How long does it take people?

antonic

Next month I will be DF, and it would have taken me 90 months.

Not been easy, but I am glad to have done it.

antonia86

Sorry to bump an old thread (it is mine) but I just wanted to say that sometimes looking back can make you feels great just totted up current debt and we are at £16,187.14. Slow and steady, but we are getting there!

Unfortunately I will be taking a pay cut next month - some mental health issues and this will afford me time I desperately need to make allowances for that. But I feel confident we can continue to manage our money effectively and am now really proud at how far we've come.

For an example, I was desperate for a new sofa (old one was £300 for Argos 10 years ago and was actually causing pain to sit on for any more than 30 mins) and though I dragged hubby to DFS and Harveys more times he would care to recall I continually decided they were too expensive and instead we bought a year old one in the colour we wanted for £80 and spent £30 getting it delivered from 20 miles away.

I'm now searching round the house for things to sell, have found a local selling page on Facebook more cost effective than eBay, and every penny will be paying off more debt.

I had, what I consider to be, a proud moment at the end of last week. The car presented with some issues (steering locking whilst trying to turn a corner) and I could take it straight to the garage knowing that we had savings to cover it (only £400) but this was NOT adding to our debt! Obviously we now need to re create the savings but we are getting there!

Muhren

Well for me I hope to be debt free by July 2016.

I had always been good with money up until the start of last year when I was being treated for depression, I started to gamble and it very quickly got out of hand. From my sig you can see the extent of the problem. It is safe to say 2012 was probably the worst year of my life!

I am not gambling and the debt is starting to come down (seems very slowly) and I hope to be debt free in 3 years time and get my life back on track.

quantic

Took me about 2 years to go from 12k debt to 6.5k savings. With a wedding in the middle. Next aim is to save up enough to move house so that we can do so without any debt like the wedding

dreamdreamer

It took me 2 years and 3 months to shed my £16k of debt. But I went properly cold turkey with all luxuries, moved into shared accommodation, went without holidays or gadgets or takeouts or anything fun to get it gone!

I've saved £6.5k in nearly the same period of time since so my spending has gone up significantly since I became debt free, in order for me to actually live somewhere I want and have a life. However my frugal ways have stuck with me. I still buy stuff second hand if I can, I still budget every penny and have savings "pots" for various things. I still use vouchers and coupons and things to make my money go further. That sudden awareness of the value of money will really stick with you and stop you getting yourself into the same mess again.

It sounds like you're well on the road. Keep plugging at it, it's SO worth it!

Firewalker

We paid off £100,000 in three years (well, three years and three weeks but who was counting ). Thing is, we paid it off fast because we were completely focused on it, like a predator hunding his food. I knew exarly how much we owe, how much we have and how much we need.

I still know all this and we are going the other way .

Firewalker

quantic

dreamdreamer wrote: »

It took me 2 years and 3 months to shed my £16k of debt. But I went properly cold turkey with all luxuries, moved into shared accommodation, went without holidays or gadgets or takeouts or anything fun to get it gone!

I've saved £6.5k in nearly the same period of time since so my spending has gone up significantly since I became debt free, in order for me to actually live somewhere I want and have a life. However my frugal ways have stuck with me. I still buy stuff second hand if I can, I still budget every penny and have savings "pots" for various things. I still use vouchers and coupons and things to make my money go further. That sudden awareness of the value of money will really stick with you and stop you getting yourself into the same mess again.

It sounds like you're well on the road. Keep plugging at it, it's SO worth it!

Sounds very similar to me. It just makes good sense to be like that, I don't always do it to "save" the money and not spend it, but if I can get a deal or coupon it means I can buy two things or go out more so why not!