Hello all, I've been lurking but not posting.
Anyhoo. I need to come back, I have still been updating my spreadsheets and tracking internet banking but something has happened that has made me realise I need to stop seeing my credit card as a safety net and need to get some savings.
Really I need to start paying my credit cards down but firstly I want a safety net of £1000 and I need to start paying for Christmas anyway. I know it's stupid to save up whilst you have CC debt but I'm scared of being left with no ready money. I also need to start putting away for Christmas too - here we are nearly half way through the year and I've done nowt.
I had a letter from one of my credit card companies on Saturday to say they were increasing my interest rate from 12.95% to 17.9% which shocked me a bit that they would do this. The excuse they gave was that I had gone over my limit (once by mistake and paid straight back!). Unfortunately it's quite a large balance and I can't afford to pay it off in one go or have any cards with enough space to BT it so I rang them and told them to cancel the card and keep it at 12.95%.
Then this morning I had another letter from another credit card (a slightly smaller balance) to say they were putting it up from the standard 16.9% to 21.9%! I have had this credit card for ages and this is the first time something like this has happened so I reckon somehow my credit score has leapt up to "very very bad". So I've done a 0%-for-20-months balance transfer to an empty card. This is the card that I use for 'emergencies' or when I run out of money near the end of the month
Stuff keeps going wrong with the house on a monthly basis that I never budget for! So far this week my shower broke so I bought a new one for £50 (in the sale) and I've had to pay a sparky £40 to put it in. Then my neighbour came around to drop subtle hints about my Leylandii hedges being out of control (they are) and he's going to get someone to come and do his sides at the weekend so do I want them to do mine at the same time - this will cost up to £80 (which is cheap). Also the same neighbour replaced two fence panels that DS2 and his mates had knackered by booting footballs at it so I had to pay for those replacing at £38. I only have just short of £450 "everything else" money each month - so you can see the need for me to have an emergency house / car fund.
On the other hand I hope to have a petrol / grocery underspend so just need to spend the next couple of weeks not spending on sweets, takeaways and extra food and I should be okay - unforeseeable expenses excluded. So, from this month - any underspend will go into the savings account and once I have £1k put away (to add to the remainder of what is leftover from DH's bonus), I will start tackling my CC's.
So, if no one minds - I'll go back to posting dailies....
Bank: £462.42 (was £512.08)
Purse: £1.94 (was £41.94)
Jar: £14.80 (was £14.80)
Grand Total: £479.16
Reduced by: £89.66
Days to payday: 18
Proper Savings: £481.09
Spends:
£49.66 - groceries
£40.00 - electrician
Budget looks like this: £479.16
Petrol: £200.00 /£90.60 / £109.40
Groceries: £300 / £131.41 spent / 168.59
Bus fares & Kids activities: £34.00
HSBC CC: £12.39
Leaves for everything else....£154.78