the maccas Debt Free Diary - 20K to pay in 18 months

beanielou

great news the maccas.
as you say no worries about your hair now.

themaccas

We've just got back from an AMAZING holiday, absolutely loved it - every minute, New York is a fantastic place to visit and with the exchange rate so good, plenty of chances to be a good MS. I have not really worked out our finances yet but we kept a spending diary and wrote down everything we spent and I do know we went £30 over budget so that's not too bad. We managed to live very well on $150 a day for the 5 of us and had a few treats too. Feeling very jetlagged at the moment will write more later.

tumbleweed261

wow $150 a day for five of you is an achievement - i can get through that in ny if i'm not careful (more if i happen to be in macy's makeup dept - ahem) - glad to hear you had a lovely time!

themaccas

Hi:hello:
Just couldn't keep away for too long, the gremlins that were stopping me access this site have now gone but I am still using a laptop as we are having to wait until next month for our main computer to go back for repair. We just can't afford the 250-450 bill right now.:mad:
I really feel that I'm losing control with our money right now, I mean I'm probably not that bad but our debt just seems stagnant as we've just had to reduce our debt payments for 2-3 months. When we came back from NY I looked at our savings, current account and budget and realised we had made a massive error somewhere, we should have had the money to pay for DS's trip (£2500) but we only had £900:eek: !!! Unfortunately we have had to use the overdraft to make up the shortfall so now I have the job of finding this extra. ANother confession is......that we have booked another holiday for next year and paid a £590 deposit. I know it was a crazy thing to do and we didn't have the money for it so it has gone on the overdraft too:o .
What a mess!!
So. Here's how we are going to rectify it. We have an extra £2190 to find to pay off the overdraft:
Savings made in this month budget - £200 so far
Ebay - this weekend have just made £160
Working an extra shift tonight - £110
Refund of expenses due at end of month - £175
Minimum payment to sainsburys over 2 months to put towards o/d- £900
TOTAL: £1545

We have more things on ebay at the moment so hopefully will make a few more ££'s this week. I am absolutely committed to paying off this overdraft asap and have added as a seperate total. After that is paid off I will tackle the main debt head-on again and reduce the other creditcard I had a major 'falling-off-wagon' time with a few months ago!
Now I have got my head straight about things, I am back on track. I don't feel bad about next years holiday, hopefully we'll be debtfree then and will enjoy it - guilt free. I have that as a goal and it is proving a real incentive right now.
I am going to update this a lot more frequently so I can see my progress. I need to update my debt total too,
I love MSE:D

taxi73

Hi there...wondered where you'd got to...it's great to have you back!!!..I've missed you....don't worry about the situation after coming back from holiday as this was exactly as we were when we got back from Goa but you get a whole new burst to tackle the debt and it looks like you've already found yours..so well done on that ...remember you have cleared loads off so far and that is an achievement to be proud of...good luck

Snaggles

Hi themaccas, lovely to see you back! Next year's holiday will be a fantastic incentive, your progress so far has been amazing, and I'm sure you'll meet your target of being debt free in time to enjoy it.

themaccas

Hi
Thanks Snaggles and taxi I'm really pleased to be back. The holiday will be great to look forward to and we still hope to be DF by then.
Well I did my extra shift last night so I'll get around £110-130 next week and have just looked on our ebay and have bids worth around £20, they all end tomorrow so I'm hoping they will go up a bit by then but if not then £20 will be good - it all helps. I have also had to just pay for a bit of petrol today £10 and I'm aiming for a frugal week.

themaccas

Some of my ebay auctions finished yesterday - the final amount I got in the end was £45, had to pay the ebay fees of £17 fo everything we have sold over the last week so final total made £160 + £28= £188. Not bad for a load of junk! Have put some more stuff on today that will finish over the weekend, it all helps to pay the o/d. Today I am not going to spend a bean but will look at our accounts and try and predict how much we will be able to pay off this wretched o/d this month.

I have noticed that our biggest expenditure seems to be petrol/diesel at around £300 per month. I really need to think about how to get that down but it's difficult when I've got an 80 mile round trip to work and I've got an extremely efficient car and able to do 65-70 mpg. OH has started leaving the car at home and cycling to work so that should help.

themaccas

What a really crap weekend. On the way home on friday someone drove into the back of me with such force my glasses flew off my head and broke, I smacked my head on the steering wheel and have been in pain with whiplash all weekend.
We sold some stuff on ebay and our highest item whilst I was preparing it ready to send, I noticed some damage which I can't believe I missed when I was taking photos of it! I've told the buyer and they are probably going to pull out. SO that's £60 I no longer have at the moment and if they do decide to have it we will have to give them a good discount.
Moneywise we had a bit of a bad start to the week. We have a weekly budget of £150 and so far we have had to pay:
food - £50
McDonalds (I know!) £11
Tesco bits(I saw some Krispy Kreme donuts I just HAD to buy. Anyone who has had one will know why!) £10
Diesel (OH car will last around 3 weeks) £67
postage for ebay - £25
= £168
So now I'm sitting here feeling miserable with a box of donuts - anyone want one?

Verbatim

Hi there,

have managed to miss this thread since you got back. I too have missed your posts and am glad you're posting again. The holiday sounds wonderful, and next year's will be an incentive to pay off the debt first. I think your New York hol acted as a spur and boost to keep at the debt reduction, when things looked grey you had that to look forward to. Where is the next holiday?