301k in debt and morbidly obese - things aren't great!

auditbabe

Ellidee wrote: »

Hey Mr B I follow Martin on Facebook and look at his latest post !

Martin Lewis
‎"301k in debt and morbidly obese. Things aren't great." This new debt diary's uplifting, especially the support shown http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=3445909

301k in debt and morbidly obese - things aren't great! - MoneySavingExpert.com Forums
forums.moneysavingexpert.com ‎301k in debt and morbidly obese - things aren't great! Debt Free Diaries

Thats where I found this thread and really enjoying the humour. Thank you MrBloater for your motivation has motivated me to diet a little harder:beer:

suehippo

Mr B

Going to follow you - you cheer me up. We are in a mess not too dissimilar to your own. LBM happened last week but last night I looked to see if there was an alternative to a DMP (as we currently can make minimum repayments but only because we take too much out of our company)! Anyhow thought I'd use the calculator on one of the websites to work out how long it would take to pay off our CC's if we only continue to make minimum repayments and one card was 126 years - I kid you not (it's not even the most money). The barstewards aren't getting money out of us for another 10 years let alone another 126!

Keep up the good work:beer:
Suehippo

Annie021063

MrBloater wrote: »

Wife safely tucked up in bed and kids snoring so I'll confess some more.

301k debts comprises:
48.2k on credit / store cards
3.3k on overdraft
27.3k on unsecured loans
221.3k on mortgage

At the start of this week I was recovering from a vasectomy, had the mother-in-law finishing her third week at my house, and weighed too much for the Wii Fit to measure me (ie, over 23stone 8).

Decided it was definitely time to confront the issues - and with mother-in-law dropped back at Heathrow it was time on Tuesday to fire up the spreadsheet and forensically go through all the paperwork and online accounts. I'm not fazed by the numbers, I have a complex, some might say bipolar approach to money but whereas MrsBloater is aghast at the amount of debt we have run up, I can look on it as something of a challenge.

The fact I have to shift some serious weight too is simply another column on the spreadsheet - a decade ago I weighed 14stone 5.

Anyways, this is what I've done so far

- Wednesday: rung up Sky on a freephone number (cheers saynoto0870) and cancelled the HD - 10.25 a month of utter waste, will not get rid of the whole package as Disney keeps my kids sane, Food Network and Ty Pennington keep MrsBloater out of the nuthouse and Discovery is my Prozac.

- Wednesday: dug out all the loose change and stuff stashed in drawers around the house, ended up with 50quid in coinage that I bagged up - 30 of it taken to the bank, 20 left to annoy the local shops.

- Thursday: dug out some DVDs that I never have and never will watch and scanned them in on musicmagpie - am so wowed by the fact I can scan in barcodes like my own little checkout that the fact they are only paying me 30p each clouds into insignificance.

Also later this evening I hit the back of the shed and found a box of CDs - most of them copies or HP driver disks, but managed to get a bagful of loot to scan in tomorrow when I get the chance.

Also plan tomorrow to sort out all the various insurances we have (house, contents, building, car1, car2) and see if better deals can be had - we currently pay nearly 180 a month which I think can be bettered.

Am also going to research how best to batter down the deals for existing customers on RAC, Talktalk, Orange, Vodafone.

Oh and I've stopped eating like a fat idiot and have lost 3 pounds already.

Tomorrow I go out for a run for the first time since the operation - here's hoping the stitches will hold......

Can I suggest you visit the NHS site and take a look at the FREE couch to 5K podcasts? I have just started week 5, I have several stone to lose and am nearly 48, the first week I could not even run for 1 minute and today I ran for 2x 8 minute sessions without stopping. If I can do it anyone can. It is brilliant and I am really getting a sense of satisfaction from it. Good luck with all your goals.

Grandma_Kate

Hi Mr B
This is my first message on the forum, so I hope I'm getting it right! I think what you're doing is great. Thankfully I'm not in the same situation, but I can suggest something if no one else has (sorry but there's 6 pages to get through).
I see that you have Sky - there are good deals to be done with them at the moment. I cancelled my Sky contract because we don't watch much other than what's on Free and we had Sky+, HD etc. After a couple of weeks I had a letter from them offering me any package I wanted for half price for 12 months! Might be worth seeing what you can get out of them.
Best of luck:T

Igamogam

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3451265
The No Spend Day thread - take a look. First post has list of other things which may be of interest too

kazwookie

MrB

Well done so far, why not come and join us on the 7lbs loss per month thread?

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3446795

pr1ncess_2

Hi, can anyone tell me how I can subscribe to this diary please? I've never done it before. Thanks )

SUESMITH_2

click on thread tools at the top of the page, and then subscribe to this thread

pr1ncess_2

SUESMITH wrote: »

click on thread tools at the top of the page, and then subscribe to this thread

Thanks very much

carolbee

I love the way you write, could you write articles for magazines/papers for money?

I have subscribed for the first time ever to a diary, very entertaining but I understand the serious undertone to all you write