What does it actually cost us to live?
We track our spending every month to see where our money is really going – and to understand how the choices we make today affect our journey towards financial freedom.
We’re not trying to spend as little as possible. We’re trying to spend deliberately, while making sure our spending reflects the life we actually want to live.
Below you’ll find our monthly spending reports, our longer-term spending history and some of the lessons we’ve learned along the way.
Where are we now?
Our current spending target
£2,700 per month
That’s the level of spending we’re currently aiming to stay around for our normal household expenditure.
But the number isn’t the whole story.
Our spending naturally changes from month to month. Holidays, birthdays, home improvements and other one-off expenses can make individual months look very different, so we’re more interested in the long-term trend than whether we hit an arbitrary number every month.
Our spending over time
One of the reasons we’ve kept track of our spending for so long is that it gives us a much better picture of how our lifestyle has changed.
Annual spending
The interesting part isn’t simply whether our spending has gone up or down.
It’s why.
We’ve moved countries, had children, changed our priorities and made some deliberately unconventional choices along the way. Our spending history is therefore also a record of how our lives have changed.
2026 Monthly Spending
How much are we spending this year?
| Month | Spending | vs £2,500 |
|---|---|---|
| April 2026 | £2,509 | £9 over |
| March 2026 | £2,342 | £158 under |
| February 2026 | £2,484 | £16 under |
| January 2026 | £4,717 | £2,217 over |
Our Spending Over Time
| Year | Average monthly spending | vs £2,500 |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 (4 months) | £3,013 | £513 over |
Previous Years
We’ve been tracking our spending for years, which means we can look back and see how our finances have evolved.
2025
What did we spend in 2025?
Our annual review of the year, including where our money went, what changed and what it meant for our FIRE journey.
Read the 2025 spending review →
2024
Our 2024 spending
A look back at our household spending and the decisions behind the numbers.
Read the 2024 review →
2023
Our 2023 spending
How our spending changed as our family and circumstances changed.
Earlier years
We’ve also documented our spending in previous years, going back to the early days of A Way to Less.
Where does our money actually go?
We don’t just look at the total.
We track the major areas of our household spending to understand what’s driving the number.
🏠 Home
Mortgage, bills, maintenance and everything involved in keeping a home running.
🛒 Food
Our supermarket spending, eating out and the cost of feeding a family.
🚗 Transport
Cars, fuel, public transport and other travel-related costs.
👨👩👧👦 Family
Children, activities, clothing, school and all the other costs that come with family life.
✈️ Travel
Holidays and adventures – because spending money on experiences is part of the life we’re trying to build.
🎯 Everything else
The things that don’t fit neatly into a category, including those occasional expenses that inevitably appear.
Why do we track our spending?
Tracking every pound isn’t particularly exciting.
But it’s incredibly useful.
It helps us answer some important questions:
Are we spending in line with our priorities?
Are our expenses creeping up without us noticing?
How much do we actually need to live on?
What could we cut if we really wanted to?
What are we happy to spend money on?
And, perhaps most importantly:
Are we becoming financially independent without making our lives miserable in the process?
For us, financial independence isn’t about achieving the lowest possible spending figure.
It’s about creating enough financial security that we have more choices about how we spend our time.
Spending & FIRE
Our spending is closely connected to our FIRE journey.
The less we need to spend each year, the less we need to have invested before we can consider ourselves financially independent.
But we’re also conscious that there’s little point in building a huge investment portfolio if we spend decades avoiding the things that make life enjoyable.
That’s the balance we’re trying to find.
Read about our FIRE journey →
See our latest financial review →
Follow the journey
We’re continuing to track our spending as our lives change – including our upcoming six-week trip through Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore in early 2027.
We’ll be sharing what the trip actually costs, how that compares with our normal spending and whether we’re still comfortable with the financial trade-offs we’re making.