been in debt for 14 years.. sick of it

Luckystepho

Hi, I'm sure nobody would expect you to get rid of your dogs- you are right, they are part of your family and something positive in your life!

Wonder if it may be worth shopping around though to see if you can find a cheaper dog groomer who will still do a good job?

delightfuldior

hi there, my rent of £325 is all inclusive of bills.. I pay this to my partner towards his house and its an agreed amount that I can afford and what he can manage with. He has a 2.5 year old Daughter who stays over 3.5 days a week, he pays some maintenance to her Mum, I have no contribution to this but she eats our food when over.. but this is only what we are cooking anyhow so we dont budget for her.
Taking into account all the 6 monthlys, birthdays, xmas, hair outgoings, dentist etc and dividing into monthly... will cost me £80 a month....
the halifax cc is 0% till Dec this year.. and my egg card is 0% till June next year... I am paying min on each totally £100 a month. My personal loan is a high apr.. I have looked into consolidating it all to reduce the monthly spend on debt below 262 a month but cant find any less than this so there is no point in consolidating whilst the 0% apr is current.
is it worth while putting £80 a month aside for the little extras instead of just paying when it arrives? if I put it away every month I'll be chipping into it as and when for eachh item that needs paying but what if I dont have enough money in the account to pay for larger things like car tax when it crops up? do you see where I am coming from??
thanks
:-)

delightfuldior

Luckystepho wrote: »

Hi, I'm sure nobody would expect you to get rid of your dogs- you are right, they are part of your family and something positive in your life!

Wonder if it may be worth shopping around though to see if you can find a cheaper dog groomer who will still do a good job?

unfortunately the going rate per dog is 25 each.. silly me chose two lhasa apso's that are naturally long coated..i avoided the cropping for about a year but their coats have changed causing uncomfortable matts which i cannot manage so they get cropped.. i also considered doing a grooming course so i could do it myself but cheapest i could find was about 200 quid..

thanks for the suggestion anyhow

RAS

Hi

You neeed to make three list

1. Things I pay every month - seems you have this sorted.

2. Things that I know have to be paid every quarter, six months or year, car stuff, presents etc. You need to total the spends for the whole year and put one twelth of the sum into a budgetting account. You might want to use a saving account rather than a current account, although you may not get a great amount of interest on a open access account.

3. Occasional spends - car maintenance, perhaps holidays. Decide on an annual allowance and put that aside as well.

josephine82

for your car- you need to work out a few things:
a) when the tax, MOT & Service are next due
b) then you need the total (rough) amount needed
c) then work out the number of months until due and work out a monthly amount to put by until then.
d) then once they are done, work out the amount over 12 months and then put that into a separate account

This way you have enough money to cover everything when its due. Boring, yes, but its worth it.

You need to work out a way of putting by the money for the other things, either into another separate account, or in a money tin or piggy bank etc.

It doesn't matter how you do it, but by budgeting for these things and putting the money by every month it makes working out how much money you have left much easier.

gonzo127

i personally would say you need a a minimum of 3 savings accounts to cover your 'non monthly spends'

1/ presents account (1/12 of annual birthdays, christmas easter costs each month)

2/ car expenses (MOT tax, service and repaires (think tyres exhust wiper blades usually roughly 10-20 a month on top of expected costs i find covers these) and put in 1/12th of the annual amount in a month)

3/ emergency fund -this is to cover all other things which can and will break, or to cover a month where your other funds cant quite cover what is needed say big car repaire

please bare in mind that it can take up to a year to get these 'pots' working correctly as you will find that somethings will come before you have enough in your pot to cover them, birthdays for example can happen any time through out the year so this pot will be going up and down like a yo-yo as you put some in just to take it out again for the next birthday

the_cat

Hi
Good start on the SOA, but can you repost it with the new information. It is quite confusing ATM....

ie: add up the annual/occasional spends and divide them by 12. Put this figure into the monthly SOA.

You will get much more help that way

InaPickle

delightfuldior wrote: »

I dont save money and I hardly ever get my hair cut, I dye it myself, spray tan myself, do all my beauty things myself..

In the 'dog food and seasonal treatments' section, are those seasonal treatments for the dog, or does that include your spray tans as well?

delightfuldior

InaPickle wrote: »

In the 'dog food and seasonal treatments' section, are those seasonal treatments for the dog, or does that include your spray tans as well?

InaPickle wrote: »

In the 'dog food and seasonal treatments' section, are those seasonal treatments for the dog, or does that include your spray tans as well?

no the seasonal treatments are advocate spot on for the dogs.. they get this in warm seasons for flea/worms etc.. its quite an expensive one but they are exposed to lung worm which bumps the price up in treatments. I dont give them it in the cooler months.. not for financial reasons but to give them a break from the drugs basically.right I have add up monthlys which you can all see above. My occasional spends are hair.. I dont think this is an essential tbh as I rarely get it cut.. its long and in good condition so I leave it to its own devices apart from the odd trim I pay and I dye it myself so I wont be invluding this. Dentist is only twice a year at £17. Again my teeth are in good condition and have never required major treatments so I wont be including this in the occasional spends as I can afford this out of my disposable income when required. I think the only things I need to save for over the course of 12 months is my car, birthdays and christmas.. holidays are not a necessity and and now situation has changed I wont be going on paid holidays anymore and will probably resort to a late deal at £125 or something!!! So.. I wont be including this in my savings..So.. here we go.. its only about 40/50 quid extra a month to save up.. I just need to work it out now as the other member said for the rest of the year..


Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet
Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 1
Number of cars owned.................... 2
Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 1252
Partners monthly income after tax....... 0
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 1252
Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 0
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 300
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 0
Electricity............................. 0
Gas..................................... 0
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 0
Telephone (land line)................... 0
Mobile phone............................ 20
TV Licence.............................. 0
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0
Internet Services....................... 15
Groceries etc. ......................... 100
Clothing................................ 0
Petrol/diesel........................... 120
Road tax/MOT/Service cost............... 12
Car Insurance........................... 30
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 25
Buildings insurance..................... 0
Contents insurance...................... 0
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 37
Haircuts................................ 0
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
(Unnamed monthly expense)............... 0
Dog food and seasonal treatments........ 31
Gym (3 months contract)................. 25
Total monthly expenses.................. 715

Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 0
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 2000
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 2000

No Secured nor Hire Purchase Debts
Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly.. .APR
halifax credit card............514.......10........0
egg credit card................4400......90........0
halifax personal loan..........8000......162.......15
Total unsecured debts..........12914.....262.......-

Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 1,252
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 715
Available for debt repayments........... 537
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 262
Amount left after debt repayments....... 275
Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 2,000
Total HP & Secured debt................. -0
Total Unsecured debt.................... -12,914
Net Assets.............................. -10,914

InaPickle

delightfuldior wrote: »

no the seasonal treatments are advocate spot on for the dogs.. they get this in warm seasons for flea/worms etc.. its quite an expensive one but they are exposed to lung worm which bumps the price up in treatments. I dont give them it in the cooler months.. not for financial reasons but to give them a break from the drugs basically.right I have add up monthlys which you can all see above. My occasional spends are hair.. I dont think this is an essential tbh as I rarely get it cut.. its long and in good condition so I leave it to its own devices apart from the odd trim I pay and I dye it myself so I wont be invluding this. Dentist is only twice a year at £17. Again my teeth are in good condition and have never required major treatments so I wont be including this in the occasional spends as I can afford this out of my disposable income when required. I think the only things I need to save for over the course of 12 months is my car, birthdays and christmas.. holidays are not a necessity and and now situation has changed I wont be going on paid holidays anymore and will probably resort to a late deal at £125 or something!!! So.. I wont be including this in my savings..So.. here we go.. its only about 40/50 quid extra a month to save up.. I just need to work it out now as the other member said for the rest of the year..

OK, so I'm with dvardyshadow: I still can't see where you have factored in spray tans (even just buying the bottle of fake tan to rub in yourself) in your SOA so I think that you aren't 100% where all your cash is going to yet. Start keeping a meticulous spending diary of where every single of your hard-earned pennies go and then when you look back on it in a fortnight/month, you will start to see small areas where you didn't realise you were spending money, but you were. These will be areas you can either reign in, or fully admit to yourself on your SOA, which will help you see what you have to do in other areas of your life instead.

I'll take another look at your SOA and see if I can come up with any more ideas. x