Debt Free in 2015 - Who's with me?!?!?!?

the_storm_fisherman

Hi all
well another week goes by and another week closer to debt free

boy was it a cold walk today a 10.5 mile hike:) along the sea shore
loads of birds about but the other wildlife i think were all at home in the warm where perhaps i should have been.
anyway it was good to get out in the snow.

A good week on the weight-loss front 2 lb lost diet going well but i still have a battle with the dreaded chocolate.:(

[Deleted User]

Well done on the weight loss & the debt busting.

I wish I got paid fortnightly just so that I could pay off more debt!!

Dxxx

the_storm_fisherman

Hi all
well another week goes by and another week closer to debt free

boy was it a cold walk today a 10.5 mile hike along the sea shore
loads of birds about but the other wildlife i think were all at home in the warm where perhaps i should have been.
anyway it was good to get out in the snow.

A good week on the weight-loss front 2 lb lost diet going well but i still have a battle with the dreded chocolate.

the_storm_fisherman

castlelough wrote: »

Thanks for the welcome Dolly! :A
I get paid fortnightly, and was just paid on Thursday. Apart from the regular (low) repayments I have to make on my debts I don't think I will manage to pay off much extra this fortnight.
I'm hoping to reduce my OD by another €25. It isn't costing me as much as my other debts but I feel like it is the one within the closest reach. I would love to just clear it entirely. When I say 'pay' a bit off I mean that I reduce the OD limit, so I have budgeted to get by on less that fortnight and can stay within the OD allowance.

I have had this facility since forever, and I wonder if I got rid of it altogether would I get stuck and really miss it?
Do you think it is a good idea to aim to get rid of the OD altogether? Or should I just try to get it down to €100 or €150.


On the weight-loss front: I am down 2.5 lbs this week! :j
So delighted with this! I have been using the MyFitnessPal free app and it has really helped me realise just how many calories I was consuming before....So that brings my weight loss to 5.5 lbs!!! :j:j

Hi castlelough

welcome to the forum well done on the weight-loss front:A

as for the OD from my point of view with help from the bank i reduced mine and have not had one since May :Dlast year i dont miss it because it was just another form of credit card only with very small interest and minimum payback but i have now learnt to budget more effectively as i am contractor i had no choice as i am paid weekly with no holiday pay or sickness pay IE no work no pay

The apps on the iphone are a big help with things and a lot are free :cool:

Debtbusterintraining

Hi all,I'm not very good at posting regularly but I have been reading. Well I must fess up that I have gone against everyone's advice and consolidated my debts. I now have cleared and closed my 3 CCs and have one loan now of £25000. Now I was paying about £1100 to the debts each month and the interest was huge so now I am paying £550 per month to the loan. The loan is over 5 years but I want it gone in 3 years so I have opened a limited access savers account and will pay £400 a month into this so that in 3 years time they will be enough to pay the loan early. So I haven't borrowed any extra and I hopefully will save a fortune in interest.

the_storm_fisherman

Debtbusterintraining wrote: »

Hi all,I'm not very good at posting regularly but I have been reading. Well I must fess up that I have gone against everyone's advice and consolidated my debts. I now have cleared and closed my 3 CCs and have one loan now of £25000. Now I was paying about £1100 to the debts each month and the interest was huge so now I am paying £550 per month to the loan. The loan is over 5 years but I want it gone in 3 years so I have opened a limited access savers account and will pay £400 a month into this so that in 3 years time they will be enough to pay the loan early. So I haven't borrowed any extra and I hopefully will save a fortune in interest.

Hi there
the only problem i can see in doing that is

A, as long as you save and pay the debt early thats OK and

B, the penalty charge for paying the loan early if there is one? that is lower than the interest cost you would have paid on the old debts?

if you do pay it of early think of the satisfaction of getting one over the greedy banks for once:D

castlelough

Thanks for the welcome Stormfisherman, and for sharing your experience of life without the overdraft! I am going to keep chipping away at it until it is gone. I think I am the type who will spend whatever disposable income there is (unless it has been siphoned off into a savings account) and will probably alway be into my OD by the time payday comes around. My finances will look more stable to the banks if I amn't regularly dipping into the OD. It is just a bit like a security crutch though!!! I feel afraid to be without it!! It wasn't ever costing much in interest, BUT I relied on it completely and I never realised how bad that made me look to the mortgage assessors.:( It is lovely to get paid now, and for the money to actually be mine (at least for most of the month anyway! )

Debtbusterintraining - Everyone has to make their own choice about what will work best for them. I know I wouldn't have that discipline to keep saving the extra £400 in the separate account, or if I did, it would end up being dipped into for something else - a holiday, car repairs, Christmas etc etc. But I bet you are feeling a huge sense of relief right now, to have cut out all the expensive interest you had been paying on the credit cards - well done on that, and stay strong on your mission!

[Deleted User]

I consolidated once before but made the mistake of maxing out my CCs again!!

I know for me this is not a good option but if you are strict with yourself about the saving then yeah of course you can achieve that goal - Best of luck to you & you can keep us all posted.

Dxxx

PRINCESSX87

Hi everyone.

I haven't been on the thread for a few days because loads have changed since i asked to join a few weeks ago. I managed to loose my new job before i even started it This has made scrap to the plans we had about becoming debt free.

My employer found out she was pregnant and was having some serious health issues so was advised to NOT work until after the birth.
However, She was lovely enough to send me 2 cheques. One was a week's worth of wages i would have had. The other was to continue with the training she put me on, So i had the money to pay for it.

So now its a simple case of re looking at the plans & hope & pray something else will pop up.

Hope everyone else is well....

Debtbusterintraining

I think I have learned my lesson from being in so much debt this time last year that I am determined that I will not be racking it back up again. Last year I scrimped and scraped and was generally miserable and I will not allow myself to go back there. My long term goal is for us to move to a bigger place and I need to clear this debt if I am ever going to achieve this. I have learned a lot about myself and money management in the last year and I hope that by hanging around here will keep me on track. The savings account is with a building society in the next town,no Internet facilities and limited access with 2 signatures required to reduce the temptation of withdrawing anything from it before the 3 years,there is an early penalty fee for paying back loan but it is only 58 days interest so I have done my calculations and still way cheaper than the interest I was paying on the CCs.
Princess- so sorry to hear about your job,hope something turns up for you soon.