WELCOME TO HOW I Spend My Money, a series on The Journal that looks at how people in Ireland really handle their finances.
Are you a spender, a saver or a splurger? 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. 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 compliance officer on €45K living in the Midlands. This week, an apprentice mechanic on €22K living in the Midlands.
My boyfriend and I live at home in my parent’s house with them and my younger brother. We give €200 per month between us to my mam for rent/bills. She wants me to save as much as I can for my own house and I want to contribute, so we settled on €50 per week. We do our own food shop for the most part. I am extremely lucky I can live at home and save as much as I can, especially being on apprentice wages.
I’m in a better position than some apprentices in this trade, as with my age and experience, my employer offered me a bit better than the going rate. I’m two years into my apprenticeship, and for my first year, I earned only €310 before tax per week, working 38 hours. Now I earn €470 before tax, but I work 45 hours per week, plus every second Saturday, which pays overtime.
My weekends usually involve working on my cars or other projects. Myself and my boyfriend rent a shed space, which costs us €530 per month. The problem is it’s over an hour away from home, but we can’t find anything closer. We use it for storage and working. We’re slowly building up our equipment, buying things when we need/can afford them. Someday, we’d like to have a fully functioning garage.
When I’m closer to getting qualified, we want to buy a house in the Midlands. We’d be happy with a cottage, a small bit of land and shed space. He gets paid well, and we are in the same trade. Hopefully someday I will be paid well too!
We don’t really get to go on holidays, but we do go camping over the summer, which usually only costs €20/€30 per night in a campsite, and we love that. We sometimes go for dinner at the weekends, or get a takeaway with our friends, and we go to a few car shows a year. I don’t spend money on hair/beauty treatments/makeup as I just don’t have the interest. I don’t buy many clothes, and when I do, it’s usually secondhand. Most of my clothes are years old. I always buy my phone secondhand, and it only gets replaced if it’s broken. I had my last phone for seven years, and I’ve had this one for three so far.
Before I started my apprenticeship in 2024, I obviously made better money. I often worked two jobs, and have been saving for many years now. I took the leap and a massive hit in wages, knowing that eventually I’ll be qualified and on better money than if I had never done it. I wish I had started younger. When I was turned away at the age of 22 for the same apprenticeship, I didn’t think it would ever be possible and I parked the idea.
Occupation: Apprentice HGV mechanic
Age: 31
Location: Midlands
Salary: €22,204
Monthly pay (net): €1,700 approx, plus overtime €100–€150
Monthly expenses
Transport: €150
Rent: €100
Phone bill: €20
Groceries: €150
Subscriptions: €16.99 Spotify Premium
Shed rental: €265
Savings: €400
***
Monday
7.15 am: My boyfriend has just left for work, and my alarm goes off. It’s later than usual as we’re house-sitting for a friend. Usually, my alarm goes off at 6.45am, and I get up and walk my dogs. This week I’ll have a lie-in (but I miss the dogs). I make breakfast and pack my lunch. I feed the cat and let him out the window, then hang out some clothes.
8.25 am: Make coffee, and I’m out the door.
9.00 am: I get to work and change into my work clothes and boots. Every day is different; I never know what’s ahead of me on a certain day.
12.00 pm: I’ve been sent for a long drive, so I bring my lunch with me and have it on the road.
4.00 pm: I have a headache from driving the van half the day… thank God it’s time for a tea break. Someone brought in some homemade honeycomb for me, so I have some with my tea.
6.00 pm: Change clothes and out the door. My boss calls me back and gives me a job for the morning, so for once I know what’s ahead! I stop for diesel on the way home and fill the van. (€81.86)
7.00 pm: I ordered tyres for the van last week from my friend’s dad, so I go to their house to fit them together. I owe him €110 and give him a €5 tip. When my wheels are off, I see something is damaged, but I have some spare parts around at home, so it won’t cost anything but my time to fix it. I go in to see my friend and give her daughter (my goddaughter) a birthday present. We drink tea and chat and laugh for a while.
9.00 pm: Back at the house, and my boyfriend has dinner on – pasta and eggs for me and the same but with steak for him. We watch the telly after with a cup of tea as always.
11.00 pm: Shower and bedtime.
Today’s total: €196.86
Tuesday
6.50 am: I’m awake well before my alarm. I get up, dress, and go looking for the cat, finding him on the windowsill staring at me. I feed him and make my lunch, which is usually the same every day – a bagel with tofu and hummus, chopped up raw carrots, a banana, an orange, a slice of bread with peanut butter and a square of dark chocolate.
7.50 am: I make breakfast, which is, again, the same as always – porridge and plain yoghurt. I empty the dishwasher and put some recycling out, and the cat comes with me – he’s meowing at me like he’s been starved for weeks, so I leave him some extra nuts.
8.20 am: I debate bringing in the clothes from yesterday, but decide they’ll be OK – quick coffee and go.
8.50 am: I brace myself to change into my work clothes… it’s still freezing in the garage, but nothing like January. Thank God it’s started to get a bit warmer. My €50 weekly DD to my mam came out this morning.
11.00 am: I wasn’t cold for long – pulled my lorry over the pit and wasn’t long warming up and getting covered in oil in the process – time for a cup of tea.
1.00 pm: It’s lunchtime – but I don’t get free until ten past because, as always, there’s a big rush for the lorries, and they have to go now! Etc etc. Also, my friend texts me in the middle of all this to tell me she’s pregnant!! I’m absolutely delighted for her.
5.00 pm: I’ve had a long, hard day, and I still have a migraine. I didn’t take an hour for lunch yesterday, so I leave work early.
5.20 pm: I need to get an adapter plug (€5) and while I’m in the shop, I get all the things I forgot when doing the big shop on Sunday and some bread and milk. I need hand soap, and as always, I do what my mother taught me – shop by the litre price for the best deal. It all comes to €11.14.
6.00 pm: My boyfriend makes us dinner while I yap away, passing him things as he needs them. We’re having the same as yesterday. I bring in the clothes and put them on the clothes horse, aka the cat’s playground, and I feed him and give him a quick brush. He is a very luxurious cat.
7.30 pm: We wash up, and I give the floor a quick skite of a mop, then get in the shower. When I come back, I see the cat has taken over my boyfriend and he “can’t move” lest he disturb the new king of the house… So I make the tea. We watch telly for the evening with a few more cups of tea and a couple of digestives, and go to bed around 11pm.
Today’s total: €61.14
Wednesday
7.15 am: My alarm goes off, and I hit snooze. I had a bad sleep, so I’m still tired. Ten minutes later, I’m up, make lunch, eat breakfast, feed the cat, drink water, clean up the kitchen, brush teeth, make a mental note we need toothpaste… and go.
11.00 am: Tea break. My job (clutch replacement) hasn’t arrived yet because the driver can’t get the van into gear. Direct debit for Spotify comes out today – €16.99. I’ve been paying for Spotify for over ten years, and it’s the one ‘luxury’ I wouldn’t be without.
4.00 pm: Tea break again. When the van eventually came, it was actually a truck, and it had an entirely different problem. It requires a lot of testing and figuring out, and I’m enjoying it.
7.30 pm: I’m late home, and I have to stop off to get a prescription, which is €39.95.
When I get home, dinner is on. We have fajitas, and they are lovely.
9.00 pm: I hop into the shower and see my hands are still dirty and bloody from work. My mam gave me a big bucket of hand cleaner for Christmas, it’s pink and smells like almonds, I love it. I keep it in the shower because we do be filthy after work
11.00 pm: I read a few pages of my book until my eyes start closing.
Today’s total: €56.94
Thursday
7.15 am: Alarm goes off, rinse and repeat.
8.15 am: On the road. The door on the van isn’t closing properly, which is added to the list of repairs. In fairness, she’s a 22-year-old workhorse with over 300,000 miles on the clock, and I’ve no intention of changing.
8.50 am: I’ve already started my first job, and I can tell today’s going to be a lovely sunny day, at last!!
1.00 pm: I see there’s a band me and my boyfriend love in concert in July, but tickets are around €100 each… I’ll have to wait closer to the time to see if I can afford it, and then I think I’d never get the day off work anyway.
6.30 pm: I’m home after a long, busy, hard day. Lots of work done! I clean up the kitchen from last night and get a quick shower. My hands are stinging, fresh cuts I didn’t notice happening at the time.
8.00 pm: We make dinner, fajitas again. Followed by cups of tea and telly.
10.30 pm: I’m falling asleep so I go to bed, where I’m wide awake again. I read my book for a while.
Today’s total: €0.00
Friday
6.45 am: Awake and up! My boyfriend is away for the weekend for his friend’s stag do, he’s one of the groomsmen.
8.15 pm: I’m at work already. I have to leave for a doctor’s appointment in the middle of the day, so I came in early.
11.00 am: I’m at the doctor’s for cryotherapy on my hands. They get a very hard time. She also gives me something for migraines, thankfully, but I don’t have time to get the prescription today. I’m lucky I have GP visit card because my wages are so low, so the appointment doesn’t cost me. I go to her every couple of weeks for the cryotherapy, and there’s no way I’d afford it if I didn’t have my card.
1.00 pm: It’s a stunning day! I eat my lunch outside. It’s payday today, and I earned €91 in overtime for working 8-3 last Saturday. I put all my overtime into a pocket in Revolut, and that will go towards fun things.
3.00 pm: I’m hauled to the boss’s office. This always makes me nervous, I feel like I’m in school! She tells me a letter came today with my call for college. I’ll be going down to Cork for six months. I’m delighted because I’ve been waiting to go to college for over a year and a half. The delight wears off fairly quickly when I start to think about how on Earth I’ll afford to rent a room in Cork city.
6.00 pm: I pack up a load of tools and go. On the way home, I stop at the shop for a drink and an ice cream, a little Friday treat. I nearly drop dead when I see the price of it (€3.10). I bring a packet of biscuits too, in case I have visitors. It all comes to €7.15.
6.45 pm: I’m going to my cousin’s TY play with my parents, and I have ten mins to be ready, so I get the quickest shower ever, peg some nuts in the cat’s bowl and run out the door.
10.30 pm: The play was fantastic. My cousin was the lead role, and she was absolutely amazing. She played the part of a female mechanic!
11.00 pm: I’m back home now and starving. I make some tea and toast, and watch a few minutes of the telly.
12.00 am: I put all our work clothes in the washing machine – I saw something earlier about energy being cheaper at nighttime, so I take advantage. And then I fall into bed.
Today’s total: €7.15
Saturday
8.00 am: I have a little lie-in.
10.00 am: I’ve cleaned and tidied and had my breakfast. I’m on my second cup of coffee, waiting for the rain to stop. I have two unopened letters, but I know what they are before I open them – tax renewals. To tax my car – which I’ve had declared off the road since last summer – and my van, for three months each, is €399 altogether. I fill out the renewal forms and date them the last day of the month. I have my savings coming out on Monday, and my half of the shed to pay for, so I’ll probably have to borrow some money to pay for tax till I get paid next Friday.
12.00 pm: I go into town to pick up my migraine medicine (€10.78) and then go to the motor factory for oil for the van (€12).
1.00 pm: I get home and the dogs run to meet me. We go for a big walk and they get into the water. They’re roasting!
3.00 pm: I get started on the van. I’m outside in the garden swapping parts, it’s such nice weather I don’t even mind being roasted with nettles. I take a quick break to run and open the garden gate to let my father in with the tractor and give him a hand for a minute.
7.00 pm: I’m finally done. I notice more little problems while I’m under the van, but they can wait til next weekend. I’m covered in grease once again.
9.00 pm: I’m at home chatting to my parents. I’m wrecked tired at this stage. I load the smallest dog into the van and she comes with me for a sleepover. I stop at the shop for milk and some puppy treats (€4.25). Dinner is a cup of tea and a bowl of cereal.
11.00 pm: Bedtime.
Today’s total: €27.03
Sunday
8.00 am: The puppy wakes me up barking at herself in the mirror. We get up and get out for a walk straight away.
10.30 am: Back home. Have coffee and toast for breakfast. I need to head out to the shed to pay the man and do a bit of work.
11.45 am: Still sitting around back at home drinking tea! I go out and start tinkering with the van, figuring some of its issues out. I go and have a cup of tea and chat to my parents and brother for a while. We talk about his wedding next summer, it’s all so exciting.
4.00 pm: I take the hour drive over to our shed and pay the man €530 (we pay half each) and start doing some more little jobs, move a few things around and make a few mental plans for next weekend.
7.00 pm: I’m back home. Bring in the clothes, tidy up and get a quick shower. Then I go to do our weekly shop. I get mostly everything, but I’ll leave my boyfriend to get the meat and his lunch, he’s off work tomorrow. So it comes to €35.85.
8.30 pm: I’m feeling really tired all of a sudden, so I start making dinner quickly, or else it’d be tea and toast again. I make a quick curry with rice.
10.00 pm: Watch the telly for the evening with a mug of tea and a few jellies, ready for another week.
Today’s total: €300.85
Weekly subtotal: €649.97
***
What I learned –
- There are always expenses cropping up nearly every day.
- Some weeks, like this week, my expenses are more than my weekly wages.
- I have no choice but to be careful with my money, but I don’t want for very much, so it’s not too bad.
- I work an awful lot for very little, but it won’t always be like this, and I love what I do. I know it’ll be worth it.
- I’m incredibly lucky not to have to pay rent for a home and realise I have it very easy compared to most.
- I don’t really spend money on unnecessary things or fun things, except taxing my nice car for the summer, which will bring me a couple of months of joy.