New and bit scared

heartbreak_star

Can you drop a brand on any of the kids' sports kit? Eg white Asda polo shirts instead of expensive branded tennis shirts?

Or try eBay for second-hand stuff?

HBS x

smartpicture

Re the tennis, a few suggestions:

(a) approach his coach and ask if you could have a reduced amount per lesson if you are prepared to book a pack of 10 in advance (for example) or you may have to stop. Your son is not only giving the coach the reflected glory but is also a selling point for his own services that he can take someone to that level and will be loath to lose him.

(b) approach the tennis committee and ask if there is any room for reduced membership costs or a small amount of sponsorship to keep him in the game. At my tennis club (not a very posh one at all) we would do this because juniors are massively important to clubs at the minute and affect the clubs own income directly. Possibly play one club against another to see what they can offer you, depends if there are other good clubs around, no club wants to lose a good junior though.

(c) share some lessons with another child to cut the cost of lessons in half without a reducing the benefit in half - their parents may be only too pleased to be approached with this idea.

(d) if he's playing at a high level, approach a few local businesses to see if they would be willing to sponsor him 'as a possible future Wimbledon player', several firms around our club do this. Even if it's only a few tennis shirts with their logo on it or one tennis racket it saves money. Start with other club members.

Just some of the things that I know local juniors do.

jayss

Have you included the cost of the kids activities beyond weekly lessons? Tournament entry fees, travel, dance shoes, costumes, show tickets? I wonder if those leak your budget somewhat.

Really once you tackle the food shop which you can knock at least a third off and get rid of sky you'll have some breathing space.

Good luck with eBay and the 0% card.

UserX

David72 wrote: »

And thanks eyeopener 2 - yes good points - re the tennis the difficult thing is that my son plays for his county and at national level - he has got so much confidence from it and lives and breathes it so much. And he is rather sensitive and fragile. Am going to try and cut it down along with everything else and see how we do.

Can he get any kind of sponsorship?

How old is he? Could he help out with the club doing practice sessions/light coaching with other members to earn his keep?

DCFC79

Can't see it mentioned OP but maybe look into the phone network Ovivo, if you pay a one off fee ( no monthly fee ) you get so many minutes, texts and mobile data.

PippiShortsock

You're really tackling your debt with gusto - well done!

You probably already know about this, but it appears that Tennis England offers scholarships to particularly talented children:
http://www.tennisengland.com/tennis-scholarship.html

Granariesgirl

David72 wrote: »

Have also taken away Sky sports and waiting to hear re the gas and elec switch. Still cheaper to keep Sky basic package as don't have an aerial and would cost to get one fitted as well as the cost of the freeview box. Will keep an eye on this.

Hi David,

Just popped in to say that we have a Freesat box brought over from France where we had UK Freesat TV. It's hitched up to the dish in our house here & costs nothing to run! I think you can even just use the Sky box if it's yours & put the freeview card in there... worth checking out. :cool:

An added bonus with Freesat is that when the phone people ring up to sell us a TV package I say "we only have a Sat dish" & they usually can't get away fast enough! :rotfl:

Good luck with the debtbusting - you CAN do it! :T

happy_dude_3

Hi David,

I am a long time lurker on this site, and haven't posted before, but I saw your thread and had a couple of ideas regarding your debt. Feel free to shoot down/ ignore anything i say

From your first post you hit the nail on the head - ~£23000 of debt at relatively high APR's is hitting you hard.

Amount APR Yearly Interest Monthly Interest
9983 18.9 1886.78 157.23
3598 23.9 859.92 71.66
6960 24.9 1733.04 144.42
670 18.9 126.63 10.55

Totals21211 4606.37 383.86

These 4 debts are costing you almost £5000 :eek: of post tax income in interest alone (!!). That is a crisis in pretty much anyone's books!

But your in the right place to face this head on! :j

So you need some way to get you spending under control, get rid of this interest payment, and you debt.

There are a few ways I think you can get this down;

1) Cutting back on spending - I would def try and suck it up for 12 months to get your debt under control.

Others will be able to help you with this better than I can, but from your SOA I think you can get this down by at least £500 per month.

The ones I would attack (monthly savings in brackets);
Groceries - Aim to cut this in half - (~£200)
Satellite - Get rid (£32)
Insurance - You have a bunch of these - are they all necessary?! Esp 'other' insurance (£31) Are you over insured ?! life assurance (£25)
Land line - Do you use this? (£10)
Entertainment/Holiday - No shame in saying you cant afford it this year. (£30)
Kids activities - Tell them you need to cut back a bit. Try taking them out to do free stuff instead. (£100)
Elec/Gas - Reduce your usage here. You pay £1750 a year on heating elec, which is higher than national average, try getting this down(£30).
Mum/Dads Debt - Ask to stop payments for a while, explain you cant afford it right now (£50)

If you can do this then that's ~£6000 that can be used directly to hit your debts. You can probably be more extreme on this if you need, but I don't think you would see too much of a 'lifestyle' hit if you were to do these.

2) Car(s??) - Your SOA says you have car(s) worth £8000, and a monthly payment of £234. Include Petrol, tax, insurance, maintenance , and your monthly total is ~£475. Or £5500 per year.

This is a huge chunk of cash - can you look at getting this down? Public transport/ going to 1 car (if you have 2)/cutting down on mileage.

Where exactly are you with repayment of the car? Is it possible to sell the car to get a chunk of your debt paid off? Even handing the keys back may be an option, as this frees up the payment to attack your debts and get a cheaper car.

3) Use your wives credit - its important that she is fully on board with tackling your debts before you go ahead with this!

You have already stated that she would be accepted for a credit card - apply for this, and see what credit limit she receives. You can use this to transfer some of your highest APR debt.

IMPORTANT!! This isn't for new spending - it should be cut up straight away!!

If she doesn't have any more credit, a couple of months down the line she may be able to apply for another card to repeat the process. This should hopefully transfer a few £'000's off your high APR debt. Tread lightly with this one, don't apply for lots of credit all at once as this may make things worse - and DON'T do any more spending on the new cards!

You have said previously that your credit score is good, however you have been refused new credit. This is more than likely because you have too much credit, rather than being unable to pay (If that makes sense). So if you were able to get the amount of your own credit down then your may be able to apply for lower interest/ 0% credit cards in time (tho not until your total credit has come down ).

4) Ebay - You've already said your son wants to help with this - awesome - that's a great attitude. Try and sell some some clutter that you dont use this can hit your debts directly. Maybe £500-£1000 for these.

5) Additional job - Can you get an evening/weekend job to raise a bit of cash in the short term. Overtime/Additional hours at work? This would be an excellent way to tackle your debts quicker.


Sorry this turned into an epic post, but while your situation might seem tough at the minute, you can definitely save it. Within 1 year I think you can have your debt under control (i.e. much lower interest payments) and 2(ish) have it cleared.

Once this is sorted you can start attacking your mortgage in a serious way! Keep this thread up as a morale booster, and to keep you on track. I have absolutely no doubt you can get there, but start taking steps NOW to turn it all around!

Good luck! Ill def keep on reading to see how you get on :beer::beer:

runforlife

David72 wrote: »

Thanks all so much.

Am crying here.

I agree we might have to sell the house and maybe rent for a bit. The house is worth about £290K so we'd make £30K but we've then got to take off estate agents fees, legal fees etc and a rental deposit. And there aren't many places for rent round here - I do not want to move my children from their school. I am seeing a mortgage broker next week.

Stopping the tennis and the gym/ballet would damage my children so much.

I've been through stepchange and they have recommended a DMP - I have asked for the application pack but it looks so scary. I've seen the threads on it too. I don't think I am going to go down that route yet - will try the income reducers and the new 0% card and go from there.

The DMP is SCARY! Absolutely! However after finally plucking up the courage to do it after several months of shall I? shan't I? my only regret is not doing it earlier.

I cannot tell you how much relief there is once it is in place.

Embarrassment? Yes. Guilt? Yes.

I earn nearly £40K for God sake but due to circumstance (and not all my own fault though I am not shirking my responsibility for it) here i am.

As for the tennis? Really think about that. Tennis v Home? May sound harsh I know but when your son is older he is more than likely going to say "you shouldn't have carried on with my tennis dad if the house was at risk". What about a tennis bursary or even sponsorship? Is there a local sports shop that would sponsor him? I remember my brother in his late teens in the 70's had a local car shop sponsor him so he could go rallying! Boys and their toys!

Good luck!

MoneyMission

Morning David. Just quickly popping in to say Hi and to let you know I haven't forgotten that I owe you some meal plans. We've had a hard week this week with a friends husband passing away but I should be back with you soon. Hope you and your family are doing well. Keep us posted. MM