Skint Dad's Debt Diary

SkintDadUK

Puzzcat wrote: »

Hi SkintDad,

Loving the blog, and well done on getting your LBM... :T

My only concern is your low electricity/gas figures.. I live in a 3 bed semi and my monthly dd for both are £129 and this doesn't seem to cover the whole annual charge..I have swapped before on the belief it would be cheaper only to be landed with a big bill and ever increasing monthly dd's.... We are reasonably energy efficient, with new double glazing and i'm mean with the heating.... only use TD for bedding/towels and turn lights/sockets off etc...

I'd suggest doing at least monthly readings to ensure you don't get caught out with a :eek: bill...

Good Luck with it all.
Puzz. x

Thank you

I will certainly be keeping an eye on the elec/gas. Although it does seem low we have started to be very conscious of what we use. The heating hasn't been on yet, we limit showers to 3 mins, make sure all the appliances are switched off when not in use.

What I have thought of doing it to take a reading once a week to see what our actual usage is. This way we can really keep an eye on it.

SkintDadUK

Little bit of an update.

We have finally agreed payment plans with all creditors! :rotfl:

Apart from £70 per month for Wonga (10 months left), £5 per month towards a family loan and £5 for Equita, all the others have agreed £1 per month for the next 6 months.:)

The figures did change slightly. The total we owed on the 1st Oct 13 was £40,123.45. The figure was owe as of 18th Oct 13 is £39,290.45. A 2.08% reduction

This was because a couple of the debts were more than we thought and a few were less. Additionally, the money we owed to our water companies have been transferred onto our current balance which we are paying monthly anyway.

So where does that leave us? I have redone our SOA(see below). Based on those figures we now have £86.50 left over per month that we can put towards debts. The task now is to increase our income and decrease our monthly expenditure.

Ultimately we will aim to save as much as we can and clear the debts one by one! Whilst speaking to a few of the creditors they did offer a discount on the total if I could pay a lump sum - this gives me hope that I will be able to do this once our cash has built up a bit.

We have just taken on a cleaning job which will go towards the debt. I will include the figure for this when I know exactly how much we will be bringing home.

I have also been offered a freelance job working for a publishing company selling banner ads across 4 websites - I will find out more about this on Monday.

The following are on my list to do. Some of them can be done now, some can be ongoing and some can be done at a later date.

• Reduce grocery shopping cost
• Cancel Sky TV (still 8 months to go on contract)
• Cancel or reduce costs of contract mobile phones x 2 (contracts run out early 2015:()
• Move to cheaper rental accommodation (current tenancy runs out in June 2014)
• Find weekend work
• Sell anything we don't use on eBay etc.
• Investigate ways to monetise my blog

These are just a few things I can think of which will allow us to achieve our goal quicker.

We have opened a new online savings account and will be using this for our emergency fund. Currently it holds £1.55! Not much but a start. We intend to transfer the odd pence amount every day and have a goal of £500.

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 2
Number of cars owned.................... 0

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 0
Partners monthly income after tax....... 1726
Benefits................................ 134.8
Other income............................ 35
Total monthly income.................... 1895.8

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 0
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 900
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 145
Telephone (land line)................... 22
Mobile phone............................ 71
TV Licence.............................. 29.1
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 21.5
Internet Services....................... 7.5
Groceries etc. ......................... 250
Clothing................................ 20
Other travel............................ 71.1
Other child related expenses............ 16
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 10
Haircuts................................ 10
Dual Fuel .............................. 50
Southern Water.......................... 21
South East Water........................ 18
Hosting fees............................ 9.1
Halifax overdraft fee................... 30
Total monthly expenses.................. 1701.3


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
mbna cc (clarity)..............2308.69...1.........0
equita.........................1868.74...5.........0
home retail (advantis..........2243......1.........0
o2(lowell).....................868.89....1.........0
shop direct(lowell)............877.39....1.........0
santander cc...................647.98....1.........0
santander loan.................6329.6....1.........0
santander od...................2427.41...1.........0
council tax....................879.......1.........0
salary overpayment.............2214.06...1.........0
halifax od.....................1500......1.........0
family loan....................600.......1.........0
family loan....................1000......1.........0
wonga..........................687.56....70........0
mackenzie - wonga..............514.87....1.........0
mackenzie - quickquid..........235.75....1.........0
halifax od.....................448.......1.........0
hastings direct................136.08....1.........0
first response(shoosm..........988.57....1.........0
collectica.....................80........1.........0
vanquis(lowell)................295.32....1.........0
wescot(sky)....................82.04.....1.........0
tmobile(advantis)..............133.42....1.........0
Family loan....................5188.19...5.........0
edf energy.....................700.......1.........0
unique international...........36.63.....1.........0
eBay fees......................74.94.....1.........0
rossendales(shopdir)...........744.56....1.........0
Childcare fees ................701.56....1.........0
Car loan ......................4440......1.........0
Shop direct - lowell...........38.2......1.........0
Total unsecured debts..........39290.45..108.......-


Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 1,895.8
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 1,701.3
Available for debt repayments........... 194.5
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 108
Amount left after debt repayments....... 86.5

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 0
Total HP & Secured debt................. -0
Total Unsecured debt.................... -39,290.45
Net Assets.............................. -39,290.45

Created using the SOA calculator at https://www.stoozing.com.
Reproduced on Moneysavingexpert with permission, using other browser.

The cost of elec/gas does seem low at £50 per month but I will be keeping an eye and will change the figure if need be.

So much for a little update lol.

As least we now know the total figure and can slowly start to chip away at it. £39,290.45 is a huge amount but still achievable to clear by 01/01/17 if we stay determined and consistently look ways to reduce costs and increase income.

SkintDadUK

Been a busy couple of days. Yesterday we made regular Saturday night fakeaway. We had 2 12" pizzas, sticky chicken wings and potato wedges, total cost for ingredients was £4.68 :j:j

Not so long ago we would of though nothing of spending £20 to £40 a week on takeaways :eek::eek:

Today has been spent setting up the standing orders to all creditors. I cannot wait until the 1st when the payments come out. It will feel like we have really started.

Also today we have check our electricity and gas usage for the week. The total cost has amount to £3.46 for gas and £9.68 for electricity.

We popped to Asda yesterday to buy a few bits. I check the receipt later on and claimed a 45p voucher back :rotfl:

We start a cleaning job tomorrow evening which will mean us not eating a meal together like we normally do but we would rather be making some money. The job is Mon-Fri 6pm to 8:15pm. It works out to roughly £250 take home per month which will go straight towards debts. Ideally we want to increase our income by an extra £1000 within a year, by doing this it will go along way to reaching our debt free date goal!

AlexLK

Looks like you are doing really well and that fakeaway sounds great, most likely more healthy too.

Also, well done on the new job.

dawnybabes

Brilliant news, baby steps, each day the end is a little nearer.

SkintDadUK

Not had much time to get on here the last couple of days as we have been mega busy!

Not much has changed since my last post. The cleaning job is going well although OH is shattered by the time she gets home. Hopefully we will be able to split the job 50/50 in the not so distant future!

At the moment it is easier for her to go straight from the day job to the cleaning job. The alternative would be for her to come home and for me to do it. This would be absolutely fine but it would end up costing us an extra £12 per week on travel and I wouldn't end up getting home until gone 9pm whereas OH gets home at 7:30pm.

It is something we have got to look at as it is not fair on her to do both jobs!

We had another no spend day yesterday which is brilliant, we may even set a proper target for November.

Looking in the cupboards we still have plenty of food which compared to this time last month is amazing as we had nothing!

Pay day for OH is on Friday and for the first time I can remember we will have some money still left in the bank albeit in the overdraft!

Today I am going to sort out some paperwork that needs to be done by Friday, I am also going to plan next weeks meals.

We are still looking at lots of ways to earn extra money and we have come up with a bit of an idea. The total amount we owe is near on £40,000.00 which as a total figure is massive and very scary!

What we have been looking at is breaking down the amount into smaller achievable chucks. For instance, instead of saying we need to make £40,000.00 we are said we need to make £400, 100 times!

Now £400 is still not a small amount but It is an achievable one! So that's the plan, make £400, 100 times!

I know people have done this in the past and its worked for them so I can see no reason why it wont work for us.

I am really enjoying finding ways of saving money and cutting back, especially when it comes to meals times. Every Saturday now we have our fakeaway which I blog about. I enjoy making the meals from scratch and then sharing our recipes with others. Both the fakeaways so far have cost less than £5 total and produced plenty of food.

I hope that by writing about our journey to being debt free on here and my blog will inspire people to do the same.

It's not difficult to cut back and stock, the difficultly is getting into that mindset and stop being in denial.

Mara_uk7

So .. £400 is 1% , I saw someone on another posting here making up a chart with 100 squares on it and colouring in each 1% as they knocked it off .. Might be better for you to make up a chart with 100 x £4 squares as you will see something happening faster ?
Even us adults enjoy colouring in

AlexLK

It could be worth you talking to "mum2one" as the breaking down into small chunks is what I believe she is doing. Personally, the thought of making x amount of money 100 (or even more) times is too depressing for me to face but I think we are in quite different situations assets wise.

Why would it take you so much longer to get home from the cleaning job than your wife? Also, in regards to an extra income, this may sound quite strange but do either of you play a musical instrument to a high standard? I earn £25.00 per hour teaching violin and piano as a side income, in Kent it'd be more like £35.00 per hour.

SkintDadUK

Mara_uk7 wrote: »

So .. £400 is 1% , I saw someone on another posting here making up a chart with 100 squares on it and colouring in each 1% as they knocked it off .. Might be better for you to make up a chart with 100 x £4 squares as you will see something happening faster ?
Even us adults enjoy colouring in

I also enjoy colouring

A chart with 100 x £4 squares would see us colouring in every day so we may go with that to start with

SkintDadUK

AlexLK wrote: »

It could be worth you talking to "mum2one" as the breaking down into small chunks is what I believe she is doing. Personally, the thought of making x amount of money 100 (or even more) times is too depressing for me to face but I think we are in quite different situations assets wise.

Why would it take you so much longer to get home from the cleaning job than your wife? Also, in regards to an extra income, this may sound quite strange but do either of you play a musical instrument to a high standard? I earn £25.00 per hour teaching violin and piano as a side income, in Kent it'd be more like £35.00 per hour.

Thanks, I will go have a look. I know it may sound like a tedious task of making £400, 100 times but I know in myself that figure is something we can genuinely aim for when looking at extra ways to make some.

Additionally, it doesn't have to be 100 different things. It could be that we do or try something that will make a lot more than £400 or on the other hand with might not even make £20 with certain things. I think it will be all about trial and error and hopefully along the way we will find some gems.