Getting professional help to beat debt. Diary

shinner

Hi i think it is the time of year i am very down, I seem to have lost track of money and debt not good. You are doing fantastic stick with it beans on toast can be really nice with a pinch of pepper. You could get some eggs to go with them. I was on fumes this morning was sure would run out but just made it to petrol station with 5 miles left in the tank.:)
Remember how far you have come.:):)

Getmeoutofdebt

Well pay day has come around again and I have finally paid off my LLoyds Visa!!! Hoorayyyyyyyy!!!! Now I only have my overdraft and two Barclaycards to go. My Barclaycards are on a fixed low interest until my review in march so my plan is to try and pay off my 2k overdraft in the meantime and hopefully clear it by March. I am hoping that I may be able to negotiate a settlement figure on one of my cards and use the available overdraft to pay it, hopefully saving myself some money. God knows if it will work... the only settlement offer I have had was with MBNA. I'm not sure if other cards offer this kind of thing but it is worth a go and I need to save some money somewhere if I am going to get this debt paid in a year!
In the meantime I am going to try and start up my "two purse challenge" again, where I put all my spare money in my second purse for two weeks and after the 2nd week try and just use what I have saved to buy the 3rd weeks groceries. I did ok with this for a while a few months ago but then after a while I started dipping into the second purse when I needed small change and ended up spending it all! This time round I am going to keep my second purse at home so I can't dip into it when I'm out and about.
I have about £30 in points on my nectar card so I am going to use it on my next grocery shop and put the £30 I have saved from my shopping money into my second purse so hopefully that will be a good start to the first fortnight. I need to stay focussed and I am finding it really hard. The nearer I get to my goal of being debt free, the slacker I become at managing my finances and saving money. I am finding it hard to motivate myself and only my husband knows about my debt so I have little encouragement. The couple of good friends I made on here are debt free now so have vanished off the forum. Sometimes I wish I had someone to talk to who was positive and would give me a good kick up the !!!! Laugh! But hey ho, onwards and upwards!!! Less than a year to go providing I can stick to what I am currently paying off each month.....

shinner

You are doing amazing you will be at the end before you know it.

Getmeoutofdebt

Having a nightmare, literally, over Christmas!! This, birthdays and nights out are the bane of my life at the moment!! It is so hard when you are on a debt plan to deal with these things, especially when you are trying to keep the debt plan quiet!!
I woke up this morning at 2am and was happily laid there thinking I have bought most of my christmas presents apart from our best friends and then I had a horrid thought that kept me awake the rest of the night! Our best friends always buy us presents and we buy them, which is fine, but just after last christmas they split and both have new partners and one new couple has a baby due in the next few weeks. So 2 xmas pressies had now escalated to 5! On top of that it is 3 of them's birthdays in december and the baby present when it's born escalates it further to 9 gifts I need to buy in december!! Arrghhh!! On top of that it is works xmas do and I've been told by the big boss that as a manager I have to go! So that involves taxis and drinks and then someone at work has arranged a girly pre christmas meal out which I politely declined as I'm skint and she's chasing me round at work insisting I have to go as it's only a fish & chip restaurant so it's only going to cost a tenner!! I haven't got a tenner spare!!! I have gone from being really organised and happy that I have most of xmas buying boxed off, to in a right stress about it!! :eek: Hubby says I'm just going to have to explain to the couple and their new partners that it has all got a bit out of control and we can only send cards instead of gifts. I can see what he is saying but gosh it is easier said than done!! :mad:

shinner

You will probably find they are all thinking the same.I stopped buying friends 2 yrs ago as it easily put on around £100 for all the children as well. Explain you are cutting down this year and how about you all send a small donation to a charity ? That way you are all doing your bit. You only have to spend £5? then.
I hate this time of year costs far too much. After all really it is one day it shouldn't be about spending money just enjoying spending time with friends and family. xx

Getmeoutofdebt

Well I have managed to have a really cheap week meal wise and used the savings to buy christmas presents and I am a bit skint now but I'm done! Everything bought and just enough money to last until next payday as long as I am sensible and stick to cheap meals, free wheel to work on fumes (laugh) etc! Phew!! I am quite looking forward to getting Christmas out of the way
and starting a new year and my final year (fingers crossed) of being in debt! As long as I work really hard and scrimp and save every penny, I should be debt free by next Christmas! Roll on 2014! The final year of my DMP! :T

Getmeoutofdebt

Bored and looking for inspiration today! Been back on Mysurvey to try and earn some more nectar points to put towards my shopping bill..... looked at my debt spreadsheet for what felt like an hour.... not really achieving much but really wanting to, if you know what I mean!! Can't physically pay any more off than what I'm paying but deperate to do just SOMETHING!!!! In the end I settled for coming up with a new coded debt motto to use as my internet banking password! Lol! I suppose it is the thought that counts!! Really in the mood to crack on and get this coming, final, year over with. Just can't do anything until christmas is out of the way and I at least get paid again!! Frustrated :mad: but feeling positive!:j

Getmeoutofdebt

Happy Christmas everyone and have a brilliant New year!! Debt busting is going to be my only resolution for 2014!! I am determined this will be the last year in debt!!
Saying that, I haven't done too well this month, only paying off the bare minimum due to christmas expenses etc..... But..... I have spent today looking online and found a few things that may help me and may help you if you are reading this...
1) Noddle. Google this!!! It is free for life credit check website!!!! Join up, log in, check your score and also view your credit searches and account statuses!! I found it really helpful because I was paranoid my credit history would look really bad but my Barclaycards are showing in green which is good, due to me being on a payment plan with them. I thought I would have been blacklisted but I'm ok! The site is not that straight forward to find things on so click all the links to see what it shows. If you are struggling reply on this thread and I'll try talk you through it.
2) Nectar adpoints. I signed up for this last night after googling how to earn more nectar points. It's simple, you watch an advert and click the prompt to show you are paying attention then at the end click thumbs up or thumbs down to say if you liked it and you earn points!! I found it a lot easier and more interesting than doing Mysurvey as you just watch the ads rather than filling loads of info in. I have earned £2.50 already and you can cheat as there is a glitch and some adverts don't register when you have watched them so you can watch them over and over again and get more points! Find a short one with a glitch and keep playing it!
3) Download Nectar tool bar. It is a small search bar that gives you points for searching. Now the search points don't add up to much... the best thing about this tool bar is that if you load up a website where you can collect points, a big banner pops up to tell you! Unaware I logged on to Vodafone as my contract is due and I want to go sim only and the bar popped up to tell me I can claim 750 points!! I wouldn't have known otherwise!
4) Save aluminium cans!!! This is a bit of a hassle as you need a lot but we laughed at my father in law for keep bringing cans home from the canteen at work and saving them in bin bags but he's just weighed them in and made £90!! Yeah there were a few bags full and they had all been squashed down so there was a lot in each bag, but me and hubby have just made it a mission to save all used tinfoil, drinks cans, aluminium food packaging, deodorant cans etc and weigh them in!
So those are a few of my money saving ideas for the coming year ahead! Hope they may be of some use to you also!

Getmeoutofdebt

Well I have been on my DMP for almost 2 years now and 2014 should hopefully be my last year!! I am hoping to get debt free by November after spending my whole adult life (approx 20 years!) in debt!
Any of you in the same position will know how hard it is and how obsessed you get once you get into paying it off!
It helps if you have great support from someone but some of us don't! Most of my debt came from me trying to stop my hubby's debt spiralling out of control and transferring it into my name. (worst thing I ever did! but hey ho! too late now!)
Since going on my debt plan he has been quite supportive but he sees me getting out of debt as being similar to us winning the lottery and for the past few months has been bombarding me with lists of things he wants when I get debt free!
Today he had a brainwave!! :mad: Now I have paid off roughly 20K why don't I just pay the minimum on the debt I have left for the rest of my life and we can both (I.e he can) live the high life from now on! :mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:
I ended up in tears of frustration because he just doesn't get it at all!!! He still has a load of debt of his own because he carried on spending after I paid his off! He doesn't worry about it at all. He is happy to live his whole life in debt, but I am not! But he just doesn't see that I'm going through hell trying to pay off 28K! He thinks I'm going to have thousands in the bank when I am clear (which is my aim) but at the same time he is planning on spending thousands!! God it is so frustrating!! Has anyone else had this problem? Any advice??

Coco114

I don't have any advice but I just wanted to say that you are doing an amazing job!! Truly in awe of how much you have paid off

I have been treading water for a long time now (just) but this diary has given me a lot of food for thought ......

Well done and keep going, you are so very nearly there x