Help me my life sucks

one-non-blonde

shrek101 wrote:

But you can still treat yourself to confectionary by buying in bulk and making your own sandwiches.

Mars bar sarnies... yum!

brisck1

Thanks for the support and info everyone!

Malestrom wrote:

You don't need a 0% card that lasts forever, you just have to take out another 0% card before the current one ends. However, using your overdraft and a single credit card with an interest free period of 6 or 9 months should accomplish the same thing. The only thing I would advise is that you don't borrow against the full amount of your overdraft - leave some spare for emergencies or overspends.

Can anyone direct me to any websites/companies which are currently offering these kind of deals as im a complete noob when it comes to credit cards.

cheers

shrek101

Martins gives some good guides on credit cards

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/cgi-bin/viewnews.cgi?newsid1081548705,45822,

and here

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/articles.phtml#CC

I just signed up to get Lloyds TSBfor 0% Balance transfers and 0% purchases although theres some clause so its best to just do a balance transfer and use another card. Again Martin gives some guidance whats best card for 0% on purchases.

The Sainsbury's card is good for purchases ONLY according to Martin.

System

brisck1 do you have to pay water rates? If so, maybe you could go on a meter.

brisck1

Thanks for the credit card info, i'll look into it.:)

As for water rates, they are included in the rent.

fazer6

Brisck I left uni 3 years ago and am the same as you. I feel as if my friends can afford to buy luxury items (by that I mean anything that isn't food or cleaning stuff) and spend money on going out and having a social life. My other half set up his own business last April and we bought our own house (that needs doing up) the August before and since finishing uni I have not really managed to buy myself anything apart from necessities. I have a bigger mortgage than my friends, they get paid more than me, and they're other halfs have normal stable jobs. So although I do get very jealous a lot of the time that they can afford to buy themselves things and have a social life in the long term I'll hopefully be better off. My social budget is £20 a month and this is for luxury items such as dvd rental and takeaways for us both. Is there any way you can cut down your social money? DVD and a bottle of wine and an asda take away at home? Tell your friends honestly that you can't afford to go out. I stopped drinking my last summer before I graduated to save money and never really started again. You don't miss memory loss, being embarassed, hangovers and wasted money. Instead of drinking just drive, I use that as my excuse for not drinking so I don't get into a round and can save money by only having a few lemonades a night. Your friends won't understand and try to presure you into drinking, after 2/3 years being like this I think my friends have finally given in and leave me alone.

Have you properly budgeted everything and set yourself a limit to how much you can spend on each thing a month? Go to moneysaving old style and use those tips to start reducing your foodbill by £5 a month. Shop in lidl/aldi/netto and go to your local market and butcher. Also double up portions and freeze half to make more use of the oven when it's on.

brisck1

Hi Fazer, you must have left uni around the same time as me! - ah I had so many hopes and dream back then! lol I thought once I was fully qualified and into the world of work I'd be REALLY livin it up in my own pad with designer clothes, widescreen TV etc etc. (was told I would be earning £18-20,000 starting wage when I started uni) - lol oh well.

Anyway, as you can see I set aside a bit of money for 'social' spending. although this might seem like alot, it also covers things like birthdays, xmas annerversaries etc.

As much as I'd love to tell my mates I cant go out as much, its quite hard. I mean, I only really do something like go the pub or cinema once a week, but thats literally all I do these days. My mates have a taste for the more exciting (and expensive) lifestyles and go on regular holidays together and excusions away from boring Devon and 99% of the time I just cant join them due to money shortages.
I think if I cut down on my social life even more i'll be even more depressed, and also I think my mates would give up on me completely (they dont even bother asking me to join them on holidays etc anymore as they know im hopeless) It's bad enough having to hear about all the fun they are having doing this and the other going here and there.

It would be a lonely existance stuck in a flat on my own (relationship with my ex didnt work out either due to a lack of dough)

ah well :P

Sugar_Junkie

Do you have to be paying back your student loan already? You don't seem like you're on enough money to be paying it back. Can't you look into getting it deferred? I left Uni over 5 years ago and I'm still not paying it back yet. I don't earn nearly enough still, which is very depressing.

VickyA_2

Hi there brisck,

It's tough isn't it? Fazer and I used to go to school together (we worked out the other week when she realised my real name!), so we must have all graduated at the same time. I'm now back to being a student (PGCE) and trying to budget at the same time. I was also promised that I'd be earning a fortune when I graduated! hmmmm.

Fazer seems to have it all sussed and I'm so impressed with how well she's doing. I can't even begin to think about owning a house, like you. However, it is important to cut back. The trouble with being a student again when all my old uni friends aren't is difficult for my social life, but I can always phone them or invite them over for a meal and they bring the wine. It's not a case of stopping seeing your friends, it's changing how you see them.

It's sometimes depressing when your friends have the nicest of toiletries and you're on the Tesco BOGOF, but at the end of the day they do the job. I remember when Fazer and I were at school we were in this predicament - there were some people who had everything and those of us (fazer and I included) who had a different make, but the same quality.

I suppose that I'm lucky that I'm living with my boyfriend as I wouldn't have been able to afford this year without him, but we've got enough money in our "holiday" account for a share of a cottage in the Lake District.

Best of luck.

MSE_Martin

I've two things to say here.

First of all - what an amazing thread. It's uplifting the way people are helping and it is EXACTLY why I wanted to start the Debt-Free Board.

My thoughts on saving money are plastered all over the main site. However the one thing I'd stress after reading the above is go and do the Budget Planner - read through that.

You are making the classic budgetting mistakes

i. Missing off little items (remember £3 spent a week is £150 a year)
ii. Only looking at your monthly expenditure - which is not a true picture of anyone's finance.

Please read teh article and then do the spreadsheet.

A few things will come out of this

A. You will have a much better idea of your finances
B. You will be able to review exactly where the money is going and find other things to look at cutting down on (how is explained in the article)
C. It will allow you to start effectively budgetting for the future.

Turning your finances around isn't a quick fix. You've been in the hole now for a year. Do a financial blitz now, get everything in order and it'll take a few months but you'll get there.

Good luck

martin