Clearing debt with a toddler, no support and a house to keep on top of!

mmummy21

My cousin was going to sell me the carseat I wanted for £40 but has just told me she has given it to someone else :-( I have found one on eBay for just £12 and the seller has agreed to send it by Courier at my cost which I think will be around £12 plus packaging so not too bad! Means I can save a bit. 2 and a half hours to go on the auction.

Done a quick house tidy, the little one is down for her nap so I'm going to jump back into bed too, not sure what's wrong with us - seems to be halfway between a cold and a flu! So tired :-(
x

mmummy21

Got a fright yesterday. I think I hit my real LBM! Checked online banking to discover my overdraft is at it's limit and the joint account is overdrawn too. We needed baby formula and milk so I'm having to go get money off my Mum today :-( I can't believe it - we're a working couple with good jobs and priorities, how can we possibly need to borrow money for milk? OH gets paid on Friday and will give me £800 to go into the joint account for bills and food plus I'll put 300 in when I get paid on the 15th Oct. This gives me £1100 which considering we have low rent, council tax etc. should be plenty to live on for next month. I don't know why I can't manage! Time to get a grip.

I will have £527 left in the joint account after all bills etc. which is for food, petrol, baby items and smoking. People on benefits have less than that to live on each week so I MUST be able to do it!

Want_to_be_free

Dear mmummy21, what ever you do, don't give up. I was there with a little baby, full time job and absent father...At least you say your partner is good in some other ways...Also you realised your situation a lot quicker then me so great on you .I wish I was able to have the insight that you have when I was as young as you. ( Well I am still young in my mind LOL)

I didn't want to read and run. I will think about your situation and get back to your diary...

natsplatnat

Hi mummy21!

Have you considered withdrawing the cash that is left once your bills/repayments have been made and using that to buy your food/tobacco/petrol etc? It may not be easy if you have payments coming in at different times of the month, but spending real money instead of using cards is a real eye-opener. It's much easier to see you are running low if your purse/pot/jar has only a few coins (and maybe a note) left!!

Just a thought - wishing you all the best, and definitely don't give up, Nats x

mmummy21

Thank you! It was so lovely of you both to reply :-)

I was thinking of withdrawing all money. We have £527 left over after direct debits etc. come out for the bills which is to pay food, baby items, petrol, cleaning stuff and smoking (yep we should stop). Although it'll be less this month as we are £47.00 overdraft plus we'll have £25.00 in unauthorised overdraft fees to come out. I just can't stop myself buying stuff we don't need and things seem to come up when I'm not expecting it.

Like this week my mop broke so I had to get a new one which cost £6. Then I had to get teething powders for the little one at nearly £5. Calpol at around £4. Biscuits for the little one (okay I didn't need them but they were on offer) at £2. So 5 mins in Wilkinson cost me £16!

I did the shopping but by midweek I had no milk, bread, fresh fruit/veg, cat food, dog food, cat litter, kitchen spray and the pasta ran out. So that was £23 in Co-Op. Another trip to Co-Op cost £10.19 and a trip to Tesco £7.26. That was on top of the £61.00 shop at the beginning of the week. How do I stop this?

We got 2 take-aways this month too at £10.00 for a Pizza and £8.50 for a McDonalds. Just convenience food as it's tiring looking after a baby all day and when she is in bed I just can't be bothered cooking something! It's harder as we don't have an oven (I can't afford to get it fixed this month either :-( ).

It's so exhausted. It's so tempting just to take out a loan and forget it all but that's what I did last time over a year ago and look where I am now!

natsplatnat

Ok, so £527, less your fee £25, less the overdraft to clear £47, gives you £455 for the month. I would be tempted to try and forget about the odd £55, divide the rest into the number of weeks it has to last you, decide on a day that your 'week' starts and withdraw the cash that is allocated for that week. A 4 week month would give you £100 and a 5 week month £80.

mmummy21

Great!

It's a 4 week month so will withdraw £100 tomorrow.

Spend £60 in Tesco including baby and pet items for the week. £20 on petrol. £10 for a midweek shopping top up. £10 left for smoking. Need to make a shopping list tomorrow :-)

OH got a little on the side job at work today so got £20 cash in hand which got us cigs and a takeaway so no more takeaways this week.

Motivation motivation motivation. Must stick to the plan!

mmummy21

Arghhhhhh. Crap. Pants. !!!!!!.

Argos bill came through, it's the first month with interest and they have added £42 in interest on! Absolutely shocking! So it has now gone from £272 to £314.92. For goodness sake!

I have had another look at my figures as they were estimates so just working out how much I will actually have left over each week. I want £400.

So October spending from joint account
In £800 from OH on 30th September
In £300 from me on 15th October

Out £260 Rent
Out £49.48 Already Overdrawn, hopefully this won't have to come out next month
Out £75 Council Tax, this will go up in March as we overpaid at the start of this year
Out £50 electricity, asked them to put DD up as we are already in arrears but might be less
Out £50 gas, asked them to put DD up as we are already in arrears but might be less
Out £37.62 TV License, quarterly, not due again til Jan
Out £75.27 Car Insurance (this will go down next March when OHs points drop off, 1 years no claims and I'll have had license for over a year)
Out £31.90 BT Phone/Internet, couldn't get cheaper as we live rural and no other providers
Out £10.92 House Insurance, think this is a good deal?
Out £25.00 for 5 days overdraft fee, again won't have to pay this next month hopefully

That only leaves me £380.82. And I have Argos to pay and it doesn't leave me enough for £100 a week which I don't think I could manage on less!

So now I need to look at my own account and see what savings I can make there instead so maybe I can contribute extra to the joint account.

Ah here we go again!

mmummy21

Plus I owe my Mum a tenner. Great!

mmummy21

And now I just checked my Next account which is due on the 2nd so to avoid charges I need to borrow the payment from the joint account and repay it later. I'm not very good at this!