Breaking an old habbit!

weeclick

Well I thought I would start a wee diary of my own - its a mix of clearing debt and also starting to save! I made a decision at the beginning of December that I wanted 2011 to be completely different to the year Ive just had, and in order to achieve that I need to make big changes!

Firstly I decided only 4 weeks ago to finally shut down my business that I worked on building for the last 2 years, spending 15 hours a day working, 7 days a week, 365 days a year! For one, its not earning even a full time wage never mind a decent hourly rate! So I start back with another company at the end of January. In the mean time I want to move house because (unfortunately) I worked from home, all my clients know where I live and a few take advantage of this, calling up as and when they please - so I want some privacy back. Problem is with my credit score so low Im not sure if a landlord would take me on right now - so that then leads to me sorting out my credit rating. To top it all off Ive decided to pay back all my loans, overdrafts and personal borrowing.

The personal borrowing is from my business partner who sold her house, give me money to set up the business and we both lived off the house money for nearly 3 years. She has already told me shes not interested in having any money back, after all we have had to financially support eachother over the last 8 months, but I would like to set up a savings fund for the both of us to enjoy and would ideally like around £20.0000. Theres no rush for this though as the other savings have to come first.

My second savings is for a house deposit for my first mortgage - again Im needing around £20,000 - this is really my big thing at the moment and something Im desperate to achieve as I hate paying a landlord so much money every month, its money I will never see again, why pay someone elses mortgage when you can pay your own! Thats the hope anyway.

Finally my last saving for now is my dream holiday which is booked for 1st July 2010 - my aim for this is £5,000 - I know this seems crazy but advice from those who have already been think I should return home with around £1,000 over as you dont need to spend much! Ive so far raised £2,000 - although due to my landlord suddenly asking for £500 by tomorrow I might have to dip into this and bring my total achieved so far down to £1,500 - which makes my goal even harder to achieve!

I'm now going to sit and go through my penny box and see what I have to start saving with and will update with a total later

weeclick

so excited to give my first report after counting the money box(s)

on my "sealed box" is £80.63 starting

on my "pound" box is £17.00 starting

tonight I've added £2.12 change to the sealed box, as well as £55.00 christmas gift money and £30.00 for selling an item on gumtree, bringing the total to £167.75

and £27.00 to the pound box bring the total to £44.00

Had a great start to sorting out the debt and beginning the savings today. I have a bit of a shop addiction, my OH will tell you that I shop for no reason, I would go to tesco and fill a trolley even if the cupboards are already full - I will look at clothes and spend stupid amounts of money on clothes that dont even fit me in the hope that one day I will lose the weight and be able to wear it - in which case I never do and end up selling on ebay for a fraction of the price!

So today, with my fresh start happening as of now I went back to town and took back £37.00 worth of clothes I had bought since sales started on boxing day - I have another pair of jeans to take back tomorrow which will give me another £10 to add to the account!

I then went to tescos and only bought what was needed this time - managed to go from a weekly £70 shop to just £16.89!! Just shows me that I can achieve it, and shopping doesnt have to be expensive!

I also made £100 today from selling stuff on ebay which goes striaght to the debts.

so for my first ever day of clearing debt and beginning to save ive achieved the following

Debts - £100 out of £4,030
Savings - £211.75 out of £43,000

Snowdonlily

Hi weeclick.

I'm exactly the same as you. I've spent a fortune over the years on clothes that never fit and they've all ended up on ebay

I'm still selling them off, but luckily sales have been pretty good over Christmas so its helping me build up my emergency fund.

Good luck with your diary

weeclick

thanks snowdonlily - glad (selfishly) that Im not the only one in the same trouble - I even caught myself on boxing day buying a size 14 (thats my target size for holiday in july) when I swing between 18-20 at the minute - when I realised how silly I was being I took it back today!

Cant tell you what a relief it is to finally have this starting. This evening I have even managed to join up with green metropolis, added more on ebay, joined the play.com trading account and also magpie - spent the last 2 hours getting everything online for sale - and managed to fill a bag for heart foundation in the process! Just hope some of this effort turns into cash! Fingers crossed and good luck with your selling - let me know how you get on?

Herewego

You have some great plans *have subscribed * and will be following.
Where are you off to for your holiday ? I will be turning 40 in 2 years along with DH and we want somewhere special to go so open to ideas

weeclick

thanks herewego

I'm going to Sensatori Tenerife - I know it doesn't sound like much when you say Tenerife but its 5 star, and just stunning! Look it up on youtube theres some brilliant videos from Thomson. If you ever watch TV and see the thomson ad where a lady lifts a leaf from this big infinity pool - then thats the one! Im so excited because of firstly the hotel, and secondly because its the first holiday Ive ever paid for!!

Definately look up sensatori packages with thomson - theres 4 different countries involved now! The packages are full board - and this holiday is only actually costing £3,000 for the two of us but Im wanting to save £2000 spending (i know i wont spend it all) but the hope is that whatever I do come back with will go striaght into savings for the mortgage! So far Ive managed to save £2,000 since July and thats with being unemployed! I start my new job next month and OH starts next wednesday too so Im sure the money will come together even quicker now! :T

weeclick

Not had a very good start to the day so far. I was meant to get up at 9am and go for a swim this morning (trying to reach my weight goal by July wont happen at this rate!) and then down to the bank to pay off the landlord - He will just have to wait until Monday now!

Planning on sorting out more of the house and hopefully come across more things to sell today - but the main aim here is to declutter so I can move from 3 bed house to a 2 bed fingers crossed!

Will report more later, hope you all have a good New Years Eve wherever you plan on celebrating!:beer:

weeclick

Well decluttering the house has certainly got better. Managed to fill my paper bin and general rubbish bin this afternoon - problem being they won't be emptied until next week! So might have to make a few trips to the dump too. Determined not to throw anything out without trying to sell online first. Had a good go at ebay today but because I haven't verified my new account yet I'm limited to only 10 items up for sale in a 30 day period, so now I have to verify my account to have the restriction lifted and put plenty of stuff on ebay.

Also tried play.com, green metropolis and priceminister - won't know how successful this will be for a few weeks at least. Stumbled on a problem today - amazon won't let me list any more items, think this might be because a few items had been posted late because in all fairness I forgot to check the sellers account for a few weeks - thats what happens when the madness of christmas takes over - anyone any idea how to resolve this?

Another problem I hit today is that no one seems to want to buy cd singles - so Im sitting here with about 50 sitting at my feet - I would hate to get rid if I could sell them, but think maybe a trip to the local charity shop is in order! Speaking of which I gave a bag of things out to heart foundation this morning on their collection and felt quite good to do something without expecting money in return, was good to do!

Unfortunately my whole family has been hit with the nasty flu bug going around at the minute so they are all at home tucked up in bed, my housemate is also ill which leaves me here with candles and the tv for company. This is now the 3rd NYE in a row I haven't been out due to trying to save money where possible - think I will make the effort to actually go out next year, feel too young to be sitting at home curled up at 7pm!!

Hope you all have an enjoyable NYE :beer: and bring on 2011 :T

weeclick

Happy New Year to you all :beer:

Herewego

Happy New Year hope 2011 is a good year for you

[Deleted User]

Hi Weeclick :hello:
Found you!!
Good luck with the savings
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