Statement of My miserable Affairs!

clb776

Hi, Looking for some help/advice in ways I can reduce my debt!

Am currently on JSA (cont) as job seeking, live in rented accommodation with a one year old and my husband (who is no recorse to public funds).

Our income includes (per week)

Jsa - £65.30
Wages - £150
WTC - £74.35
CTC - £54.30
CB - £20.30

We also get £68 per week Housing benefit.

Having worked this out on a monthly average, this brings a total of :
£1870 (approx) howver my husbands wages flucuate depending on what shifts he is given etc.

Our outgoings are (long list!!!!)

Rent - £700
Council tax - £130
Water - £58.30
Gas - £30
Electric - £35
Tv licence - £20
Loan - £200 (mum)
Overdraft fees - £38.50
Mobile phones £30 (both of ours)
Internet etc - £38
credit cards - £265 (minimum payments on 8 cards)
catalgoues - £90 (minimum payments on 4)
H/P - £15 (1 item, around 2 years to go)
Car insurance - £39
car tax - £15
food - £140

this totals £1843

we are really struggling to carry on like this!

Cannot change the loan of £200 as this is to my mum who took out a secured loan on her house to help me avoid bankruptcy around 4 years ago, wish I had taken the bankruptcy tbh!!!!!!

My food bill includes baby milk, nappies, cleaning stuff, shampoo, washing powder etc (i buy the special offer/cheapest decent ones at the time), etc, but not clothes, etc. Which is what we use the remainder of our £27 per month to buy/save towards things.

We also owe my husbands relative £6000 (paid for our wedding (booked before redundancy, couldnt afford it after, a deposit for a previous home otherwise we would have been homeless and other monies borrowed by my husband before I met him) and my Nan £1800 (for most recent house deposit) although my nan does not want the money back until we can afford it, and my husbands auntie could probably wait another 6 months before we begin to repay.

We could cancel the internet/home phone etc however my husband regularly calls his mother (cheapest telephone company for his country is 40 pence per minute) and we have found the internet is the cheapest way of doing so.

I can sell my car, however, this opens up alot of oppurtunities for me whilst job searching and not having my own transport I feel i am limiting myself to a small area as public transport would not be an option for getting to and from work as it is sooo expensive! My husband currently walks to work in good weather, I drive him, or he gets a bus in the bad

I appreciate any insight you could offer as a way to get my debts down!

Happytogetdebtfree

Hi and welcome to the boards, the good thing is you have a small positive balance at the end of the month :-) sober are starting on good ground. I don't understand why you are paying rent if you borrowed money for a house deposit or have I read it wrong? Wow your mum took a big risk doing that but how very kind. Can you earn any extracash by selling on eBay or carbooting to bring in some excess funds. Othe people will be along soon to post. All the best with your dfw journey :-)

clb776

thankyou, sorry, the 'deposit' was for the 6 weeks rental deposit and one months rent in advance! previous to this we were staying with friends and family and giving what we could, doing food shopping etc, so our debts have already come down quite a bit, but we had to get our own place as it wasnt fair on my son sleeping in a travel cot somewhere new all the time!! we stayed with my mum alot but it wasnt possible all the time.

yes, i was very lucky that my mum did that for me, it wasnt quite enough but helped alot, although i still have about 5 years or more to pay and i wish i had not been so proud in the first place, but i couldnt not pay back what i had spent!!!

clb776

and i thought you had to declare income from ebay etc? or is this just if its a high amount?
i dont have anything i could sell on ebay really, apart from a few dvds, not got much else!

Happytogetdebtfree

Well the main focus is to generate some cash sonhav a sort out things to sell or eBay? Can hubby get more hours, can you meal plan to save even more money can you maybe find somewhere cheper to rent 700 is expensive with other bills on top:-/. Council tax seems high is it over 12 months? Do you have sky? If so you can get free Internet. And I think re phone line shop around you can get packages for calling abroad etc can oh get more hours? :-)

mum2one

clb776 wrote: »

and i thought you had to declare income from ebay etc? or is this just if its a high amount?
i dont have anything i could sell on ebay really, apart from a few dvds, not got much else!

From what I can gather is your selling your own stuff, eg dvds, clothes kids have growm out of, thats not classed as income, if you were buying to sell then the profit would need to be declared. x

clb776

Thankyou mum2one, perhaps I could sell a few of my little mans old clothes! been saving stuff up for a bootsale (not quite got enough!)

We looked for somewhere cheaper for a long time, but had to take into account distance to work etc as my hubby does not drive and at £4 a day for a bus it would have cost alot more! (he still has to get a bus now as it is a 45 minute walk but he can do it in good weather!).

We then faced alot of no's as we are on a low income. for a 2 bed property in my area this is about the average (could probably get a flat for around £650 but we looked at some and without lifts would be impossible to go anywhere with a buggy! then there are parking permit costs to consider (£80 a year i think!). Did look at some one bed properties also, but could not find anywhere that would accept us that was big enough!

our council does not spread payments over 12 months and will not. as we moved into the property 2 months into the tax year our council tax was recalculated...we were meant to pay £150 for 7 months but they adjusted it to £130 for 8 months, so we will not have to pay this in march.

mum2one

clb776 wrote: »

Hi, Looking for some help/advice in ways I can reduce my debt!

Am currently on JSA (cont) as job seeking, live in rented accommodation with a one year old and my husband (who is no recorse to public funds).

Our income includes (per week)

Jsa - £65.30
Wages - £150
WTC - £74.35
CTC - £54.30
CB - £20.30

We also get £68 per week Housing benefit.

Sorry to say this, but check - have a feeling the ctc goes down once the child is one, - may be worth looking into.

Having worked this out on a monthly average, this brings a total of :
£1870 (approx) howver my husbands wages flucuate depending on what shifts he is given etc.

Our outgoings are (long list!!!!)

Rent - £700
Council tax - £130 - doesn't exactly reduce it, but could u ask to pay over 12 months not 10 - as you get houseing benefit, are u entitled to any council tax benefit.
Water - £58.30
Gas - £30- slightly high, can u alter the thermostat so it cuts in at different temp, eg central heating cuts in at 18C, change it to 17C, you won't notice the difference, - also if you are quarterly bills, always check the bill for the reading and compare to ur own. If theres a difference ring and ask for the bill to rechecked

Electric - £35 - High, simple things like not leaving items on standby, turning lights off, biggest offender - charging mobiles, laptops etc, as we tend to leave them on, I put mine in charge in the room that I'm in, so more liable to remember to turn them off

Tv licence - £20 - if this is the 1st time paying over time period, think 12 monthly will be £13

Loan - £200 (mum)how much longer have you got left on this

Overdraft fees - £38.50 - not nice

Mobile phones £30 (both of ours) - are you on pay and go, can get some good deals out there, knock at least £5 pm pff

Internet etc - £38 -is that phone line as well as internet, may be worth shopping around, I do line rental BT, £13 per month, internet with AOL, (that includes national and local calls) pay £7.00 per month

credit cards - £265 (minimum payments on 8 cards) - not being cheeky, but may be worth listing the cards as name or nickname, amount owed and the apr

catalgoues - £90 (minimum payments on 4) - list them as above
H/P - £15 (1 item, around 2 years to go)

Car insurance - £39 - quite high, def shop around at renewal, try cashback sites

car tax - £15

food - £140- good value - thou meal planning, old style boards will have some ideas

this totals £1843

we are really struggling to carry on like this!

Cannot change the loan of £200 as this is to my mum who took out a secured loan on her house to help me avoid bankruptcy around 4 years ago, wish I had taken the bankruptcy tbh!!!!!!

My food bill includes baby milk, nappies, cleaning stuff, shampoo, washing powder etc (i buy the special offer/cheapest decent ones at the time), etc, but not clothes, etc. Which is what we use the remainder of our £27 per month to buy/save towards things. Your doing absolutely brilliant with what you buy

Just a thought - Nappies - if you buy from Boots, you get 4p back in the £1 on a loyalty card, soon mounts up, helps out for christmas.

Your shampoo etc, cleaning - try poundland and Home Bargains, get some good savings,

We also owe my husbands relative £6000 (paid for our wedding (booked before redundancy, couldnt afford it after, a deposit for a previous home otherwise we would have been homeless and other monies borrowed by my husband before I met him) and my Nan £1800 (for most recent house deposit) although my nan does not want the money back until we can afford it, and my husbands auntie could probably wait another 6 months before we begin to repay. So in 6 months time you you have to add repayment schedule to your husbands relatives,

We could cancel the internet/home phone etc however my husband regularly calls his mother (cheapest telephone company for his country is 40 pence per minute) and we have found the internet is the cheapest way of doing so.
Being cheeky (sorry), does he do the skype calls, do you pay for them?

I can sell my car, however, this opens up alot of oppurtunities for me whilst job searching and not having my own transport I feel i am limiting myself to a small area as public transport would not be an option for getting to and from work as it is sooo expensive! My husband currently walks to work in good weather, I drive him, or he gets a bus in the bad

I appreciate any insight you could offer as a way to get my debts down!

Your car is useful espically if you find a job, just look at extra ways of cutting it back sometimes grab the keys out of convience, but drive higher gear, etc.

Did notice that you have not put petrol, birthday, xmas prezzies or any insurance in there? xx

clb776

Thankyou once again, I shall write down amounts/aprs etc, probably tommorrow.

they wont reduce the council tax to 12 months (dont do it here!) but i managed to get one more month out of them.

We havent had an actual gas bill as of yet but that was the gas companies estimate, the same with the electric, although we do not have the heating on at the moment, its completely turned off, but we have constant hot water.

We are both on contracts, but these are ending soon when we may move to PAYG (my husbands is £10 a month which includes texts, internet, unlim landlines, etc) and mine is £20, but we dont go over them.

Yes, this includes the landline, sky and internet! My mum actually pays some towards this for us so it costs us £20 a month but I did not put this there..ooops!!

The loan has about 5 or 6 years to go ((yyyiiikkkeeesss!!!) I think, but I am not 100% sure as my mum deals with all that!

What other insurance would I have? I only have my car?

No, I have not included petrol...this is probably only around £15 a month but would be more once I had a job!

And birthdays and christmas....arrghhghh dont get me started!!!!!!!! It is my little boys birthday in one week, I have maybe £4 to make it nice for him and buy a cake, make food blah blah blah (my mum will probably help out!! (luckily I got his presents when sainsburys had their half price toy sale...I hope they work!!!!! its his first birthday, I want it to be great for him!!!!) The other annoying thing is that to get DD discounts we have to pay monthly but we cant because of the way we get our money, we have a few setup but it causes problems sometimes!

I sometimes go to boots but i find them more expensive. I usually stock up on things when they are a good offer and make do without something else!

Never heard of home bargains!

Thankyou for your comments and advice mum2one....its very much appreciated!!xxx