Advice to clear my Debts.....

obev0098

Dinah93 wrote: »

So is £80 a month just for your phone? This needs looking into as its very high. I get unlimited web browsing, 1000 texts and 750 mins for £21 a month with Vodafone.

For some quick wins in getting down the balances stick some clutter on ebay and Amazon, even old DVDs soon add up - I've made over £3000 on Amazon alone in the last two years just selling clutter I don't want anymore that I thought was worthless.

For food for one you should be able to get this down under £100 and still eat meat and your 5 a day. We certainly spend under £150 a month for two of us including toiletries and cleaning and we're usually at 8 a day with good quality meat for dinner, no processed food. Try approvedfood for hugely discounted food - a lot of it is past the best before - but when you're looking at pasta or rice or sterilised sauces it doesn't really make a difference if its 2 weeks or 6 months past the date. I got my brother 29kg of food (addmittedly down the pot noodle and jars of sauce and tinned fruit line) for £34 - it saw him the last 2 months through uni when he'd spent all his money on boozing. Its your call where you draw the line - you might be happy with 10p packs of chinese noodles on there 3 meals a day and be able to cut your food bill down to under £20 a month for all I know!

I[d definately recommend a second job, and maybe look into mystery shopping. My DH does a lot of this, usually around 5-8 jobs a week, but he makes over £400 a month and we get a few meals out on top of this, so its worth doing.

Hope that helps x

Thanks for your reply

My phone costs are high as I have two contracts at the moment *Stupid me* However one of them ends in December and that will reduce it to about £50 a month.

I didn't realise I could sell stuff on Amazon, I thought eBay was the only real thing I could use however I will look into this. I do have alot of old stuff I dont need anymore so can review them over the weekend.

Thank you for your advice I will certainly look at my outgoings on foods, perhaps bulk buy.

obev0098

Is there any way I can stop the interest being applied to the Very Catalogue Account?

Dinah93

If you're missing payments then they might freeze it if you enter into a DMP, but if you're up to date its unlikely they will change their terms.

gfplux

If you have two phone contracts can you sell one of them. I know that sounds a silly question but I wonder if it is possible.

Magpie23

Hello and Welcome,

Just wanted to say 'Well Done' for taking the first steps, those are the scariest! You've got some great advice from the above posters, especially with regards to your food shopping. But at least you can make some instant savings there .

I know you're feeling like you're treading water at the moment, probably because your interest rates are killing you!! This is the most soul-destroying part of having debt; you pay what you can and still end up with more debt. It is a viscious cycle but you can and will get out of it! Our saving grace was having all of our cc's at 0% for a while. I know there are still the balance transfer fees but the 0% usually runs for 6mths+ which is enough time for you to have some breathing space and gain momentum which will allow you to make a huge dent in your debts. Especially, if you do get that second job.

Best of Luck with it all,

Magpie23
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