The time has come to sort it...... my SOA

WelshPlum

Hiya,

Well, 01/01/2012 signified the date that we finally decided that DH and myself need to sort out our debts once and for all, or things will never improve. I've done my SOA (though there are some bits that I couldn't find, e.g. gym membership (£20.50/month). I'm also aware that I haven't put anything in for birthdays etc, but we will do I just want to work out how much rather than rely on ad hoc purchases as we have in the past.

Debt-wise - we are currently ploughing £850 extra off the credit cards to try and get rid ASAP (by Summer). The smaller loan (14%) finishes in Sept 2012, and the other a year later (the 19% one), though I do have a 0% balance transfer offer on my credit card until Oct 2012 so was thinking about maybe transferring to this (any opinions?).

Our fuel is a lot, I know. But both of us work 25 miles away (we travel together 3 days/week), in a public sector workplace.

Childcare is taken from DH's pay (before tax) so that is why it's not included in the SOA (likewise for car parking).

Currently we are on an interest-only mortgage (on standard variable)- as soon as credit cards are cleared we'll be ploughing money into reducing this balance.

DH has to find £5800 next month to pay the bubble payment" on his car.......... we are working on this.....
Anyway, I'll stop waffling. Here's the SOA (with annotations):

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

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

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 2094.35
Partners monthly income after tax....... 1465.61
Benefits................................ 134.8
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 3694.76

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 488.8
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 128
Electricity............................. 41.5
Gas..................................... 41.5
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 48.71
Telephone (land line)................... 24.2
Mobile phone............................ 72 (this is for DH and my contracts)
TV Licence.............................. 12.12
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 20.5
Internet Services....................... 0
Groceries etc. ......................... 300
Clothing................................ 20
Petrol/diesel........................... 350:eek:
Road tax................................ 25
Car Insurance........................... 54.43 (for 2 cars)
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 0
Car parking............................. 10
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 20 (clubs etc)
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 5 (prescriptions free in Wales)
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 8
Buildings insurance..................... 18.79
Contents insurance...................... 12.71
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 17
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 0
Haircuts................................ 20
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Total monthly expenses.................. 1738.26


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 180000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 15000
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 195000


Secured & HP Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 167000...(488.8)....0
Total secured & HP debts...... 167000....-.........-

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Barclaycard 1 (me).............2600......100.......0
Barclaycard 2 (DH).............2200......100.......0
HSBC...........................1700......50........0
Car Loan (DH)..................6000......201.......NaN
Abbey Loan.....................580.......66.6......14
Car Loan (me)..................1800......87.71.....19


Thank you in advance for any advice.pearls of wisdom. I have to say, I find so many of the people and stories on here a real inspiration.

WP x

Tixy

Hi and welcome

WelshPlum wrote: »

Hiya,

I've done my SOA (though there are some bits that I couldn't find, e.g. gym membership (£20.50/month) you can add in new lines or if in doubt include them in entertaining.

Debt-wise - we are currently ploughing £850 extra off the credit cards to try and get rid ASAP (by Summer). The smaller loan (14%) finishes in Sept 2012, and the other a year later (the 19% one), though I do have a 0% balance transfer offer on my credit card until Oct 2012 so was thinking about maybe transferring to this (any opinions?).
transferring a loan onto a card is not easy - unless your card allows super balance transfers - to your current account.
Our fuel is a lot, I know. But both of us work 25 miles away (we travel together 3 days/week), in a public sector workplace.

Childcare is taken from DH's pay (before tax) so that is why it's not included in the SOA (likewise for car parking).

Currently we are on an interest-only mortgage (on standard variable)- as soon as credit cards are cleared we'll be ploughing money into reducing this balance.

DH has to find £5800 next month to pay the bubble payment" on his car.......... we are working on this.....
Anyway, I'll stop waffling. Here's the SOA (with annotations):

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

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

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 2094.35
Partners monthly income after tax....... 1465.61
Benefits................................ 134.8
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 3694.76

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 488.8
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 128
Electricity............................. 41.5 gas & elec look reasonable over all, but if you've not shopped around recently its worth doing just in case you can save.
Gas..................................... 41.5
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 48.71 metered?
Telephone (land line)................... 24.2
Mobile phone............................ 72 (this is for DH and my contracts)
TV Licence.............................. 12.12
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 20.5
Internet Services....................... 0
Groceries etc. ......................... 300 this is quite high for a family of 4 (for this board!) maybe see if you could reduce a bit - maybe aim for £250 this month?
Clothing................................ 20
Petrol/diesel........................... 350:eek: might be worth a read of article on keeeping costs as low as possible - i'll post a link
Road tax................................ 25
Car Insurance........................... 54.43 (for 2 cars)
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 0 need to try to work out a budget for tyres, servicing etc
Car parking............................. 10
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 20 (clubs etc)
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 5 (prescriptions free in Wales)
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 8
Buildings insurance..................... 18.79
Contents insurance...................... 12.71 imagine you might be able to save a bit on buildings & contents if you shop around at renewal (based on your house value)
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 17
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 0 as you know try to budget for this
Haircuts................................ 20
Entertainment........................... 0 and maybe something here to be realistic?
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Total monthly expenses.................. 1738.26


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 180000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 15000
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 195000


Secured & HP Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 167000...(488.8)....0
Total secured & HP debts...... 167000....-.........-

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Barclaycard 1 (me).............2600......100.......0
Barclaycard 2 (DH).............2200......100.......0
HSBC...........................1700......50........0
Car Loan (DH)..................6000......201.......NaN
Abbey Loan.....................580.......66.6......14
Car Loan (me)..................1800......87.71.....19


Thank you in advance for any advice.pearls of wisdom. I have to say, I find so many of the people and stories on here a real inspiration.

WP x

You've missed the bottom off the soa with the summary - is that all your debts listed? what does it say you should have surplus? is it the £850 that you intend to pay to the cards extra?

OHs car - is there an alternative to paying off? can he hand back and look for something cheaper maybe?

This is a link regarding fuel that might be worth a read to see if you can shave anything off your spend -
Cheap Petrol & Diesel Cut your fuel spend by a third

mmummy21

The first thing that stands out to me is the cars!

Petrol - £350 a month is HUGE! Those cars must EAT petrol. I travel 44miles round trip to work and back a day and my little car only uses about £8 a day maximum.

Can you get rid of both cars, settle the hire purchase/loan and then buy one car between you? You can get yourself a reasonable, reliable car for cheap and this will reduce your debt by more than half and free up almost £300 a month to pay towards other debts. It might mean that one of you has to bus or get a lift to work. We had to do the same and it means that OH now has to get a lift to work (I can't as I have my LO to drop at my Mums and the bus doesn't arrive in town early enough) but it's a sacrifice we've had to make and TBH he doesn't know the difference now.

Mobile phones are expensive! Although I can't talk as ours is £80 a month together. We are reducing them by phoning and going down a package every month. How long until the contracts are up? Could you agree on no upgrade for 6 months and just go for a cheap sim only deal (looking at less than £15 a month each for unlimited calls/texts).

Your water rates look expensive too, do you think you would save with a meter?

Satelite TV, looks like the price of Sky to me, might be cheaper to look into Virgin or BT Vision if you live in one of these areas? Or Freesat really is just as good. We got Sky recently (before our lightbulb) and TBH there isn't anything we'd miss but we can't cancel now for 12 months :-(

Groceries and clothing look good for 2 adults and 2 children in my opinion.

Does £24 include landline, home phone and broadband? You might possibly be able to get this cheaper by going onto a half price deal for 12 months etc. - have a look at comparison sites.

£20 a month is huge on haircuts too. £240 every year on haircuts?? I dye mines a lovely brunette/mahogany colour at home now and get it cut only every few months from somewhere cheap. I used to spend £80 at a top salon every 6 weeks and not a single person has noticed a difference!

In comparison, you have £1600 a month more than me and DH to live on in very similar circumstances and we are able to reduce our debt by around £700 a month and could still make savings. You could be debt free really quickly if you wanted to.

WelshPlum

Thank you for this! Yep, looks like I have only copied some of the SOA, and now need to do it all again cos I shut it down without saving. ARGH!!!! The surplus was over £1K though. Yes, this is all the debt.

If we hand DH's car back we have no deposit for a new one. We need two cars (although we work in the same place, I am on a campus 3 miles out of the city, and work my hours around the school run etc. But I think I've overestimate on fuel - basically we put all food and fuel on our Tesco credit card and clear every month. The total for this is £650/month. Either way, we're either overspending on food or fuel!!!! We need to sort this.

It seems having an inch-long urchin cut is not money saving either as it genuinely needs cutting every 4 weeks (hairdresser does my sons at the same time though, included in the £20)! maybe I should grow it...... But I use a colour from Poundland :rotfl:

Our water rates are fixed rates. I had no idea this was a lot. We have a 3 bed detached, - would it be cheaper to have a meter?

x

chunkytfg

Assuming the mileage you quoted is correct thats 1400miles a month.

£350 on fuel @ £1.40(generous) is 250litres or 55 gallons

So you are getting 25MPG ish average on the commute between the two cars. thats not silly low but it is still low. What are the cars? if they are diesel you should be able to up the MPG significantly even if they are big engined ones.

Tixy

Be worth looking into a meter - have a read on your water company site to see if its likely to help mean a saving for you. If you do switch and its more expensive then you can still switch back to fixed within the first year. (I think you can still do this, check before you switch).