Savings per month?

4maxine

albertross wrote: »

I notice there are some people in debt who also save..

Whats the point of saving if you are in debt? Pay off the debt faster with any extra money you have, and use CC etc to pay for stuff as you need them instead.

It doesn't always work like that. I am on a DMP and all my regular income is accounted for. I keep all extra money (overtime, ebay, Amazon, etc....) and put it into a high returns cash ISA until I have enough to make a final offer to some of my creditors, effectively reducing my debt my more than I would have if I had simply overpaid by a few pounds. Then the money freed by getting rid of a couple of creditors can be used to pay the remaining ones faster.

Per definition irregular income cannot be relied on so, if I were to up my monthly DMP payments, I would have no way to be sure that I could pay every month.

Dithering_Dad

albertross wrote: »

I notice there are some people in debt who also save..

Whats the point of saving if you are in debt? Pay off the debt faster with any extra money you have, and use CC etc to pay for stuff as you need them instead.

I think that although the common advice is to use all of your money to pay off debts and don't have savings (because interest rates on debts are higher than on savings), this is missing the point that many people get into debt because they do not have a saving "mentality".

Putting a little away each month helps people get into the habit of saving and helps lessen the psychological effect of reaching the end of a months worth of working and scrimping with having nothing to show for it, except for reducing the negative balances of loans.

Ali-OK

I've only been debt free for 2 months and the plan was to save £900 per month. It's not quite worked out like that!

£220 a month is saved for annual outgoings (car ins/tax/service, Xmas, b'days, school hols childcare, etc).

£250 a month is saved in a Lloyds 8% Regular Saver.

The rest should go in my new ISA (once Barclays open it :rolleyes: ), but there are some house jobs that need doing, so I'm picking one a month and what's left over will go in the ISA.

I also skim the odd amount (anything less than a round £5) from my current account at the end of each month into an easy access account, along with the current account interest (usually £2-3). And I save 5p's or less in a pot - when these reach a round £1 I put them in the eacy access account too.

Strangely, I don't feel the need for a holiday this year. No debt, no worries - I'm much more chilled out day to day. There's still the mortgage and the plan is once I've got 6 months salary saved, I will start overpaying the mortgage (probably next year), but I'm not in a hurry.

SarahNeedle1872

albertross wrote: »

I notice there are some people in debt who also save..

Whats the point of saving if you are in debt? Pay off the debt faster with any extra money you have, and use CC etc to pay for stuff as you need them instead.

I am in debt but still save... I'm not quite organised enough yet to save for ins/car tax etc, but I have just seen that u can get stamps from the PO, so I like that idea.

As u can see from my sig, I am saving to pay off my CC that's at 0% as I am unable to make overpayments on my loan. Once the 0% ends, all the cash I've got will come off the balance, then I'll stop saving until that's clear (although I hope I'll have raised enough to clear it completely, that's my goal :-) )

loopylass81

at the moment as I am on an iva i am not saving anything... I do surveys, ebay etc and that is being saved for christmas and birthdays

babes21

Thanks everyone for your replies, greatly appreciated.

At the moment i'm going to put £100 straight into my ISA once i get paid, then if there's any left to put an extra £100-£200 per month in. So hopefully £300+ per month, depending on the month of course.

It doesn't matter how little or how much you save, at least you're going to have something to fall back on if needs be.

immoral_angeluk

All our spare money goes towards debt but from this month we're going to be saving £30 towards car/tax mot which are due in sept...

honey_gem

Although i am in a Trust Deed I have in my Budget money for things like Prescriptions, Car tax, Maintenance, Insurance and Clothes and do put this money away in an account incase for when I need it for these things.

Newgirl_2

albertross wrote: »

I notice there are some people in debt who also save..

Whats the point of saving if you are in debt? Pay off the debt faster with any extra money you have, and use CC etc to pay for stuff as you need them instead.

Not possible in a DMP as you are not allowed credit cards or any credit at all.