Catriona's Credit Card Countdown

bellevie

Happy new year to you Catriona!


Hope your hangover clears quickly

Rebecca01

Happy New year Catriona.

Yay on the lodger front. Sorry to read about the boy but if theres no chemistry then you have done the right thing xx

AspiringButAnxious

Happy new year! Hope the new lodger turns out to be fabulous and stress-free

beanielou

Have a fabarooni 2016

Orange_Ena

Happy new year Catriona

Great news about the new lodger......hope she turns out to be a good one. Can't be much worse than the last one though I guess?!

Sorry to hear you had to end things with that guy. New year, new opportunities. Wishing you a brilliant year

clearmydebts

Happy New Year Catriona. Agree with the others about that fella. You're right to nip it in the bud if there's no chemistry!

catriona79

So, it looks like lodger is in, we sign tomorrow night. L1 on board as well.

When I first arrived back from Xmas at home, I looked at my bank account and found out that L1 had paid me the reduced rent we agreed for when there were three of us living together. This was the trigger for me to advertise the room. It's better for me to have the higher rent, and I think L1 will be thinking of buying soon, and so she should, obviously! She needs to get on the ladder. As for me, I know I won't have difficulty renting her room out at all.

So, very soon I will be looking at reducing my debt, and it will be much needed, as I have spent a fair bit in the sales this year. All good though, and all necessary. Will be returning loads too. So no clear figures as yet, but will work them out soon. I checked my credit card bill earlier today and almost had a coronary!!! will have to wait until the shopping returns clear. At any rate, I've managed to get some cheap work clothes.

Being at home for a week meant a lot of saving on food and going out, and I had the most amazing Xmas in a long time, with mum and dad and grandma and my uncle and his family. Family are so important! I forgot how much good it does you to be around them, as I'm normally so far away.

Right, I think it's time to go to sleep now, so late!!

catriona79

Morning all,

After a week in bed, feeling miserably ill, I've finally this morning got my act together and did some work on the finances.

My credit card bill, with large uni fees and Xmas presents and a new phone before Xmas was rather high. So, I did the old trick of getting a balance transfer. Preferable to using up my savings - to me anyway. Or paying interest on my card!

I got the B@rclaycard which lets you do a BT for 20 months and charges no fee for it. So I'm really happy with that. Also, wonderfully, it gave me a large limit of 14k, so I can easily stick all of my cards on it. And as H@lifax is coming up to the end of the 0% period in March and S@ntander in May, it's a sensible thing to use this card to have all my debt on.

I've already requested and had agreed the balance transfer of £5700 from the H@lifax and £2500 from my regular card onto it. I didn't ask for S@ntander to be transferred too, as thought I'd never get this high a limit. But, I had a nice surprise and when this card arrives in the post and I can activate it, I'm going to transfer that balance onto it, then close down the two old cards.

Yes, this sure brings my debt up again, but means that I don't have to touch any savings or pay any interest. And with the new lodger moving in on 25th, I'll soon be up to speed again.

This month has been very frugal so far. Ever since I boarded the plane home on 21 Dec, I've hardly spent anything, so I am really pleased with that and the fact that there's still 1k in my current account, which is not normally the case at all. So, the earlier overspend will be clawed back partially through that.

I don't regret any of the spends. They were mostly on making others happy and it gave me joy too. I'm drawing a line and will be working on it. I'm sure that I will be debt neutral by the summer, hopefully still by the end of April as planned.

I will update my totals next week, when the credit card situation is clarified.

P.S. Forgot to say that I got £25 cash back for opening the card. Always thinking!

Orange_Ena

catriona79 wrote: »

Morning all,

After a week in bed, feeling miserably ill, I've finally this morning got my act together and did some work on the finances.

My credit card bill, with large uni fees and Xmas presents and a new phone before Xmas was rather high. So, I did the old trick of getting a balance transfer. Preferable to using up my savings - to me anyway. Or paying interest on my card!

I got the B@rclaycard which lets you do a BT for 20 months and charges no fee for it. So I'm really happy with that. Also, wonderfully, it gave me a large limit of 14k, so I can easily stick all of my cards on it. And as H@lifax is coming up to the end of the 0% period in March and S@ntander in May, it's a sensible thing to use this card to have all my debt on.

I've already requested and had agreed the balance transfer of £5700 from the H@lifax and £2500 from my regular card onto it. I didn't ask for S@ntander to be transferred too, as thought I'd never get this high a limit. But, I had a nice surprise and when this card arrives in the post and I can activate it, I'm going to transfer that balance onto it, then close down the two old cards.

Yes, this sure brings my debt up again, but means that I don't have to touch any savings or pay any interest. And with the new lodger moving in on 25th, I'll soon be up to speed again.

This month has been very frugal so far. Ever since I boarded the plane home on 21 Dec, I've hardly spent anything, so I am really pleased with that and the fact that there's still 1k in my current account, which is not normally the case at all. So, the earlier overspend will be clawed back partially through that.

I don't regret any of the spends. They were mostly on making others happy and it gave me joy too. I'm drawing a line and will be working on it. I'm sure that I will be debt neutral by the summer, hopefully still by the end of April as planned.

I will update my totals next week, when the credit card situation is clarified.

P.S. Forgot to say that I got £25 cash back for opening the card. Always thinking!

Evening Sorry to hear you've not been well. Everything is so much harder when you're poorly.

Well done on that super duper balance transfer :T:T And that's amazing you have money left in your account. Do you think YNAB has helped with that? I've actually still got money left too which is amazing. In previous months and years, I've got to the first week of the month (about 10 days after payday) and I've had to scrape the money out of my little savings accounts or use the CC.

And nice little bonus of £25 for opening it. I love free money :T

Have a brilliant weekend, feel better soon

catriona79

Orange_Ena wrote: »

Evening Sorry to hear you've not been well. Everything is so much harder when you're poorly.

Well done on that super duper balance transfer :T:T And that's amazing you have money left in your account. Do you think YNAB has helped with that? I've actually still got money left too which is amazing. In previous months and years, I've got to the first week of the month (about 10 days after payday) and I've had to scrape the money out of my little savings accounts or use the CC.

And nice little bonus of £25 for opening it. I love free money :T

Have a brilliant weekend, feel better soon

Thanks Ena. I'm feeling better now, and hopefully next week at work is going to be ok.

I think your self control with regards to budgeting and keeping on top of your spends is amazing. Very disciplined.
I'm nowhere near as disciplined as you, so I'm having to make up for that in other ways.

I've now totted up all of my Christmas spends and returned all of the gifts that were not needed and also returned a large chunk of my online sale shopping- I did well and got some cheap but smart clothes for work and a few more relaxed. I now don't need to shop until the summer.

It means that, together with uni fees and new phone my CC bill is a humongous £2k :eek: but oh well, uni fees are expensive and the phone was too. It was however much cheaper than getting a contract, and my old phone was useless as it was so old. So sensible(ish) money spending.

I haven't been able to use YNAB since changing my phone, which is annoying. I did some work on that yesterday already, and hopefully will finish it off tonight. I'm going to try and limit my spending now, but on 20/1 my godfather arrives at mine for 4 days and so I'm going to spend a bit more then.

Also, reshuffle with lodger, who politely pulled out (no hard feelings), but had another one on the back burner, so I was able to speak to her on the same day and she will move in probably on same day as old lodger. It was my fault really as I hadn't made it clear that the house wasn't suitable for someone who wants to have lots of guests. Her boyfriend lives nearby and would stay over often and she'd have liked to have visitors stay. The house is just not big enough for that when there's three of us living here; it's at full capacity then. I think it was the right thing to do.
New lodger is much more introverted but a real sweetie. INFP, I think. Very gentle and softly spoken. L1 not keen due to her introversion (she says), but I think it's more her not wanting to share with two people. But she continues to pay me the lower rent we agreed for the period when there were 3 of us in the house. You can't have it both ways...
And she'll be buying by herself soon, and moving out. Six months at most I think.
I have to be careful with L1, because she's a very strong girl, and while helpful and sweet, I have seen that she can sometimes act like she wants to assert herself a little more and that makes me back down on a lot of things. While I want to be flexible, I need to remember that with some stuff I need to do what is right for me, and not what's best for her. This is one of them.

I have to say, that on an emotional level, I got a bit shocked how L1 said L2's introversion was the reason she didn't want her to move in. It really upset me, because naturally introverts have a harder time making themselves liked, but I've never seen anyone feel so strongly negatively about a person just because they are quiet. But maybe that was just a smoke screen, and the reason is that L1 likes to commandeer the living room and TV, and I let her, while another person may make it more difficult. Quite difficult dealing with people at this close proximity, everybody pulling in their own direction.

Back to money matters:

1. Lodger moves in at the end of January, so that means February should be a good month savings-wise. For the moment I've decided not to pay off the cards fast, but carry on saving cash.
2. Meal plan to be done, and eating out of freezer and cupboard till the end of the month, except for uncle's visit.
3. Sunday lunch with friends today, but I need it and it's budgeted for.
4. Finances to be sorted properly once returns get back on my credit card
5. Santander card to be moved onto new B@rclaycard, and following that both S@ntander and H@lifax cards to be closed down.

I have also closed down my P@st Office card, which I had for spending abroad, and which had a limit of 4k. As I don't intend to travel soon, I won't need that one and it means less credit exposure.
I will have to see how all those moves have impacted my credit score.

Have also lent a reliable friend £1k. I will get it back in May/June time and that's fine. I know I will get it back, unlike with other friend.

Think it's time to get up! I may be back with an update at the end of the day, when I've sorted my accounts. Have a good Sunday everyone.