To think living in overdraft is the norm?

[user1490465531]

Beginning to think it was just me.
Despite working I am always in my overdraft a week before pay day.
I have paid it of before only to be in it the next month.
Speaking to people it seems very common due to rising costs of living and no wage increase.
AIBU to think unless you have a fantastic paid job you will living in your overdraft.
I live a pretty basic life apart from odd treat so not exactly due to extravagant lifestyle don't own car don't go on holidays etc.

I'm always in mine every week

one thing is picked up on threads and it's like a dog with a bone.
I appreciate not everyone is in debt and that's not what I meant by smug.
Empathy and understanding goes a long way and a lot of ppl that have never been in debt have still given some very helpful advice.
I'm only 200 in debt so not a lot at all and I am lucky it's only that as know some others are in real dire situation which must be hard.
I have a roof over my head and food on my table and for that I'm grateful.

Not the norm for me.
I earn more than I spend. So savings are always increasing.

And I don't earn megabucks.

My last car cost me £700 three years ago.

I like to live within my means

During my childhood, teens I saved in 20 at university got into as little debt as possible and paid it back as quickly as possible. By mid 20s I was saving a third of my income every month for years and it gave us the house deposit.

I’m a natural saver yet I’m still into overdraft.

My two areas of weakness are the corner shop – picking this up other than milk because even though they are used it’s still a drain and the children – less asking for things they hear no a lot – more stuff they need and the primary school is sometime a constant couple of quid here and there. I need to work on this.

One Christmas few years ago I totted up the cash for the school between mid Nov to December it total £260 – nothing over £25 and it was over three children – some of it optional clubs that they really wanted and had frequently waited long time for a place to do some of it school trips – but all we felt we couldn’t really turn down.

Tracking where your money is going is useful and eye opening.

I got into some debt after university in my 20s when the free overdraft became one with fees and I had health issues.

What really helped me was I had to take on a DMP with Payplan- this meant opening a new simple bank account with no overdraft- debts and old bank account were closed.

Years later, credit rating now much better, and still no overdraft. Would very much recommend doing if anyone really struggling with debt. I used to get all these fees and charges, and now nothing, and it really helped me.

Until the boiled failed and i got pregnant ive never been in the over draft. Since them its been a nightmare to clear and just now 2 years later im about level. Never ever want to go in again. We lived on £20 a week food and still didnt clear.

In an earlier post I was going to suggest people have a target of outgoings in the most expensive month of the year, plus the cost of replacing your most expensive appliance, as the minimum positive balance you should aim for. But I thought I'd get a pasting as that's going to sound impossibly high to people who are living hand-to-mouth.

(By "target" I mean the balance below which you regard yourself as too poor to spend more than the least you can survive on.)

I"m never not in it. For me it's the norm. I'm jobhunting right now and can't claim benefits so it's inevitable..however it was the same when working.
But, I've never had a loan or credit card..could be worse.
My overdraft is £1350 so I always owe that and the fees
But this is far far less than anyone else I know, in terms of what they owe on cards and loans or borrowing from friends/relatives

For people who aren't struggling, I think the rule-of-thumb in an investment forum I'm on is that you should always have six months spending available in cash.

By cash I mean in the bank (rather than investments), not notes under the mattress.

Another idea could be to have a 0% credit card offer for say two years and put the overdraft on to that (can you transfer it like with cards?) and then set up a standing order to pay that off. Would only work if you can transfer though and not sure about that.

On these threads, anyone who's never been in debt, or is now debt-free is automatically referred to as smug, for some reason.

I don't think that's the case, but some on here are being very judgemental and those posters do come off as smug.

Only as a student because it was interest free, paid it off within a couple of months of graduating. It's a difficult trap to get out of of your wage only just gets you out of your overdraft each month and then you end up paying interest or fees, how would it ever end without a random cash injection?

We have no overdraft or credit card debt anymore. However, both DH & I used to live in our overdrafts as well as having a lot of credit card debt.
We consolidated the majority of it into a loan & paid that off over 5 years. It was the only way we could do it.

I think that posts like ‘no, I manage my money’ and ‘I live within my means’ come across as hugely smug.

I'm on a very low wage so I'm always overdrawn close to the limit by to end of the month, I'm now having to dip into savings and have about two weeks money saved.

living within your means varies for people.
Someone earning 30 grand a year will be able to live within there means a lot easier than someone earning 15 grand.
It's not all black and white.

OP if you only have £200 of debt can you do a bootsale or eBay some stuff? It'd go a long way towards it

It’s become my normal recently and it causes me huge stress. I am working on reducing it.

DH and I both live in ours. Despite desperately trying, we can't climb out

It costs so much! Like £6 a day or something, so I couldn't do it. I have a 'buffer' of £100 which is the minimum I like to have in my account, I occasionally go in to that but it stops me going in to my overdraft. I do have a very strict budget for everything though.

I have overdraft facilities on both my accounts but dread the thought of going into them. It's good to know I've got them in an emergency but I don't use them of it can be helped. I also have 3k available on a credit card but again it's for real emergencies only. In the past I have been in debt so now I only have a mortgage as debt i try really hard not to go into debt again, bit appreciate it can't always be helped...

user very true. As someone who has survived on very little money though, debt if you are poor can be totally catastrophic. Much harder to climb out of and more likely to lead to eviction.

Living within your means will depend as much on your essential expenditure as anything else.

But it’s not just as simple as income is it? Someone on a higher salary than me may have more dependants, higher bills etc. which means I may actually have more disposable cash than they do. I don’t think anyone else ever really knows the truth about others finances so shouldn’t be smug about being debt free or make assumptions about people with no debt.

Not me. I had a credit card at 18, where I was paying off the 300 pound balance each month, so no interest. Once I had it paid off for good and stopped using it I never went into the red again. I will cut everything to the bone if needed.