smartbear's road to debt freedom

smartbear1

Thanks Chevalier.

Yes, I've started to hunt out cheap insurances and utilities. However, I do pay extra for what i consider to be a great internet service from Demon and keep the home phone with BT. Whilst this costs more than other providers, I learnt lessons from switching in the past to so called cheap phone deals. I ended up paying for calls to both SKY and BT at one stage as they battled over who was bililng for calls. Complete nightmare which raged on for 6 months and vowed never to switch again.:mad:

Was going to switch from Orange PAYG, because I was paying £21 a month in extras for mins and texts. The extras packages have now changed and I now enjoy 100 cross network mins for £5 and unlimited texts for £5 a month. :dance:

I'm waiting for £50 cashback from topcashback.co.uk for home insurance policy, which worked out at just £29 for the year with the cashback. My cheapest home insurance purchase ever!! The cashback will go straight off a debt when it comes in.

Even made the switch to energy saving bulbs and got 3 twin packs of energy savers from Morrisons supermarket for £1. Bargain!!!

Big news!!

I got my statement from Santander today and it was amazing to see "£0 minimum payment":beer: I'm looking forward to shredding all the statements and starting afresh!!!!

Who knows they might have a great balance transfer deal next month which means lower interest payments. Keeping fingers crossed on that one!

Smilerwoman

Energy saving bulbs are super.

I first got them when I was being all green, not realising the effect they'd have on my pocket. We've had ours three years now and I've not had to replace one yet. Touch wood.

smartbear1

Not a bad money saving week. £1 a day challenge is going well. I never realised before that when I draw the odd tenner from the cash machine I spend what's available in my wallet. This way I'm clawing back the cash to spend another day in the future.

smartbear1

Great money saving day! Had a voucher come through from Tesco that offered me £7.50 off a £50 spend. However, after a delivery charge this would only be £4.50 off. Instead I used the online shopping catalogue to find all the grocery bargains. I trawled through 21 pages but found the bargains I wanted and products I regularly use at etiher bogof or reduced price.

I spent £25 on expensive items like dishwasher tablets and toiletries which would have cost me approx £40 normally. Bargain!!!! I even showed other shoppers I was ticking from a list. Funny enough most the bargains on my online list had been pushed to the back or side of shelves in favour of thier so called bigger savings. I was controlled and stuck to my list rigidly. I've found its much easier and fun to go shopping for bargains on a checklist than getting distracted from aisle to aisle.:T

smartbear1

Yes!!! Finally under the £3,000 barrier with Sainsbury's!:beer: Was so excited when I got the statement through today. Things are moving in the right direction. Gives me a little buzz to see the amounts going down. Can't wait to see the MBNA statement and wondering what difference the £7 a week standing order has made on that one?

scotdebs

loving the diary smartbear - a lot of it could have been written by me espec the "more you earn more you spend" and refinancing existing cc debt either on to the mortgage or 0% cards only to rack up the the original card again:mad:
anyway started my own diary today and hoping it works as well for me as it seems to have done for you:T

Scarcat67

With all those credit cards would you not be better off approaching the bank for a loan at a lower interest rate to pay off all those credit cards, then tackle the loan by paying more off than the minimum. I would also speak to the credit card companies and tell them you're struggling to amke the payments and ask for the interest to be frozen or reduced. Try asking you might be surprised at the response.Best of Luck !:)

I the bank says no then defo speak to the card companies respectively and stop using them completely.

savingholmes

Scarcat67 wrote: »

With all those credit cards would you not be better off approaching the bank for a loan at a lower interest rate to pay off all those credit cards, then tackle the loan by paying more off than the minimum. I would also speak to the credit card companies and tell them you're struggling to amke the payments and ask for the interest to be frozen or reduced. Try asking you might be surprised at the response.Best of Luck !:)

I the bank says no then defo speak to the card companies respectively and stop using them completely.

I think you should be very careful about following this advice. Generally on this board - debt consolidation into a loan is not recommended as the temptation to respend remains high and the motivation to clear your debt often drops. We have done consolidation loans in the past - and all that happened was we ended up in twice as much debt.

If you use the snowball calculator at whatsthecost it will show which debt you should prioritise first - generally the highest interest one....

It sounds to me like you are making good progress. I have found far more satisfaction out of taking babysteps to deal with my debts that I ever did out of the bigger solutions like redundancy pay, inheritance and remortgaging... I am hoping that this way the lesson for me sticks... When I first joined - I was earning about £400-£500 per month more than I do now and overspending by £1K. This next month I intend to cleark at least £1K of debt, and the next month and the next etc until it is all gone.

You can do this - it does take time but after a while you build up momentum, you get your fixed costs down and control your unfixed costs better and then you should start to see those cc debts drop

Good luck!:money:

scotdebs

ditto savingholmes advice thats half the reason Im in the state Im in - only do this if you are going to CANCEL - not just cut up all of your CCs also you have to make sure thst its a loan that allows overpayments and doesnt penalise you for overpayments/repaying early

girlracer

Hey smart bear
Just wanted to wish you all the best on your debt free journey
i will follow with interest
all the best