Anything missed? Answers on a virtual postcard!

goolieman

Ok, I have posted a few times with more specific questions, but I just want some new eyes to scan over what I have done so far to see if I have missed any other money savers.
I apologise in advance if this post turns out to be long/boring or same old thing you guys see everyday (always the optimist, me!lol!)
Here goes:
Brief background:
Living with partner and 2 kids (1 & 2.5) in privately rented house in Hampshire.
Debts:
£17000 loan with Egg at 6.9% apr includes payment protection (approx 4yrs left)
£ 6500 HSBC graduate loan at 7.9% apr includes payment protection (2yrs left)
£ 5000 Capital one at 3.9%
£ 1400 Egg card at 0%
£ 1000 HSBC Mastercard, one used regulary at 17.4%
£ 800 Amex Blue at 17.4%
£ 2000 HSBC overdraft (always used to max)
TOTAL
A quite staggering £33700
(Which is just over what DP bring home a year BEFORE tax)
Some of the cards are DPs, some mine.

Down to the nitty gritty:

*I have just been approved a Mint card with enough credit limit to move the overdraft to 0%. Which I should be able to pay off before the 0% runs out, change that to WILL pay off!

*I can't change Gas/Elec companies even though that would save me over £100 because we rent and it is in the T's & C's

*I have cut the weekly shop by using Tesco online and buying more own brand goods.

*DP has sold his Scooter and got a push bike to get him to and from the Station

*We are trying to sell our car (Freelander, anyone interested?? lol) should get more that £8000 for that. So we can 'downgrade'.

*Apart from moving to a 'scummy' area we pay the best rent for the house we have and a basic 3x salary mortgage wouldn't cover the price of a shed in these parts!

*I don't work, my kids are still young and I think it is important to be with them. I could work part time, which I did over Xmas. However I view this as a last resort, I don't want my kids to suffer in any way because of the mess DP and I have got ourselves into.

*I try to pay over the minium payment every month, even by a few quid.

*The last two months have been very hard. DP's wages have been arrested for unpaid council tax, which he is now trying to prove he doesn't owe. We have been £500 down for the last two month. We have managed, just, but it meant that the sale of the scooter was eaten up by bills, not to pay a lump sum to a card as hoped.

*We make over £200 a month on eBay selling tat.

What else???? I have Martin's book and have been following. But as I said before, fresh eyes may help.
Especially when it comes to payment allocation etc...
Thank you in advance and again apologies for the length of this post!!
Cheers
C

robnye

as a first stab at help.

what interest rate is the overdraft?
a lot of recommendations on this site, suggest paying of the account with the highest %,

which will be HSBC or Amex Blue (both at 17.4%
of course you could move the overdraft to mint, pay minimum monthly to mint and then larger payments to HSBC/Amex.

if you have enough credit limit on mint, move one of the HSBC/Amex onto it, or a bit later on, when the amount owed is less than available credit on mint.

Mrs_Thrift

As robnye says, depending on the % on your overdraft, throw everything you can at the highest %, paying the minumum off everything else.  And move as much as you can onto 0% cards, or even cards with a lower rate than you currently have.

As far as making your money stretch further, when you need to renew your car, life, contents insurances shop around using Martin's articles and the Insurance chat board - you should always be able to shave a few quid off a renewal quote by shopping around.  And you can even haggle a few more pounds out of them sometimes!

Can you cut down on your phone bill at all?  By reducing use, changing provider, getting rid of mobile phones? (or changing provider or only using in emergencies?)

The Moneysaving Old Style and Marriage, Babies & Familes chat boards have some great tips for getting bargains and making things go further, etc.  Even small things like using less shampoo and clothes detergent can make a noticeable difference.  Some good, cheap recipe ideas, too.

And, if you can trust yourself to not be tempted to actually buy the product, make full use of the Freebies board to get samples of anything that you use.

For general tips on cutting back, and to help you get into a moneysaving frame of mind, I think Merrick's story (in the book and on the How Much Have You Saved board) is really good for ideas and inspiration.

And for more inspiration, people like Yeovilmac, Rochdale Guy and Heddwen have posted their progress to show how they're working on their debt.

Hope some of this helps.  :)

Ms T

Andrea

Hi  :)

I'll leave the others to help with the credit card/ loan bit.  I could try but I'm not very good at explaining things so I might just confuse the situation.

Do you have any Aldi/ Lidl/ Netto near you?  If you do they're definitely worth checking out for your everyday foods.  Lidl's veggies are a lot cheaper than Tesco.  Admittedly they tend to go off a bit quicker but as you're a family you'd probably get through them quite quickly so it won't matter.  This thread lists their websites.

If not make good use of the Tesco codes on the online discounts board.  This is just one of the really useful threads.

Of course, check out the Freebies board. ;D

Also, pick up some extra cash for 5-10 minutes' work a day using Manthatcan's Free money tip.

And finally... (taking a deep breath) there's some good tips on this Food shopping for a family thread.

Hope that helps a bit  :)

Hi Ms Thrift. It took me so long to write this we cross-posted on a couple of things. ;D

DiggingOut

£17000 loan with Egg at 6.9% apr includes payment protection (approx 4yrs left)
£ 6500 HSBC graduate loan at 7.9% apr includes payment protection (2yrs left)

Monthly payments on these?

£ 5000 Capital one at 3.9%
£ 1400 Egg card at 0%

Minimum payments on these?

Some of the cards are DPs, some mine.

How much of the debt is DP's? How is his credit record? Any chance of him getting any new 0% cards as well?

*I have just been approved a Mint card with enough credit limit to move the overdraft to 0%. Which I should be able to pay off before the 0% runs out, change that to WILL pay off!

You got this, or DP did? (may affect DP's chances of a new card)

*I can't change Gas/Elec companies even though that would save me over £100 because we rent and it is in the T's & C's

£100/year or £100/month? If the latter, I'd be talking to the landlord.

*I don't work, my kids are still young and I think it is important to be with them. I could work part time, which I did over Xmas. However I view this as a last resort, I don't want my kids to suffer in any way because of the mess DP and I have got ourselves into.

Good priorities, if you can manage it -- do all you can to do so. Can DP pick up any extra work evenings / weekends for a few months, or is that just too much?

*The last two months have been very hard. DP's wages have been arrested for unpaid council tax, which he is now trying to prove he doesn't owe. We have been £500 down for the last two month.

Too much in your situation. Even if he does owe it, get to CAB to A) get this resolved or if not resolved, at least to reduce the amount they are taking.

After the monthly payments on the loans and the minimum payments on the credit cards, how much left do you have to make extra payments?

With that info, maybe we can make some suggestions that might save a few quid.

Also, the interest rate on the overdraft is important, as robnye said.

vanoonoo

heartily agree with all the above and would like to enforce that you need to get that council tax saga sorted.

If you are the same poster that posted one friday afternoon - please double check the response I gave that evening. that amount of money taken from wages more than once is shocking, no matter what the previous circumstances.

are you claiming everything you can in the way of working tax credit and benefity / allowancey type things?

if you are planning on staying put in your rented property for an extended period ouf time it might be worth talking to the landlord as already mentioned, about the utilities and why it is that you can't change them - surely if you take them on in your name you should be able to choose your supplier.

in addition it may be worth trying to negotiate a rent reduction for long term assured tenancy - jsut a thought. you certianly want to look towards a rent freeze - the last thing you need to swoop now is a rent increase.

that's all I can think of for the moment - good luck though!!!

goolieman

Right....
Monthly payments:
Egg Loan: £303
HSBC Loan: £193
Capital One: £160
EGG Card: £40
HSBC £28
The Overdraft is at 14.8% plus £10 if I go over the £2000 limit up to a max of £72pm. At one point we went £300 over.

The Egg loan/card and Amex are DP's (I hold an additional card)
Cap one, HSBC card and Mint are mine.
The HSBC Loan is on a joint account.
DP is weary of his credit rating, I think it might be worth getting a copy to see if this is founded or not. He defaulted on a RBS card 7 years ago, but did repay the amount.

I wish it was £100 a month on the Gas/Elec!! No I worked out we could save £149 a year, but that would reduce our monthly DDs which are £35 and £40 respectively for each.

It would be far too much to expect DP to work any more. He works in London and is away from the house 12hrs a day.

Council Tax:
Vanoonoo, DP did get onto personnel about this, they were helpful to an extent. They said because it was a Scottish arrestment they didn't need any consent. He managed to get a stop on this months wages, so he thought, but they took the same amount AGAIN! They claimed they didn't process it in time. They are quick enough to make the arrestment but take time to stop it >:(
He has been assured that they are taking no more (although they say there is still some outstanding) but we are not holding our breaths until the end of June when his wages come in.
I will send him to CAB to see what they say.

Rent:
We pay the lowest I have seen in the area £825pm. (Unfurnished)
We have lived here for two years and so far the rent has not increased. The Landlords now live abroad, everything is done through a letting agent (Including awful, intrusive quarterly house inspections)

We also claim Tax Credits and Child Benefit.

Thank you everyone for your suggestions, I have looked at the boards suggested and have some good ideas.

Digging Out I hope with these figures you can give me a few extra pointers.
Cheers!
C

goolieman

P.S Not an awful lot left at the end of the month!
At max £200 if we don't use the eBay money.
We rarely go out, and I mean rarely!
Lack of babysitters does have its advantages!
C

DiggingOut

Will try to give this a going-over tomorrow, unless someone beats me to it.

Forgot to ask about credit limit on new Mint card.

Tim_L

I think you're doing all the right things, and your positive attitude will work wonders. As Andrea says, it's possible to get cheaper shopping with a bit of legwork, and you can also use vouchers (Asda and Tescos tend to take these even for things you don't buy if you aren't silly about putting in hundreds). See the Online shopping voucher board. Using these has saved me around £8 a week over the last few months, which when multiplied up is a useful annual saving. It probably will be a case of making lots of little savings now, I'd imagine, but they do add up.

Another thing maybe to consider is a short term Sunday morning job for you - it might be that getting out of the house and away from the children is good for your state of mind anyway (!), and you might be able to get decent rates of pay for Sundays. If this was a supermarket job, you may also get discounts on shopping (and be able to make sure they took your vouchers!).

Also make sure family and close friends know you're making economies, and why - there's no shame in being in debt these days as so many people are. This will allow you to declare moratoriums on expensive presents at birthdays and Christmas while you get the debt down.

lswwong

I might be telling you something which you know already, or is not suitable for your circumstances, in which case please excuse me.

A friend of mine who is divorced with one little boy - but kept the marital home - sometimes rent out her spare bedroom to English language students from the local language school. The room holds 3 comfortably and she only has them from time to time, each stay lasting between a week to 3 weeks. (A week is more typical, particularly if the students are from a school in, say, Germany and are part of a larger group staying in the local area.) She provides breakfasts and a light supper, does a bit of laundry and that's about it. This brings in about £200 a week cash.

Good luck! All the best too.