you were to follow your financial plans given that major challenges during the year.

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The Fear

/ Gracie Sunderland / Leave a comment

Things seem pretty scary at the moment. Climate disasters, war in Ukraine, Ebola in Uganda, right wing shifts in Italy, significant remilitarisation in Europe, a soaring cost of living – I could go on. Having always been a political animal I now refuse to have the news on in the morning because it makes me want to go back to bed and just stay there.

Writing a blog about personal finance (and I mean that in the loosest sense) means that recognising the impact political and socio-economic changes have on people’s lives and opportunities is critical. There is a big difference between painting a falsely aspirational picture versus giving people hope and courage to try a different path and see how they can succeed in their context.

So I just wanted to take today to talk about The Fear and why it’s not unfounded.

100% faith over fear. But it takes a lot to say faithful in an unstable world when you keep getting kicked down. Photo by Sincerely Media on Unsplash

Personal finance is largely built on evidence-based faith. We look at the options open to us; historical shifts, values and movements; and our own future plans and needs. Then use all that information to triangulate the best options. I mean – this is what happens ideally. Sometimes we get hopeful, or greedy, and it’s more like a game of pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey. Sometimes we freak out, and it’s more like flipping over a table full of delicious food in order to hide underneath it. But in essence, making decisions means assessing what we think will happen, in our lives and in the markets, and trying to match them up with available options.

Take deciding to invest in the stock market. This is traditionally somewhere where it’s easy to be fearful, and decide not to get involved (caveat – there are other excellent political reasons not to do so, but that’s for another time). It is also a place where people are likely not to realise that not investing creates other risks around having their savings eroded by inflation. But intentional action always feels more scary than unintentional inaction, even where the impact might be the same.

Over a long period of time, the stock market has consistently gone up. As the financial planners say, it is time in the market, not timing the market that delivers results. Taking the graph below which models the sorry history of a fictional investor who puts money in just at the worst possible time, we see that he still benefits from compound interest and ended up with a 7.98% annualised return.

In other words, however disastrous certain moments were, the net result of investing in the stock market has been positive.

Modelling of a single, ill-timed (and imaginary) investor. Credit

The massive caveat here is that if the market crashes at a point where you need your money, you are screwed. And that’s where The Fear comes in. In the example above, if that investor had lost their job and been forced to pull out their savings to live off, or reached pensionable age and had to cash out an invested pension, they would not have won.

This is all aside from people freaking out and pulling their own money at the wrong time, like I did in 2020. If you are in a position where you must – either for reasons of perception or fact – have to take money out of the market at a time when it is down, you will lose.

This week I have been reading Nomadland (also a film). This amazing book charts what has happened to the “invisible casualties of the Great Recession”, largely older people who unexpectedly found that, in spite of investing in it for years, the American Dream would be forever out of their reach. There is more I want to reflect on about the changing nature of work – most of the people featured in the book will never be able to retire but are forced to work seasonal, temporary jobs – but that’s for another time.

Having a global financial shitstorm happen at a time in your own life where for whatever reason – divorce, illness, getting to an age where you are considered disposable – on top of all the other institutionalised inequalities that impact on people’s ability to make ends meet, can push you permantly to the bottom of the heap. Whils the stock market recovered from the 2008 mega crash, and people who were able to stay in the market have done very well indeed, 10 million Americans lost their homes. For those who lost their homes but were upside down on the mortgage or on other debt, they could spend many years paying for something they no longer own. Having to make money to service a debt for a dream they suddenly couldn’t afford.

So The Fear is real. It’s not to stop any of us from dreaming, or investing, or anything else. I still wanted to recognise how quickly things can go left: there are long term impacts that we can still see, and blithely ignoring the possibilities is just foolishness. I want to leave with these two photos from Detroit of a residential street 9 years apart, in 2009 and 2018. Detroit was one of the hardest hit areas during the recession, meaning there are a lot of streets like this.

It’s ok to be afraid and still look for ways to keep moving in faith: in fact, that’s maybe all we have. But remember that there are people and places which have been erased by these historical financial moments. And they won’t be coming back.

From a community to an overgrown pathway in less than ten years. Read the full story and see other examples here.

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The cost of having kids

/ Gracie Sunderland / Leave a comment

This started off as two totally different posts but for whatever reason, I ended up wanting to talk about the cost of having kids. Clearly feeling grumpy about it!

Having kids is a huge fianancial commitment whether you are single or not: even a married mama will earn one-third less than male counterparts by the time her eldest is 12. Very often people focus on the cost of having kids in terms of the things we need to buy for them, which is honestly by far the smallest part of the equation. Lots of places list out the things you’ll need and how much they might cost but it’s not rocket science, and with the rise in great second hand equipement, doesn’t need to break the bank. I bought everything second hand (other than a car seat because you can’t guarantee it hasn’t been in an accident which migth render it useless, and cot or Moses basket mattresses since you there is a small chance that using a second hand mattress from outside the family increases the risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome or SIDS).

Clue: you need very little of this stuff. Photo by elliot verhaeren on Unsplash

I got many things for free, and did without a whole load of others which seemed unimportant. Then I made sure I passed on all my used stuff, from books and maternity wear to kids clothes, toys and books, to make sure someone else benefitted. Kids use things for such a short amount of time – though honestly they can also properly trash some things which are just unusable after a few months – that most things are good for another few years. So much of the things we purchase for our children end up as waste, with more than 2.2 billion pounds of clothing for children aged 0-11 ending up in American landfill each year: the equivalent of 45 pounds per child. 90% of toys are made at least partly of plastic, and 80% end up in landfill including things in good working order that kids have just grown out of.

Which is kind of ironic given that this wastefulness is bringing about the kind of climate change that means the lovely babies we are so proud to show off in a new outfit, or make smile with a new toy, are more likely than ever to end up living their adult lives at the sharp end of a fiery apocolyptic disaster. And even if you don’t believe in climate change (you probably shouldn’t be on this blog to be fair) or don’t care, the sheer wastefulness in terms of money and resources makes doing things differently surprisingly easy.

Not my child but what a cutie: Photo by Kiana Bosman on Unsplash

But these costs are nothing compared with the cost of childcare, and the impact on your career. And we haven’t even started talking about if you want to prepare them for college, or save up so they can have a deposit for a house. In 2020, 49% of first time buyers under 35 got help with their deposit from their parents, with the majority of them saying they wouldn’t have been able to buy a house without this support. So if you can’t help out your kids, they are going to get left further behind. Just in case you didn’t feel bad enough already.

Research (though I always think these things are a bit vague given the many different approaches you can take to parenting) suggests that the cost of raising a child in the UK is £193,801 for a single parent. Using that and the lack of financial support since their birth, I will have lost almost £400,000 by having children. According to some back-of the-envelope calculators, investing that in a low cost ETF or stocks and shares ISA would grow to around £700,000 in the 18 years. Add to that the reduced earning power, and having two kids has probably cost me £1 million.

Obviously, I didn’t have children to make money (child labour is illegal after all…) And this calculation doesn’t include the fact that they will look after me in my old age (which, thanks to our cultural background, they really really will). Having kids is awesome, and my two are both pretty much the best fun I ever have, as well as potentially being part of the solution to the problems my and my parents’ generation have created in this world.

Also not my kid, but a child quietly reading a book is something I fully support. Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

But the cost of having children is real, and shouldering the burden alone can feel like a huge strain. Being part of the FIRE movement, where it feels like it’s predominantly white married couples who have nothing to do with my life (this was the other post I started writing) can make things feel even lonelier. But FIRE as an approach means that I feel in control or the spending and financial decisions I make, and more confident that I am creating the kind of future my kids, and I, deserve.

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Commitment #2

/ Gracie Sunderland / 1 Comment

Last week I posted on my Insta about paying off £27,000 in 19 months and I wanted to talk about it in a bit more detail here and how it relates to my thinking on commitment.

Generally I don’t carry debt. I appreciate there are a number of schools of thought on this one, especially about ‘good debt‘, credit card benefits and so on but for me it always comes back to the kinds of risk I am willing to take (TL:DR – not many, usually based on complex zombie apolocalypse scenarios where I can’t look after my kids).

But when I was buying a house last year it turned out that I couldn’t bridge the gap between my deposit and the mortgage. I had 10% as a down payment but needed more to be able to access the financing. I had already scrimped hard to get the downpayment together and, with fees and costs associated with moving, just couldn’t make the rest in the right time frame without leaving myself with no emergency fund at all. So I took a bridging loan, just as a personal loan from my regular bank.

I figured that adding it as a risk to the overall house buying approach should work. Photo by Ingrid Martinussen on Unsplash

But in taking out that loan I made a commitment to pay it off as quickly as possible. The total to repay including interest over the original 60 months was £29,349 for a £25,000 loan. This felt like more interest than I was willing to pay, and was definitely a spur to get it out of the way. My original monthly payments were £500 per month, and with this rate I paid back £1,400 on average every month.

And now, aside from mortgages, I am debt free again. And it feels like a huge weight off my shoulders.

One dictionary definition of commitment is an engagement or obligation that restricts freedom of action. For me, having this loan restricted my actions in other areas, which was interesting since I already thought I was quite frugal:

  • This is the big one – no holidays. I value travel and connection with my kids and our worldwide family but I cut it out for this period other than going to visit my sick father. Everything else felt like it could wait. So one month in Kenya long planned for this summer got cancelled and that money paid off the last £5,000. Interestingly planning this trip also raised issues of commitment about how others were showing up (or not) for me, which made the decision to cancel a lot easier.
  • A ‘squeeze tax’ on most of my other spending. Basically this meant reducing groceries and other discretionary spend by about 10%. It also showed me what the space is in my budget, though I am aware I don’t live that close to the knife edge anyway. I added in two additional meals a week to be prepared on a Sunday meaning I could use up odds and ends, use the slow cooker, and generally remove the temptation to nip out and spend more money on food as the week headed to Friday. Ditto with packing lunches for the office. And clothes – I spent around £120 on clothes in this total period for all three of us.
  • Cancelled all subscriptions. All but one. I used to regularly check I wasn’t being charged for things I didn’t want, but here I cut out everything I didn’t actively value.
  • Got energy from freaking out. I have been writing about the cost of living crisis which we are all freaking out about, whether a little or a lot. I made the decision to take the loan when I could easily manage the monthly payment, and looking down the barrel of rising prices everywhere, made me really conscious that I needed to tighten down my commitments.

The take away for me was that through commitment all things are possible. This isn’t going to be true if you are already living close to the breadline, but for many of us on the FIRE journey, our ability to squeeze more out of our budgets depends on where we are trying to go. I have never quite managed to find the same drive for investing and saving as I found for paying off this debt which is showing me some interesting tactics and opportunities to get better (or clearer) at getting inspired in those other areas.

So I feel pretty proud of this. Being able to commit to something, and see it through with very minimal support, really keeps me confident of my ability to chart this path, however much it changes along the way. So stay committed. Stay focused. Sometimes restricting freedom of action can feel limiting, but remember that you have a bigger goal in mind.

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Cost of living crisis 1: Energy

/ Gracie Sunderland / 1 Comment

Quick reminder to come and get your flowers (or a random selection of inspiration, poor jokes from me and photos taken my by daughter) on my Insta.

The soaring cost of living crisis is real. You don’t need to understand inflation, changes in base interest rates or why the stock market is having a wobble to know that your supermarket shop is costing more. Indeed, there are so many cause-and-or-effect conversations about the macro-economics of it all that at the moment I don’t care. But I do know that I just got a water bill for the equivalent of £4,000. And that’s just one of my skyrocketing utility bills which are stacking up like an angry little bomb waiting to go off.

I wanted to write a few posts looking at different aspects of what is going on and why, and how we can navigate it and stay sane and solvent. Starting this week with energy as it’s top of mind, and one area where increases are making a terrifying dent in people’s pockets.

Even the moths have flown. Photo by Towfiqu barbhuiya on Unsplash

So what can you do about your energy bills?

My focus here is for the UK though a lot of the household tips are universal. Whilst I live in Denmark, the utility market remains a total mystery. We don’t have many companies, especially since in urban areas a lot of energy is from the Kommune or local council. This means there are no switching or price comparison services. So whilst prices are going through the roof the options are a) turning everything off or b) saving money elsewhere.

In the UK, energy costs have already doubled for many households and will likely rise by October to almost £3,000. With the median income in the UK being £31,400, this means that energy only (not even all utilities) is costing households 10% of their income. Unfortunately switching deals is not likely to make any difference and is not even available to most unless you get an ‘existing customer’ deal. And watch out if you do switch since exit fees have gone up 10 times in the last year.

The idea of creating competition in the energy sector in order to benefit customers has only created a monster market where providers can do what they like. Issues in Ukraine are exacerbating fears around supply, but these price rises have been coming for a while and are only possible on the back of the ‘competitive’ set up.

Pulling money from your bank account all the way into the horizon. Photo by Matthew Henry on Unsplash

The main things you can do to save energy are things we should all be doing anyway for environmental purposes. Unfotunately some of them require an outlay at the start which might not be possible in these belt tightening days but some are pretty simple.

Big outlay changes

  • Look at your heating system. Is your boiler efficient? There are simple ways to check. Generally putting in a new boiler unless you absolutely have to isn’t going to save you anything, but when you do, shop around for the most efficient kind going.
  • Think about insulating your house more efficiently. When I was growing up my best friend had cling film across all the windows to reduce heating bills, so it doesn’t all mean huge outlays on triple glazing. There are some great tips on insulation from the Energy Trust – such as fitting a hot water tank with an insulating jacket at a cost of about £25 which will save you £35 a year in heating costs and 115kg of carbon dioxide emissions.
  • Consider generating your own electricity. This can be very expensive, and most of the government grants have ended. But with the energy crisis likely to be long term, it’s worth exploring if you have any spare cash to invest here. Solar is the obvious one for homes, with a lot to think about before you take the leap.
  • Check if your appliances are energy efficient and consider replacing them, once they are dead, with a focus on efficiency. White goods especially – fridge, freezer, washing machine, oven – are massive energy leakers.
Turn off that tumble dryer! Photo by Brina Blum on Unsplash

Day to day changes

  • Use your timer and thermostat. This is the easiest way to save money and help the environment, just having the heating on when and where you actually need it. Go through the house and turn down radiators where you don’t need them on.
  • Turn down the thermostat already. Most money saving and environmental groups recommend 68 degrees (20 celsius) in the winter. Remember how cold your grandparents’ house was? You’re aiming for a bit warmer than that. Don’t expect to be walking around in a t-shirt, instead invest in a fluffy dressing gown and socks, and pretend it’s intentional hygge.
  • Decide what you will use less. Tumble driers are particularly energy heavy: dry outside in the summer, or get a couple of clothes racks and dry inside. When I lived in a badly ventilated flat, drying clothes inside contributed to mould and meant that I had to have the heating on and the window open so I used to go to the laundrette which takes time and money in a different way. So one to think about how best to manage depending on your circumstances.
  • Turn off all standby appliances, including turning off plugs which aren’t in use. My grandparents always turned everything off at the plug at night in case of lightening – this isn’t a bad idea just in order to stop energy leakage.
  • Make sure you have a full load every time you turn on the washing machine or dish washer. Wash your clothes at 30 degrees – it really does work. Use the eco setting if you have one. The one on my dishwasher lasts 3 hours and is really noisy so I load the dishwasher during the day then put it on after breakfast when I leave for work.
  • Check out your fridge and freezer. Fridges should be set between 3-5 degrees, and freezers need defrosting regularly (this is a job on my list. Note to self – do not do this with a knife or you will regret it). Fridges actually work more efficiently when they are nearly full so add that extra milk or whatever and you will save on the energy bill.
  • If you are really struggling, there might be help: Citizens’ Advice can help out.
Protest signs in London 2022. Flickr/Gary Knight

Finally, consider the politics. My blog is about personal finance, but this is so closely linked to politics that it’s hard to keep out. There might not be simple answers, but the people who are already the most vulnerable are going to be the hardest hit and the most hurt. And that’s something we can all care about.

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Happy Father’s Day

/ Gracie Sunderland / 1 Comment

Caveat: bit of a controversial post. Consider yourself warned.

Happy Father’s Day to all the great dads out there. To all those who miss their dads; all those who never knew them; all those for whom ill health, distance, or social norms have made relationships difficult. Basically all the same things I say on Mothering Sunday. All parents matter.

Today I have been thinking about the ‘bitter single mums’ trope which is particularly active on social media on Father’s Day (seriously – why do you have the time? Shouldn’t you actually be hanging out with your kids?) and about a series of conversations I’ve had on toxic masculinity and how men are so undervalued by society that their only possible reaction is violence and disrespect. I am not a psychologist or a social scientist so I am perhaps even less qualified than usual to write this blog, but these are things on my mind so I share them with you, with these caveats in place.

Add your own definition. Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

The FIRE movement has a lot of great parenting role models. On a personal level I find the amount of people who reach FIRE based on spending one partner’s income tedious and irrelevant, but I get that for many folk it’s a new way of thinking about family spending. Lots of FIRE people got on this path in order to spend more time with their kids, and to be better parents, and that is something to celebrate. Mr Money Mustache has a lot to say on parenting his son, including since he and his wife divorced. Brad and Jonathan in Choose FI are always talking about their kids and how their FIRE pathway has focused on being with their children, and on leaving a legacy.

In fact there are lots of brilliant dads out there, of course there are. My own father, and the father of my children, don’t fall into this category but I don’t hate them for it – my children have never heard a bad word from my mouth about their father. The issue is that I have to make up for it, financially, emotionally, in terms of time spent and choices made and so on. And that’s not ideal but it’s ok. I am very lucky though in that I have an amazing step-father, fathers of friends (two of whom I have been really close to and sadly passed away this year), uncles and all. And I have friends, family and colleagues where I have so much respect for the way the father shows up, that it really inspires me on a daily basis. So I salute all those fabulous men: we see you. You’re doing great.

A Palestinian father bathing his daughter and neice, giving them as much of a normal happy childhood as he can in spite of the chaos all around. Credit: Wissam Nasser

There is, though, an increase in the number of women having to parent alone. There is plenty of blame around this, and there are multiple sides to every story, but the truth is that men are now allowed to absent themselves in a way that society permits. In my personal experience, this lack of involvement doesn’t stop them loudly complaining about how their ex will not facilitate the kind of contact they want with their children. The kind of people who complain in this way are, again in my experience, the same who want contact on a whim, when it’s convenient for them, and will change those times at the drop of a bar bill.

In Kenya, the outgoing President Uhuru Kenyatta has even made the issue of single parents as one of his key concerns. Globally Kenya is one of the countries where women are most likely to become a single parent, with almost 60% of women likely to be single by the time they are 45, whether or not they have children. Kenyatta’s concern was with the rise in the percentage of single parent households from 25% in 2009 to 38% today. I am not Kenyan but I lived there for a long time and intend to return for the RE aspect of FIRE (watch this space for posts on that thought process, white privilege and colonialist mindset – I’m here for self critique and growth as well, of course). It is one of the places where I find being a single parent the hardest, since even though there are so many of us, it is seen through a lens of shame and ‘burdenhood’ which basically makes me a social pariah. This kind of nonsense article, which paints women as insatiably greedy and self-centred, character developing then abandoning poor, defenceless Kenyan guys, just fills me with rage.

It’s also ironic when – look, I’m just going to say this and take the flack – Kenyan men are seemingly happy to pay for a whole lot of whatever when it comes to relationships. And I mean prepared to pay rent/transport/salon for your side chick (girlfriend) for years, but you think that I, as someone who earns 10 times more than you, is going to be a financial burden? Kthxbye.

There is also a growing narrative around the issues of toxic masulinity, and how men feeling undervalued, undermined and unable to navigate the changes in society mean that they are struggling to find ways to act as men, husbands and fathers in this brave new world. Masculinity itself isn’t toxic, that much should be obvious. So challenges men are facing are absolutely something which we need as a society to deal with in order to create a world that works for everyone. But at the same time this cannot be an excuse for gender-based violence or refusing to look after your own children. And it will bleed into the next generation. If you as a man are struggling with masculinity and shifts in social expectations, it should be obvious that if you have children – and not just sons – they will need you are a role model to work through those challenges with.

The seed never falls far from the tree. Photo by Bibhash Banerjee on Unsplash

In short, we could all do better. This world is not binary: most parents are both good and bad depending on the day. I might be doing it alone but it doesn’t mean I am any good at it, just that I don’t have the luxury of deciding to step out for years at a time.

And I am all for putting in the work to create a world where men feel appreciated, valued and heard. Where they can grow into their power in a way which doesn’t involve crushing (either physically, emotionally or financially) the women and children in their lives. That’s something that we can all believe in. Happy Father’s Day.

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Staying strong

/ Gracie Sunderland / 1 Comment

I’ve had lots of topics in my head this week to write about – the possible impact of inflation in investments; how to get started with real estate; my tax return (I am SO MUCH FUN at parties). But sitting here this Sunday morning I just feel – crappy. It’s been a busy few weeks but it has felt sort of like a deflating balloon: handing off at the end of my temporary promotion (after almost nine months of working my ass off); hitting some financial walls that I wasn’t expecting; finding it hard to get the enthusiasm together to plan for the summer, which should be exciting but I. Just. Can’t.

I mean, really. Consider how many people in your life ask this question becuase they care about the answer. Credit Finn /Unsplash

I feel lonely. And that’s a difficult spot to be in and stay motivated. There is something about having to constantly be my own cheerleader, my own auditor, commentator, coach, tiger mom or whatever else is just exhausting. Right now, nothing is motivating me enough to play all these roles and keep myself on track. I want to just lie down in a dark room – and unless I can pull myself out of it and get back to a place of peace, that is exactly what I will end up doing.

It is also hard to accept that when you start growing into your self, you leave people behind. The simplest antidote to loneliness feels like it’s company. So we go and hang out with those friends at the bar, take someone home for the night, get into social media scrolling. But all those things feel so empty that they can make the loneliness feel worse – make you feel like you are creating white noise instead of real connection, to distract yourself from doing the hard things.

Somewhere between these two things is where I am spending a lot of my time at the moment. I’m struggling with my own judgement about what matters, who to trust, and how to voice my needs. Honestly, I am scared that the depth of my need for closeness means that I am prepared to overlook a lot of small things which are flags that there are people who aren’t really that bothered about me after all. And I just don’t know where to go with that at the moment.

I wrote a post in January about loneliness, how it is more common than even, and the impact it has on our well-being. In that post I focused on three strategies for mitigating the feelings of loneliness and finding the kind of peace which acts as a foundation when things get rough. The first was building a stronger community, whether with family or friends, all the other Sunderland supporters you can find (good luck with that) or the girls you play Roller Derby with. My second strategy is around focusing on the calendar. Having rituals or activities which mark the passing of the seasons – from new year’s resolutions, spring cleaning, or The First BBQ of the Summer – makes me feel more like an active participant in something positive. Finally perhaps it’s about learning to listen, and to be heard. Building meaningful connections can take time and can be challenging – especially if you are feeling low – but it’s really worth it.

The JFK quote above though is also a reminder that finding peace, which is the first step to pretty much everything else really, is a transformational process even at personal level. It means taking down walls, building up new boundaries, reframing pathways and just keeping on going with the constant shift. This article about the habits that people give up on the road to peace was insightful and is helping me think about my own reactions. It talks about moving away from toxic people, from comfort, from the pursuit of perfection or impressing others, or from holding grudges (this is my own personal favourite).

But even though it sounds obvious, transformation is hard. Growth is painful. Moving away from people, and having that level of certainty in yourself and your pathway, can be lonely and exhausting. Thinking about where you will be in five years might be the right approach when you’re struggling to keep going, but if you’re doing that whilst watching people you have moved on from have The Best Party Ever on IG then it can feel like a fictitious bargain made only in your mind. I have days like today when I forget how these feelings and challenges show up, but I know that I always get through them, however crappy I feel for a little while. It’s ok. We got this.

And if it gets on top, go somewhere that reminds you of the powerful certainties of this world, and get it back into perspective. Photo by frank mckenna on Unsplash