The Mystery Of The Disappearing Dosh

A staggering £83 billion in cash simply 'disappears' from our wallets every year - that's £1 in every £8 spent that we can't account for.

Do you ever wonder where all your money goes? It's a mystery, isn't it? And you're not alone. According to new research from Visa UK, we spend an average of £33 a week with no recollection of what that money bought. No wonder we're a nation in debt!

All in all, it amounts to a whopping £83 billion that simply 'disappears' from our wallets every year and the research shows that the top occasion when people are most likely to 'mystery spend' is when we're shopping for food.

That makes perfect sense to me. I've always maintained that anyone wanting to get out of debt should start by looking at the 'small stuff' that they're spending their money on.

For example, people spend an extraordinary amount of cash on buying sandwiches for lunch when they could easily make one for far less. If you're spending a fiver a day on a sandwich, a can of coke and a packet of crisps in the shop across the road from the office, then you're parting with at least £100 a month.

Add to that a daily newspaper, a few takeaways and the odd CD or DVD and it's easy to see where all this lost money is going.

People trying to get out of debt have found that keeping a daily spending diary for a month is a very effective way of helping them to rein in their spending. Somehow, it seems to bring home the true value of money when you've got a piece of paper in front of you telling you where your entire salary for the month went.

According to Visa's research that missing £33 a week could, in an average UK household, pay for three months worth of mortgage payments each year, all gas, electricity and water bills for the year or three quarters of all annual home improvement costs. It would also go along way towards clearing a £2,000 Visa credit card debt!