The Last £3k

BeckyS

It's New Year's Eve - a good day to set goals.

In 2001 I was in well over £20k debt. I was also in the midst of a severe emotional breakdown because I lost both my disabled parents in 7 months. As a result of this I was on benefits from then until September 2004 when with the help of CBT and medication I was able to get a job. At which point I did a budget and began plugging carefully away at my priority debts and the biggest of the non-priority ones.

So far I've cleared my rent arrears (about £1k), my TV (£700ish - though I was never defaulted on that since it was a small amount monthly), a CCJ (About £500) , some Council Tax arrears (£300ish) and the big loan (which at £15.5k was the bulk of the debt). Roughly another £2k of non-priority debt has gone statute barred in the interim.

At this point my only debt is roughly £3k on two credit cards and is actually quite new. I had a credit repair card and even though the interest is ouch it's still better than a payday loan and I was having a bit of a short term cashflow crisis a couple of years back that I couldn't just weather. Most of the balance is now on another card at 0% until December 2013 but I still have £900 on the high interest card so I'm going to concentrate on clearing that first. I hope to get it cleared by my birthday in May so I can clear as much of the £2100 on the other card by the time the interest kicks in January 2014.

When I get home from my New Year Break I'll start work on my budget but my quick estimate is I can afford to throw about £110/month at the credit cards on top of minimum payments and this will go up as the minimum payments come down.

Things I'm looking at doing to save money.

1. Stop buying tea and cola at work - it's costing me £2.08/day 5 days a week :eek:. We have free hot water machines I'll just have to carry my own tea bags, sweetners and milk.

2. Buy (yes buy - I don't own one yet) a slow cooker and cook a week's worth of lunches on a Sunday. I don't have time to cook next day's lunch on weeknight but I'm dropping another £2-3/day on lunches 5 days a week. This will be good for my diet as well as I'll have more control over the content.

3. Grow my own veg. I have been allocated an allotment (half plot) and it's a jungle. Unfortunately I haven't been able to locate a friend with a petrol strimmer so renting one seems the only option. I certainly can't clea it by hand. I do have a friend with a rotovator so once it's strimmed I can borrow that (I hope) to turn it over.

4. Properly stock my store cupboard. I only have a tiny one but I'm single so it should surfice.

5. Save loose change in a money box and bank and pay off the cards when full. So far I have about £20 in assorted change from 1p - 50p in a digital counter money jar and it's only about 1/5 full (been saving since mid-december). If it keeps filling at this rate that'll be another £100/quarter off the cards.

6. Save £2 coins in a sealed pot. I have joined the £2 Savers Club Challenge I'm not sure if I have £14 or £16 saved at the moment but since I'm not breaking the the pot until it's full that doesn't matter so much.

7. Sort through my vast library and see what books are a: in good nick and b: unlikely to be read again and look into selling them.

I don't know if I can clear all of the last £3k in 2013 but I'm sure as heck going to clear as much as I can. Any thoughts on what else I can do would be gratefully received.

Now how long will i remember to keep updating for?

BeckyS

Well, it's New Years Day, so Happy New Year, everyone!

Should be an NSD as my friend and I aren't even planning to leave the house. :-)

optimistic-mummy

good luck hun you have done really well so far clearing the debt that you have. well done!!! keep up the good work. you sound like you are heading in the right direction x

BeckyS

Buh, checked my credit card balances earlier and realised my last £3k is actually the last £3140.95. Some of this extra £140.95 is me having done my figures wrong and part is the interest on the high interest card having gone on I think.

Anyway:

Card 1 - Current Balance = £1,025.86 (as opposed to £900 as I thought).
Card 2 - Current Balance = £2,115.09 (which is close enough to the £2100 I thought that I'm just going to shrug at that).

I think that including minimum payments I should be able to pay £220/month off these. I've put this into the Snowball calculator and it says I'll be paid off by May 2014 (around the time of my 42nd birthday).

Not too bad, but let's see if I can't do considerably better than that.

BeckyS

You'd think so, wouldn't you?

But that's only true if the money would otherwise be thrown directly at my cards and since we're talking about individually small amounts of coins that come in via my change and that would otherwise be in my purse.

I know th way my mind works and I really would probably just spend it and end up paying the debt off slower not faster (leading to yet more interest).

elantan

Don't rotorvate the plot straight away ... Wait and see what weeds etc you have ... If you rotorvate it it will make the weeds worse ... Are u planning on going organic ? If not get some glysophate and treat the weeds first .. Make sure they are all dead then pull them up etc before starting ... A bit of patience and doing it right at the start will save you soooo much backache

Good luck

BeckyS

Thanks for the advice. :-)

I'm planning on going at least mostly organic (I'll almost certainly slip up wen the cabbage white caterpillers appear) especially since it's a half plot and I don't want to contaminate my neighbour accidentally.

The thing about not rotovating straight away is probably good. I may get tons off weed rpellant fabric instead.

Becky

BeckyS

Not much to report today. Mostly just posting to keep myself in the habit. It wasn't a NSD but I did get another £2 coin in my change.

Can't get to work on my budget until I get home Sunday morning. Will hopefully get my SOA done by the end of January.