I'd like some help please

Little_Miss_Road_Rage

Right I've been facing up to my debt crisis for a little while now but I feel I need some more help. I read the ideas on this forum and have been taking them in.
It all started 8 years ago when my nan died of cancer and my mum collapsed beside her and died a week later. I seemed to take it very well but I was using shopping to help me get by. I spent my £6000 inheritance and much more on credit cards. I don't really have a lot to show and can only name a handful of things I bought. My ex used to encourage me to spend on my car and now I'm with my new partner, who's very supportive, we've been tackling it together.
We now have our own house but I have been diagnosed with ME and have been finding it hard at work and I may lose my job soon so we need to pull our belts in tighter.

Any help will be gratefully appreciated.

Here is my SOA

Monthly Incomings:

My salary - £1187.02
Partners salary - £1714.48
Benefits - £0

Total - £2901.50

Monthly Outgoings:

Mortgage/Rent - £880.62
Council Tax - £110
Gas - £30
Electric - £26
TV License - £10.54
NTL phone/ broadband/ tv - £33.99
Food - £216
Car Insurance - £134.81 (will be £69.95 soon)
Petrol - £40
Life Insurance - £46.73 (will be £116.74 soon)
Mobile - £75
House Insurance - £47.62 (will be £17.51 soon)
Pet Insurance - £15
Bus pass - £45 (when i'm working)
Bank - £24
Car tax - £13.75

Total: £1749.06

Debts

For Life of balance cards
Barclaycard - £5798.32 (6.9%) £115/month Limit £7000
Capital One - £979.42 (4.9%) £29.38/month £3000
Amex - £6724.15 (4.9%) £202/month Limit £10,100

Other cards
Intelligent Finance £4770 (0% 8 months) don't know monthly payment yet Limit £5300
BOS £2842 (0% 5 months) £56.84/month Limit £3600
Natwest £2.25 credit (18.3%) Limit £2900
MBNA £10.65 credit (15.9%) Limit £8900
Marbles £293.65 credit (15.9%) Limit £11,300
Halifax £0 (22.5%) Limit £13650

Loans
Cahoot £6425.58 (9.5%) £128.51/month Limit £11,000 (About £5500 should be payed off soon)

Overdrafts
Joint account £128.69
My account £1,608.48 (not for long hopefully)


Total debt
£28970.09 ouch

Mortgage
£174,000


Well thats it I think. We've got 2 cars to sell So the insurance will be reduced
and my overdraft will be reduced and some of the debts. I've been selling stuff on ebay too.
Go for it lets see what u can do to help.
Thanks
Kelly

**purpleprincess**

Hiya!! Well done for posting, can be a bit daunting seeing it all in black and white!! What's the "bank" amount for? How many people does £216 feed a month? .............. have you looked at snowballing??? ............... sorry to hear about your ME, I have CFS so can sympathise xx How much are you currently paying on debt repayments each month?

**purpleprincess**

Forgive me if my maths is wrong but I work it out to be £1152.44 left over after bills etc that can go on debt repayments (obv that's only at the moment with both salaries)

dave318

Welcome and well done for stopping and becoming a DFW.

As Purpleprincess says, how many people are you feeding for that, because it does seem excessive. As does £75 for mobile bills.

Good to hear you are getting rid of cars as the insurance alone seems a bit steep, especially when you are only spending £40 per month on petrol. Are they really worth having?
Just looked at our two cars. If I get rid of the small cheap one, I could save about £150 per month. That includes payments, petrol, insurance, Road Tax and Servicing, but takes off what I would be for buses and what extra petrol I would use in the other car.
If I got rid of the expensive one, I could save £477 per month. Just got to talk my OH into getting rid of it, as she loves it so much.

**ALERT** Life insurance will soon be £116. How Much???
Check all of Martins Articles :money: You must be able to get it cheaper than that. Although I did notice that the mortgage payments are quite high as well. (Could you take a payment holiday from your mortgage for a few months?)

Credit cards seem a good mix of 0% and low rate life of Balance, but you still have some BT free, use it as much as you can, and Snowball your cards. Speak to CAB or CCCS for advice. They may draw up a reasonable budget and help you by writing to all your creditors asking for reduced payments and interest freezes.

Get rid of Natwest, MBNA and Marbles Cards first. They are all quite low anyway, but high rates of interest and just cut up the Halifax one. Don't even touch that at 22.5%. Ouch. You will feel good even if you get rid of these cards.

My other tip would be to look at everything you are paying and to see if you can save on it. There are tips on here for everything.

good luck, hope you can keep working and become Debt Free.

Dave

bargainbetty

Just a couple of ideas....

Little_Miss_Road_Rage wrote:

Mortgage/Rent - £880.62
Council Tax - £110
Gas - £30
Electric - £26
TV License - £10.54
NTL phone/ broadband/ tv - £33.99
Food - £216 (this can be brought down - check out the Old style boards)
Car Insurance - £134.81 (will be £69.95 soon)
Petrol - £40
Life Insurance - £46.73 (will be £116.74 soon)
Mobile - £75 (change contract, get free minutes, stop using it)
House Insurance - £47.62 (will be £17.51 soon)
Pet Insurance - £15 (do you really need this?)
Bus pass - £45 (when i'm working)
Bank - £24
Car tax - £13.75

Total: £1749.06

Debts

For Life of balance cards
Barclaycard - £5798.32 (6.9%) £115/month Limit £7000
Capital One - £979.42 (4.9%) £29.38/month £3000
Amex - £6724.15 (4.9%) £202/month Limit £10,100

Other cards
Intelligent Finance £4770 (0% 8 months) don't know monthly payment yet Limit £5300
BOS £2842 (0% 5 months) £56.84/month Limit £3600
Natwest £2.25 credit (18.3%) Limit £2900 (if these few are in credit, have you asked for the money back? Do it, then close the cards, improving your credit rating to get more 0% ones for transfers )
MBNA £10.65 credit (15.9%) Limit £8900
Marbles £293.65 credit (15.9%) Limit £11,300
Halifax £0 (22.5%) Limit £13650 - close it now

Loans
Cahoot £6425.58 (9.5%) £128.51/month Limit £11,000 (About £5500 should be payed off soon)

For all the others, cut up the cards, keep bringing the limits down so you can't spend anymore on them, check out the snowball calculator, to see how to best hit them, and throw your spare caah at the highest APRs....

Oh, and welcome!

Little_Miss_Road_Rage

The bank amount is for our accounts, mine is the advantage gold account, to be honest I don't actually know what I pay for. I had a review of my account with some muppet at Natwest and he was no help. I think we should both cancel it.

The food amount is for 2 of us and the dog.

The mobile bill is for both our phones. My partners is on a special offer at the moment and we're both tied into 18month contracts that run out in April 07.

The life insurance includes critical illness and is for our mortgage. Its the cheapest I can get as most companies won't touch me due to my ME.

We can't take a mortgage break as we've only had it 5 months.

We have bought an estate car and are selling our other cars and just running the one car. We don't use the car much as my partner rides to work and when I'm working I catch the bus. We don't smoke, drink or go out so we have the car as our treat. We go to the occasional car show with it.

I didn't realise we had £1152.44 left after all the bills are paid our accounts are empty so i think i've missed some things out. I pay the minimum payments on my debt and i'm not sure what my partner pays. I will have to look into this further.

Thanks for the help

Little_Miss_Road_Rage

bargainbetty wrote:

Just a couple of ideas....



For all the others, cut up the cards, keep bringing the limits down so you can't spend anymore on them, check out the snowball calculator, to see how to best hit them, and throw your spare caah at the highest APRs....

Oh, and welcome!

Oooooh I didn't realise by closing my cards would increase my credit rating. That would help cool doing it now.
Thanks

dancingfairy

I would get back the £300? credit you have on the credit cards and cancel them all. That could help pay off some of the others.

**purpleprincess**

Little_Miss_Road_Rage wrote:

The bank amount is for our accounts, mine is the advantage gold account, to be honest I don't actually know what I pay for. I had a review of my account with some muppet at Natwest and he was no help. I think we should both cancel it.

The food amount is for 2 of us and the dog.

The mobile bill is for both our phones. My partners is on a special offer at the moment and we're both tied into 18month contracts that run out in April 07.

The life insurance includes critical illness and is for our mortgage. Its the cheapest I can get as most companies won't touch me due to my ME.

We can't take a mortgage break as we've only had it 5 months.

We have bought an estate car and are selling our other cars and just running the one car. We don't use the car much as my partner rides to work and when I'm working I catch the bus. We don't smoke, drink or go out so we have the car as our treat. We go to the occasional car show with it.

I didn't realise we had £1152.44 left after all the bills are paid our accounts are empty so i think i've missed some things out. I pay the minimum payments on my debt and i'm not sure what my partner pays. I will have to look into this further.

Thanks for the help

Cancel it!!! Extra income then!!! ................. You could reduce the amount you're spending on food by nearly half!! Take a look over on the Old Style board for ideas ...................... You do have quite a bit left over before you start paying off your debts. Get all credit amounts back, and cancel all the ones with no balance on them!! ...................... have a look at what else you may be spending out on? Birthdays etc etc

Floss

I don't do credit cards so have no advice on them.....however, i would recommend both of you starting a spending diary & writing down everything (and, yes, I do mean that Crunchie & paper you bought for your bus-ride!) so you can see exactly where your cash is going. Then you can tackle any problem areas & look at your housekeeping.

The first step is one of the hardest - you just flung yourself over the edge of the DFW canyon! We're all fairly harmless on here, so join the gang

Little_Miss_Road_Rage

Right I've cancelled some of the credit cards and I have got the credit amounts back which I'll put in the bank towards m overdraft. I have phoned vodaphone and I'll be saving £16 a month now by lowering my tariff.

The diary is a good idea as I don't know where our money is going.

When we go shopping I mainly buy the Tesco savers food. I did as Martin said on a TV prog to try it and if u really don't like it swap back but if u do like it switch.

I saw an idea on here somewhere about baking your own bread. I have a bread machine so I can have a go. Is it freezable?

I'm off to the old style board for some more ideas now.
Thanks for making me feel welcome