Start of my Debt-Free Journey

[Deleted User]

Thank you so much Hovel Lady, I have been reading your thread with great interest.

I like the way you write all your spends down, that would give me a reason to post daily and hopefully keep me on the straight and narrow so I'll be pinching your idea if thats ok.

Nearly made a huge financial blunder before the weekend, visited a friend who has a wood-burning stove. Her DH was telling me how much money they save on gas through the winter, came home and told DH about it, then as we used to do, we started egging each other on, convincing ourselves that although we would need to use the credit card (the one DH saved for emergencies), we would save that money over the winter not needing to put the central heating on.

But luckily within a few minutes that old sickening feeling came back I used to have whenever I used the credit card for something I'd convinced myself I needed. I told DH and he looked so relieved also, we were very proud of ourselves that we'd resisted- last year I would have already have ordered it.

It just goes to show old habits die hard, I just need to keep resisting, this urge doesnt come so often now- first time in months- fingers crossed it wont happen again for a while.

Spends today: Potatoes
Milk

Off to write these on my spreadsheet x

AllThatStuffIsJustStuff

Well done on your self discipline - a stove will take many winters to pay for itself, if it ever does. We nearly bought ours brand new on credit a couple of years ago but it feels so much better to have waited. We would never have bought a second hand stove back then and certainly wouldn't have paid for the installation by selling on eBay.

Your patience will pay dividends - well done

thebroad

Hi all, I've never posted on here, but looking for opinions/advice. My hubby and I are up to our eyes in it. Probably too scared to write if all down at the moment. We are not overspenders, but a failed business has left us with debts. We already have a huge mortgage which we are only paying off interest at the moment and doubt very much we can afford to go on repayment for a good number of years. However, hubby is now 50 and at the moment is looking at the next 10 years of drudgery to stand still basically. We have to sell our house at some point to pay off mortgage and downsize. HOWEVER, I have an opportunity at the moment to downsize dramatically but will leave us mortgage free to allow us to pay off debts. Am I mad though? I am in a 4 bed detached at the moment, I am looking at shifting us into what is a one bed flat, but converting it to allow us all a bedroom. It will be small and a big comedown from where we are now, but we will have no mortgage. people I've ran it past so far think I'm mad. I can't downsize any other way just now because we won't get a mortgage having been in arrears. Neutral opinions would be great.

lucielle

Hi thebroad, first of all well done for sticking your head out of the sand and taking the scary step of posting. Now you do need to be brave and write it all down (it can be quite catharic) even if you don't post it on here, you do need to know exactly how much debt you're in. If you do decide to stay where you are, what would the plan be? Have you done a statement of affairs (income and expenditure)? This will also give you an idea of how much income you have to throw at the debt. At the end of the day only you can decide whether to move or not. It could be a short term move till you get back on your feet. Hope this helps.
L

[Deleted User]

thebroad wrote: »

Hi all, I've never posted on here, but looking for opinions/advice. My hubby and I are up to our eyes in it. Probably too scared to write if all down at the moment. We are not overspenders, but a failed business has left us with debts. We already have a huge mortgage which we are only paying off interest at the moment and doubt very much we can afford to go on repayment for a good number of years. However, hubby is now 50 and at the moment is looking at the next 10 years of drudgery to stand still basically. We have to sell our house at some point to pay off mortgage and downsize. HOWEVER, I have an opportunity at the moment to downsize dramatically but will leave us mortgage free to allow us to pay off debts. Am I mad though? I am in a 4 bed detached at the moment, I am looking at shifting us into what is a one bed flat, but converting it to allow us all a bedroom. It will be small and a big comedown from where we are now, but we will have no mortgage. people I've ran it past so far think I'm mad. I can't downsize any other way just now because we won't get a mortgage having been in arrears. Neutral opinions would be great.

Hi there thebroad, glad you posted. Its difficult to start but it does get additive after a while. I agree with lucielle, its ready worth doing a statement of affairs, mine is posted earlier in my diary, it gives you a great idea of exactly whats going on and it gives you back control. Its not easily and might look quite bad but prob no worse than whats in your head, it gave me a good focus (need to re-visit mine).
You never know, things might not be quite so bad. You sound like me, the idea of cutting your losses and downsizing sounds very attractive, I have thought about selling house and renting and it remains an option. What does your OH think?
Would love to hear how your doing- good luck- keep posting!!

Hovel_lady

Well done for not using the credit card :j
Happy to have my idea of posting my spends in a diary pinched

thebroad

Thanks guys for posting supportive replies. I've been going on about this forum all day to OH. Anyway, whilst it sounds mad to move from our house to a much smaller one, infact when we sat down tonight and talked about staying in this house, we worked out that for the next 16 years (which is what is left in the mortgage) we would just feel stressed and pressurised to earn the money to pay the mortgage before we thought about paying anything else. However, if I sell this house and buy the flat, once I pay the initial costs to convert it and OH doing a lot of the work, then the money we would have been putting to our mortgage we can put to paying off other debts, it might take 3 years,might be longer, however, there would be an end in sight to our debt, where as at the moment, all we can see is years of stress ahead of us. Never liked this house anyway...lol...When I first suggested this on Saturday OH initially threw it out completely. However, when the thought of mortgage free really started to filter through to him, it became more attractive. We went and had a good look at flat and again our intial thought was that it was mad, because it's not a big flat. HOWEVER, again the more we thought about what this house meant to us or didn't mean to us, we talked ourselves around and found solutions to the arguements we were having. We made enquiries with building control and they were supportive of our changes, spoke with a builder to check our ideas were feasible, which they seem to be, so tentavily (is there such a word) feeling a little bit more positive, than the complete depressed state I felt last week.

thebroad

OMG! I've just used the minimum repayment calculator and that was an eye opener!! I found another forum on here last night which was really interesting and talked about making offers to settle but starting at 30% of total debts..now that's great if you've got the money to do that, but again an eye opener...I feel I'm having a light bulb moment this week!!!

AllThatStuffIsJustStuff

Hi thebroad,

Whether it sounds like madness to others is irrelevant. I have come to think that a lot of the ways that the mainstream of society think about posessions and property is madness. If it's right for you it's definitely right. Obviously you need to make sure you are right though.

Reading your posts the following occurred to me as a little excercise yo ucould do to see if you are mentally ready for the downshift. You and your OH could take a couple of hours to go round your house looking at every space, your furniture and your posessions. You will most probably find that most of these things you haven't been using fully for a long time - if ever. That's just how it is for most people, they accumulate stuff without consideration of it's future purpose. If you don't find that's the case then you will have to think long and hard about if the change will be right for you. But from what you've said I'm sure you will.

More subtle and interesting to clock will be your emotional reaction. Most times you will be on a scale from "I'm worried and scared about how I'd live without that" on the one extreme to "My god, I'd love to not have to clean that again" or "If I never see that again I wouldn't care" at the other end. If mostly your reactions are at the former end you need to take more time to think about it and it might not be right. If most or all of your reactions are at the latter end - then what are you waiting for?

Oh, and def get your SOA up on the forums. The community on here is very supportive and will really help you out.

Best of luck and keep on posting

[Deleted User]

I totally agree with AllThatStuff, it is irrelevant what others think- they wont be sat there with you in the middle of the night worrying about money, or be there with you in years to come if you have regrets. It seems to me that people are too quick to give us their sweeping opinions, I always find most of the posts and replies on here are very considered and unbiased (as above post illistrates). I have realised in last few months to hell what friends, colleagues, or even extended family thinks, its what I, my DH and DS think and feel thats important.

I'm on my journey to becoming debt free, I had my LBM at end of February and initally used the debt-free threads, however as a result of trying to think outside the box and (hopefully) never get myself into this situation again I have found the 'old-style' threads. They are fab too and I am currently trying to simplify my life, clear out the clutter, stay away from people who can be quite toxic with their opinions and make my and my families life what we want it to be and not what society leads us to think it should be (keeping up with the Joneses, having good cars, furniture, holidays etc). I can honestly say that now I am out of that rat-race I have never been happier, still skint but never happier. My DH is proud to see me finally face my debts and we are closer as a result.

Sorry to go on, I just feel so strongly that life improves when you take out all the modern pressures of society. I hope you find yours will.

I am not denying there will be hard times so you may fall by the wayside occasionally (read mine and others diaries), but I no longer have that sickened feeling spending on what was basically cr*p, in fact I am getting that I hate having to spend money at all!!

Anyway, enough of my preaching (so sorry). Hovel Lady going to start my spending diary here today, thank you for being so gracious in me pinching your idea x