My Diary to Debt Freedom!

MrsSmith2013

Hi All,

Have decided to take the plunge and start my diary to debt freedom!

We recently got married and let ourselves get a tiny little bit carried away with the wedding planning, and ended up having to use a credit card to pay for a large chunk of it. I know this is against what everyone says on here, but the good thing is that it is a 0% for 16 months deal, and we should be able to clear it within around 12 months. The balance on the card is £7,500 (ouch to say out loud).

I've decided that if I document it in here, I'll make sure that we are making regular payments to it, and therefore will clear it quicker. My husband is paid weekly, and I am paid monthly, so we plan to make a payment every week when he is paid, and a payment every month on my payday. I also have shares which I can cash in every six months, so that will give it a boost in Dec/January, and help to blitz it!

We're planning to pay £50 per week from hubbys pay, and then £300 per month from mine, making it around £600 per month (give or take with some months hubby having 4 paydays and some months him having 5) and then with anything extra along with my share money we should remain on target.

We're aiming to clear it within a year, so that if there is anything that comes up along the way that stops us making our planned payments, then we still have 3/4 months of 0% leeway.

Our masterplan is to pay this off, then get our house ready to go on the market so that we can move to a bigger place. All going to plan, we would be looking to move in 18-24 months when our youngest starts school and we can free up some money with less childcare to pay out. We have 2 children, the oldest is already at school.

I hope I haven't rambled on too long, and hope that I will be able to keep up with some other diaries on here too - its a great site, I love it already!

Hopefully chat to some of you soon!

Wildchild_2

Hello :wave:

Good luck with the debt busting and congrats on the wedding

beanielou

Happy shiney new diary
Hope all goes to plan.
Keep posting!

MrsSmith2013

Hi Wildchild and Beanielou - thanks for reading my first diary entry! I'm just updating before I go and get showered and ready for Monday morning... boo!!

Today has been a NSD, my first in my latest DF journey! I think I will keep a tally of them somewhere!

Not a huge amount to report, we got our gas and electricity bills in this weekend. Gas owe us £151 which they are repaying back into our account, which is helpful as our DD will be at the childminders over the holidays as well as our DS. But on the otherhand, the electricity is going up from £74 per month to £102!! That is largely my fault because we got a tumble dryer in a wedding present, which I love. I detest ironing, and the tumble dryer means that half the stuff doesn't need ironing, so it is making my life a whole lot easier, so I'm willing to stump up the extra for leccy.

I've decided that I will keep a check on my finances on a daily basis to make sure I know what is coming in and going out, and a Sunday I will transfer savings to my little savings plan (more on that in a minute!) and on Wednesdays I will make the credit card repayments.

I found this little savings thing on a facebook page (I think) and althought it was in USD I thought I could adapt it to use myself. I'll try and upload a copy of it below, but its basically an excel sheet (and I am a massive excel fan!!) with £1, £2, £3 etc in one column and then week 1, week 2, week 3 in the next. So the idea is, every week from 1 - 52 you save £1 up to £52 on the last week. I thought that it would be too difficult to do the last few months of it if I was saving upwards of £40 per week so I am dotting back and forth between the weeks and am on week three. I thought if each pay week I did a "big" one it would make it easier to do the other weeks.

I'm not sure if that makes sense to everyone, but it does to me! Plus I thought it could also be a little boost to the credit card if we need it at the end, as it will be £,1378 after 52 weeks.

Anyway, I am rambling - must go and get organised for morning. Think I am going to wash my hair and stick in my velcroe's as my hair is a bit bland and boring at the moment!.... Rambling again!!.....

Little-Miss_2

Hi MrsSmith

Good Luck with the credit card, I will be subscribing to follow your progress!
I hope your eldest has finally gone to sleep lol

MrsSmith2013

Thanks Little-Miss, I look forward to following your progress too! Yes she eventually went to sleep about 10pm I think I am going to take her to the doctors, because it is draining, this constant shouting down every night.

Today I am at work, and haven't been organised enough to have stuff in for a packed lunch. I think I'll scribble a shopping list during the day along with a menu plan then hit asda either tonight or tomorrow night.

Have a cheque to pay in to our joint account, which will go towards some of the extra childcare over the summer so will do that at lunch time.

I also need to have a car boot sale. There is quite a big one locally every Sunday so my mission will be to clear out a cupboard or a drawer every night, get the house in order and get rid of some stuff we don't need!

Think thats all for now, have a great day everyone

MrsSmith2013

So today has turned out to be quite a good Monday! Got to work nice and early and got a head start on some spreadsheets I am working on. Hubby called later in the morning to say he'd got a payrise this week and is up £1 per hour, which is fab!! He also has been told that there is a job for a friend of his, and he starts later in the month, which means hubby can get into the office and hopefully more of a managerial role, which will hopefully lead to more money - so its all good on his work front!

Popped to my local asda at lunch time, and got some veggies to make soup for taking to work, and a nice brown bread to take to have with my soup. Will make that tonight along with the tea and I will be leaving my purse at home the rest of the week, hoping for some NSD's!!

Paid a cheque into the joint account today, and got a form to officially get my name on the account. I think I will get my credit file checked before we do this as I don't want my hubbys credit to be tarnished with my bad credit rating. I had worked out that I would be free from some defaults in July this year, so may wait until into Autumn before I check it to give these time to drop off.

Off to make the tea and my soup for work, will be back on later. I'm finding my diary quite motivating, and am looking forward to Wednesday to OH's payday so we can make a payment against the credit card!

TTFN

MrsSmith2013

Just checked the credit card online and the balance was £7,433.83 - being slightly pedantic and daft, I've just paid £3.83 off to round it down to an even number, so we are sitting at £7,430.00.... thats better!

Little-Miss_2

Well done to you DH that's brill news.

MrsSmith2013

Thanks Little Miss! Every little helps as they say, it will all make a difference.

Not a huge amount to report today, I have brought some of my home made soup to work for lunch so won't need to buy food today at work. I have an emergency £2 in my desk as I am trying to stop drinking coca cola, but am struggling. I must drink between 6-8 cans a day, and its ruining my teeth and costing me money! But if I stop dead, I will end up with a migraine with the caffine withdrawls so I am anticipating needing a caffine fix around 11... will slowly wean myself off! Gosh I sound like a drug addict

Moneywise I am desperate to make another card payment, but don't want to go and leave myself short for food shopping. I'll look at it later at home and see if I could maybe bung a fiver at it.

Just want this all cleared up so we can get on with life!

Have a great day everyone x

MrsSmith2013

Well today I am feeling slightly demotivated Can't seem to make any progress tidying the house or writing wedding thank you notes, by the time I get the kids to bed, I am exhausted.

Hubby isn't to happy with me either, because for some unknown reason he was looking at my ebay feedback score last night and noticed I had sold some John Lewis vouchers we got as wedding gifts. I thought it was better to sell these (as I think John Lewis is a rip off!) to pay for a couple of wedding things, florist etc as opposed to asking my parents for more money, or taking a silly payday loan. My plan is once the credit card is paid off, I'll put the money to the value of the vouchers I sold into my savings account for buying house stuff when we move.

He knew at the time I was selling them, but this is a classic example of him saying "Oh yeah" or "okay thats fine" without actually paying attention to what I'm saying! *Rant over*

Haven't made the payment to the card yet today, we'll need to talk later and sort out how much.

I also need to do a food shop, which is one of my least favourite things to do, so this won't be a NSD. Did bring my lunch to work today, so haven't had to buy food so far today... every cloud and all that!

Will try and get back on later on to update with a (hopefully) more positive update.