Madnessa's Debt Diary & Change Life by Xmas Challenge

GettingThingsDone

good work on getting the debt down! i always have a little celebration when i go under the next £1000 marker - nearly at one now...

gtd

Madnessa

Thanks GTD, it just seems to go so slowly though doesn't it!

I just heard back from Estate Agents and they are giving me back £578 of my £625 deposit. Their first offer was £525 but for the first time ever in my life I haggled.

Great for my learn to say NO resolution

I still think they are taking too much but I want the money as soon as possible so I can pay it off on my CC. I wonder how long it will take to get to me. I will leave it a week and if there is nothing on my account by then I will give them another call. Though I'm sure if it had ever taken me that long to pay my rent to them I have had loads of calls immediately.

chocolatechipcookies

My husband and I started getting veg from the local market and meat from the local butcher. So much cheaper and the meat and veg taste better. You could get a bag full of fruit and veg for £5, easy. This cut out food bill down a lot!

We were also in a year contract with the gym, I am so glad it ended, because we cancelled last month. The annoying thing is we haven't been since before Christmas so we threw away hundreds of pounds. :mad: But we did learn from that mistake.

It sucks, because my working situation is a but like yours. The husband is in full time work, I'm in part time. I'm also going to be taking a part time college course in September as well as having to volunteer one day a week in order to take the course. I'm also going to look into a job I can do one day a week.

RAS

Hi

Just to say, you really are doing very well.

How is OH doing work wise??

And regarding local butchers, out little one gives away the boes and carcasses that are left after he has trimmed of the joints.

This means a chicken carcass with both wings, as he cannot sell them, loads of breast meat still attached and all the meat on the underside. Enough for a good pie or curry for two and bits for stock/soup.

For nothing.

Madnessa

Thanks RAS and chocolatechipcookies. I've found a good fruit and veg market in York where I will be going from now on. Their food looks much better than in the supermarkets. Will try and find a butcher too.

Also yesterday I got two cheques in the post for a grand total of £665! :j That's my deposit back and overpaid rent.

That's going straight on the CC as soon as it gets put on my account. I only took them to the bank this morning so probably won't have the money till next week. i think that will bring my CC to £2685.

My total debt will now be less than £5000 I think.

Still a lot. I will aim to get my CC down to £2000 by the end of August. That's £350 from my monthly wages and the other £335 I will have to scrape together from somewhere.

Madnessa

OH has also found one part time temporary job cleaning which will bring in £350 a month and another job as kitchen porter which he starts on Saturday this is for 5 full days a week. So he should earn about £950 out of this.

I am a little worried about the first job as they insist they need a photocopy of his bank card. I have never heard of this before so I am not sure what to do. We have refused so far and they have all the bank details they need so I think I will photocopy it but cover up all the details except the account number and sort code and his name. Without the long number, expiry date and security number they can't do anything.

Am I being paranoid about this or should I be worried?

Madnessa

Just paid off £805 on my CC thanks to deposit on old flat and extra job. My CC will come down to £2545. Hopefully next monday I will have another £80 to throw at it. But I have no shifts for this week though. But I should have some work for the week after.

My total has now come down to £4776.36 so I am now under the £5000 mark.

I am aiming to get under £4000 next month so I will try to pay off about £800 next month. i have no idea how I am going to do this. I will pay £279 on car loan and £350 on CC so that leaves £171 that I need to get through my other job. That's about one shift a week.

For my health resolution I am now doing a detox lasting 28 days. I should get id of about half what I need to by doing this.

hypno06

Good news on getting the debt under £5000 - I am sure you will meet your next target very quickly!

Also good luck with the detox - 28 days is a long time, so you have all my admiration!!

Madnessa

Had a no spend day yesterday and I'm going for another one today. I have to make up for last week because I only had one NSD. Must have at least three this week. I will need petrol and soem food on Wednesday and then I am going for another NSD on Thursday. Also looks like I will be working this week after all. Just one shift though. But still ...

Am on my second day of detox. This means I did not eat anything yesterday. Just had plain water and today the same again. Feel a little tired but my tummy is much much less bloated:D So that is some good news.

I weighed myself for the first time this morning and I was 66.3 kg. I want to get this down to about 64.5 after my detox and then I will need to get rid of 4.5kg.

Today I will do a search for healthy and cheap receipies so I can keep with the healthy living.

As of tomorrow I am allowed to eat fruit for two days and after that I can add raw veggies for two days. So basically every two days I can add another type of food in. The point is to clean the system and get myself off of all the addictive stuff - mainly sugar in my case.

So far I feel ok, but went to bed at 6pm yesterday and I will probably do the same again today. I will feel better when I can eat fruit again though.

Madnessa

Just had two NSDs this week. Will need petrol today but I am going to try not to buy any food. Then tomorrow will go for another NSD. As I will be working till about 2am this shouldn't be too difficult. Hopefully will not spend on Friday either.

So now my CC is at £2545. My next planned repayments will be:
Mon 23.07.07: £80
Fri 27.07.07: £350
Mon 30.07.07: £40

This will bring my CC down to £2075

So I still need to get £75 from my second job during August to get CC under 2000. I don't think that should be a problem. It's only two shifts and I'm pretty sure of one shift already.


And this morning I weighed in at 66.1kg. Am aiming for 65kg by Monday morning and then I want to lose 1kg per week after that. So my fat free date should be 27 August