Newbie needs advice

mum2one

jdh3 wrote: »

Hi mum2one thanks for your reply,

- Mortgage £565 - Tried to remortgage, keep getting turned down. Went interest only for 12 months while partner was on maternity, both changed jobs recently so went back to paying full amount, not sure if we could go back to paying interest only.

Maybe try riding out the normal payments, if you have been turned down for remortage, its best notto rock the boat.

- Secured loan - 4 years to go now - ok 4 yeears, break it into months,48 left, bet you've paid a fair wack off already - thats fixed, hands are tied.

- Council tax - Wasn't aware you could pay over 12 months instead of 10, I'll definatly look into that, thanks. It does depend on the council, but as say no harm in asking whats the worst they can do say no - if they do say no, then theres 2 months worth of payments that can go off a debt .

- Gas/electric - Something else I need to sort, thanks for advice - Again may be worth looking into swopping, in all honeslty me personally we haven't swopped, but have renewed the british gas price capping. Def check the meters

- Satellite/broadband/line rental - all with sky £40-£45 per month. Had this conversation with my partner so many times. Wouldn't even have a TV if it was up to me. Especially in the bedroom!! ah - say no more, but coiuld always ring sky sayig your leaveing as your not happy with the price, penny to a pound there reduce it, if they don't you dnon't have to leave.

- Mobile phones - £50 - 2 phones on contract £25 each p.m - thats not to bad, but look at the contract are you making the most of the minutes, texts etc - if not then start looking around for when your out of contract

- Cars/petrol - 2 knackered old cars, high mantenance, expensive run. Petrol might even be an underestimate. I have to travel 340mile round trip once every other week. - Know that feeling, just had the brakes donr and some other work on mine that was £300.00, got its MOT and service next week, only M reg, but its my car.... and its paid for.
Don't fancy that round trip, simple things help petrol consunption, keep the contents light, take roof rack off if you have one, use hghest gear possible, try steady speed. all saves a penny here and there.

- Overdraft fee - Only way to get rid of this is to get rid of my £2000 overdraft which I'm always upto at least once a month. I'm in the same boat, so can't say anything... I'm guessing your account the same as mine £1.00 per day, regardless of whether your a 1p o/d or £2.000. Just have to go on back burner.

- Credit cards - Partners best friend, my worst enemy! Most are in her name and she has screwed up her credit rating, apr's have gone up, credit limit has gone down, all cards are at their max now, no chance of transferring balance, cant get more cards with 0.0% on transfers. I will look at snowballing though.
- Sorry to say this, but in a wa thats good, not from o% or balance tansfer point of view,, but may make your partner realise how much your actually spending.
For example a 7k card paying the minimum as requested, would take 22 years, but paying the 1st amount requested -keep it at that would be 7 years.

That snowball is a godsend as it accounts your interest as well and sets out the payments so after a couple of months, your actually be paying more than the card minimum, which means your interest is covered, and your actually chipping away at the bill.

Thanks again, I will get there one day! (Hopefully)

Your get there, we've all ben there done that, brought the t-shirt and me like somany got bailed out by family, never lernt my lesson did the whole saga again, I'll be honest I'm on my 3rd lightbulb moment, but for some reason this is working, if the 1st one had worked, ie me paying more spending less, I'd of been debt free next yr, but I failed myself, and the 2nd attempt was half hearted, but after a swift kick up the backside, plenty of support from people on here, and the fact that I want to go to Las Vegas when I'm debt free.... my det free date Dec 2015..... but I'll get there.

As well as taing eah month at the time, get a spending diary, littel botebook, put everything you spend, ie when you tp up petrol, do you think ah just add that bar of choc - the garage has enticed you into buying chocolate as its at eye level, and you pay 4 the pleasure, so maybe once you put choc in the book next time ur think that £1 could of gone for x,y,z.

If I can help anyway just pm xx

dancingfairy

With regards to the mobiles - can you lower the tariffs at all? even 5 pound saved on each one would be a start. Sometimes apparently even in contract you can go down a tariff or 2.
The main areas to tackle for you appear to be the electric and gas and the food budget.
Good Luck
df

jdh3

Phoned my mobile phone company, got 11 months left on contract so they weren't too keen to lower my tariff but they have given me more minutes and texts so at least I have less chance of going over my limit. OH can change her phone in august so we can shop around there.

Will phone council on monday about paying tax over 12 months.

Cant really save on the sky package - TV, broadband and line rental.

Just checking Uswitch now for gas/electric.

If all fails I'm gonna buy a tent and move to France!

Thanks for the help

jdh3

Just made £101.51 profit from car boot sale this morning!! :j

Any recommendations what to do with the money?

Should I put it towards one of my debts or should I try and increase it by buying and selling stuff and adding a little profit at a time?

Any other ideas?

dancingfairy

wow - I don't know how you managed to make that amount of money - that's fantastic. What a nice dilema to have.
How confident do you feel buying and selling stuff? is this something you have done before? The safest thing might be to keep a small amount for emergencies and then maybe throw it at the next card as it has a high apr and is the smallest balance as well.
df

TeetersOnHeels

Well done with the boot sale :T
Personally I'd pay it towards a debt - I'd be tempted to treat myself if I didn't.
I've just been digging around and put some DVD's and books on Amazon, don't know if that's something you've looked at? And Ebay too....

jdh3

dancingfairy wrote: »

wow - I don't know how you managed to make that amount of money - that's fantastic. What a nice dilema to have.
How confident do you feel buying and selling stuff? is this something you have done before? The safest thing might be to keep a small amount for emergencies and then maybe throw it at the next card as it has a high apr and is the smallest balance as well.
df

I cleared out the loft for stuff to sell at car boot and was very pleased to make over £100. I would like to see if I could slowly build up a business from virtually nothing in my spare time while I pay off my debts and once they are gone invest in the business, quit my job and work on the business full time.
Unfortunatly I feel I have no support from my partner or my family who seem so negative about my hopes of setting up in business. This does make me more determined to prove them wrong though, which is one of the reasons I did the car boot sale.

I've set up and sold a car valeting business previously and I also managed to make a living off ebay for 6 months a few years ago, I've always been interested in business.

I have my own website and am working on other website ideas and feel I could make a decent amount from these if only I had more time to work on them.

Started snowballing my debts now, managed to pay just over £100 from my wage on the next account. Hoping to clear the rest of the next account in 2 more payments.

jdh3

I'm determined not to spend this money, I've put it in a tin with a notepad and pen to keep an account of how I made the money in the first place and how I can hopefully add to it.

Gonna look at amazon and others, find ebays selling fees are a bit too pricey now for people just wanting to sell their own stuff.

busybeee

Are you sure you're not entitled to any benefits? working tax credits or child tax credits? It might be worth trying the benefits checker on the direct gov website -I havent been on this site long enough so it wont let me post the link

I earn just over 3000 pcm, but still get some tax credits so its worth a look

jdh3

busybeee wrote: »

Are you sure you're not entitled to any benefits? working tax credits or child tax credits? It might be worth trying the benefits checker on the direct gov website -I havent been on this site long enough so it wont let me post the link

I earn just over 3000 pcm, but still get some tax credits so its worth a look

We are entitled to £10.50 per week but dont get it due to HMRC cocking up our claim last year and overpaying us. Don't know anyone who hasn't been overpaid by HMRC!

Its about time they sorted it, they take tax off us, they know how much we earn, they should know how much we are entitled to in tax credits/benefits.

They are hopeless! :mad: