Learning to Live on Less!

debtfreewannabe321

I hope everything goes well with the kids going to school today! Great news that the new job is going well. Your plans are sounding very positive

White_Iris

lucielle wrote: »

Wow, sounds like you are beind very determined. Just curious about the £3000 savings, would that not be better put towards the debt then you aren't paying as much interest?
L

Using the £3000 towards the debt is something we've talked about but it wouldn't make a huge difference on either of the loans (wouldn't reduce our monthly payments) and both credits cards are 0%. Plus I don't think we'd have the willpower to save it again and I like having a small cash lump sum in case we have any emergencies.

White_Iris

The end of a busy week, first week at school for the children and the first time I've had to juggle work and school runs - I have even more respect for mums and dads who do it everyday, parents who work full time must be exhausted by the end of the week!

Earlier in the week, we got SIL to work out how much of a mortgage we'd be likely to get at the moment and the news was not good. We might be able to stretch to a small hovel in the roughest part of town but certainly not a house in our village. It wasn't unexpected but it did prompt us to have a chat with our landlord about his intentions and he's reassured us that he has no plans to sell our house for a year or two at the earliest, so we have some breathing space. The main reason we can't borrow much is that we pay a lot on debt repayments each month, our credit ratings are actually very good so if we can reduce our monthly outgoings we may be able to borrow more.

We have had some good news, a close family member had a small windfall and has gifted us £1000 :j. What I need to do now is think of the best way to use that money, and rearrange the rest of our debt, to try and reduce our monthly outgoings. At the moment I'm thinking, pay off one of the credit cards, transfer the balance of the smaller loan on to the now empty 0% card and throw all available cash at getting that cleared. I need to check the figures and work out how long that would take but it's a possibility.

White_Iris

Well we decided to pay £500 off the credit card (reducing the date it will be cleared by 2 months) and use the remainder to pay for swimming lessons for the children and top up the emergency savings.

We've also decided to transfer the balance of our smaller loan to a credit card once they are cleared. DH was a bit hesitant in case we couldn't get another balance transfer once the 0% period ended but I'm confident that won't be a problem. We can then pay it off at a rate of £500 a month and clear it within 18 months, instead of the 7 years it will currently take. :money:

I've also had some good news from work, we're getting a pay rise. It's not massive - a bit now and a bit more in April - but it should mean an extra £50 a month from April onwards.

We had our car insurance renewal quote and it came in at a lot less than I expected (plus an extra £20 off if we renewed online). Using that figure I have amended the budget, as we are now able to put less aside for next years insurance and also tweaked it in a few other places, changing what gets paid when and from which savings pot. Overall I've managed to free up a bit more spending money without reducing our debt repayments, so financially things will be much improved as of October 1st.

White_Iris

I forgot to mention my fantastic freebie Boden socks, I got for being a new customer when I bagged DD a pair of leggings in their sale for only £3.60 (with a free post code from Quidco, so cash back too!). I was so pleased with them as I needed new socks but a pack of three from the supermarket would have cost more than my entire Boden order and I got seven gorgeous spotty pairs for nothing! :money:

Twoblackcats

I read your diary but don't normally post, but as I am wearing a beautiful free pair of spotty Boden socks that always make me feel happy, I thought I would pop out of lurkdom to say keep going and also enjoy those socks!

White_Iris

Well it's been quite a while since I last posted and things have been busy but in a good way. Once he got paid at the end of September I asked DH if he would get rid of his overdraft and he agreed (with no resistance - amazing!). It was only £50 but he was always in it and it cost him £6 a month. So far he has managed to budget and hasn't felt the need to reinstate it.

Last month I got paid the tax that was taken in error in August plus some extra hours and back pay from when they paid me at the wrong rate, which meant I was able to book and pay for our hotel room at Christmas (when we go and visit my family). This is the first time I can remember paying on a debit card for this, usually we put it on a credit card but never again!

I've been doing lots of extra hours at work his month, which should mean I can do all of my Christmas shopping when I get paid in November. Hopefully I'll continue getting offered hours so that I can also pay for the petrol and spending on our Christmas trip. As of January I'm going to start saving regularly for Christmas 2015, so I won't need to rely on additional hours.

Off to work again in a few minutes (they are really good about fitting in extra hours around the school run) so better go but I will try to update more often!

sweetpea26

You are doing really well WI, sorry I haven't popped in for a while. Are you enjoying your job?

White_Iris

sweetpea26 wrote: »

You are doing really well WI, sorry I haven't popped in for a while. Are you enjoying your job?

Still loving it, thank you for asking (although the extra hours are wearing me out a bit - I'm enjoying the extra money though!).

White_Iris

More additional hours this week, although I've now missed the cut-off date to have them paid in my October salary, so these will appear at the end of November.


Unfortunately, I seem to have already spent the extra money I've earned this month on a new winter coat. I've been looking for something on eBay for about a month now but they all go for more than I want to pay for a pre-loved coat which I'm not 100% sure will fit or I'll like it. While on my lunch break yesterday I saw one in a shop window really liked it, when I tried it on it fitted well and I'm certain I'll wear it for several years. It did cost £70 (which I borrowed from our saving pot) but I love it!


We had a pleasant surprise from our water company last week, when they sent us a letter saying they are reducing our bill from £26 to £5 a month as we've built up so much credit over the last year! I was fairly certain we were paying too much but I guess they wanted a year of us being on the water meter to properly judge our usage. I might divert that extra £21 over to credit card #2 and get that paid off even sooner.