Broke Kitty's Debt Diary

Broke_Kitty

I thought I best start a thread here, after getting some great advice in the thread I started in the main Debt Free Wannabe section.

I feel excited for the future, and I've drawn up a spreadsheet with a strict budget, I think I'm gonna implement the 'handbag piggybanking' technique (if this wasn't a thing before, I'm inventing it now) and have different purses for groceries, social etc.

My biggest area of difficulty is definitely my going out budget, and going forward I am attempting a £10 per night out budget (down from at least double that).

I put all of my info into the snowball calc and putting £550 of my monthly income towards my debts (all of one of which are 0% after a bit of a balance transfer juggle at the end of last month) I should be debt free in 23 months!! Even sooner if I can rustle up any extra cash here and there (I'm thinking the 1% challenge sounds like a good idea).

Yesterday I put my old, not 0% credit cards I cancelled into the shredder and it felt good!

I'm looking into ways I can cut back my outgoings even more (cheaper contact lenses, deciding if my health cash plan is worth it or not etc) and build up an emergency fund which is a pretty important thing to have, yet I've never set one aside.

If I stick to budget, and only spend what I earn each month, I know I can do this.

Domayne

Good luck broke kitty! I managed to catch your thread over on the DFW board and seems like you now have a plan I look forward to reading your diary and seeing how you get on with things!

Broke_Kitty

Thanks for stopping by Domayne!

Just found a free site that lets me access US Netflix. £3 a month saved as I was paying for one before! Not a huge amount, but it's going towards the 'rainy day fund'

Domayne

Every penny counts as they say!
How does the US Netflix compare to the brit one? I only just subscribed for a 30 day free trial to Netflix this weekend gone but so far I'm not too impressed tbh and don't think I'll be keeping it after the 30 days are up..

Broke_Kitty

Domayne wrote: »

Every penny counts as they say!
How does the US Netflix compare to the brit one? I only just subscribed for a 30 day free trial to Netflix this weekend gone but so far I'm not too impressed tbh and don't think I'll be keeping it after the 30 days are up..

The US one has a LOT more choice, I wasn't keen on the UK version either. If you use 'Hola Better Internet' extension for chrome (https://hola.org) you can give it a try right now while your trial is still going! It's a free extension

Sometimes I like to switch between the UK and US versions as there are things on the UK one I like to watch that aren't on the US, but very rarely.

Cancelling Sky and getting a £5.99 Netflix subscription was the best thing I ever did. Between that, YouTube, and iPlayer I have plenty to watch! Still have a freeview box too, although the TV has been unplugged for the past year because nobody can work out how to set it up (I'm by no means a technophobe, but it has me baffled).

Domayne

Thanks for the link! I will install it when I get home and have a look through, but the UK one, well the only things I was interested in watching are things I already have on dvd or downloaded on isohunt before they got shut down :rotfl: Most of the stuff they have on there is quite old...and not a very wide selection...which is actually a good thing I guess since I'll save £5.99 a month by not keeping it :rotfl:

Broke_Kitty

There are a LOT of new releases on the US Netflix. I used to spend a lot of time on isohunt but not so much since I got Netflix. It's more convenient than having to wait for things to download, and not that expensive! There are still a few things I do have to er, acquire, but more like once a month than once a day now

Domayne

Aww I used to just download while I slept or was out at work and it would be done, the most annoying thing though was taking forever to download duff files that never worked :mad:
Tbh I do have a few series and movies I could watch that I've downloaded (or bought ) and haven't gotten around to watching but I'm not a huge tv fan and tend to find that I zone out with things that I haven't seen before...Is that weird? 0.o Like I can watch Buffy/Charmed/Angel and the L word every single day because I know whats going to happen, but with things I've never seen I struggle to understand whats going on, I LOVE game of thrones...but don't know what the heck is going on and I've had to rewatch the first episode 7 times to get it :rotfl:

Broke_Kitty

I'm a bit the same, I like to rewatch things and sometimes it takes me quite a while to get into a new series. On the other hand, I only watched the first few episodes of Game of Thrones because I read all the books like ten years ago so I know what happens!

Domayne

haha I like to read a lot, but somehow I missed that series...Or more like I saw the size of the book and thought...eh, no thanks!
At least it keeps us entertained and stops us from going insane on No spend weekends I guess? :rotfl: One of the girls from one of the offices in my building has just come in with a TON of new look and zara shopping bags, Now I'm fighting an urge to go and spend money and really, I'm not even a fan of clothes shopping! Oh dear....I just need a spend day
So what is your plan of how you are going to stick to your budget? I've found mine easy for the last week...but that's because I haven't really gone out anywhere yet...xD Have you managed to get your bf/friends in on your plan?

Broke_Kitty

Domayne wrote: »

haha I like to read a lot, but somehow I missed that series...Or more like I saw the size of the book and thought...eh, no thanks!
At least it keeps us entertained and stops us from going insane on No spend weekends I guess? :rotfl: One of the girls from one of the offices in my building has just come in with a TON of new look and zara shopping bags, Now I'm fighting an urge to go and spend money and really, I'm not even a fan of clothes shopping! Oh dear....I just need a spend day
So what is your plan of how you are going to stick to your budget? I've found mine easy for the last week...but that's because I haven't really gone out anywhere yet...xD Have you managed to get your bf/friends in on your plan?

I think my plan is to physically withdraw my weekly budget, minus £20 for fuel because I can only buy that on card at Asda, and I'm not going anywhere more expensive.

Then I'll keep a separate purse for groceries, and try to plan meals. Using my slow cooker on sunday night was a brilliant idea, so I'm gonna try do that again, get a few work dinners frozen, I'm trying to figure out whether wraps would be good frozen or not. I think it could work!

I think if I have separate purses, if I do my main shop, if there's anything left I know exactly how much I can afford to drop on 'top ups'.

Yep, boyfriend and friends fully on board, as we speak I just finished eating a portion of the spag bol-y type stuff I made on Sunday night, with added jalepenos served with doritos because I don't really care for spaghetti or pasta. I'm going round to his now and we will go to Wetherspoons but I'll just get a £2 dessert, or nothing if I'm too full, and he still gets the meal he looks forward to.