debt free wannabe

skye

Hi, I have been reading the boards for a month or two now and have bought the money diet book, but wondered if you guys have any more ideas to help me. I am 21, living in rented accomodation with my boyfriend and I am around £10,000 in debt:


Goldfish loan £5500 @ 6.7% - about £4000 left to pay - £107.67 per month

Egg card (green) £2882 @ 1.7/1.9% til June then 14.9% (which I will transfer in June) Anniverisery offer of 0% starts in September. Credit limit is £3000. Not sure of the min payment as just transferred this from my overdraft, as it was at about 18% and I was paying £26 a month interest and it was never going down.

Egg card (blue) £846 @ 0% on purchases til June. Credit limit is £3000. Min payment is about £12 per month. - I share this with my boyfriend for shopping etc (we intend

Lloyds TSB card £449 @ 6.9% for the life of the balance. Credit limit £1750. Min payment is £10 per month

Barclaycard £1995 @ 0% til August. Credit limit is £2850. I cannot transfer anymore on to this at 0% though. Min payment is £39 per month.

Mint card about 11% but do not owe anything on it. Credit limit is £4850.


After tax and pension my monthly wage is £890, but I get £200 off my boyfriend per month for his share of the rent and bills (not including shopping or blue egg credit card).


My rent is £55.79 per week
Council tax is about £70 per month, but I have paid this to April.
Gas is £19 per month (but think they will owe my about £60 is March)
Electricity is around £50 for three months.
Water is about £200 per year.

We spend quite a lot on shopping, (tried getting it cheaper but can't seem to get it get down) about £60 per week (plus a take away once or twice a week at £8 each).

Having done a rough budget it brings me out at £8.22 left (this is without birthdays, xmas, clothes, magazines, make up) and only counts bills, minimum credit card payments, drinking, shopping and smoking.

I have cut down a lot on going out as much, stopped smoking as much. Although I have tried to save money, I still don't seem to be saving that much.

I have been trying to play the 0% credit card game, but recently have been refused for new credit cards, so don't want to apply for anymore. Instead I have had a go at the credit card shuffle.

Sorry my post is so long but I tried to add as much information as possible. Is there any other ways I can try and get rid of my debt quicker or do you think bankruptcy would be a better option to look at. I always make at least the minimum payment on my bills, and the rent etc always gets paid on time.

Thanks for any help you can give.

ms_london

Hi

Well done on finding the boards & making the first step in the right direction!!!

What is your income? Oh I see you said it is £890.00 - after tax & PENSION - how much is paid into your pension each month? Is this something that could be put on hold for the time being? Even if its £50.00 - £100.00 a month, this can be put into your debt & really make a difference.

Is £200 that your boyfriend gives you EXACTLY half of all of the bills & rent?

Re your council tax, that means in March you will have an extra £70.00 to throw at your debts.

How are your other bills paid? Perhaps its worth asking Gas/Electricity/Water Companies to set you up with a card, so that you can pay a certain amount each month, an average amount that they will work out for you and then when the quarterley bill comes in, you pay the difference (if there is any) - I do this at home and I share a flat, so ALL bills come out monthly, it makes such a difference and means we dont get any scary unexpected bills which we dont have the money for.

£60.00 a week on shopping for 2 people is LOADS of money, and 2 takeaways a week - tut, tut, tut!!! :0) - You could easily get by on £20.00 a week for the both of you. Read the "Money Saving Old Style" part of the chat forum, great advice on how to cut shopping bills yet still eat healthily, also ideas on recipes and things. If you spent £20.00 a week on food, you would be saving £40.00 a week (£160.00 a month) more money that can be pumped into your debt.

""Having done a rough budget it brings me out at £8.22 left (this is without birthdays, xmas, clothes, magazines, make up) and only counts bills, minimum credit card payments, drinking, shopping and smoking.""

Would you be able to post your rough budget? It would be interesting to see what your allowance for drinking, shopping & smoking are. Are you managing to meet all of your minimum payments each month? If you use this following calculator:

https://www.whatsthecost.com

You can work out how long it will take you to pay off your credit cards & loans whilst making the minimum monthly payment (taking into account the APR of each debt). Its quite interesting to see.

My advice would be to list your outgoings, perhaps put it all into an excel spreadsheet (if you would like to see a copy of my own personal one to point you in the right direction I will happily email it to you). Post it on here, and then we can suggest ways that perhaps you havent thought of to cut costs & save you some money.

Do you have a car or pay for travel? Have these costs been included in your budget?

Well done for posting on here. To shed a bit of light on your situation, I once owed 19K, im 24, female living in London & through sheer hard work & determination I have now got that debt down to £8.5, and it will be paid off come December - and if i can do it, you most definately can.

Does your boyfriend know of your situation? Could you get a second job? Perhaps sell some things on ebay? This all helped me.

I hope we can help you.

Ms_London

skye

My boyfriend gives me slightly more than the bills usually come to (to cover say more more electricity etc). He does know of my situation, and although he earns more than me and has no debts, he never has any spare money and sometimes borrrows from me at the end of the month (god knows how but it used to be out of my overdraft, which I have now paid off with my egg card in order to save the £26-30 a month overdraft interest).

My pension is now £82.08 a month, I am scared that if I don't pay into this it would just be wasted on crap I don't need. And i might be even worse in years to come.

I don't really want to get another job as I worked in pubs for 2 years trying to get extra money, in the end I was constantly shattered and even more in debt. I was thinking about the ebay thing but i don't have much that would be worth anything, but i might try and give it a go.

I think I am going to have a go at a spending diary, and will try the other advice like about the shopping that you have write.

I will also try putting up my budget when I get a chance, to do this properly.

I don't have a car and usually get a lift off my boyfriend to work (he has one but I don't pay anything towards it) or get a free bus to work. Occansilly I might get a taxi if we've been drinking (although I try not to as part of my debt is from taxi fares, going on nights out, along with being ripped off with interest rates and loans).

Debt_Free_Chick

Skye

You can do this if you get your spending under control. I don't think you know where your money goes .... who does?

Why not keep a spending diary. It sounds like a PITA, but it becomes quite addictive after a while. Simply write down every penny you spend .. paper, coffee, whatever. At the end of each week put this into a list or a spreadsheet and group your spending under different headings. At the end of the month, look at what you've spent. You will then be in a position to make positive decisions about how you spend your money and what you spend it on. So you will see obvious areas where you can easily cut back.

Your food bill is horrendous! I feed two adults on about £120 a month - and that includes household stuff e.g. cleaning, loo rolls, toothpaste etc. Where do you shop - Fortnum & Mason ;-) LOL!

Seriously, getting your spending under control is the best thing you can do, so you spend less on cr%p and have more money to pay off your debts.

Cheers

dougk_2

I agree with the previous posters...your food bill iis well out of control - You should be able to get this to under £150 a month easily. Dump the take aways too.... You would be better going out to a hungry horse or Weatherspoons pub where you can get meals for under a fiver. You should restrict this to a "treat" at the weekend. Personally I would restrict the "going out" to 1 night a week unless its just visiting friends which costs you zilch. Short term pain for long term gain!

Also you should make sure you do not buy lunches out etc. Make you sandwiches at home and take them to work (this applies to you both!).

If you are spending £60 a week on food your b/f isn't paying enough at £200 a month.
I would be asking him where all his money goes! My partner and myself work together at reducing any debts (she had some from being a student - I had none) so i have helped pay them off because it works out better for us both.

If you save £100 a month off the food bill think how much quicker your debts will go!

Mark_petty

From what I and most of us can see, you could save so much money if you cut down your food budget. You could cut down some of the cost by using the vouchers/freebies forum.
I spend £160 a month and thats enough for me my girlfriend and our little boy (He is 2 and he eats lots).
I reckon you could save £80 a month easiliy and that could be used to pay off debt.
As someone else has mentioned try and get your boyfriend to pay a little more towards your shopping bills etc.

Anyway good luck

If you can reduce your outgoings I reckon you won't have a problem in clearing your debt quite soon.

Conor_3

STOP SMOKING.

My Sister in Law smokes. She is BURNING £2000 a year.

Your boyfriend is also sponging off you. If he earns more than you and has no debts then how come he's having to borrow off you? Something really stinks there.

skye

My boyfriend gives me half the money for the shopping etc as well as the £200 for bills. If he borrows money off me, he usually pays it all back when he is paid, or the next month if it is bigger (for example plane tickets back to see his parents i may put on a credit card then he make take 2 months to pay it back).

The main reason he has no debts is because he has a poor credit rating (default on a bank account, now paid off), hence he has no overdraft, no credit cards (except the blue egg card we both have for bills etc because it is 0% on purchases at the moment).

I think I am going to start a spending diary, as I do buy a lot of rubbish, for example magazines which I know I have to stop. I was also thinking that I might have more things than I originally thought that I could sell on ebay, the only thing is I don't have a computer at home so unless I go to my mum and dads this may be difficult.

Do you think it is worth shopping online so I know how much it comes to before I buy it?? I tried this once and it did seem cheaper (but I like to choose the best dates on food and they seem to give you the ones near their sell by date). I will also try collecting the shopping coupons.

I have cut down on smoking and now generally only smoke on the way to work and when I am drinking. I know If I cut this further it would save more money, but it's having the will power to stop completley.

skye

ms_london wrote:

Hi

You could easily get by on £20.00 a week for the both of you. Read the "Money Saving Old Style" part of the chat forum, great advice on how to cut shopping bills yet still eat healthily, also ideas on recipes and things.


where do I find this section?

fazer6

I spent £100 last month of food for me and my other half, this month I'm getting it down to £80.

Get to money saving old style and join the march grocery challenge.

If you absolutly have to have takeout get the takeaway deals from asda. They're more expensive than a normal meal but at least it's half the cost of a take away. Oh and restrict yourself to one a month.

If you do cut the food bill down your out of debt date could be brought forward by at least 6 months or more. Now is that not enough of an incentive to cut back a bit?

pickle

The way i saved money to pay off my debts was to buy value brand products, ate loads of pasta, rice dishes and potatos. Is there a LIDL ar ALDI near you - they're much cheaper than other supermarkets. Why not make up extra food on a couple of nights and freeze it and take it out when you would normally have take away (as usually the best thing about take away food is that you don't have to make it). It's a boring long haul but worth it in the end.