Babes Diary

babes21

Hello everyone, i'm babes and i'm 24 years old. I've decided to start this diary to give me the motivation to clear some debts and build on my personal savings. Feel free to follow me and listen to my daily/weekly ramblings :rolleyes:, i'll try not to bore you too much .

My SOA:

Income:

£970 per month

Outgoings, monthly:

Rent: £100 to parents
Internet: £20
Laptop Insurance: £10 (last payment this month)
Credit Card: £40
TS Store Card: £50
Very Account: £60
Mobile phone contract: £35 (although it's been twice as much as this the past previous months :eek:, mainly internet browsing and downloads, i know, i know , definitely cutting this out. My contract gets renewed the end of January so will look for a much better deal)
Travel: £40
Lunch/Snacks: £80 per month
Cigarrettes: Approx £80 per month (will cut this down)
Clothes: It depends, on average i'd say around £150
Socialising: £200
Savings: Varies from month to month so won't include it in my soa
Dental/Prescriptions: Varies, but i'll put down £20 to cover it

Total Outgoings = £885

Debts

Mastercard: £190.12 (i haven't used this for absolutely ages, really need to concentrate on clearing this one first as it as the most apr)
TS Store Card: £133.74 (i pay £50 per month, will try to clear it in two payments for each month)
Very Account: £670 (this is controllable, i have interest free and the money comes straight out of my account each month, the balance seems high but i had a new mobile phone and camera, i'm paying £150 of it this month so this should go down pretty quickly)

Total Debts: £993.86

So as you can see above my debt isn't *too* huge but it's a debt all the same. I know i need to cut back on a few things and concentrate more on clearing those cards, that way i can focus on building my savings. I think this will be easily achieveable by the end of January what with taking Christmas into consideration. New year, new beginning eh.

Also if anyone as any ideas on how to up my income, preferably something i could do from home, free online bingo etc then please leave me a comment.

lilmissmup

Great minds think alike hun. I am just going to start a new diary too! :j

babes21

lilmissmup wrote: »

Great minds think alike hun. I am just going to start a new diary too! :j

Yay, once started post a link for me here so i can bookmark it, my subscribed threads don't seem to be working properly .

babes21

So as of tomorrow i'm going to note on here my daily spends, i found last time that keeping a spending diary really helped as i could see exactly where my money was going on those day-to-day spends. I'm going to give myself a weekly budget, that budget will include daily my travel, cigs, snacks/lunch and any added extras. I think to start with i'm going to give myself £40. I will draw that out of the cashpoint each week.

I'm starting my Christmas Shopping the week after next so hopefully will get all of that sorted in the next month or so. I don't have to buy for *too* many people, although what with the festive season comes more socialising, christmas parties etc so obviously it all adds up.

babes21

So Day 1, spends for the day:

£1.20 - Bus
£7.00 - Cigs and Snacks
£4.00 - Lunch
£6.00 - Met a friend after work for something to eat in the pub and a drink, she gave me a lift home too

Total = £18.20

It's surprising how all these things add up doesn't it, aiming for a much lower spend day tomorrow.

maman

Just looking at today's spends. What jumps out is that you could have saved a bit on lunch and snacks by taking your own from home. Even if you just did it for a couple of months it would help you pay additional Christmas expenses.

Good luck with your diary, I think you're being very sensible paying off debts now before they become unmanageable.

babes21

maman wrote: »

Just looking at today's spends. What jumps out is that you could have saved a bit on lunch and snacks by taking your own from home. Even if you just did it for a couple of months it would help you pay additional Christmas expenses.

Good luck with your diary, I think you're being very sensible paying off debts now before they become unmanageable.

Hello Maman, thank you for your post. Yeah i've noticed that too and it is something which i've realised. I have a fast metabolism so need to eat well and quite regular, something hot which is convenient too. Looking at bringing my own from home even if it's just 2 or 3 out of the 5 days. Then cut down on the amount of snacks which i buy.

Today as yet i've spent:

* £2.40 - Bus
* £1.00 - Crisps & Drink
* £2.50 - Lunch

Total = £5.90

mumslave

hiya babes, I think you are being very sensible too. How far is it to your work? Is the bus walking distance? If not, you could get off one stop earlier, making the bus ticket a little bit cheaper? Do you smoke proper cigarettes or roll ups?

babes21

mumslave wrote: »

hiya babes, I think you are being very sensible too. How far is it to your work? Is the bus walking distance? If not, you could get off one stop earlier, making the bus ticket a little bit cheaper? Do you smoke proper cigarettes or roll ups?

Hiya mumslave, i live around 20 mins from work. It is of walking distance, although with the dark nights now approaching i wouldn't feel safe enough walking home alone. I smoke the Menthol Cigarrettes, that's the only ones i can smoke now. Just recently i've been through a stressful time so was smoking around 15-20 a day, buying a packet of 20 per day. Bit by bit it's down to around 10, looking to halve that.

mumslave

well you can buy menthol filter tips to smoke in rollups, thats what I used to do and it works out much cheaper than buying the real deal. Takes a bit of getting used to though. The other thought about travel, is there anyone that drives your way home from work that you know? Might be able to work out a cheaper arrangement by offering a little for fuel each week.

babes21

Thanks mumslave, will look into it.

The plan the end of next week is to pay off around £200 off my debt total, maybe more depending on the total outgoings for the month. Then November month around the same amount and so on for the end of December. If it all goes to plan i should have it cleared by the end of January.