Buckle up - it's going to be a bumpy ride!

GotNoRhythm

I have been lurking on this forum for a long time now (I hate that word - 'lurking'), trying to talk myself out of posting anything on here. 'I'll post something when I've worked out my SOA' (see - I even know the lingo!)
But the problem is I know it's yet another excuse not to face up to my debts - and I need to start now!!! So.... I'm going to take a deep breath and buckle up for that bumpy ride!

I know my debts are in the region of £40K - this is made up of unsecured loans, student loans, credit card debt and an overdraft. There. I've said it now. It's in black and white. And I will work out my SOA in detail - I'll do it by Sunday. That's a promise. Please feel free to chase me up on this. (I'm off work Fri/Sat/Sun so will have time to do it then)

How did I get here? Long story - here's the abridged version....
- went to university and acquired student loans and overdraft facility :beer:
- after graduating I moved out of my parents' home, moved back in, moved out, moved back in...
- Had to replace a lot of furniture in 2000 due to flooding (no insurance - loan #1)
- had to replace my car when a moronic neighbour :mad: backed of their driveway into my (parked) car and wrote it off (Loan #2)
- Had a number of below-average-pay jobs and high travel costs for a number of years. I live in a rural area which hasn't helped!
- I tried playing the 'credit card balance transfer game' but eventually fell foul of it (evil credit cards!!! :mad:)
- I consolidated what I owed on the cards (Loan #3), and cut my losses and went to work abroad. This lasted all of four months - I hated the company I was working for and decided to.... go back to my parents with my tail between my legs. (and it cost me £500 to ship my stuff back to the UK)
- Had a few more years of not-brilliantly-paid jobs and robbing-peter-credit-card-to-pay-paul-credit-card
- Decided to do a PGCE course. This was actually the easiest time for me financially because of all the grants and bursaries that are available.
- Slipped up and failed my last teaching practice. Had to wait A WHOLE YEAR to retake it!! Couldn't get a job as I couldn't commit long-term so spent much of the year on JSA, and maxing out my credit cards. Oh, and i had a job for about 2 months before being made redundant.

There. That's it. My financial 'car crash' displayed for everyone to see.

I'm still trying to formulate a plan of attack, but it looks something like this at the moment...
I finally did pass my teacher training course in July (yey!! :T) and I have an interview a week on Wednesday with a supply agency. I'm also trawling the job sites online for teaching posts in my area - nothing suitable so far but I won't give up hope! I have a casual contract working as a receptionist, at the moment (I worked for this company throughout the summer as a temp and they offered me a casual contract so that I can continue to work for them in the school holidays, which will hopefully fit with supply work)

I also intend to have a good clear-out of stuff on ebay/amazon and have also been looking at bigwardrobe.com (not sure about that one...)

I also need to look at my spending habits. They're not good, either...
(I told you it wasn't much of a plan) I don't know where to start with my credit cards.

So, I hereby vow to access my Inner-Martin :money:, and give myself a financial kick up the @ss :A

GNR
x

tealady

Hi and welcome. Re your credit cards, did you see "It pays to watch" last night. In there Martin showed ways of reducing your card debt.
If you put the details of your cards into the snowballer (cant remember what its called - sorry - but someone will know) then it will help you sort how to pay of you debts quickest.

sparky0107

Hi GNR,
Welcome to the forum, as tealady has said if you go to www.whatsthecost.com you will need outstanding balances & APR's, put them all into the snowball calculator & this will tell you your debtfree date. Also try the Statement of Affairs link www.makesenseofcards.co.uk click on the convert to MSE format and paste it into your next post, when you put your SoA on here some very helpful people will come along and give you some great advice. I just wish I'd "stumbled" onto this site 2 years ago, as I would be almost debtfree now.

Good Luck

Miss_Piggy_2

Morning!
Well done for being brave enough to come on here and put it in black and white. I sometimes think thats the scariest thing.

Credit cards....spawn of the devil and should be destroyed. I got my first one when I was 20 and wanted a nice winter coat that I didn't have enough cash for. 14 years on and that initial £80 spend has managed to grow to vast proportions. It gets easier and easier to flash the credit card for everyday things.

A year and a half ago I cut every single one up. Not saying it was easy. In fact its been really difficult at times but am so happy they're gone.

I'm on a DMP with the CCCS and I would strongly recommend you speak to someone like them for advice. Even if you don't want to go down the DMP route then they are able to offer practical advice.

Once you get you SOA up there will be lots of suggestions forthcoming on how you can save money. Trust me, at this point, you just can't afford to have frivolous outgoings.

Good luck and we all look forward to helping you with you SOA (and we WILL be chasing you if you don't post it )

Miss P
x

Piquant_2

Welcome:hello:

It's a long old journey, but you've started now. It's quite a lot easier with the support from this board and the virtual friends you make along the way. I've found some of the challenges give me something to aim for and keep me on the straight and narrow, you might find they help too.

I'll be looking for your return

Piq

saucymare

Just to say good luck on your quest. I still haven't done my SOA yet but I will get round to it when i get a little more confident.I'm doing a spending diary just now Just to see where the money goes.From what I have seen on here the people are fantastic there is a lot of support. I'll follow your thread.:D

Shoozles

Welcome! Congratulations on writing it all down at last.

Alot of your post sounds very familiar to me, especially the part about falling foul of the balance transfer game!

Congrats on the job too :T

mintymoneysaver

Welcome! Looking forward to seeing you SOA and seeing what we can do with it!

GeorgeUK

Well done for posting GNR.

As tealady and Sparky say, the SOA will tell us if there are any savings you can make and hopefully we'll be able to devise a plan to tackle this. Creditcards are not all bad - only when you spend on them. They may be able to get you out of trouble if they make a good enough offer. Don't look on it as robbing Peter to pay Paul any more. It's more a case of using Hugh to eliminate Pew, unless Pew can help to eliminate Barney - then continue the process. Hopefully we'll be able to make them work for you this time.

GotNoRhythm

Thanks to all of you for your replies - knowing that there are people out there who are kind enough and interested enough to follow my thread really helps! Many thanks.
I read your replies laughing and crying in equal measure!
Now that I've (finally) wrestled my laptop and broadband cable back off my sister (She's home from uni for the weekend) I can check out those links. They sound good! I'll do that next.
Unfortunately I missed Martin's program (sorry Martin!) - it clashes with mum's soaps. That could go on my list of things to do - record it!!! Why didn't I think of it sooner?? :rolleyes:
And I'm going to start a cash book for recording my spending. The silly thing is that I look after the petty cash at work and it's always absolutely spot-on. I need to do this for my own spending really.
Sorry about my login name btw - I wish I could change it!! The silly things that pop into your head when you're thinking these things up! Oh well... I'm showing my age, aren't I??! (Wham - honestly...)
Jobs to do, then:
- set up a cash book (I have one in the house so I can do that tomorrow morning)
- set the digibox to record Martin's show
- sort out my SoA
There. It's a start, isn't it?
Nighty night all
GNR
xx

tealady

Hi If you look at the It pays to watch website then you should be able to watch the most recent show. There is a forum on this site with a link.
HTH