Debt Free before my 25th birthday.

MusicalLawyer

This is going to be my getting free of debt diary...

I currently owe £1188.11 to lenders, which consists of;

Wonga - £342.61 - I re-pay £25pcm
Littlewoods - £490 - I re-pay £65 every 4 weeks
Capital One - £355.50 - I re-pay £20pcm

Today I joined the 'Extra payment a week Challenge'. I had an odd £8.11 on my Littlewoods debt, so paid off £8.11 to make it a square £490. Next week i will do the same for Wonga (£2.61), and the following week the same for Capital One (£0.50)

I also have a loan with Provident, which is £10.50pw. I only have 19 weeks left to pay! So the money I'd normallyuse paying off this will be split between Wonga and Capital One. Upping them to £40 and £45pm, which means that ALL debts will be paid off by October - just one month before my 25th birthday! :T

I also put all of my coppers and silvers in just one pot. Which at the end of the month i will take to work (Sainsbury's) and cash it in. I think there is about £15 in there at the moment. I will pop this in to savings for the summer when we're not at work.

I have also been doing cash back websites, i have £9 on one, and i also joined two survey websites. I think I have about £3 on one and £0.50 on the other currently. I think I have opted for Amazon E-Vouchers, so I can buy cheap DVD's etc essentially for free.

I have also decided i am going to sell ALL my CD's to music magpie (why have CD's when i have imported most of them on to my iTunes!?) I will do both of this tomorrow as it is my day off. All money from Music Magpie will probably go in to my savings account for the summer.

I am really excited about clearing my debts and hope I can achieve this by my 25th birthday which is Nov 20th 2012 :rotfl::cool::D:A

MusicalLawyer

Things I'm going to do today to rack up some extra cash to pay off on some of the debts

- Count up the cash in my money pot and allocate it to one of my debts
- Check all my CD's for condition, and scan them in to Music Magpie & see how much they'll give me
- Call law firm about Work Experience (1)
- Email form to law firm about Work Experience (2)
- Hunt the flat for things I don't want/need anymore to sell on eBay

MusicalLawyer

Counted the money pot. Had £17.82.
Going to continue putting money in it until it reaches £20 then use it to pay towards my Littlewoods debt.

I got a Kindle for Christmas, so I'm going to start selling the physical books I've already read - I have 42 by just one Author! Hopefully i can make £1 - £1.50 for each of them and make a nice little sum for me to be able to pay a decent amount off of my Littlewoods debt - the largest of the 3.

MusicalLawyer

Put 17 of my books on eBay at 99p starting bids.
As well as my old Dell laptop at 99p starting bid.

Just going to let them sell for whatever they sell for and put the money towards debts!

MusicalLawyer

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 0
Number of cars owned.................... 1

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 500
Partners monthly income after tax....... 0
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 700
Total monthly income.................... 1200

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 0
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 350
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 32
Electricity............................. 30
Gas..................................... 0
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 25
Telephone (land line)................... 0
Mobile phone............................ 42
TV Licence.............................. 5
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0
Internet Services....................... 14
Groceries etc. ......................... 75
Clothing................................ 20
Petrol/diesel........................... 0
Road tax................................ 0
Car Insurance........................... 0
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 0
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 30
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 0
Contents insurance...................... 6
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 0
Haircuts................................ 0
Entertainment........................... 10
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Provident............................... 42
Investment.............................. 60
Takeaway................................ 15
Total monthly expenses.................. 756


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 0
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 0
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 0

No Secured nor Hire Purchase Debts

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Capital One....................0.........20........0
Wonga..........................0.........25........0
Littlewoods....................0.........65........0
Total unsecured debts..........0.........110.......-


Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 1,200
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 756
Available for debt repayments........... 444
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 110
Amount left after debt repayments....... 334

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 0
Total HP & Secured debt................. -0
Total Unsecured debt.................... -0
Net Assets.............................. 0

Created using the SOA calculator at https://www.makesenseofcards.com.
Reproduced on Moneysavingexpert with permission, using other browser.

MusicalLawyer

I have just 19 weekly re payments left on my Provident Loan, which means that cash will be free'd up on / just before May 11th.

By this time Capital One will have £275.5 left, and Wonga will have £242 left. I will then split the £42 over the Capital One and Wonga payments, upping them to £41 and £46 per month.
Littlewoods last payment will be July 6th.

When the last Littlewoods payment has been made, Capital One will have £193.5 left, and Wonga will have £150 left.

I will split the Littlewoods payments in half to Capital One and Wonga, upping the payments further to £73 and £78.

If I do this, Capital One will be paid off by September 2012, and Wonga will be paid off by August 2012.

I am continuing to do the Extra Payment a Week Challenge, and this will hopefully mean that I can pay the debts of a little faster.

MusicalLawyer

Paid further payment of £65 off of Littlewoods - now down to £425.

MusicalLawyer

I have work tomorrow, 12pm - 8pm, so I won't be getting a NSD, as will spend about £4 for my lunch (after staff discount).

I will take £15.50 out of my money pot and change it up at work. I'll put it in to my bank account and pay towards Capital One debt to make it a round number, and because it is the debt which has the smallest repayments each month. This will reduce the debt to £340, a nice round figure.

Hopefully my books will sell on eBay in 2 days time, however so far they have 0 watchers and 0 bidders
Macbook has 2 watchers, hopefully someone will buy for the BIN price - giving me £10 profit to put towards Capital One debt.

MusicalLawyer

Found out that some charges on my Littlewoods debt are deemed 'unfair' due to them charging me £12 for them to send a debt collection letter.

The money in my pot - £17 - i will use £10 of this to send a SAR to Littlewoods. My logic in doing this, is that I can see they have added at least £36 in these unfair charges by looking at my statements online, so by sending them £10 for the SAR, I could get minimum £36 taken off of my Littlewoods debt.

I do not have statements 1 through to 8, and statement 17 is also missing. I received a charge in statement 17 though don't know what it was for as cannot find it or see it online. I am sure I have more charges for apparently sending me 'debt collection letters' in statements 1 - 8 as well. This would take my Littlewoods debt down to £389 at the least.

Little_bit_dizzy

Hi Kelly,

I've just seen your diary and wish you the very best of luck in you journey to debt freedom and I'm sure that with the determination you're showing you will indeed manage it before you are 25.

I wish I had been as determined as you when I was 24. It took me until I was 37 and I'd been in debt since I was 18. I got there eventually, but I missed out on so much along the way, simply because I've spent most of my adult life in debt.

Good luck to you, I wish you the very best.

MusicalLawyer

Ended up with £16.50 in my money pot, and topcashback have paid out £5.50. Making a total of £22 which I can put towards another debt.

NEED to ring Cap Quest to find out my reference number so I can make extra payments online instead of having to ring their premium rate number, so I'll put this one towards Littlewoods - the biggest debt anyway.