Help with sorting out this mess please

Hootie19

The short message is that with a joint income of £45,000, we are struggling. Which is stupid, I know. We have got a pack from Payplan and have today filled out an income and expenditure sheet. I have completed it in excel, but I don't know how to copy it into here to let you all have a look.

In brief, our income is £2,733 a month, and our outgoings are £2,745.01. That's without making any payments to creditors.

I don't *think* I've over estimated on anything other, perhaps, than our food bill, which is terrifyingly high. Payplan allow for things like hairdressing and clothing each month, which is a bit hard to peg down to an exact figure.

Is there a way I can copy an excel sheet into here without the formatting going haywire, or am I going to have to type it all in?

Our biggest problem (apart from a very bad credit record) is our mortgage. Our mortgage was £115,000 and our monthly payments are £935.17. We are two months in arrears with this. I don't think that a re-mortgage is even an option at the moment. Our mortgage provider is The Mortgage Business (apparently part of The Halifax) and was taken out over 15 years.

We are two adults (aged 46 and 47), and three teenagers (aged 18, 16 and 14) two of whom are about to start college and one who is at upper school about to start on GCSE courses. And a dog. And three goldfish.

Not sure what else, if anything, to add in an initial post, so will wait and see what, if any, replies I get before elaborating further.

amosworks

Try copying the relevant fields from Excel to notepad - which will remove the formatting. Correct the line endings, remove the tabs and other fixed columns delimiters, then paste in to a window here. It doesn't have to be perfect, just list to us your stuff line by line.

Looking forward to it! I'm sure we can save you a packet!!

Toomuchdebt

!!!!{hugs}}} Everyone is so helpful here and has loads of good advice-you've come to the right place for help

Hootie19

thank you. I've never used notepad before, so I hope this is ok. If not I'll just type it all in again from scratch!


Income
Husband's salary * £1,800.00
Wife's salary ** £800.00
Child benefit *** £69.80
Wife's DLA £64.00
Total £2,733.80


Expenditure
Mortgage £935.17
Central heating loan - 2nd charge £35.00
House buildings/contents insurance £37.01
Endowment on top up mortgage £31.51
Council tax £149.00
Water rates £46.81
Gas/electricity (Scottish Power) £98.00
Husband's mobile (new contract) £25.00

Wife's mobile (new contract) £25.00

House phone (line rental only BT) £8.75

House phone calls/ADSL
via husband's employer £19.00

Road fund licence x 2 £35.00

Direct Line car insurance £31.46

Premium Funding car insurance £29.00

Petrol/diesel £80.00

Public transport/parking
Son to college £3/day x 3 days a week £36.00

Daughter to college as above £36.00

Wife's parking £48.00

M&S Pet Insurance £11.11

Dog food £15.00

British Gas insurance for boiler/water pipes £24.82

Housekeeping/food £550.00

Daughter's contact lenses £15.00
Wife's prescriptions £19.00
Hairdressing £30.00
Clothes/shoes £30.00
Magazines (1 subscription, son's Xmas gift) £2.50
Hobbies/clubs/societies
Husband's wargaming club £8.00
Son's golf lessons £25.00
Children's pocket money £120.00
TV licence £10.99
TV rental £26.99
Sky tv package £42.00
Total £2,636.12
£97.68



Hmmmm - I've just previewed this post and it looks a bit jumbled up. Sorry - I think tomorrow I'll type it all in again more neatly. It's a bit late for me to try typing figures comprehensively.

I would add this re the income though:

Husband's salary is a bit variable, as it depends on how much overtime he does. At the moment he is on sick leave as he has just had (minor) surgery, so his income for this month and probably next will be lower than the figure I've put down.

Wife's salary is a pure guess. I have just given up childminding and gone back to working in "the real world". My accounts are with the accountant/IR and so I've no P45 to hand over to my new employer. I started this job on 3rd July. My first salary payment was £1,112 (I think - can't just remember the exact amount). It had NI deductions but no tax deducted (whatever happened to emergency tax???). I've no real idea how much I will be paid each month, until my tax code is sorted out.

Child benefit should increase, as this figure was the last one the DWP sent to me, and was based on my two older ones having left full time education. However, they have both been offered and have accepted places at college, starting first week in September. I have written to DWP and told them this.

I informed the tax credits (I can barely even bring myself to type those words without hyperventilating!) about my change in income, expecting our payments to reduce. Instead they paid a further £60 odd into my bank two days later. Then we received a letter saying that from next month, our tax credits payment would be £10.62 every four weeks (really - is it worth it!?) However, as I am convinced that we have been overpaid for the last two years, I haven't included this in our income, as I'm sure once it is sorted out, it'll turn out to be another debt, rather than part of our income!

Anyway, I think this is probably enough waffle for one night, so I will finish and wait to see if anyone has anything to say tomorrow :-)

CLAPTON

format of the SoA is OK


do you have any debt?
if so post list of debts i.e. for each debt

amount of debt, minimum payment , and APR

totals would be helpful

southernscouser

First things first you have to keep on top of the mortgage! That, council tax and your utlities are your prioritys!

Gas and electric seem awfully high. Try and get in the habit of turning things off when your not using them. If say kids are on the computer make them turn the TV off or play CD's on the comp rather than having a stereo on. Switch off lights when not in the room that sort of thing.

How many kids have you got coz £120 for pocket money is huge? :eek:

I see you have a son and daughter in college! Do they have part time jobs?

I'm basing this on there being four of you. The £550 on groceries I reckon can be knocked down to £250! This includes household products. Get reading on the Oldstyle board for help on that one.

I don't mean this to sound harsh or anything so apologies if it does. Plus its all on presumptions. Your son is old enough to get a part-time job yet you give him what, £60 a month pocket money and pay for his golf lessons? You simply can't afford to.

TV rental at £26.99 a month. It's so much cheaper to buy one. You can get a nice widescreen for easily under £200 nowadays. Even if it breaks every year it's cheaper to buy it out right.

Sky. People hate cancelling it as "we never go out, it's my only luxury". If thats the case why not just downgrade your package. Get rid of movies or something. It's alot of money over a year. (although I really want it for the footy )

Whats Premium funding car insurance?

Have you shopped around for cheaper house insurance? If not do so and read up on Quidco. You can get cashback for signing up through it.

Theres something to get started on!

PeachPickle

Are you giving your 3 kids £40 a month pocket money? I think that's a bit excessive, especially when 2 of them are perfect ages for part time jobs.

Could you manage with one car and use public transport more?

Like SS says, get rid of the rental. You can get a very decent tv for 4 months rental now. I was very tempted by a 28incher in Asda a few months ago (that's 28 inch tv, ss :rolleyes: )

Dump the sky and get freeview, there are still lots of channels. Or at least phone them, threaten to leave and get a hefty reduction. I did this about four times in a year before I got rid of mine - and each time was the last time they could do it :rotfl:

You can prepay prescriptions - I'm not sure for how much (but someone else will, that's the beauty of this place!) but it def works out less than £19 per month

£15 per month for contacts is quite expensive - what kind does she use? Think about dropping to a cheaper type if she's on fancy ones?

Good luck, well done for taking the first steps

lil_me

Transport to college and school sounds high would a weekly pass not be cheaper ? Parking, do they offer a pass aswell ?

£120 pocket money, do you want to adopt me ?

http://www.ppa.org.uk/ppa/ppc_faq.htm Pre Payment Prescriptions info

£30 Hairdressers try local mobile/cash in hand hair dressers. My local one does hair cuts for £5. Male members of the house can use clippers.

Are the children old enough to take on paper rounds/part time work to help cover their clubs and sports ?

Sky you must be on top package. I would suggest considering dropping that down if possible, I doubt you'd miss it.

TV rental, get out when you can, maybe see if you can get one from freecycle for now and save up what you would have paid them to buy one

sleepless_saver

PeachPickle wrote:

You can prepay prescriptions - I'm not sure for how much (but someone else will, that's the beauty of this place!) but it def works out less than £19 per month

£95.30 for 12 months

CLAPTON

If you are behind on your mortgage you need to take drastic action.
You must give priority to your mortgage even if it means defaulting on your other debts.

a. talk to your children and explain the financial situation and that you have to cut back on all optional spending. They are old enough to fully understand. They can get part time jobs so provide some income for themselves.

b. you should be getting child allowance for the two at college assuming it is full time education as well as tax credit.

Spending.

Stop all non essential spending.
Look through the store cupboard and the freezer and try to live out of your stocks for a few weeks and spend only the bare minimum on fresh good.
Start a proper weekly meal plan and hence produce a shopping list and buy only the things on the list...no impulse buys.

What is the 'endowment 31.50' ...is it compulsory with the mortgage or can you stop paying?

elect/gas...start reading the meters once a month and monitor how much energy you are using and try to cut back....reduce the amount of time the heating/hot water is on by adjusting the time switch'

British Gas ...24.82 this is very expensive ..you are paying 300 a year for insurance against a plumber being called out ...how often have you used it over the last 5 years (you've spent 1,500 over that time...plumbers aren't that expensive)

Housekeeping/food is huge...see earlier comment

you can't afford sons golf lesson

you can't afford 120 pocket money...the older children need to get part time jobs and can the younger one do a newspaper round?

TV rental £26??? Just looked at Comet online...you can buy a 21 inch TV for £99.99 or if you must then a 28inch for 139.99 ...

you can't afford Sky see whether you can get freeview in your area or at least downgrade Sky to minimum.


Start keeping a spending diary so you can track all the other spending that isn't yet in your SoA.

Bestthingsinlifearefree

Just a couple of quick thoughts. You need to take strong, decisive action now.

Sky needs to go.

Kids pocket money needs to go (time for them to get part time jobs if 16 years +)

Golf lessons need to go.

Keeping your house is priority, the above luxuries are not.

I wish you well.