Debt support thread #2

[Nerfmother]

Here we are! Can't be bothered to think of an exciting title, sorry

Hello afterthought.
Totally agree it's about mindset and the way you think and feel not just the actual debt.
There just seems to be a point when you realise it's not sustainable , and I don't mean one in reality like bankruptcy, it's almost like you wake up and realise.
Are you having any help to deal with the mental and emotional health issues?

Morning all, welcome after.
Nerf how annoying about the meal, I hate it when you have budgetted and then it is more. I'm a bit anal about checking bills!
So today we are off to see the Lego movie for dh's treat before he goes on his school holiday for a week. I am half-expecting an Ofsted phonecall this week while he is away, we are incredibly overdue and sod's law says it will be this week while he and my in-laws (other regular chilcarers) are away!
It will be a cheap week this week without dh here! I have more of a hande on funds than he does! He went out with ds yesterday to 'get a couple of bits' and spent a fortune. About all his monthly is gone now. one week after payday. Luckily the money he earnt from a little extra job paid for his car so that hasn't cost us any extra.

Well im a bit happier this morning, checked my quidco and had £60 waiting to be withdrawn so ive transferred that to my bank account and that can replace money I had saved for our stairs carpet that had been used for other decorating. We bought our house 7 and a half years ago and have never had carpet on it. We have completely gutted the entire house over the years spending ££££££ but have never put carpet on the stairs so the house has always been incomplete.

Badvoc Use part of the ISA leaving £500-£1000 for a baby emergency fund. Dave Ramsey recommends only having a £1000 emergency fund while you are paying off the debt, then building it to 3-6 months expenses after that.

I did the savings while in debt thing for years (vicious cycle of hoarding savings, getting into debt, using savings to part-pay debt, then saving again ...dumb! ) and now have no savings but am siphoning off a bit each month into a smart saver for emergencies.

I can't wait until the ££££ we are putting off debt each month is going into the emergency fund, then into the house deposit fund.

I am now slowly learning to live within my means - I never bought loads of designer shoes or anything although there may be a handbag or two in there but now I examine my bank account closely it is truly horrifying how all the little £10/£20 purchases add up!

The wild ones - is quidco any good?
MissA - YY, just bought something for twenty quid, it doesn't do what I was told, am taking it back, whereas before I'd probably not have bothered.

(((()))) to all those with emergency car and pet spends, that's how we wound up extending our debt by 1600 in just 2 months

We went for a mooch round the snowdome yesterday (went to look at bmx's for ds1 birthday present in the bike shop next door). Am now super motivated to get the debt paid off and start saving for skiing next year!

Also before this thread we would have said 'f it' and bought a decent bike for ds1, (£200) knowing it would be passed down and we would get our money's worth. Now, we are looking at cheaper options for now and eBay.

Wow, speedy thread!
Quidco is good if you were going to buy / need what you're buying anyway. The odd 5% here and there tends to cover any P&P charges, but you can get really good deals on breakdown cover and car insurance.

I forget who asked, but use the ISA! That's what savings are for.

Morning of ebaying stuff I'd have just taken to the charity shop (and reading Life after Life which I bought pre-budget of doom). Quite a few of the books on my amazon wishlist are at 99p, but am resisting so far.

Morning everyone!

Nerf I totally get how you obsess over every tenner when you are in this mindset. It does take over a bit and I find we argue over £11 whilst there's £15k of cc debt sitting there not being dealt with .

TheWildOnes nice to get a bit back from quidco well done .

Welcome afterthough . Glad to hear that you are seeing the light a bit as it were, I was am just the same as you in that I will buy a black jumper when I already have 3 at home . Get so angry with myself and daren't add up the waste over the years.

Badvoc I don't know how ISA's work either but think I would use that money to pay for the emergency kitchen and then work on gradually replenishing it rather than borrowing from elsewhere.

Well we got our 0% balance transfer cc through yesterday and put £5500 on to it which is brilliant! Slightly offset by the fact that i booked a holiday and added £700 worth of deposit on to it .

DH got his bonus which was a lot lower than expected. Why oh why don't I ever learn not to depend on bonus payments or the like - they are just that - a bonus not a guarantee.

DH is away on business all week so we too can eat pancakes for tea every night to save money, bed early and cereal... living the dream....

puffy our booked holiday is a ski holiday for next year. I absolutely love skiing and I'm hoping that it will be a massive incentive not to spend - everytime I think of buying something I picture myself swooshing down the slopes and that concentrates the mind. Holidays are my obsession and the one motivation that might just keep me on track.

Doesn't work for everyone, but instead of pet insurance we had a savings account for our pets. Put £30 month aside to cover bills - meant there was no excess or quibbling with insurance companies. As they were never ill, we used it for routine vaccinations and cattery fees. This method does depend on them not getting ill for a good few months first!

afterthought welcome to our band of debtors! Mindset is tricky to get out of - DH and I were awful for buying either good quality (and expensive) stuff instead of accepting that actually sometimes our income does not allow for those things and we need to accept the crappier version - Badvoc we would have been the same with the bike in the past. It's a big re-learning time for us.

Burma can you cancel the holiday booking if you've only just made it, to make up for smaller bonus? Normally a 7 day cooking off period for such things.

Thanks for the welcomes. I had counselling about a year ago, which while it wasn't particularly helpful (my counsellor got fixated on one tiny thing which I don't think is that relevant) I think it did start to make me consider why I did it.

I start a new job in a few weeks which is really making me feel like this is achievable. It is quite a bit more money than I get at the moment, plus I won't have a commute so I can save the extra money to go towards emergencies, car repairs etc while the money I'm saving on my commute can go towards my weekly budget as it has been virtually impossible to live on my previous budget (hence my debt increasing - along with my impulsive purchasing!).

The mistakes I have made in the past have always been trying to pay the debt off so quickly that the payments are too high, and without addressing the actual problem. I think it is finally starting to sink in that I can't have new stuff all the time.

I still have some stuff I can ebay, but I need to be careful not to put it on on impulse and then regret it because it is something I need, but seriously who needs 3 pairs of wellingtons, 8 backpacks and 10 waterproof jackets?

Quidco is definitely worth it, I just click through them when buying stuff online, getting phone contracts or insurance and ive had nearly 700 pound cash back so far.

Thank you.
I will have a chat to dh later wrt the kitchen.
I have decided I am giving up amazon and e bay for lent :)
I spent sooo much in feb..am shocked tbh.

Thanks wildones will have a look.

Im sort of thinking boot fair, but they are so depressing and pointless im not sure. Ebay and local selling pages seem to be no good - the local pages just move so quickly, not sure how anyone sells anything through them.

I need to sign up for quidco as well as topcashback - apparently one is quite often better than the other. I have all of £11 in my topcashback account, but I not started using it after Christmas and haven't had any insurance renewals etc in that time.

Have just made two loaves of banana bread from excess eggs/overripe bananas, will slice and freeze for packed lunches I think. Need to start using something cheaper than butter for baking I think - I love the taste of butter, but I'm thinking even a 1/3 own brand margarine to 2/3 butter mix would be cheaper and still taste good? We go through about 3-4 packs of butter a week with baking/sarnies etc

I've switched to Tesco Value Butter for baking and have yet to notice the difference ...

I use lots of Tesco value stuff and it seems fine. I don't eat meat though, so just veg and things like the butter.

Used Tesco vouchers, £15 got us all into cinema, though we upgraded (which cost about £8 for all of us) as show at that time was 3D. Took some of own snacks, but did get them popcorn and me and DH shared coke. £16 all in rather than usual £60+ for a cinema trip for 4. (Tickets for 3 adults as DD is 15 and 1 for DS are £40+ for 3D; £32 for 2D. Popcorn, drinks, chocolate are some equally stupid price. We rarely go because of daft cost.)

If you are going to see Lego movie, I wouldn't bother with 3D as don't think it did much at all, however loved the film. Had me and DD in stitches .

That's it for trips for month though. Next week is nephew's birthday party and week after they will come to play, so trips out will just be to free places.

Now the main reason I feel guilty is not because of the spends, but because I have a mountain of work to do and this was supposed to be a working weekend - all weekend. Inspectors next week. Worked yesterday but still a huge heap to do today. Feel naughty and am now off to get on with it. Sigh.

I already use the value butter Mum2Fergus - it's normally about £1 per 250g/£4 per kg, and just looking at sainsbos Stork is £2 per kg and the own brand soft spread is £1.52 per kg if you buy a 2kg tub. Actually, I didn't realise it was that much cheaper. Definitely going to give it a try!

Kinky I haven't been to the cinema with DH since we went a year ago and realised that after babysitting, cinema tickets, popcorn and drinks it had cost us £80 for two of us! I've taken DS1 a couple of times, but take snacks.

Possiblyorange I will eat jam sandwiches to go skiing ! It is a stupid indulgence I know but I keep thinking if we haven't managed to find the balance by November then all we will lose is the deposit

savings/spending
its really simple
you save out of excess income
if you have ANY debt, clear it and stuff the ISA / PENSION "guidance"

get to where you income is working for you, no the bank
end of

" New Season Clothes "
Sorry, does not compute
I buy classic, timeless clothes that I mix and match for years and years and years
fashion is for fools who do not pay their own bills
get it right and stop worrying

same with house decoration : no room should need re-doing within 20 years unless you cocked it up first time

A silly thing : Christmas
we each buy A decoration each year to add to the tree
total cost around £20 plus the tree
we have an absolutely amazing selection that will last a lifetime
not "trendy" but "right"

29.83 left out of household budget this week...transferring to current ac towards car purchase on Sat instead of CC1.

TalkinPeace - I probably didn't explain myself very well with regards to new season clothes. I'm not into fashion at all. In the past though if I like something, I have tended to buy 2 or 3 of it and then have 1 to wear, and 1 or 2 in the reserve pile. So at the moment, when I need something 'new' it is off the reserve pile (so a new version of the thing that is falling apart) rather than something new and different. I am trying to beat my obsession of having back-ups so that when I do need something new, I can actually go out and choose it, rather than it just being one of the back-ups.

At the moment I am sorting through the stash - stuff is going into two piles - ebay and charity. All the time I have the stash I will keep adding to it, it needs to be gone.

The saving thing is also important for me. My debt is a loan so is not accruing interest each day it sits there. I know that I need to have money for emergencies. Putting an emergency on the CC doesn't work for me as once there is something on there, nothing stops me.

I've also in the past been terrible for buying nice stuff for example nice tops but then buying a load of cheap stuff (shapeless t shirts) to wear so I don't ruin my nice stuff. I then end up with loads of shapeless stuff that I wear everyday (which obviously does nothing for my self esteem) and a wardrobe full of nice stuff I never wear. It is ridiculous - I am ridiculous (but as I mentioned before this is all linked to some mental health problems I have had). It has helped just typing things out this afternoon.