{"id":621942,"date":"2026-08-05T14:57:25","date_gmt":"2026-08-05T14:57:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/621942\/"},"modified":"2026-08-05T14:57:25","modified_gmt":"2026-08-05T14:57:25","slug":"how-is-your-spending-going-this-summer-would-you-like-to-keep-a-money-diary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/621942\/","title":{"rendered":"How is your spending going this summer? Would you like to keep a Money Diary?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"article-updated-redesign article-updated-redesign-voices\" title=\"Wednesday 5 Aug 2026, 12:00 PM\">\n<p>                            LAST UPDATE<br \/>\n                            |<br \/>\n                            3 hrs ago\n                        <\/p>\n<p>AUGUST IS HERE, and with the rain looking like it\u2019s here to stay and the school holidays slowly drawing to a close, many people\u2019s thoughts will be turning to their finances as we get back to normality after the summer.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>With electricity bills <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thejournal.ie\/electricity-prices-increase-october-7117054-Jul2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">due to go up again<\/a> in October and one-off cost-of-living supports seemingly <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thejournal.ie\/simon-harris-child-poverty-budget-7111574-Jul2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">off the table<\/a>\u00a0for Budget 2027, we want to hear how you\u2019ve been managing your spending. Are you struggling with back-to-school costs? Will you be able to save at all over the coming months?<\/p>\n<p>Readers here at\u00a0The Journal\u00a0will be familiar with our popular\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.thejournal.ie\/money-diaries\/news\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">How I Spend My Money series<\/a>, which\u00a0looks at how people in Ireland really handle their finances. Over the years, the series has chronicled the lives and financial ups and downs of hundreds of readers.<\/p>\n<p>We are asking readers to get in touch and write a Money Diary to keep track of their spending and saving, and to help us understand how they\u2019re coping with the cost of living right now.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1785941845_780_.PNG\"  alt=\"download\" class=\"alignnone inline-image\" \/>\n<\/p>\n<p>Would my diary be of interest?<\/p>\n<p>Absolutely. Everyone is in a different place when it comes to money and will have different incomes and outgoings.<\/p>\n<p>Everyone also has different approaches to finances. For instance, are you a good saver, or does money burn a hole in your pocket? Can you afford a pension? What about mortgages? Are you confident you could qualify for one, or are you meeting your mortgage payments?<\/p>\n<p>If none of the above even seems remotely possible right now, then we also want to hear from you. It\u2019s not an easy time, and we get that, so you might just feel like saying \u2018I can\u2019t make ends meet\u2019 and that\u2019s OK too.<\/p>\n<p>How does it work?<\/p>\n<p>Over the course of a week, we ask you to keep a record of how much you earn, how much you save (if anything) and what you spend your money on.<\/p>\n<p>Our Money Diaries readers also love to hear about your day, what kind of routine you have, what you had for dinner \u2013 all of it. Woven into that is a note throughout the day about how much you spent on groceries, incidentals and other expenses.<\/p>\n<p>Readers often get helpful information and tips from reading the diaries, so include details about batch-cooking, Revolut vaults or any other handy savings tips you might have.<\/p>\n<p>What next?<\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re interested in keeping a diary for a week,\u00a0<strong>send an email to money@thejournal.ie,<\/strong>\u00a0and we\u2019ll be in touch. We would love to hear from you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LAST UPDATE | 3 hrs ago AUGUST IS HERE, and with the rain looking like it\u2019s here to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":621943,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[177],"tags":[79,18,2644,59371,59372,19,17,825,24840,234,235,12985,5569,59373],"class_list":["post-621942","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-business","tag-eire","tag-finances","tag-hismm","tag-how-i-spend-my-money","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-money","tag-money-diaries","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance","tag-saving","tag-spending","tag-spending-and-saving"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117043492012563607","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621942","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=621942"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/621942\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/621943"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=621942"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=621942"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=621942"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}