Below are five of the apps that caught my eye that I think prove excellent value for money and can help you to improve your life skills.  

If you are sensitive about bad language then be warned, the world 'filth' is frequently substituted with another word beginning with the letter 'f'.  That said, this is an excellent app for assisting you in getting on top of housework, decluttering and generally getting your home more organised and tidy.  Its straightforward language makes it very accessible, especially to a younger audience, and it helps to motivate you into action without coming across as naggy or patronising.  

You can access motivational prompts, select tasks by room or time duration, get allocated random tasks or use the pomodoro style timer to block off time for chores and schedule regular breaks.  It works on the principle that any task is achievable if you break it down into bite-sized chunks.  The app is available for both Mac and Android devices and costs less than £1. 
 
This is a mental health monitoring app that is excellent for anyone looking to develop greater insight into their own mental health.  It allows you to keep track of symptoms, staying well strategies, triggers and symptoms with the option of also adding diary style entries in the notes section.  The app is customisable so you can tweak the prompts to fit your own circumstances and it will produce reports and charts to help you view your mental health over a given time period.  This can come in especially handy if you are having regular mental health appointments as it can provide some concrete data to back up your sense of how you have been over a given period.  


The app is available for both Mac and Windows devices or via a web browser.  When I tested this app originally a year ago there was a small charge (around £1) but judging by the information on the website the app can now be accessed for free.  This maybe a 'lite' version with slightly less features but, even with a small charge, the app is worth every penny.

The is a fun and free app which uses gamification and the theme of a fantasy role play game to turn your to do list into tasks, which on completion, unlock magical items and progress your character through the levels.  This can add an element of fun to something otherwise dull, like doing the washing up or hoovering your living room.  It can also act as a motivator and can be linked up to your Google calendar.  You can schedule tasks to repeat at preset intervals or set tasks as one off jobs.  You can weight the tasks depending on how demanding they are and this allows you to score extra points for bigger or more challenging chores.  Unfortunately this app is currently only available for Mac devices but hopefully this will be rolled out to Android ones at a later date.  

Available for free and available for Mac, Android and Windows devices this app is an excellent tool for helping to track your day to day spending habits.  This is especially handy if you are someone who is on a tight budget or who regularly overspends. It allows you to enter your income and expenses and will provide you with a running balance of what cash you have available.  You can customise the subcategories to fit your own personal spending patterns and, with the help of the graphs and charts, you can see where your money is going each month.

This is a simple, pomodoro style timer app that allows you to ring fence timeslots for specific tasks that you want to complete throughout a given time period.  The app aims to increase productivity by helping you to focus on one task at a time.  By working to a timer it can also reduce any tendency for procrastination.  The idea behind pomodoro style timers is that you can achieve more by breaking tasks down into small, manageable chunks and taking regular breaks.  It keeps both motivation and energy levels topped up and can allow you to complete daunting, challenging and mundane jobs in a given time slot.  This app can be applied to lots of different settings and tasks and I have found it especially helpful when cooking a complicated meal like a Christmas dinner as you can set alarms to go off at various intervals during the cooking process to prompt you in getting everything cooked and ready for a particular time.  Unfortunately this app is currently only available for Mac devices but the principle behind it has been replicated by other app developers so a search around will soon find you a suitable substitute.