Wake up call time

honey10

I think getting work expenses back should be a priority, because thats your money you're spending, that you shouldn't have to.

Is there any way to prepay your contact lenses to make them cheaper? Also, is Simply Health reimbursing for your dental treatment at all?

I had a bit of a think, and you may be able to reduce your grocery spend, for both home and work. It may be worth investing in a slow cooker, to do some batch cooking that you could freeze. Maybe try soups, pasta dishes etc that you could take to work?

Well done on trying to cut drinking down, good for both pocket and health :-)

I missed where your dad bought it for you, it was just a thought, for instance if you had an expensive car that was costing more to run etc etc

Now that mum is home more, could you maybe arrange with friends/her that you each have a month that one week you go to each others home?

Katzen

This is a good start Broke Kitty, you are now on the right track.

Reading what you say about meeting mates in the pub, I can totally understand that, but as you are going to see them (for the sake of your sanity) and not to get drunk then driving there and staying on the soft drinks sounds like a sensible compromise.

Your boyfriend will just have to accept these changes quite frankly. He can not insist on going out and then insist on your spending money you don't have, so he either needs to agree to cut back, agree to pay himself (and don't let him talk you in to 'borrowing' money from him for dinners out as that is not helpful) or he can do one!

You still have over £130 a month in your food budget, can you not make lunches out of the £90 grocery shopping? As someone else said, cooking batches of soup or dinners you can take in leftovers of will barely cost you anything. Visit the Old Style board (or maybe it's debt free wannabe) and find the 'take you lunch to work' thread for loads of ideas

Happier_Me

Hi there

I keep looking at the apr of 22.8% on your loan and wondering if there is a way to shift this debt onto an interest free credit card without incurring lots of bank fees etc. You will obviously need enough 0% credit to do this and this might be a problem considering your debt is relatively high compared to salary (and you may be taking on more debt for dentistry work).

I hate seeing those double digit apr's - it might be worth looking into whether this is feasible or not (without incurring lots of bank fees).

Good luck

bouncydog1

Please think long and hard before having a denture to save money. Nothing is as good as your own teeth. Speaking from experience as I lost my front ones in a car accident. Had to have denture whilst healing was going on but then had bridg which is much better.

On the boyfriend front you need to stand up to him as it seems all his way at the moment - do you run him about by the way in your car?

tallyhoh

Have you thought of getting the tooth extracted & an implant put in? or have you looked at other dentist costing's? £5000 seems an awful lot for the work you are describing.

Broke_Kitty

harrys_dad wrote: »

Well done OP, you are getting there. Have you considered showing this thread to your boyfriend this weekend?

I just had a chat to him on Friday and explained my new budget means I can't really afford to be eating out and drinking so much. I also told my friends when I was out that I was spending no more than X amount that night, and added up how much I was spending as I went. Once I'd had a few drinks I just stopped! It worked really well. In total this weekend I have spent £15, when it would normally be closer to £30 or £40 depending on how much I drank, whether I got takeaway etc. I guess there are people who wouldn't spend £15 a weekend, but for me that's a really big improvement.

honey10 wrote: »

I think getting work expenses back should be a priority, because thats your money you're spending, that you shouldn't have to.

Is there any way to prepay your contact lenses to make them cheaper? Also, is Simply Health reimbursing for your dental treatment at all?

I had a bit of a think, and you may be able to reduce your grocery spend, for both home and work. It may be worth investing in a slow cooker, to do some batch cooking that you could freeze. Maybe try soups, pasta dishes etc that you could take to work?

Well done on trying to cut drinking down, good for both pocket and health :-)

I missed where your dad bought it for you, it was just a thought, for instance if you had an expensive car that was costing more to run etc etc

Now that mum is home more, could you maybe arrange with friends/her that you each have a month that one week you go to each others home?

I'll put in an expenses claim form at the end of this month, I should get quite a bit back! Straight to the debts

I pay for my contact lenses monthly with Specsavers, and with that I get free eye tests, and a big discount on glasses. I dunno if I'd be better off buying them elsewhere? I dunno what I would do when my vision changes though, I know there are lots of sites online that sell contacts but I guess I'd need to go for eye tests still. Might be something to look into.
Simply health do pay back dental fees to a certain limit, it's only a few hundred pounds though. I'm starting to debate the benefit of having the insurance really, if you think about it in terms of how much I pay for it versus the benefit of being able to claim back a few hundred quid... which I still have to find in the first place before I can get it back... I dunno, maybe that £23 a month would be better spent elsewhere.

I do actually have a slow cooker which I bought last winter but didn't have much luck with... I somehow managed to make a pot of uncooked veg despite pre-heating it and leaving it for 8 hours on the hot setting. Baffled me. I did have some success making spag bol though, so I've picked up some end of the day reduced mince meat and I'm gonna give that a bash to take to work. I do struggle to cut down on grocery spend because it's not just for me, it's between me and my mum, I live with her rent free so I definitely can't grumble about buying the groceries! I do the vast majority of my shopping at aldi, though.

Katzen wrote: »

This is a good start Broke Kitty, you are now on the right track.

Reading what you say about meeting mates in the pub, I can totally understand that, but as you are going to see them (for the sake of your sanity) and not to get drunk then driving there and staying on the soft drinks sounds like a sensible compromise.

Your boyfriend will just have to accept these changes quite frankly. He can not insist on going out and then insist on your spending money you don't have, so he either needs to agree to cut back, agree to pay himself (and don't let him talk you in to 'borrowing' money from him for dinners out as that is not helpful) or he can do one!

You still have over £130 a month in your food budget, can you not make lunches out of the £90 grocery shopping? As someone else said, cooking batches of soup or dinners you can take in leftovers of will barely cost you anything. Visit the Old Style board (or maybe it's debt free wannabe) and find the 'take you lunch to work' thread for loads of ideas

Like I mentioned above, the grocery shopping is for two people, not just me, so I dunno how much to cut back there really but I can try. I will definitely be having a look for that thread! Like I say, I used to be really good about taking my dinners to work, I just got lazy.

I know it's difficult to judge a situation from snippets of information on the internet, I feel like everyone is getting completely the wrong impression of my relationship haha. I don't mean that in a bad way, but yeah. He's pretty wonderful, and I am very happy with him. He's not some tyrant forcing me to spend money, we've just got into a routine where we go out, we go get food together etc, and I know that he likes to do that and can afford to himself. We both like to do it, and I understand why lots of people are saying 'well he should foot the bill' but not all relationships are like that, we both pay our own way completely, and to be honest I've never felt comfortable with people paying for everything for me anyway.

He understands that I'm on a budget now, I've always just pretended to myself that I can afford to live like everyone else because I can just get things on my credit card. Obviously everyone else's normal lifestyle doesn't include £400+ a month on minimum payments because they've been silly and got themselves into a load of debt, it's hard for them to see the problem but it doesn't mean they don't mean well. He understands my budget, and he might not like having to stop doing the things he likes with me like going for a meal out every week, but he isn't gonna flip out at me or anything, he'll just be a bit disappointed because it's something he looks forward to.

When you both only get two days a week to spend with your friends, I don't think it's realistic to expect that someone would just drop seeing their mates to sit in and watch a film with their girlfriend because she's broke. He needs to see his friends as much as I do mine, and he wouldn't enjoy being forced to do that at all so I wouldn't expect it of him! We do chill out together, and normal couple stuff, but not at the expense of missing out on seeing mates! We're both very social creatures, you can probably tell haha.

If I were to sit at home because I'm poor, everyone else wouldn't change their social agenda just for me, we're a big group and meeting in the pub just makes sense! I think my new compromise and making sure I only spend a certain amount will mean everyone can be happy. It's all about finding a good balance!

strandedinaber

I think you're doing great! For me it's all about sustainability. You might be able to cut out meals out our the pub entirely for two months but on the third you'll be right back there. Keep budgeting for pub nights out, look on groupon or for vouchers for cheap meals out and stick to your budget and then it will last

Broke_Kitty

maharani_m wrote: »

Hi Broke Kitty

I appreciate it is hard to reverse the situation but it is possible and you are making good progress, so well done on that.

One suggestion to decrease the amount of money spent drinking out would be to turn up later in the evening and only drinking soft drinks - so you see your friends but have less drinking time and save money by drinking soft drinks.

To decrease your meals at work - are you able to take food from home instead?

To decrease your grocery spend - try buying in bulk, for example rather than buying enough dry pasta for one week, buy a bigger bag that will last two months say. This gives a small saving at the time but it all adds up as time goes on.

Your boyfriend, unfortunately, sounds extremely selfish. He should be helping you out of this situation not creating more issues by restricting your ability to get yourself out of this mess. I would question if he's worth the time and effort if he can't see the bigger picture - in the long term, this will affect him and it is best for both of you to sort this out sooner rather than later. He should not be 'lending' you money, he should be picking up the costs or not going out to cinemas, etc.

I do usually go out quite late anyway, about 9 or 10 usually where everyone else is out from 6 or 7! Me and my boyfriend share a taxi in to save money, and have a few drinks before we leave to save money too. If I'm driving half the time now that's even more money saved!

I'll definitely be taking dinners to work again as of tomorrow, I just fell off the wagon there due to laziness, I used to be very good. In terms of grocery spend I don't really eat things like pasta etc, I mostly eat fruit and veg and meat, which obviously spoils quite quickly, but I am looking into cooking big batches of things to freeze, we recently inherited a second fridge freezer so I have tons of space in the freezer for lots of frozen meals!

See my post above re my boyfriend, I think everyone's being a bit harsh haha. He obviously knew I was in debt, but if I haven't changed my spending habits that's not his fault, I've been ignoring it and not really pushing to change anything. I know everyone seems to think going dutch is a terrible thing but imo that's a bit of a traditional view of a relationship, especially for people who don't even live together! I really appreciate him lending me money to fix my car when it's two weeks til payday and I would have to be carless otherwise (public transport is a very very expensive joke around here) and I would NEVER expect him to foot the bill. Or anybody else. I feel bad enough that my dad bought me my car, and I intend to pay him back one day and he's family!

Happier_Me wrote: »

Hi there

I keep looking at the apr of 22.8% on your loan and wondering if there is a way to shift this debt onto an interest free credit card without incurring lots of bank fees etc. You will obviously need enough 0% credit to do this and this might be a problem considering your debt is relatively high compared to salary (and you may be taking on more debt for dentistry work).

I hate seeing those double digit apr's - it might be worth looking into whether this is feasible or not (without incurring lots of bank fees).

Good luck

I did actually want to do this, but I applied for the Virgin money transfer card and although I got accepted I didn't get a high enough credit limit at all, unfortunately. I guess because of my high amount of available credit. I don't know enough about credit ratings to know when it would be okay to try something like that again, how long I should wait etc, but that high APR is really bugging me too. I rang up and asked them if I could negotiate a lower APR and they said unfortunately if I refinanced the loan the APR would actually go UP.

I do keep seeing an offer for a 5% loan with M&S for existing card holders (which I am, although I've balance transferred said card and it's now paid off). I wonder whether it would be worth applying for that and paying off my Lloyds loan, or whether I need to wait.

I'm also waiting to hear back about a PPI claim I've made, I don't know whether I will get anything or not, but if I did, I could throw that at the loan and at least knock it down a bit. I don't know if you get penalties for paying off chunks. I really have been so financially ignorant til now, I horrify myself.

bouncydog1 wrote: »

Please think long and hard before having a denture to save money. Nothing is as good as your own teeth. Speaking from experience as I lost my front ones in a car accident. Had to have denture whilst healing was going on but then had bridg which is much better.

On the boyfriend front you need to stand up to him as it seems all his way at the moment - do you run him about by the way in your car?

I know, I am a bit loath to not get the best possible treatment just to save money. I'm told that redoing the root canal for £800+ would be quite a bad choice though, as it's likely to not work anyway and then you've just wasted £800+ and need to still spend money to get extra work anyway. I thought perhaps a denture until I'm out of this mess and can afford an implant? I need to figure out what will work best with my existing invisalign treatment too.

I don't run my boyfriend around no, he pretty much does all the driving when we're together.

Broke_Kitty

tallyhoh wrote: »

Have you thought of getting the tooth extracted & an implant put in? or have you looked at other dentist costing's? £5000 seems an awful lot for the work you are describing.

I did specify in my previous posts that I am being referred for an implant, but that will cost £2000. That is less than I was quoted by a private dentist. I think it's pretty standard. So a denture would be cheaper. I am already a quarter of the way through my invisalign treatment.

strandedinaber wrote: »

I think you're doing great! For me it's all about sustainability. You might be able to cut out meals out our the pub entirely for two months but on the third you'll be right back there. Keep budgeting for pub nights out, look on groupon or for vouchers for cheap meals out and stick to your budget and then it will last

Thank you! I agree, I don't want to restrict myself in ways that are going to make me miserable and not be realistic, and fall off the wagon. Still doing the things I do now, but spending less on them seems to be a good way forward. If I wasn't so health conscious I'd probably opt for a £2.50 bowl of chips and cheese at wetherspoons instead of my usual steak and salad (we go on Steak night, so there's always a deal on). I don't actually like chips though, hah. I am considering switching to the 'beer and burger' deal instead as it's a few quid less (and I can still swap the chips for salad).

Broke_Kitty

Made spag bol for work in the slow cooker overnight! It is delicious, although I put courgettes in it and they haven't cooked... maybe my slow cooker is a bit rubbish, because I put it on high for the first 3 hours then turned it on low all night.

Whatever, I can deal with a few undercooked courgettes, and that's this week's dinner for work sorted