1 month update

Mindy_2

Today is the 1 month anniversary of my LBM, so I thought I would post a quick update of how we are doing.

Cancelled my ISA, frozen my stakeholder pension, queried my electricity bill, cancelled pet insurance, cashed in our Family Bonds, got promotion at work.

I have registered with Pigsback and also the daily clicks sites, but as these will be a bit few and far between have not put any amounts on the summary.

Summary of achievements:

Money received
£300 from ISA
£220 from Southern Electric
£3793 from Family Bonds
£4313 - TOTAL

Monthly savings
£100 for ISA
£146 for pension
£45 for eletric
£43 for pet insurance
£50 for Family Bonds
£50 for groceries
£87 for promotion
£521 - TOTAL

Still to do this month, get life assurance sorted out as we have a "Whole of Life" policy which we don't want, the premiums are £90 a month and it has a cash in value of £3500 which will pay off the Reading FC card (and save us a year of payments).

Switch the gas and electricity using Quidco - sorting this out at the moment.

I should get my renewal notice for my car insurance this month, then I will shop around (probably with Quidco) and get a better deal.

DS is putting some signed footie shirts on Ebay - it won't give us any extra money but I don't give him pocket money if he has earned it himself that week (he is a Level 8 football ref at age 14 and earns £12 a game in the season), so that will save me £5 a week.

We are going to get into the loft and sort out some stuff for car booting. Last year we took approximately one third of the contents of the loft to a car boot (couldn't get any more in the car!) and took just over £220.

I have got some more books to go on Amazon, and one to post out on Tuesday which has just sold.

This saving money thing has got under my skin - shame I didn't have my LBM years sooner.

JoKay_2

Wow Mindy, you've certainly started off well!!

Good luck for the future.

Spendi

Well done

£521 saved a month ?? thats some going !!

GirlRacer_2

Well done on your saving. At this rate you'll be debt free in no time. Good luck.

helping_hubby

Congratulations Mindy. It sounds like you're well on your way to sorting things out.

May I ask...your pet insurance, was that for 1 or 2 dogs? I'm not convinced cancelling pet insurance was the best idea. Animals can be so expensive when things go wrong. My rabbit would have cost me £600 so far this 'pet insurance year'. Are you at least putting some money aside instead?

Mindy_2

Spendi - £521 is a lot of money, but like others on here we have a higher income but had just managed to fritter the money away - we do have things to show for it but not many! So it was a case of sorting ourselves out, and I never never never want to be in this much debt again. MY DH keeps saying that his salary is a good one (he is contract) but it may not go on for ever.

Helping_hubby - The pet insurance was for 2 dogs, and it was about to go up to £54 a month which is why I cancelled it. I didn't take the decision lightly, however I have an 8yr old Schnauzer and a 7yr old Welsh Terrier. If anything happened to the Schnauzer and she couldn't get up the stairs unaided (can't carry her up and down as she is 26kg!) then we would have to have her put down - she suffers from separation anxiety if I am at home, she needs to be within sight of me at all times, and to have her left downstairs if I was upstairs would be appalling for her.

We aren't putting money aside as such as we have humungous debts, but the extra money that we are throwing at our debts each month could easily be diverted if it had to be.

magentadreamer

Well done on your great start! I gave me a buzz when I looked at all my S/O's and DD and managed to save loads just with a few phone calls.

Hope78

Fantastic! You've achieved loads in a month - well done.

poppy_f1

well done, its a great start