Lightbulb Moment

chops22

oooohh I always wanted an Aga....but thats a lot a month. Good luck on the debt free journey.

gargrave50

Speedys wrote: »

Its been a while coming so recently decided to do something about it.

The SOA is how we stand at the moment, just going through debts and working out where to move debts to as we have a couple of cards that have a zero balance.


My Monthly Income £3,897.61
Wifes Monthly Income £1,292.00
Benefits (Including Child Benefit, Child Tax Credits & Income Support) I don't mean to be rude but how do you qualify for income support?£201.00
Design Income £350.00
INCOME TOTAL £5,740.61


Mortgage/Rent: £1,954.00
Buildings & Contents Insurance: £87.43 This could easily be reduced by shopping around - if you shop around and find who is lowest go via a cashback site to earn some extra cash.
Council Tax: Article £161.88 This seems quite low?
Water Rates/Meter: £52.31
Gas/Elec £320.00 Try being particularly frugal with your utilities - change your habits, put lights off, heating on a timer etc.
Home Phone £64.00 Massive cost - could easily be reduced.
TV Licence £12.04
Mobile Phone £30.00
Food and Household Shopping £324.75
Eating Out £26.00
Drinks for Home £25.98 Isn't this part of your household shopping?
Drinking Out £43.30
Breakdown Cover/Roadside Recovery £14.95 You could save here by shopping around (again go via a cashback site!)
Car Maintenance £37.50 (Is this for the company car? Same for insurance and car tax?)
Car Insurance £27.92
Car Tax £17.08
Parking £5.00
Petrol/Diesel £70.00
Comp Car Payment £300.00 Doesn't this come straight off your salary?
Credit Card Repayments £1,500.00 (Snowball debt payment) Is it possible to break this down?
Childcare/Play Schemes£98.50
Baby Sitting £5.00
Nappies/Baby Extras £20.00
Pocket Money £4.33
School Meals £53.33
School Trips £2.50
IT/Computing £1.67 Can you specify what this is made up of?
Hobbies £10.00 Is this for the kids?
Shopping for Fun £10.00 By getting rid of this you save £120 a year. There are other things to do for fun which are free - the forum is full of lots of ideas!
Books/Music/Films/Computer Games £10.00 Again this could be another £120 a year to save.
Cinema/Theatre Trips £2.50 Is this realistic - £10 a month. This is less than one adult and one child to the cinema?
Family Days Out £8.33 Really?
Satellite/Digital TV Subscription £47.50 Could this be reduced? If you can't part with the package you have, perhaps you could stop your shopping for fun to compensate?
Fitness/Sports/Gym £51.96 This is over £600 a year. Do you use this? It could be cancelled and give you £50 a month to throw more at one of your smaller debts.
Haircuts £34.67 For how many people?
New Clothes £20.00 You should be able to cut this out for adults - I know all about children growing!
New Children's Clothes £20.00
Work Clothes £20.00 Again, could this be cut out for a while?

Total income £5,740.61
Total spend £5,578.41



Card Balance Int Rate
Santander 8,913.93 21.90%
Barclay Plat MC 12,500.00 19.90%
Virgin Money 7,259.85 19.90%
Capital One 5,711.98 19.50%
Halifax 6,076.89 19.00%
Select 14,900.00 11.90%
Barclay Plat Visa 8,889.00 6.90% life of balance
Barclaycard 5,128.69 6.90% life of balance

Card Debts £69,308ish:eek::eek::eek:


House Value - £550000
Mortgage - £390000

So the plan is to clear the £70k by May 2015 sustaining the £1500 per month payments off cards using a snowball. Any extra income will also be going towards the cards.

There are a couple of things in the SOA that will be going soon, ie Sky.

Anyway, thats me, will keep you guys updated as we go along.

I apologise if some of the comments seem harsh, however sometimes it is useful to have a fresh eye to see where your expenditure could be reduced or cut. Good luck:D

chops22

hi I don't think the £201 is income suport.. they have three children so it will be child benefit.
Think the heading on his SOA has benefits, ie child benefit, and the income support would also be included here, if he recieved it.

In_my_dreams

I am "in your crowd" so to speak and living proof that high income can = high debt! It has been so easy spending money until the time comes to repaying it. We have a similar DFD I think, mine is 2015 and I can't wait for it. Hope to get there sooner but with my level of debt it's going to be tough. Good luck, I look forward to your journey!

littlechezza

Is it just me that's confused but I thought people coming here were looking for advice, what they earn is surely not for people to comment on!!!

Speedys

In_my_dreams wrote: »

I am "in your crowd" so to speak and living proof that high income can = high debt! It has been so easy spending money until the time comes to repaying it. We have a similar DFD I think, mine is 2015 and I can't wait for it. Hope to get there sooner but with my level of debt it's going to be tough. Good luck, I look forward to your journey!

Just read your post 77 thousand reasons to be debt free, and I know what you mean.

I think ours was around the same level but I managed to find some bits and bobs ie stocks and shares which paid off a chunk a little while back.

Its a big boat, climb aboard. Its a free bar too which is nice. :beer:

Speedys

gargrave50 wrote: »

I apologise if some of the comments seem harsh, however sometimes it is useful to have a fresh eye to see where your expenditure could be reduced or cut. Good luck:D

Yes, I know what you are saying, but some of those things I won't cut back on for my own reasons, either they are something we do as a family (families that play together stay together) or I have made a concious decision to keep doing something as the debt payments are sustainable and you have to have a balance in life.

Yes, we are in a bit of a mess but I am not going to eat gruel and turn off all the lights and the heat, there is a life balance to consider.

I am working hard in the background to get extra funds in, its a long slog but what isn't in life. Hopefully I will be able to generate extra income to increase the payments from the debt, but as it stands, June 2015 is my target date.

IWantToBeFree_2

Good luck on your journey Speedy! You do seem to have your head screwed on and I am sure that in 5 years time you will be debt free.

I am in a similar position to you in that I want to be debt free, but I want to do it whilst having a life at the same time, and I think that you can do both hand in hand. You will find that a lot of people automatically say 'cancel the sky, cancel the gym' etc as its almost automatically programmed in, however, it certainly does't have to be that way!

Good luck

milliemonster

Hi Speedy, I do have to agree with your last post, I think while ever you are in a position that you can meet your committments and have a little left over then yes, why not make that dfw journey a little bit longer whilst still doing family things. We also have a faily high income and I have been 'attacked' by some posters on this forum (not this board!) for still having holidays when we have this level of debt, but fortunately for us we have a low mortgage so have around £2500 a month spare to overpay our debts and/or enjoy our lives without adding to it.

We have 2 yound kids too and I don't see why we should go without as a family whilst we can afford to pay our debts and still have a few luxuries.

Yes it would be very different if we had more going out than coming in but I take the view that my kids are growing up, I want to enjoy time with them, while I can and while we can afford it, whilst still getting the balance right and paying off our debts

gargrave50

Speedys wrote: »

Yes, I know what you are saying, but some of those things I won't cut back on for my own reasons, either they are something we do as a family (families that play together stay together) or I have made a concious decision to keep doing something as the debt payments are sustainable and you have to have a balance in life.

Yes, we are in a bit of a mess but I am not going to eat gruel and turn off all the lights and the heat, there is a life balance to consider.

I am working hard in the background to get extra funds in, its a long slog but what isn't in life. Hopefully I will be able to generate extra income to increase the payments from the debt, but as it stands, June 2015 is my target date.

Thanks Speedy. I quite agree that there are some things which you are just aren't willing to sacrifice - I think we all have our own little things.

Families that play together stay together is quite right, however many of us who just aren't willing to sacrifice our family time have found alternatives. Personally I save my Tesco clubcard vouchers and exchange them for Clubcard deals e.g. PizzaExpress, Snozone and Mini Golf. That way we can have a real treat together as a family without having to "spend":j.

I don't think anyone on here will suggest you eat gruel and turn all the lights off. Personally the changes I have made have meant that I can see a difference in my monthly utility d/d (always welcome!;)). Simple things like we don't leave the TV on standby now, set the heating to be off when we are out and on when we are in, and turning lights off in rooms we are not in! The old style board is a great source of menus designed to save wastage on food - again great for reducing your cost at the checkout. I have to say we eat better now than ever:rolleyes:!

Good luck with making some additional income - every little counts. Like I said I've subscribed to your thread to see how you get on.:T