Lunar has a house and lots of shiny new debt to get rid of!

lunar · 17 May 2009 at 11:27AM

Hopefully this will be the third and final part of my quest to be debt free. For anyone who doesn't know my story I first cane to MSE in August 2007 with almost £36000 of debt. Over that time I have had a real roller coaster ride to get me where I am right now. In that time I have moved twice, had fertility treatment which actually worked, had a gorgeous baby boy, got my and got my debt down to £8000 with the help of my amazing partner.

Up to now we have been renting and saving a deposit for our dream house and on Friday we exchanged contracts on our dream 4 bedroom detached house. At peak these houses were selling for £245000 so we were thrilled to find that the price was reduced to £174999! the major headache for us has been getting the deposit together, we could only get a mortgage by giving a 25% deposit which was almost £44000!!!!! We are due to complete on Friday 22nd May.

My OH has been working every overtime shift going and we got a good amount saved but nowhere near enough. This means we are back in lots of debt again and need to start working really hard to get it paid off. My mum took out a loan for us for £15000 and we got a flexi loan from HSBC for £5000, this has given us enough for our deposit, fees and moving costs and about £3000 left in savings. My OH said he wouldn't go below that amount between us in the bank. As we have been renting we will have some major bits to buy including sofa, fridge, freezer and washing machine. We do have a sofa but its falling apart! We had thought about trying to get these things second hand but have decided against it as we would want to replace them so soon anyway. We will be hunting for 0% finance for them and will just pay it off as soon as possible, we have agreed on £4000 spending limit for these bits and some other thins that we need.

I should go and add up what our debts will be when everything settles out.

If anyone is interested these are links to my old threads.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=531617&highlight=lunars
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=1172779&highlight=lunars

lunar · 17 May 2009 at 11:37AM

This is what our debt total should look like including my remaining previous debts when everything is all paid out.

Mum Loan with A&L..........£15000
HSBC Loan.......................£5000
BT credit card...................£3175
Virgin Card......................£2775
Barclay Card....................£2300
Approx for “essentials”.......£4000

Total...............................£36250!!!!!

So that looks like I am right back where I started when I found the site. The major difference is that they are not just my debts now. When I joined the site my relationship was quite new and the debts were all mine. My OH offered to help pay them but I declined as I wanted him to know that I was committed to paying everything off. Now we have been together a few years and have our son it's a completely different story.

We will have an expensive 2-3 months as we can't give up our rented house and move properly until August so we will be paying for both houses until then. After that we have a rough SOA worked out and on basic wage will be able to overpay the debt by £1000 per month. OH will continue to do overtime but not quite as much as he is doing right now. He said he will aim to earn an extra £1000 per month after tax until we have got rid of the debts. We are hoping to be debt free by Christmas 2010. I am still on maternity leave so need to do as much extra as I can with a 7 month old needing all my attention.

jo1972 · 17 May 2009 at 11:47AM

Just wanted to pop on and say good luck Lunar, hope everything goes well with the house sale and you enjoy your time living there.

Look forward to reading the next chapter of your diary

xx

doodledo_2 · 17 May 2009 at 11:57AM

Happy new diary

You have come so far already.

Well done on the new house sounds perfect.

urg123 · 17 May 2009 at 12:04PM

Hi Lunar

You've come such a long way. Congratulations on reducing that debt, having a lovely baby and buying your new home. You do have one major thing on your side - you've done it once so you can do it again!

I'll watch your progress with great interest.

I have some great sofas that we bought from DFS on pay nothing for 12 months and then spread the costs over 3 years. Just be a bit careful, you'll be credit checked loads over the next few months as you get everything sorted for your new house.

Don't forget to use freecycle and ebay for bits and pieces. I know it's tempting to get everything nice and new but there's nothing wrong with getting second hand stuff until you can afford it. I still have some ramshakled furniture and electricals that people have kindly donated to me. I'm sure friiends and family would be happy to let you have stuff that might otherwise go to waste. Also a friend bought lots of decent furniture from ebay at a fraction of the cost. It's all worth a look.

Good luck

urg x x

pandapaws · 17 May 2009 at 1:48PM

Ooh! New diary - hello!
Congratulations on exchanging, that must be a weight off your mind. Have you got a move-in date yet?

Re buying stuff...have you looked at the catalogues? I know they're a total rip-off, but when you use discount codes etc you can actually get some really good deals. I'll be back with a link in a mo...

pandapaws · 17 May 2009 at 1:54PM

http://www.hotukdeals.com/item/388466/littlewoods-direct-30-off-excluding/

Plus lots of other similar things - search that site for Littlewoods, Littlewoods Direct, Additions, Kays, Choice, Marshall Ward. All the same company but you can have an account each, with each. Got my £900 laptop for £348 after Quidco with a discount voucher! Different terms on some than others, check the APR as some are 0%, others do BNPL 12 months, some it's a whopping 39%! Loads of bargains to be had though. Give us a shout if I can help with any of it, I consider myself a bit of a catalogue scamming expert now!

penguin83 · 17 May 2009 at 2:25PM

Hi Lunar - huge congrats on the new house, hope you, OH and littleun are very happy there.

Lovely shiny to diary to get you started x x xx

ps cant believe baby is 7 months already! x xx

Buffythedebtslayer · 17 May 2009 at 3:06PM

ooooo Lunar, I have read your diary on and off for a while but recently lost it really pleased you have moved and I am sure you will manage to get out of debt - I love reading your diary!

Buffyxxx

hypno06 · 17 May 2009 at 3:47PM

Excellent news! And No you are not "back where you started" - not by a long way. You are now at the start of a very exciting future as a family.

I wish you all the very best - now get reviewing on dooyoo and I will get rating - you will want all the 1.5ps that you can get right now!!

wantabetterlife · 17 May 2009 at 3:48PM

Hi Lunar. I had also read your previous diaries and just wanted to say congratulations with the house. If you get rid of this debt as quick as your last one you will be sorted in no time!!! well done

WABL

Lunar has a house and lots of shiny new debt to get rid of!

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