Pay off as much as you can in 2012 challenge!

sarahs999

That's very exciting! I bet we'll get loads of new people arriving now.

A thrilling £25 to report off Barclaycard.

fastdeb

Please can I join? My target for 2012 is to reduce my debt by £3500. Total debt is £11000 (excluding mortgage). Not including my husbands debts as they are not in my control. (Come to think of it they are not in his control either!!) Will be a challenge as my husband is contributing very little to the family finances at the moment due to being maxed out on his credit card and his wage disappearing into the black hole that is his overdraft each month. So it's down to me to pay all the bills and make sure the kids are clothed and fed and can have some days out etc. Planning to sell anything I can. The loft is stuffed to bursting so there must be loads to go at up there if only I could get to it!:o

jwil

onthelookoutforsavings wrote: »

Hi

I'd like to pay off £5000 in 2012.

Thanks for all your great advice

Welcome to the challenge onthelookout, good luck with the debtbusting

LAM2011 wrote: »

Whoo hoo - we are in the headlines - well done everyone!

Hellooo and welcome to new friends, good news on vets bill being paid Dane - I have another one on the way for another course of antibiotics and the manuka honey

My car is also currently off the road as I hit a pot hole (cant believe I didnt see it - its a gaping hole) and not only ripped the tyre but damaged the rim. Fortunately OH is sorting it as I was ferrying his DS2 around at the time

I am hoping to make another overpayment just before month end.

How is the arm now Jacci? And I see you are down into the £15K's now - well done.

Happy hump day everyone :D

:mad: to the pothole lam, there seem to be a few nasty ones appearing around here at the moment too.

fastdeb wrote: »

Please can I join? My target for 2012 is to reduce my debt by £3500. Total debt is £11000 (excluding mortgage). Not including my husbands debts as they are not in my control. (Come to think of it they are not in his control either!!) Will be a challenge as my husband is contributing very little to the family finances at the moment due to being maxed out on his credit card and his wage disappearing into the black hole that is his overdraft each month. So it's down to me to pay all the bills and make sure the kids are clothed and fed and can have some days out etc. Planning to sell anything I can. The loft is stuffed to bursting so there must be loads to go at up there if only I could get to it!:o

Welcome to the challenge fastdeb, good luck with the debtbusting

Keep posting everyone, it all helps keep the motivation up.

I paid a hefty 50p this morning

seethelight

Please can I join? I'm a newbie to this forum, although have been reading the MSE email for some time. I've stupidly ranked up £36,000 against credit cards and an overdraft over the last few years and am now in trouble. To cap it all, my car died last week and has been scrapped and worse, I've pulled my son from pre-school because we can't meet the fees. So I've had enough. I've no idea how I'm going to start, but once I get going, I'll keep going and will maintain a positive outlook!

sarahs999

fastdeb wrote: »

Please can I join? My target for 2012 is to reduce my debt by £3500. Total debt is £11000 (excluding mortgage). Not including my husbands debts as they are not in my control. (Come to think of it they are not in his control either!!) Will be a challenge as my husband is contributing very little to the family finances at the moment due to being maxed out on his credit card and his wage disappearing into the black hole that is his overdraft each month. So it's down to me to pay all the bills and make sure the kids are clothed and fed and can have some days out etc. Planning to sell anything I can. The loft is stuffed to bursting so there must be loads to go at up there if only I could get to it!:o

Welcome fastdeb. Would you say your husband has had his lightbulb moment or not? It sounds like he is well overdue it. What I would say is that it's really important to get him on board with the debtbusting or you will be fighting a losing battle. And as a married couple, do you not have joint finances? It is very unfair to make you pay all the bills etc, he should be working hard to reduce the overdraft. Surely not all his money goes into it? Perhaps he needs to get a 0% credit card that will take the overdraft onto it and then start contributing to the family finances properly.

I speak as someone who has a husband who was once hopeless with money (and had the black hole overdraft too). I insisted that he clear this debt himself - made him get a 0% card and deal with regualr payments to it. He's still going, and there's still 2k on there to clear (he reported very proudly to me the other day that he's now under £2k owing!). Meanwhile I have cleared and am sorting all our other debts using our joint money. DH is now much much better, now he can see how easily sucked up money is by debt, and how much better off we'd be if we weren't throwing all our spare cash at debt. It has taken several years though, and several showdowns (and some patient explanations and printed-out-on-paper-in-black-and-white moments) to get where we are, but I now know that he is pretty much on the same page as me. In the old days I might slave at extra jobs like mystery shopping or filling in online surveys and be thrillde to make an extra £50; to pay off a credit card, and then he would come home with a parking ticket that wiped it out. It was things like that that drove mental and I can honestly say that if he hadn't manned up and started acting like a grown up I'm not sure our marriage could have stood it.

Not saying you're in the same scenario, but it's dangerous ground when only one partner is trying to debt-bust.

sarahs999

seethelight wrote: »

Please can I join? I'm a newbie to this forum, although have been reading the MSE email for some time. I've stupidly ranked up £36,000 against credit cards and an overdraft over the last few years and am now in trouble. To cap it all, my car died last week and has been scrapped and worse, I've pulled my son from pre-school because we can't meet the fees. So I've had enough. I've no idea how I'm going to start, but once I get going, I'll keep going and will maintain a positive outlook!

Hi Seethelight and welcome. Of course you're welcome here - maybe the best place to start is with an SOA on the debt free wannabe boards, to see how your monthly budget balances and how much is left over for debt payment.

seethelight

sarahs999 wrote: »

Hi Seethelight and welcome. Of course you're welcome here - maybe the best place to start is with an SOA on the debt free wannabe boards, to see how your monthly budget balances and how much is left over for debt payment.

Thanks Sarah. I'm not sure what an SOA is, but have a clear view of my income / expenditure, which currently leaves nothing extra. Being self-employed, I'm working to generate more income to reduce the debt and that's my main goal for this year.

Marvin6418

Can you add me please I would like to join in too. Put me down for £9350

Although I won't hit this target fully it is something to aim for. My aim for 2012 (although starting late) is to decrease my overdrafts/loan and clear my sofa payments.

sarahs999

An SOA is a statement of affairs. like this: http://www.makesenseofcards.com/soacalc.html

It details all your income and all your expenditure. If you look on the forum you'll see people doing it all the time. People can then look and help you decide where you could make changes to save yourself money. It's amazing what people spot that you can't see yourself (or sometimes that you don't want to see!). It can also give a clear idea of how imbalanced your income/expenditure is exactly, which can be helpful.

sergeant_cookie

Hey guys. I am new to this forum, but have been receiving the money saving email for quite a while now (1-2 years+). I would like to share my target of being debt free this year too if I may. A few years ago I was £9000 in debt with 4 credit cards, loans and general debts. Sadly I have 2 CCJs to my name of which one disappears from my file this year and the other in 2014. I have just written to one of my creditors for a CCA request to see if I signed up for PPI on a previous loan which if I have then that would go towards paying off the loan. My target is to be debt free within the next 6 months.

Lloyds TSB loan £2423 with a settlement offer of £1800 through Bryan Carter & Co.
Dad £654
Mum £235
Overdraft £446
Total debt £3970
2 CCJs disappear November 2012 / April 2014