£37k to £0 in a (determined to make them wonderful) few years!

Ladybird.

Another glorious day of sunshine!

We were planning to cancel our most expensive CC, the one whose debt is being transferred to our new 0% card... but OH has just pointed out that said expensive card is offering 0% on balance transfers on it too, so it looks as though we will be able to move a chunk of our next priciest CC to it and do a bit of a shuffle! :j

Today's mission is to find a replacement barbeque as cheaply as possible! Our old one fell apart last year and we can resist the urge to cook outside in this weather no longer!

Have a great weekend all!

Ladybird.

£10 barbeque purchased yesterday and now lit again for the second time this weekend- such a wonderful weekend in the garden enjoying the sunshine!

Finally managed to sort out online banking for our main accounts, and arranged the first balance transfer online too. I use my own online banking daily but this is the first time OH's accounts have been set up for it, I'm sure it will make a real difference to how we manage our money.

Not so good is the fact we have just cottoned on to the fact that we have missed off a hefty CC min payment from our budgeting spreadsheet... honestly, I have no idea how we have managed to do this given the level of scrutiny we are applying to everything at the moment. Muppets! So we actually only have £300pm for groceries and clothes and everything else after bills, not £500. B*gger.

£300 really not a lot, few tears shed over it (mine!) but do-able- we have had a lovely but frugal month and are only just hitting our OD limit with payday just days away. I think £50 a week is enough for food and groceries so that leaves us £100 for other bits. Nearly £3k paid off this month so the worry of the small budget is being balanced with a bit of confidence that when push comes to shove we CAN boost our income!

Back into the sunshine now, that BBQ must be ready for some sausages by now!

Samantha22

Ladybird. wrote: »

Hi Sam!

Swaggbucking is a made up word (and, I have just realised, a spelt wrong made up word to boot)... just means that I have been using http://www.swagbucks.com where you can earn 'bucks' (points) for doing various surveys/internet searches/bits and bobs. Good fun and very easy! Now that I am into the swing of it I earn about £5 (in Amazon vouchers) every 5 or 6 days just by doing some morning and evening

There is a good thread here- https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3883703

Hi Ladybird,
Thank you so much for taking of your time to explain 'swaggbucking' to me. I shall have a browse through it.
Good Luck with your diary, and money saving,
Sam x

Ladybird.

Thanks Sam!

Both balance transfers done now so the current total debt has gone up again by a few hundred to £33,985... but will save us so much money in the long run :j

Current focus now on the £7,253 we have on a 25.9% card, although once all the balance transfers have updated with the various accounts we are hoping to transfer £5k of this to a 0% deal offered by one we have just transferred out of.

Looking at our most recent snowball it is nice to see that most months we will be dropping 'a number', so next month down to £33XXX, the next £32XXX even if it isn't a whole £k we are paying off each month

Ladybird.

Into Month 2 of our debt free wannabe journey, today our total debt stands at about £33,700.

After the success of our first month everything feels a bit stagnant... not helped by the short term costs of our three 0% balance transfers (transferred the other £5k I mentioned last night) adding to the total debt. Still, next month we will be reaping the rewards, be SO good to see some payment actually come off the debt total rather than just paying interest!

According to my trusty Excel spreadsheet we have reduced the total minimum payments by £75pm already, looking forward to seeing that come down more and more.

Continuing to eBay and Gumtree bits and pieces, carefully budgeting shopping, cutting right down on alcohol and so on.

Onwards and debt-downwards!

Ladybird.

Argh, I am such an idiot, have just realised that we have been focusing on totally the wrong CCs... bloomin confusing different rates on statements. Turns out we are paying 35% on our biggest £10k card.

On the one hand I don't know how I have been so totally and utterly stupid enough to notice that that 2.5% we were paying was MONTHLY but on other I am equally annoyed at how complicated and confusing all these companies make things???? :(

Realised a day too late too, only just made that £5k transfer from the 25.9% card.

Oh well, spilt milk and all that. Our 25.9% card has about £8k of room on it now, perhaps it would be worth a call to see if they would offer an attractive BT rate to get away from the extortionate 35%? Our monthly min payments are just over £1000 now, but about £400 of it is still going down the drain in interest...

Can't face doing another snowball calculator and seeing the massive difference correcting the interest on this stupid 35% card makes to our projected DFD, maybe tomorrow when I have finished sulking :cool: ETS-updated our snowball after all and it added 6 months onto our DFD, now September 2015 :(

jennypennysaver

Hi Ladybird! Had to pop by, your diary is an inspiration. I started on here in June but fell by the wayside, anyway, I'm back with a vengeance now! It's amazing how it makes you focus.

Good luck on your journey x :T

Ladybird.

Hi Jenny, glad to have inspired you, the truth is I have fallen by the wayside a bit myself recently! Need to get back into it after a few lazy months. We are having to move house in the next month or two so all our finances feel so up in the air it's hard to keep track as clearly!

Almost at the first milestone, current debt stands at £30,840.

Time to get my focus back again, would really like to see us drop under the £30k mark next month, I'm sure we can do it if we set our minds to it, just need to find an extra £200ish to chuck on top of our existing monthly payments.

Scary yet encouraging to think we are 5 months into our debt-free journey already. Time really does fly and with each month that goes by so does the debt.

Lashing with rain outside, kids sat in front of a DVD quite happily, think I might pour a coffee and catch up on here, time to get some fresh money saving/making to-do lists on the go.

Ladybird.

First milestone reached! We are under the £30k mark, yeah!!!:j:j:j

Used payment for some freelance work to make an overpayment on our most expensive CC and discovered that actually there was a few £100 less on it than I thought. So good seeing figures coming down, next milestone is £25k, looks as though we will reach it next summer without overpayments so perhaps early spring might be good to aim for?

Been trying to get back into the habit of using Swagbucks, and doing a better job of budgeting the food shopping as bad habits are seriously creeping back in again. Would like to do October alcohol free to save money and give my health a boost too. Did a big Lidl shop today, hopefully it will last us for a bit. Seriously need to stop the daily trips to the supermarket for bits and pieces as they seriously add up!

Need to aim to have a sort out and stick stuff on eBay, keep saying I'm going to do it but not getting round to it!

please-let-me-be-lucky

It's free listing on eBay tomorrow and Sunday so that's incentive for you to get stuff on there!