Aaron's Debtstiny

afield23

Hi everyone, i have been amazed at how many people are in the same boat as me! (it's obviously a big boat too!!)
I have joined up because i sit down sometimes, i work it all out penny for penny and yet month after month i am skint for 3 weeks a week after payday!! :mad:
I got into debt 5 or 6 years ago in my early 20's and used to brush the problems under the carpet until my 'lightbulb moment' when i decided to get my act together. My SOA is below and i would be grateful for any input for me to consider. I never realised how stupid i had been until i looked at my statements recently and noticed where i messed up. I took out loans to clear the credit cards, and i got tempted by the fresh balance on the credit card, and it all snowballed. I never knew how much i actually owed because i never really thought about it. I was happy piling it on spending and spending, and then reality set in!

I have been good for the last 2 years, and i have been looking at MSE and realised i can do better. I used the calculator to work out the snowballing and it matches what i worked out myself but in an easier to read fashoin.

These are the monthly facts :



Income after tax £1075.00

Food £240.00
BT (broadband, calls, line rental) £40.00
o2 mobile £25.00
o2 mobile (partner's) £35.00
Gas £41.00 (clearing arrear's)
Electric £89.00 (clearing arrear's)
TV license £11.00
Council Tax £95.00

Total £576.00

Remaining £499.00



Of this amount, i then pay my debts :


Alliance & Leicester Unsecured Loan £225.00
Egg Loan £122.00
Alliance & Leicester Credit Card £35.00 (minimum at present)

Total repayment on debts £382.00


This leaves me with about £117, but this never seems to be the case! Something always pops up, i sometimes pay for petrol for my partner's car (we share it afterall), or it needs work doing to it. Sometimes my bike breaks down and needs a repair, then sometimes i owe the sandwich lady at work about a tenner, and in the end it is basically all gone.

I have noticed people saying to write down everything i spend which i intend to do. Bear in mind my total debt at it's highest point around 3 years ago was £18,900.00 :eek:, and now the total outstanding is £8,500.00 so i am over half way!

Basically, i look forward to hearing other people's opinions as it gets my mind working!!



THANKYOU PEOPLE IN ADVANCE!



Debt Free in 25 months!! I want it to be sooner than that...

mae

Hi well done for getting your debt down so much thats fantastic. I'm not as good as the others who will be along to help you soon but I know they will ask you to post your interest rates for your debts. Also how many is the food amount to feed? Have you looked over on the old style board to see if this can be reduced?
Have you looked to see if you can get your broadband down any cheaper? The mobiles seem high too can they maybe be lowered or go on pay as you go? I mean you are paying out £100 per month just for phones thats alot. Just as an example I pay £9.99 for my broadband, £20 for mobile, £11 BT and then use18866 and thats about £5 ish per month never more. So basically thats £45.99 and if you could get in down similar thats £54 per month spare just from phones?
How long will it take you to clear your gas and elec arrears?

Well done so far you are doing great by the looks of it and your post seems determined so I'm sure you'll have it more under control in no time.

art_student

Hello! Welcome to DFW!
Here are my thoughts on your SOA.

afield23 wrote: »

Income after tax £1075.00

Food £240.00 is this for 2? If so, you could get it down to £150 quite easily - see the old style board for meal planning and recipie ideas
BT (broadband, calls, line rental) £40.00 you can possibly get a cheaper broadband deal. Make sure you only call people when it is cheap. See Martin's article on cutting the cost of calling mobiles
o2 mobile £25.00 can you get PAYG?
o2 mobile (partner's) £35.00 as above
Gas £41.00 (clearing arrear's) obviously you have to clear arrears but still check to see if you can get cheaper when this is paid off
Electric £89.00 (clearing arrear's) as above
TV license £11.00
Council Tax £95.00

Total £576.00

Remaining £499.00



Of this amount, i then pay my debts :


Alliance & Leicester Unsecured Loan £225.00
Egg Loan £122.00
Alliance & Leicester Credit Card £35.00 (minimum at present)

Total repayment on debts £382.00


This leaves me with about £117, but this never seems to be the case! Something always pops up, i sometimes pay for petrol for my partner's car (we share it afterall), or it needs work doing to it. Sometimes my bike breaks down and needs a repair budget for these things - have a separate account and pay in a set amount each month for petrol and bike repairsthen sometimes i owe the sandwich lady at work take lunch with youabout a tenner, and in the end it is basically all gone.

I have noticed people saying to write down everything i spend which i intend to do. Bear in mind my total debt at it's highest point around 3 years ago was £18,900.00 :eek:, and now the total outstanding is £8,500.00 so i am over half way!

Basically, i look forward to hearing other people's opinions as it gets my mind working!!



Good luck!

GirlRacer_2

Congratulations on getting your debt down, its a massive achievement. A spending diary is a must, you'll be surprised how much money you spend on 'stuff'. Your food bill is quite high, there's room for improvement there, make sure you meal plan and write a list for the supermarket and stick to it.

As Mae has suggested the mobile bill is quite high, if your on contract phone your provider and downgrade your tariff.

Also try and shop around for phone and broadband.

Sign up to some of the cashback sites and earn some money every time you shop online, pay insurance or just do the daily clicks and earn a couple of ££ per month.

How much longer have you got until your arrears are paid off with the Gas and Electricity? This will give you a few more pounds to throw at the debt.

The only other thing I can suggest - is it possible to transfer your credit card balance onto another card that offers 0%. That way all your repayment will come off the balance and thus bring it down quicker.

I'm sure the other bods will be along shortly and offer some more advice.

I know they'll probably want to know what your APR's are on your debts as well.

Good luck

hypno06

Hi there and as said above, well done for getting your debt down so much already.

Now, with a little focus and effort, you will have that remaining £8500 gone in no time.

Definately do the things that have been suggested above, particularly writing down every little thing that you are spending. With regards to your food budget and your "leftover " £117 that is never actually leftover, do take a particularly hard look at these and see what it is you are spending your cash on. I would expect that with a little more budget planning, you could put a bit away to safely cover the repairs to the car etc when they arise, petrol etc and have an emergency contingency fund of about £20 for real emergencies (try and play a game of how long can you last before you break into that £20 - it gets to be addictive, honest!) and you may well find that you can easily salvage another £100 to £150 to go off your debt each month.

Now go back to your snowball and edit it to show the difference in the amount of time it will take to clear your debt if you throw that extra £100 or £150 at it. For me the difference in those dates is the biggest motivator!! (ok, I know I am sad, but it works for me!).

Sorry, have rambled, but I think you are doing well, room for improvement but you will get there much quicker now you are on these boards!

findingmyownway

do you not pay mortgage/rent, council tax, house insurance etc. what about bday/xmas presents, hair cuts etc. Have a look at southernscousers sticky for more info on complete SOAs.


well done for getting this far!

afield23

findingmyownway wrote: »

do you not pay mortgage/rent, council tax, house insurance etc. what about bday/xmas presents, hair cuts etc. Have a look at southernscousers sticky for more info on complete SOAs.


well done for getting this far!

My parnter pays the rent and i generally pay the bills and food as i earn more than she does, etc. With regards to haircuts i shave my own head so that's free! , birthday / xmas presents tend to come out of what i have left or i conveniently forget;)

Thanks for your reply, i am going to amend my SOA so that it is more detailed.

afield23

With regards to reply's to my post, i am going to put more detail into my post:


Total Debt £8537.51

Alliance & Leicester Loan £4995.05 APR 8.9%

Egg Loan £2127.93 APR 10.9%

Alliance & Leicester Credit Card Balance £1414.53 APR 16.9%



My monthly outgoings are as follows :


Income (after tax and deductions) £1075.00




Food £240

This is average as we tend to go shopping every 10 days and spend about £80 for two of us - i realise some people spend alot less but this includes everything from the supermarket including household cleaning and pet food, etc. I am going to monitor food spending more closely to see how much i can save here, but i do eat alot as i do a manual job, i cycle 10 miles a day and use alot of calories!!

Council Tax £95.00

BT (broadband, line rental, call charges) £40.00

This tends to fluctuate between £35 and £45, i cannot migrate to another package as it is a contract. It is the cheapest package and gets ALOTof use, but once this contract ends i intend to change!

Mobiles £35.00 (partner's)
£25.00 (mine)

I use my phone alot at work and get plenty of free minutes so i never go over the £25. My partner's phone was a birthday present, she wanted the phone and she is diabetic so i wanted her to have one she can use all the time.

Gas £41.00

This is British Gas and they decide how much i need to pay to clear arrears and pay the bill.

Electric £89.00

This is British Gas and again they decide how much i need to pay to clear arrears and pay the ongoing bill.

TV license £11.00



I don't have a car or house insurance, my credit card was stopped years ago and i currently pay the minimum each month. I would rather pay my large loans first then once they are gone hit the credit card hard and clear it fast.

I am also in the process of claiming £800 bank charges from Alliance & Leicester, however they conveniently sent a letter which never turned up!! Watch this space on that one, they are stalling!!


Any help / ideas would be great!!

art_student

afield23 wrote: »

Food £240

This is average as we tend to go shopping every 10 days and spend about £80 for two of us - i realise some people spend alot less but this includes everything from the supermarket including household cleaning and pet food, etc. I am going to monitor food spending more closely to see how much i can save here, but i do eat alot as i do a manual job, i cycle 10 miles a day and use alot of calories!!

Honestly, you can get this figure down alot. I used to spend about that amount for me and my hubby but I have found that with a bit of planning - work out what meals to have during the week then buy the ingredients for those meals only. Check what you have in the cupboards/fridge/freezer first eg. if you have sausages, flour and milk, buy eggs and have toad in the hole one night. I also find it helpful to do a weekly shop so I can plan week by week. It's really not too hard once you get started. Also my hubby also does a manual job and cycles and he takes sandwiches and he hasn't starved yet!;) Give it a go! set yourself a challenge of £40 for this week's shop then you can maybe reduce that after you get more used to it! One way to see how much you will spend is to go on your supermarket's website and enter your items on the online shopping first - this will give you a good indication of how much the shop will be. Good luck, I know you can do it!

afield23

:cool:

hypno06 wrote: »

Hi there and as said above, well done for getting your debt down so much already.

Now, with a little focus and effort, you will have that remaining £8500 gone in no time.

Definately do the things that have been suggested above, particularly writing down every little thing that you are spending. With regards to your food budget and your "leftover " £117 that is never actually leftover, do take a particularly hard look at these and see what it is you are spending your cash on. I would expect that with a little more budget planning, you could put a bit away to safely cover the repairs to the car etc when they arise, petrol etc and have an emergency contingency fund of about £20 for real emergencies (try and play a game of how long can you last before you break into that £20 - it gets to be addictive, honest!) and you may well find that you can easily salvage another £100 to £150 to go off your debt each month.

Now go back to your snowball and edit it to show the difference in the amount of time it will take to clear your debt if you throw that extra £100 or £150 at it. For me the difference in those dates is the biggest motivator!! (ok, I know I am sad, but it works for me!).

Sorry, have rambled, but I think you are doing well, room for improvement but you will get there much quicker now you are on these boards!

Is Norwich full of debt?? I'm from Norwich too, thanks for your reply, i have been playing on the snowballer.... if only i earned enough to make it work! Thanks for your support

hypno06

afield23 wrote: »

:cool:


Is Norwich full of debt??

Probably partly due to the incredibly poor wages that get paid in this part of the world?

One day, someone on these boards is going to recognise me and I will either be dead embarressed or actually relieved that they are in the same boat

Keep going with the debt busting, the end is in site, then you can treat yourself to a day out in Yarmouth to celebrate.....(hmmm...)