Newbee

DebtFreeWannabeeHibee

Evening guys (and gals), here is my story -

I am 27 and haven't ever been that good with money if I'm being honest. However over the past 2/3 months my partner (she is 25) and I have been cutting back on things. 2/3 months back our budget looked like:-

Wages In £2700

Mortgage £780 (Abbey)
2nd Mortgage £167 (Nemo)
Council Tax £162
Credit Cards £130
Store Cards/Directories £240
Opticians £21
Mobile Phones £60
Sky & Setanta £85
TV Licence £12
Home Insurance £22
Car Insurance £65
Utilities £190
Family Loan £163
Diesel £150
Food/Lunches etc £150

As you can see, not good! Have found a cheaper Optician (£15.50), have now got PAYG Mobiles (£30), Tiscali TV (£36.99), Home Insurance down (£71.00) and Car Insurance is down also (£44.63).

So, any advice!?! Got a few more additions:-

* Have Bank Charges in at HBoS for around £2000
* Had to pay this off prior to starting to work for HBoS believe it or not
* These Charges have caused a Default to appear on my account

Think thats it!?!

So my partner or I won't get a loan. Am thinking of asking one set of parents for help and won't get a contract as such written up to say we'll pay every month etc.

Anymore questions or queries on my problem, just let me know.

Thanks very much in advance and sorry if I haven't given enough information or rambled on too much!

Hibee

PS - All payments are minimum, again NOT GOOD!

TotallyBroke

Hi, Welcome..

Please use https://www.makesenseofcards/soacalc.html this will help you to work out exactly what goes out each month.
Currently you have a car but do not put anything aside for mot or tax let alone servicing.
Once you post that up people will be able to help you both cut back a bit more or move the debt around for a better deal.

Good luck

halight

Hi
first weldone for getting it down!!!!!

Next i think you need to cut back a bit more and get your debts down.
You could do this by asking for the money off friend or family and paying off all your cards and stuff. Then paying them back.

Or have you thourt about a debt managent plan?
With this your card companys accept a lower amout monthy and should freez all the intrest on the accout.

I think it would be best to have a chat with debt line, The phone number is on this web site somewere but in sure that someone who knows it will post it up here later on for you.

also folks on here use cccs again number on here somewere but im sure someone can post it up for you.

I hope this helps
Good luck mate and keep us posted on how you get on and if you need any more info

RAS

Hi

Also, list the loans, cards and catalogues and their APRs. Also the number of payments left for the loans and the maximum value and current amount on each of the credit cards.

Also, clothes, holidays, presents, other travel etc.

Your utility bills are huge, what are you heating? If it is that big, can you take a lodger?

And suggest you both keep a spending diary for a month.

DebtFreeWannabeeHibee

Hi, SOA below but have done a fair whack since my first post, whatcha all think and any other ideas?

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet (approx)

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 1600
Partners monthly income after tax....... 1100
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 2700

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 780
Secured loan repayments................. 167
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 162
Electricity............................. 150 NOW 60
Gas..................................... 40
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 0
Telephone (land line)................... 25 NOW 0
Mobile phone............................ 60 NOW 20
TV Licence.............................. 11
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 85 NOW 37
Internet Services....................... 0
Groceries etc. ......................... 150 NOW 100
Clothing................................ 0
Petrol/diesel........................... 150
Road tax................................ 0
Car Insurance........................... 65 NOW 40
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 0
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 9
Contents insurance...................... 9
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 0
Haircuts................................ 0
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Total monthly expenses.................. 1863 NOW 1585

Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 183000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 3500
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 186500

Secured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly....APR
Mortgage...................... 165349...(780.00)....5.69
Secured Debt.................. 17000....(167.00)....10.9
Total secured debts........... 182349....-.............-

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly....APR
HBoS Credit Card...............5100......120....... 28.0
Tesco Credit Card...............500......13.........18.0
Vanquis Credit Card.............500......25.........39.0
Alliance & Leicester C'Card....3500......100........18.0
Next Directory.................1800......165........28.0
Littlewoods Direct.............3200......70.........39.0
Overdraft.......................450......5..........??.?
Family Loan....................7000......162........0.00
Total unsecured debts.........22050......660...........-

Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.....................2,700
Expenses (including secured debts).......1,863 NOW 1,585
Available for debt repayments........... 837 NOW 1,115
Monthly Unsecured debt repayments....... 660
Surplus(deficit if negative)............ 177 NOW 455

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 186,500
Total Secured debt...................... -182,349
Total Unsecured debt.................... -22,050
Net Assets.............................. -17,899

dancingfairy

Hey - congratulations - looks like you have made huge progress - the one thing i would say is maybe set aside some money each month for entertainment/car maintenance/presents etc.
You will probably need some money for entertainment although your sky bills is still rather huge but a vast improvement.
Your next task is probably to track down where your spare 400 a month is going - some will be on presents entertainment etc but I am sure some of it is just dripping away on the 'odd' cd/dvd/lunch out/pint after work/lunch at work/bottle of pop/magazine/haircut/new item of clothing/cigarettes etc, etc. Maybe do a spending diary and see if you can reduce this.
I think Vanquis would be a qood starting point as the interest on that is massive but the balance is relatively small - I reckon you could crack that one soon - especially if you can find some of the lost money (of the 400 odd pounds) and also if you can find a bit of extra work or sell some bits and bobs - you should get it gone pretty sharpish. I might even be tempted to extend the overdraft just to get rid of the Vanquis as the interest is so ridiculously high - you would save yourself loads in interest right away.
Good Luck
df

Jesthar

Heya Hibee, and welcome!

Congratulations on the improvements so far - well done you two! :T

I agree with dancingfairy - a spending diary is a very good idea. I'm not in debt, but I have one (an excel spreadsheet of my own design which does most of the work for me - yup, I'm a geek! ), and it keeps my 'splurges' in check si I can afford to have home improvements done!

You seem to have forgotten road tax and water rates on your SoA, and you should probably allow something in at least one of entertainment/presents/emergency fund.

Well done on getting your electricity bill down so far! Dread to think why it was so high in the first place! :eek: Looking at your gas and elec bills, they still seem a bit high for two people in one house. I have a small one bed semi detached house, and my bills are probably one third to one half of yours. Ok, I live alone, but many things are should be the same - it will still cost the same to heat the house for either one or two, for example, and the cost of having the TV on would be the same. Might be worth having a look at some energy saving tis, see if you can save yourself even more money here.

Aside from all that, you seem to have a nice amount of money left over each month, so I suggest you check out 'snowballing' - the art of paying minimum payments off all your debts each month, and then throwing all your spare cash at the one with the highest interest rate. Link to a handly calculator is here:

http://www.whatsthecost.com/snowball.aspx

but it's clear you need to start with the Vanquis and Littlewood cards - those interest rates are crippling! :eek: is there any way you could balance transfer the Littlewoods to another card with a lower intersst rate, or even a 0% balance transfer card? The vanquis can be paid off in a few months if you keep to your budget, so that's not such a worry.

Hoep that helps,

~Jes

TotallyBroke

Well done on reducing some of your outgoings.

I agree with the spending diary. Or look through some bank statements from the last few months/year and see where some money went.
That will also give you an idea of what you spent over the last year on birthdays/Christmas. You will also see what your car tax and MOT and servicing cost over the year.
Add these amounts into your soa but every month move that amount into a savings account and access it from there when needed. It means it won't get accidentally spent. Plus with your new mse habits you won't spend as much and these savings could be used against a debt or kept as emergency fund
I agree with paying off the highest interest first but I would start with the littlewoods catalogue personally. If you was able to find £300 and pay £370 per month off this it could be finished by September next year. You would then have £395 to pay off Vanquis which could clear that in almost one payment and so on.
See if you can find out what your overdraft interest rate is. But personally I choose to live in mine so that I use that to overpay on other debts.

Well done so far