LBM Part 2!!

Tiggy10

So I thought this would be a good place to start!!
Yet again, half way through the month I have found myself with zero money. After having a LBM in January 2011 I thought I had taught myself alot of MSE ways..... Apparently not.

Part of this came from picking up a 2nd job in the summer hols (im a teacher) and being taxed extra on my main wage.

I moved out in April this year, but myself and OH keep our finances separate as we are not ready for the pressure of combined finances. My SOA below shows just for myself and my half of all bills etc.

I sold my car in May as I live a 15 minute walk from work however I would like to save up for something more economical and pay off my remaining debts.

Hope you guys can rip it apart as I have seen so many times before and offer me some help please.

Household Information[/b]
Number of adults in household........... 1
Number of children in household......... 0
Number of cars owned.................... 0

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 1338.27
Partners monthly income after tax....... 0
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 1338.27

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 0
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 325
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 50.5
Electricity............................. 30 on Economy 7 - prepaid meter- cant change.
Gas..................................... 0
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 10.5
Telephone (land line)................... 0
Mobile phone............................ 40 tied into contract until January
TV Licence.............................. 14.55
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0
Internet Services....................... 20 Internet/homephone/BT vision
Groceries etc. ......................... 100
Clothing................................ 50
Petrol/diesel........................... 0
Road tax................................ 0
Car Insurance........................... 0
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 0
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 0
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 0
Contents insurance...................... 4.16
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 10
Haircuts................................ 8
Entertainment........................... 100
Gym........................................ 31
Holiday................................. 0
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Total monthly expenses.................. 793.71


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 0
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 0
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 0

No Secured nor Hire Purchase Debts

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Credit Card....................250.......5.........49.9 credit booster card, paying off in full each month but tend to spend back the limit
Overdraft......................950.......50........0 student OD needs to be 500 by August
Laptop.........................722.19....38.01.....0

wegle

Well according to your SOA you have £451.55 left over after you've made the minimum payments. As you're halfway through the month with zero pennies then this money is obviously being frittered somewhere. Time to keep a spending diary and find out where it's going.

If you can find this missing money then according to the snowball calculator you could be debt free in 4 months! Pretty good going!

Other points on your SOA:

*Emergency fund- you really should put something here even if it's only small. This will reduce the need to spend more on credit should anything unforeseen arise and once the debt is paid this is good financial planning.

*Medical- same as above. We all visit the dentist twice a year, or we should, prescriptions, lemsip etc.

I'm not really going to comment on any cutting back as you have a supposed large surplus and if you can find it, there's no reason why you can't continue to enjoy things like the gym as its not going to dramatically impact the time you can pay off your debt.

So get that spending diary going, sign up to the no spend day challenge to help curb the needless frittering. You'll be DF before you know it.

Tiggy10

Thank you very much!

I need to do this, 4 months really isnt a long time when you put it like that.

Any tips for keeping a spend diary, i have tried in the past but i can usually not keep it up for more than a few days.

wegle

Do you have a flashy smartphone with that £40 contract? If so theres loads of free spending diary apps. I use one, and I also have two spread sheets, one which just lists how much money I spend each day so I can keep track of my no spend days and one that separates the spends into budgets each week. E.g my entertainment budget is £80 for the month so £20 a week. Each week on the spreadsheet I keep track of my entertainment spends so I know when the budget is spent.

Other little tips I do:

*Log onto Internet banking everyday. Even if you haven't spent anything. Knowing how much money you have is imperative.

*Move money that is allocated as debt overpayments to a separate account. This means I can't touch it and waste it but it also means its available should there be an emergency. Note: wanting a dairy milk does not constitue an emergency :rotfl:

*100% challenge. Work out what 1% of your debt is and each time you pay off that amount cross off a box of your 100% chart that you've stuck to your fridge/wall/desk etc.

*Post in your diary everyday. Even if it's just to say no change, the support of other friends you make here will keep you motivated.

*Read other peoples diaries and get involved with them. Find someone with a similar debt level and become DFW buddies.

*Most of all keep smiling!

Tiggy10

yes I have a smart phone, I tried to use an app before but it would only let me allocate the same budget for each area every month, different months have diff priorities.

could you recommend one?

I have my bank as a phone app, I check it everyday which is very useful for me. I also have a separate account for bills as i deal with 80% of the joint bills.

I love the 1% chart idea!

Thank you for all your advice it has been very helpful!

wegle

The one I use is called spending tracker. It has a picture of a brown wallet as the icon. It doesn't let you allocate a budget but you put in your income when you get paid then log each spend and you can either use one of their preset categories or write your own. I always get receipts for everything I buy and put it in my wallet, so if I've been rushed on a particular day I can can go through the receipts when I've got a bit of time and get all the spends logged.

Weird_Nev

just use a notepad style app, then transfer your spending to a spreadsheet at the end of each day.