My SOA

tilly2484

My debt is a combo of uni and idiocy when I was younger.One of the suckers who fell for the credit cards and loans you get sent through when you turned 18. My partners is from a car and a loan he took out about 10 years ago. As we used to be on very good money it wasn't so much of an issue but as we have got older it is something we need to address, along with the fact we have now halved our income.

So in short the debt was built up when we were very young, we have not increased the debt for about 7 years. paid off £10k but that was when we were on more money.

Partner is on the phone to sky as we speak.

Will defo be looking into the O2 thing- is it on their website?

Thanks everyone.

elsiepac

here you go link

patman99

I know you said you live in the middle of nowhere, but you can club together with people within a 3 - 4 mile radius to form an oil purchasing company.

I will assume your OH's car runs on diesel judging by his mileage. If so, try googling to see if he can run it on a mix of WVO and diesel (or even home-made bio-diesel).

tilly2484

We already do the oil share with one other family. The next village is about 4 miles away and we don't know of anyone who uses oil other than us on the farm. I will ask the lady in the local shop if she knows of anyone and maybe put up a sign.

Yes his car is diesel- no idea about the mix thing.It's an old Peugeot- do some cars allow you to mix fuels? Where do you buy the fuel from?
Thanks

gfplux

Hello Tilly,
I know it is only two days since your posting but this matter is VERY serious and you need to act quickly.
What have you managed to do to cut down your expenses and monitor your spending by the time you read my posting.
Having been paid a high salary in the past I imagine both of you are very dynamique and pragmatic and know how to act quickly.

ViolaLass

Agreed. OP, have you identified whether the theoretical shortfall of £132 in your SOA is what happens in real life?

tilly2484

So far this has happened, still a lot to do:

1. Sky cancelled
2. Spoke to my neighbour to see if he knows of anyone else who can do oil share with us-he doesn't know of anyone else on oil but is going to ask in the nearest village
3. Shopping budget reduced to £50 pw- this week was £48
4. Downloaded Blackberry money manager (free) to keep a spending diary and see where money is going
5. Booked in 2 extra cupcake classes with a couple of free days i have in the next few months- extra £150 that can go towards one of the debts.
6. Done a mind map to see how I can maximise income even more once January comes around (this is when the travel money they are paying us for the 1st 6 mths of our relocation stops)

Other things that are in progress- looking to see if we can get cheaper on the following: Electricity, phone bill/internet (elsiepac has sent the link for an O2 deal I want to look at)

One question I have. At the moment we are only set up to pay token payments. if I build up a pot of money- e.g this extra £150 from extra classes should I pay things off as I get it or build a decent amount up and see which creditors will do a "deal"? 2 of them have already mentioned they would. Not sure what the best option is?

patman99

tilly, if you get your oh to google the model of the car followed by either 'running on WVO' or 'running on biodiesel'. You will find sites where people have not only converted their cars, but info on what vehicles run on it.

WVO (Waste Veggie Oil) is the easiest to deal with and use. Read the various forums from beginning to end to learn the art of using an alternative fuel source. Even using a 50/50 mix, your OH will cut his fuel bill by at least 45%.

tilly2484

Thanks Patman- will get him to look into it :-)

tilly2484

Couple of updates from today.

1.Managed to save £6 per month on business insurance. From £22 to £16 per month.

2.Phone/Internet package down £5 per month from £35 to £25. We had to stay with BT as all the other providers we called do not offer broadband to our area- as I mentioned we live in the middle of nowhere on a farm so they have said there is "no provision" there.

3.Nice sparkly spreadsheets put together to keep track of things. Tabs for Monthly outgoings, debts, xmas and birthday list/plan/budget and a few other things to add.

So far the things we have cut down this week work out to approx £100 per month saving which is great :-)