Learning to Live on Less!

Skint_but_Optimistic

Sounds like things are coming together. So glad you have transport sorted.

LianneH

sounds like the car is going to provide you will another MSE boost! x

Wobblydeb

White_Iris wrote: »

Well the card with the larger balance was interest free already, just the smaller one we were paying interest on (about £10 a month) so it won't make a huge difference unfortunately but having it all together will make it a little easier to manage.

But doesn't that mean you will pay a balance transfer fee when you were getting 0% interest already?

White_Iris wrote: »

Well, we got a car for less than we budgeted and although it needs a little bit of cosmetic work it'll do perfectly for DH :-) The insurance for him was a bit steep but he needs to build up some no-claims discount of his own - next year should be cheaper. Need to have a sort out of the finances tomorrow - move some money around, check balances etc. Also need to post some eBay parcels (assuming the buyers pay at the end of the auctions this evening), as well as the usual Monday deep-clean to remove the accumulated grot of the weekend, so tomorrow may be a little bit busy!

Are you included on his insurance for the second car? My OH discovered his insurance actually went down when he added me to it! :rotfl:Could be worth looking into?

debtfreewannabe321

ah i know what you mean, I have 2 lil ones, not twins but at one point they both were in pram or trolley and i recall one time at a$da and i couldn't find a mum & baby space, then I couldn't find a trolley with two seats .. i was having a bad day anyway :rotfl:and i ended up at customer service nearly in tears telling them how crap they were (i was most annoyed though at the fact 6 out of 10 cars had no car seat in (i went and checked lol)! To their credit everytime i've been since there have been trolleys available for me

I've never noticed double ones at our aldi though, always have to go with just one child usually!

I'm glad the car is opening up more opportunities for you, :T

dfw x

White_Iris

Wobblydeb wrote: »

But doesn't that mean you will pay a balance transfer fee when you were getting 0% interest already?

The 0% period on the larger card was due to finish soon which is why we were looking for another card to transfer everything to.

Wobblydeb wrote: »

Are you included on his insurance for the second car? My OH discovered his insurance actually went down when he added me to it! :rotfl:Could be worth looking into?

Yes, I'm a named driver on his policy and it has helped. It's amazing the difference minor changes make - increasing the excess from £450 to £500 knocked more than £50 off the price and we had thought about having only 3rd party but it was over £100 more expensive than fully comp! Not always good though - I thought I'd be honest and tell my insurance company that I'm no longer working but being a "house-person" cost me an extra £12 :eek:

White_Iris

LianneH wrote: »

sounds like the car is going to provide you will another MSE boost! x

...or maybe not :mad:

Took the new car for an MOT yesterday (half price voucher through the new insurance policy - woo hoo) and as well as several advisories which we expected it failed due to worn tyres, a number plate bulb and a serious fluid leak from a rear shock absorber. I'm peeved with DH because he told me when we bought the car that the tyres and number plate light needed fixing before the MOT but clearly he didn't bother to fix them :mad: If the shock absorber had been ok it would have failed due to problems we already new about and could have resolved!

Anyway, we got the tyres changed (£100) and a new light bulb (£5) and we arranged for a chip in the winscreen (one of the advisories) to be repaired today (£10 insurance excess). It's going to our local garage tomorrow to fix an oil leak, so it'll get the shock absorber problem fixed then as well but it'll all come to about £200 :eek:.

Chip fixing guy has just been and has said that he can't fill the chip as there are another 3 smaller ones which would also need doing (2 of which are microscopic!) and he isn't allowed to repair 4 chips, we need to replace the windscreen instead :mad:. So that'll be another £70 insurance excess!

By the end of the week we will have spent about £540 on this car and completely thrashed the credit card. Will have to talk to DH when he gets in - probably end up doing another balance transfer to our 0% card but then I'm chopping the cards up!!

debtfreewannabe321

rubbish news about the car, this also happened to us when we bought our new one the other month (well new to us...) We had a chip which we could see but 'apparantly' there was another one immediately next to it and he couldn't fix two that were that close together so our excess was £100 to get it replaced !!! We couldn't see any other chips on the screen but we just got it changed anyway! Gutting though spending all that money on a car that you've just got! Hopefully once you have paid all that out it will run beautifully until next MOT!!! xx

LianneH

Aww WhiteIris...rubbish news about the car. But hopefully the future savings and trips you can take the twins will make up for it, in the long run? x

White_Iris

Well we've moved the balance over to our 0% card and once all the payments have gone through the little card will be closed. We've also decided to stop focusing so much on debt repayment and instead start to reap the benefits of our money saving ourselves.

We have enough money in the budget to more than cover the minimum repayments on the credit card, and as long as we keep tarting to 0% cards we will keep paying it back, but until we pay off our large loan in a couple of years we simply don't have enough money to make serious dents in to the debt and live a reasonably comfortable life.

So the focus from now on will still be money saving, living frugally and trying to make extra money but instead of aggressively paying down debt, the challenge will be to maintain our lifestyle without getting in to more debt. This sounds a bit self-indulgent but clearly the old way of doing things wasn't working, as our credit cards debt has increased by about 2k this year (:eek:) and we really have been quite miserable at times because our budget has been so tight.

White_Iris

On a more positive note, I did weigh and photograph four dresses, two other items of clothing, a pair of shoes and an enormous pile of spare Christmas decorations yesterday, ready to write up on turbo-lister and then list on eBay over the next few weeks. We've made about £70 on eBay this month and now, with our new money-saving mindset, I can spend it on family things without feeling guilty about not paying paying down debt!