6 grand in 6 months - my personal challenge!

cottage_retreatist

NinjaSavingKat wrote: »

Oh Cottage_Retreatist! I wish I had started reading your blog before. I have read the first page and immediatly had to write something down. You are doing SO well, your enthusiasm has me hooked and I love the wrangling with the OH that you dealing with as well. You are clearly hook line and sinker on the debt-busting machine and I LOVE IT!

I am subscribing but gonna read more of your thread today and over the weekend. Keep going though, keep pushing as you are. OH will fall into line ( tee hee ) soon when he realises just what you are doing for you BOTH..

You're so super cool I am sending you cyber hugs too... ;- )

hello NSK!!!

welcome to my little hole where I spend most of my time!!! :beer:

I am glad you liked my diary so far! OH is a bit of a stumbling block in the debt-busting battle but every soldier needs their supply chain and he provides (most of the time) the emotional stability and common sense I need to keep going!! Other times I just want to kick him in the shins - if he wasn't 6 ft 2!! :rotfl:

I'm hoping I can keep up my run so far and keep going into Xmas and beyond!!! These next few months are going to start getting a bit awkward as there won't be 'easy' debts to pay off and as I'm waiting on F&Fs I don't want to put money towards credit cards instead and then 'boom - take this or else' comes along from DCAs. and the money si stored up if they don't drop their offers low enough for a single month's allowance.

It's a tricky one but hopefully the key defaults will be sorted by Xmas - that's my goal!!!

drop by anytime! Nice to have new readers/co-crusaders!

xx

cottage_retreatist

HOK3Y wrote: »

Hiya C-R, well I hope your Friday has been better than your Thursday. X Men! Who needs 'em?! Okay, I kinda like mine and it sounds like you kinda like yours so I guess we just need to deal with their charming quirks.....:p:o:D:o:p

Mine just walked in the door to a hot bath and a glass of whiskey waiting for him on the side as I knew he was in for a rough day today......although the universe seems to have shared the !!!!!! around quite evenly to be fair! Was just glad to see the clock hit 5pm!

It's officially the weekend, C-R so a little time to chill and relax. Hope you have a lovely couple of days before more debt busting with the start of a new week! Xx

Hey HOK3Y!

Yep -their charms!! and their giant flaws!! :rotfl: but we can change them right? :rotfl::rotfl:

Last night went well - i did the Wa!trose shop! Spent quite a bit :eek: but you can't take the debt-buster out of the girl!!! Every item was either yellow stickered or on offer (expect for the whiskey)!! Got a meal for 10 quid but got the chocolates instead of the wine!!! So had a camembert baked for starter (supposed to feed 6!!!) and then chicken pie with some veg and then got the OH some gu cheesecakes (half price) and some crips (2 for 2 quid) and some extra veg (yellow stickered)!!!

And the OH was overjoyed!! :j:j:j:j
we ate it all then fell asleep on the sofa - success!!! :rotfl:
even got enough for us for today so today is officially a NSD!!!!!!

my OH wasn't given the whiskey in the bath though - that's the next step!!!

this weekend we're having a furniture re-shuffle so that will keep me busy!
you have a great weekend too!!!

xx

Thrifty_Fashionista

Have a lovely weekend CR, I do love a furniture move about!

TF x

HOK3Y

YEAH!!! Sounds like a positive day in the C-R household! That's great C-R and it is amazing how happy the men can get with the simple pleasures when everything has been restricted for a while! I am always gobsmacked how happy hubby is to find roadkill - I have got him well trained!

Furniture reshuffles are great - a whole new look without actually buying anything new! Plus it counts as exercise.....right...?!

cottage_retreatist

So we are into the 5th month of my 6 month debt-busting challenge so I wanted to re-asses how far I have come so far (and how far I still have to go! ). Right here we go:

in May 2013 I had:
£23,536.27 worth of debt with 17 creditors :mad:

At the start of October 2013 I have:
paid a total of £5,397.36 off our debts and now only have 13 creditors. :j

We pay 8 of those creditors monthly amounts.
The rest are with DCAs we are contacting or have contacted about full and final offers with one hopefully due to be paid off this week (fingers crossed) and another one due to pay off at the beginning of next month.

And the biggest success to date? Today the OH agreed for his 'carp credit' credit cards to be chopped up - 'lets do it tonight' he says - I just smiled! :rotfl:

So aqua and vanquis once they are paid off will be cancelled.

I think we have done well so far! Just wish we could have less creditors.

My regret: paying off the credit cards and then re-spending on them :mad::mad: but I've learnt my lesson the hard way! :eek: Debt-busting needs a level of commitment and a level of sacrifice to make it a success.

The aim? Less than 10 creditors by Christmas (I could knock 3 off - the OH's low-limit credit cards, but we might aim for a big creditor or two (over 1 grand amounts).

Further - we both did 30 minutes of YouTube yoga this evening and we're going to try and turn it into a daily thing when we return form work, later -a bath with a couple of cups of epsom salts! nice!

And to start the month as I mean to go on - today was a NO SPENDING DAY!!:j

My aims/budgets this month are:

NSDs - 1/20
AFDs - 1/31

Food - 0/240 - need to restock the larders but aim is to come in under budget
Tobacco - 0/40 - v generous for OH so hopefully less
Post - 0/10 - for recorded delivery for f&f letters
Car - 123.75/150 - road tax for 6 months and renew driving license (need new photos for driving license :mad:)
Savings: 0/60 - other 100 was put towards car this month.
Xmas gifts - 0/60 - spreading the cost! (hamper details to come! . . . )
charity - 0/3 - fireside canines for retired police dogs this month

OK! Thats as many numbers as I can think of so far!!!!


Thank you all for following me on my journey this far - hopefully the way only becomes easier and the load (fingers crossed) lighter from here on in.

xx

Igamogam

You sound very organised - well done on your achievements so far

cottage_retreatist

Igamogam wrote: »

You sound very organised - well done on your achievements so far

thank you Igamogam!

Hope your debt-busting is charging forward?
xx

HOK3Y

cottage_retreatist wrote: »

So we are into the 5th month of my 6 month debt-busting challenge so I wanted to re-asses how far I have come so far (and how far I still have to go! ). Right here we go:

in May 2013 I had:
£23,536.27 worth of debt with 17 creditors :mad:

At the start of October 2013 I have:
paid a total of £5,397.36 off our debts and now only have 13 creditors. :j

:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:
:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T
:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j

That is freakin' AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Well, well done!!!! Holy cow I would be shouting that from the rooftops if I were so far down my debt busting road! That has to feel good!!!

cottage_retreatist

HOK3Y wrote: »

:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:
:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T:T
:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j:j

That is freakin' AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Well, well done!!!! Holy cow I would be shouting that from the rooftops if I were so far down my debt busting road! That has to feel good!!!

hahaha! thank you HOK3Y!! And congratulations to you for getting under 20k!! :j:j:j:T:T:T:T:j:j:j

I suppose it is good going! but you know how it is - I want to have paid off 10 grand in 4 months!!!!!

haha!!! almost! :cool:

I think I don't see it as being far down the road because we still have so much to tackle but come 31st December 2013 - I WILL be aiming for a debt total of 12 grand! - by hook or by crook!

Bring it on B**ches!!!! :cool: :j:j:j

HOK3Y

LOL! Yeah but you are soooooo much better off now than you were just a few short months ago. I look at my current situation and realize the 3 months prior to joining here, I had an additional $5k+ of debt - and I know that if I hadn't taken conscious steps to reduce it, I would still be in that position with no idea where my money had gone. I am so glad we have changed our ways and our viewpoint. I'd like to think we're seeing clearly now C-R!

Happy to help show those B**ches how it's done......just say the word!