A thread for people trying to pay off debt?

[moneyworries8]

Would there be any interest in this?

I'll start us off. I'm 30, a SAHM with 2DC.
Our debts are:

£4,000 loan that we've been paying off for 6 months.
£2,300 on a credit card

The debt is manageable but I've had the realisation that if something doesn't change, these figures are going to get bigger and bigger. I know it's a hard time of year to start but I don't believe in "waiting until the new year!"

We could post on here for advice/support as well as sharing our successes (and failures, but hopefully there won't be many of those) with each other. I feel like I need some people to help keep me on track.

So, is anyone interested?

Just checking in. I've NCd. I have finally been paid the back pay - 3 months on messed up wages is not fun.

I've paid back the money I borrowed for rent from the credit union, I owed a friend money for a concert so I paid that back too. I paid off a little on my cc so I've now cleared €350. Which at one stage was maxed so every little bit is an improvement.
I'll also put aside 3 months worth of the money I had budgeted for a Christmas savings account so I'm on top of things for next year.
I have a hen party and wedding to go to later in the year so I'll put money aside for that now.
It's a relief to get a bit of cash in!

Turquoise
THe thing to plan now is how to minimise the spend on those events and on Christmas.
Only buy stuff that will still be in use at least a year later

Haha talkinpaece that really made me laugh!! I’ve had my head buried in spreadsheets all evening so that was a real lift, thank you

So I’ve created a spreadsheet based on yours, I’ve plugged in all my debts in order of priority with dates when 0% deals end.. it isn’t looking as bad as I thought which is great. We’ve agreed to leave paying off big amounts to the end of the month as that way we can agree if we’ve built up excess in our envelopes wether to pay off debt or do something to the never ending list of stuff to do to the house.

I’ve also rejigged as was finding it so hard to work out how to budget with 3.4k (average wage over a year) when the realistic figure is absolutely nothing like that in a week with only 4 fridays in it! It’s cash out on a Friday for us from now on and dp is going to do the supermarket shop, to minimise those pesky Aldi cushions / throws / plants ending up in my trolley

Feeling so much better. Sorry that I haven’t replied to anybody directly, it’s just nice to get things out and down on paper and feel more in control 💪🏻

And I was planning to absorb some debt in to our mortgage, if we ever get around to remortgaging (can’t at the mo as keep going over our overdraft limit by pence) but didn’t realise how much debt would affect what we can borrow. In a way it’s nice to be able to shelve extension / renovation pipedreams for a while and focus on family!

puffy
Poohticks is much underrated.

DH and I had a night away in a village we thought we knew well
and found a poohsticks bridge we missed entirely when the kids were small
have informed them that we'll drag them there when they come home from Uni
that will make a lovely cheap afternoon

Haha Pooh sticks is brill! I’ll be dragging my pair away from fortnite down to the local river at the next opportunity

Well it's Friday tomorrow and I have not 'earned' a single penny this week! Oh the joys of self-employment.

I've tried to push two jobs along but client taking too long to respond and what I hoped would be finished and billed, is going into next week.

Technically I have 'earned' money, but there is nothing tangible because I haven't been able to invoice them.

Morning all...not much to report here. Life slowly returning to our new 'normal' following the loss of both DH and I's fathers. I'm still only officially 'at risk' of redundancy so feel a bit in limbo til I get my formal notification. I don't feel I can make any real plans until my end date.

Some good news though I'm that I have calculated my severance pay and it will repay all debt except mortgage and leave me an emergency funds equivalent to just over 7 months of my current salary. So not all doom and gloom.

On the work front, I'm going to get registered as self employed that way I can work with DH if a new permanent role for me doesn't materialise immediately.

Hi there Fergus
I think the whole country is in limbo at the moment so I'd not worry about it too much.
Companies are livid at being messed about so much.
Its all a bit surreal.

It’s a horrible limbo isn’t it talk

I’m in the property industry and everything just feels in suspension at the moment. Luckily I have had a big piece of work come in this weekend so can do some overtime while the kids are away! But the big projects are mainly all rumbling very slowly while everyone sits tight and waits.

Agreed about the 'limbo' bit. It is a strange surreal time, that's for sure.

Anyways, I may not have earned anything this week but I did spend half an hour online with BT going through my broadband / phone / TV package and have got my monthly bill down by around £20, so that's going to be a significant saving over the course of a year.

Also I've totted up work in progress jobs which should all be invoiced next week and profit is looking at around £750, so that's cheered me up a bit.

Also got paid today by a new client. I only invoiced them last Friday, so they've paid in a week which is great.

Now I'm going to make a huge pot of vegetable soup out of all the leftover veggies I've got before they start to go off. They'd usually end up festering in the bottom of the fridge and then get binned.

I am feeling very virtuous with this new responsible attitude to my finances. Just wish I'd done it years ago!

Talk you are so right about Christmas. We managed to cut one Chris kindle out last Christmas. We tend to leave present buying too late then throw money (we don't have) at the presents problem. We got my bil a jumper for €75! I don't think I even spent €75 on my clothes the entire year. Ridiculous!

In other news I have started transferring money to my cc every time I fancy a bar of chocolate on the way home from work (which is actually every day ) it's only a small amount each time but pennies and pounds and all that.

Fergus your Severance package sounds great! And Fanny enjoy the virtuous veggie soup!

Turquoise
The whole competitive gift giving has gone mad.
I spend up to £20 on my adult siblings well the ones I talk to
Up to £75 each on my parents
Up to £15 each on nieces and nephews
Up to £150 each on DH and DS and DD
and remember I have no debts at all
Friends get cards and a beer when we meet them.

I was reading back through the thread earlier (it's a monster - 33 pages!) and there was one line that jumped out at me.

Someone was writing about spending money on 'treats' and the response from another poster was along the lines of - what treats? When you're skint / in serious debt, there's no treats.

This really hit home because it's so bloody obvious, but I just never looked at that way before. So many times when I'm tired, can't be arsed to cook it's the take away, the bottle of wine, the trip to the cinema, the pizza after, the stopping off at the pub, the online buying especially eBay (justifying to myself that I'm buying cheap/secondhand) when I've already got shitloads of clothes / shoes etc and really don't need any more. All this while I owe four and a half grand on my credit card. Just crazy!

@FrugalFanny I went cold turkey on buying clothes and I know find it really hard to ever spend money on them! I only replace them once they have holes! It’s made so much difference.

I do think though that we still need to (within reason) live life a bit. That can be finding simple pleasures- a walk, a bubble bath, or curling up with a book. But we also use various discount vouchers etc to do things like cinema/ eating out without it costing silly money. I think because we both work quite hard and often from home getting out of the house for a “date night” every now and then is really important to our relationship. But I agree that a period of “spending” cold turkey to break the back of the debt could be a great approach.

@TalkinPaece can I pick your brains on my current ponderings?
I have a big project on this weekend so will earn a decent chunk of overtime. I am weighing up whether to use it to over pay credit card debt or to overpay mortgage?
The credit card is on 0% (and was to cover necessary legal costs - abusive ex). It’s at £2500 and will be fully paid off before the 0% period ends. Whereas the mortgage is pretty big (c £300k) with a 30 year term (we plan to over pay whether possible). (Needs must with the mortgage, we live in an expensive part of the UK and can’t move elsewhere).

Nearly a year ago I swapped the payday take away to an end on month treat if money allowed. It sets a better tone for the month as I don’t feel I’ve wasted the money straight away, but more of a reward for having paid all the bills and not over drawn.
It feels different.

This month I saved enough to pay off one loan £400 and saved £75 in interest which I paid off the CC plus the payment of £70 a month is now going into a savings account to pay off the CC in a few months time

It adds up quickly

OH and I won £20 in a scratch card which I’ve also saved

Sorry, I think my question is, for this overtime and any future, should put it towards paying the credit card off even faster? Or leave the credit card on standing order to be paid off within the 0% period and start throwing extra money at the mortgage?

Twerk I agree. Daughter and I are going to the cinema tomorrow night early showing, but usually we would have maybe gone to our favourite Italian for a pizza as well, and then probably stopped off at the pub on the way back.

Instead we've agreed to come straight home, make something here food wise and maybe have a game of scrabble or cards - just entertain ourselves at home. It will be a lot cheaper and we'll have a laugh.

It's more this 'treating' myself thing. Shit day at work - let's have chocolate / a bottle of wine / a take-away. I do too much of it, but I never really made the link between that sort of unnecessary expenditure and the credit card debt. If I didn't fritter so much money away I could make bigger monthly payments to clear the card. It just needed reading this thread for the penny to drop regarding 'treats'.

And for the clothes thing. I'm a sucker for vintage stuff and am always scouring eBay. That has definitely stopped.

Depends on the CC

Mine was being paid off at £70 a month
I swapped to 0% interest and the DD is set at £25 meaning that at the end of the 0% interest I will still have a largest dept

I am saving the £45 they don’t take plus the £75 I’ve saved by ping off the loan to pay the CC back in full before the 0% runs out

IYSWIM

@FrugalFanny I see what you mean. I guess it’s about finding new ways to treat yourself after a bad day that don’t involve spending money...I totally get what you mean about “frittering” i have definitely been guilty of that.

@Twerk I follow the Dave Ramsey approach so it would be the CC first for me.

Twerk I'm not am expert but I'd agree with Fergus - pay off the cc first, it'll feel better psychologically to get rid of it

I was in £10,000 of credit card and overdraft debt 4 years ago. Then after years of ignoring it I faced it and put it into one big loan. I can remember feeling like I was going to faint when I saw the final figure. But I have been paying it off and managed through some really tricky times not to get any more debt. I no longer have credit cards. Now I’m 6 months off paying it all off. The problem I have now is I’m so scared of doing it again I’m sort of frozen. I know credit cards have their place and can be useful but I just feel too scared to get another one. But thinking about how close I am to having no debt is just amazing. It seemed so awful at the time.

Another 350 paid off. Still so far to go

Hi nevertwerk
Sorry, have been at the Brexit march all day.
Card every time.
Clear unsecured debt before secured.