Debt free by 40 -- 19 Months and counting

debtfreeoneday

I haven't been in here for yonks, but you have been doing fantastically! Well done x

misstara

Glad the experiment worked out - that is a great saving

StressedSteph

Morning all,


Thanks for the support after my Lidl trip out. Feels so good to have the meals planned out for the week. I really hate not having the food organised and then having to waste precious fuel tripping out to the nearest supermarket (6 miles) to spend MORE money.

Think my food and fuel budget is so closely linked because we are so rural. So if I am not organised with the food the fuel budget will also suffer badly.

Had an odd morning so far, one of the dads at the school didn't see my huge black truck this morning and reversed into me :mad:, thankfully he hasn't done any damage to my car but he broke his tail light. Heaven only knows how he didn't see me, my car is a Mitsubishi Shogun so not small.

I handed in the order for the school photo's this morning but I decided on a compromise. If I got the cheapest choice for all three photos (2 singles & 1 together) it would have cost me £18, but instead I just ordered the photo with both of them together, which has only cost me £6.

£6 feels so much better than £18. I am comfortable with that.

Got to pay £20 for sons residential trip today but I have budgeted for it so the money is there.

I am feeling quite positive today and have a new resolve to cut out any spending leaks. It felt good with the photo's to look at it more closely and try to find a way to lessen the cost, instead of just giving in to the stupid prices they charge.

Not much is happening today, bedroom wardrobes seem to have exploded this weekend, and I have a tonne of washing to pack away in them. Don't think I can just pile the clean clothes on top, I need to drag them all out and get them organised.

Boring time consuming job but I am feeling like I haven't got any clothes to wear, but I think it is mostly because the wardrobe is such a mess.

So a nice quiet day planning, pottering round the house. I have put socks and a jumper on because its freezing today.

Chilli con carne for dinner tonight so will get that bubbling away at some point today. It always tastes better if it has had chance to simmer for a few hours.

Hope you all have a good dry day planned. NSD 3 here for me.
xxx


Ps. I have added to my signature my NSD's and grocery challenge running total. Will hopefully keep me on track. x

maddiemay

Hi Steph
Will catch up later, but if you have not already seen her diary over weekend you might like to pop over and see DFW321 she has been in the wars:eek:
MM

StressedSteph

maddiemay wrote: »

Hi Steph
Will catch up later, but if you have not already seen her diary over weekend you might like to pop over and see DFW321 she has been in the wars:eek:
MM

Oh no... I'm off to have a look

StressedSteph

Morning Diary,


Balanced YNAB against my bank statement this morning. For some weird reason I have had a refund from Wessex Water for £208. Must have used less water this year. Weird but I'm not complaining.

Unfortunately with October being a tight month and hubbys work looking less than certain at the moment, I haven't been brave enough to pay it against a debt. I have just left it in the account, I won't spend it unless I have to, but it is just nice to have a little breathing room in case someone hubby is working for is slow to pay etc.


I hate this time of year for self-employed builders , we have been really lucky the last few years and always had a big job on that took him through the quiet Christmas / New Year period.
Unless something big comes in, we have work up until the first week in December. We can stumble by until January, but desperately need work for him to go back to after the Christmas break, but people don't usually start calling until their next pay check comes in at the end of January at the earliest.


Fingers crossed a call comes in for some work between now and then. I will be diving on the phone every time it rings .


Just paid Co-op Credit card and L1ttlewoods. Now at 88% of my 10k in 2014 paid off. I just have £1200 to pay off in these last three months, which should be easy as long as hubby's work keeps coming in.


I keep thinking of Plan b's if the work dries up, and I think a DMP would be my only solution. If I could pay token payments to my debts while the work is slow then that would take off a lot of pressure. Time will tell.


Not much else to report. Chicken Pie on the meal planner for tonight. I had better get on with it this morning as hubby likes Cold pie :shocked:, so need time for it to cool down before dinner tonight. Awkward devil!!.


Just paid the heating oil bill of £420 :eek:. The tank is full so hopefully that should see us through until the spring. Really hate paying out that amount of money, but glad I actually have the money, unlike last year. I must keep reminding myself of the changes that have happened.


Will be nice when I am in a situation where I can pay car and house insurances in one payment. I would love that, to lessen my Direct debit strain every month. One day.......


Hope you all have a good day today. Should be NSD 4 for me today. Not planning on going anywhere xxxx

NoOneAround

Hi SS,
I know exactly how you feel as we are in work related to the building industry and it goes quiet in the winter months - and its always nice to have a bit of work to do over winter to get paid in Jan!
88% of 10K paid is brilliant, well done you !!:T
xx

misstara

Great news on the refund from Wessex Water and fingers crossed that hubby gets lots of work over the christmas/new year period.

mfmaybe

It must be very scary having such inconsistent income. I know you are partially doing this already, but for now I'd start putting anything over and above the minimum payments into an emergency fund. The target to get everything paid off by a the big birthday is a date you have set. Yes, of course you want to achieve it; but it's more important to be able to eat, pay the mortgage, and at least make minimum payments when you can. If you get through Christmas without a drop off in work then you can pay a huge lump off the debt at that point.

You have done amazingly well this year already, and so many positives to remind yourself of. Slowing down the pace of repayment at this point isn't failing - it's doing exactly the right thing in your current situation.

StressedSteph

NoOneAround wrote: »

Hi SS,
I know exactly how you feel as we are in work related to the building industry and it goes quiet in the winter months - and its always nice to have a bit of work to do over winter to get paid in Jan!
88% of 10K paid is brilliant, well done you !!:T
xx

Hi NOA


I am always unprepared for this time of year. Like I said, we have been so lucky in past years and gotten away with it, but it would just be typical, at the half way point in my debt busting to get hit with 2 months unemployment :eek:. I fear it would totally blow all our hard work in 2014. one good thing (In a way) is that any lines of credit that I have paid off have been cancelled and closed so no hope of re-spending on them and it is very unlikely with my credit score that I would get accepted for anything atm, (which is good), but also scary as we have NO safety net what-so-ever.


Nothing like walking on thin ice to keep the nerves jangling

misstara wrote: »

Great news on the refund from Wessex Water and fingers crossed that hubby gets lots of work over the christmas/new year period.

Thanks MissT. Fingers Crossed xx

mfmaybe wrote: »

It must be very scary having such inconsistent income. I know you are partially doing this already, but for now I'd start putting anything over and above the minimum payments into an emergency fund. The target to get everything paid off by a the big birthday is a date you have set. Yes, of course you want to achieve it; but it's more important to be able to eat, pay the mortgage, and at least make minimum payments when you can. If you get through Christmas without a drop off in work then you can pay a huge lump off the debt at that point.

You have done amazingly well this year already, and so many positives to remind yourself of. Slowing down the pace of repayment at this point isn't failing - it's doing exactly the right thing in your current situation.

Everything you have written there mfmaybe is correct.


I have been having a big struggle to admit that saving for a bigger emergency fund is a smarter thing to do right now, instead of ploughing it into the debts.


Worry is, if we do have loss of income for a while, it would be such a shame to undo all the hard work or worst still go totally under just because of my haste to pay off the debt and not save anything.


I did decide at the end of September to start putting anything above the minimum payments into a savings account to cover the New Year period. Big problem is that October then turned into a really tight month, and it is now looking like I won't have any extra to put into savings anyway :mad:.


We are pretty much sorted out with savings for Dd's birthday in December and Christmas. So hopefully I can put away abit of money during November & December but I worry it isn't going to be much.


I have a lot of faith in hubby though, we have often had these moments of real panic and something always comes up to sort the situation. Hubby is a good provider bless him.


I always have that fear though that we have come so far. Had the LBM, made real headway, but it isn't good enough or quick enough to stop the disaster happening.
Looking back I have no clue how I slept at night. Chest deep in debt, no emergency fund, no savings, no money put aside for Birthdays and Christmas. How on earth did we get away with it for so long.


I just hope I can get us out of this mess before its too late.
We only need hubby with no work, off ill or the car to blow up and we are screwed!!.


I must have been totally out of my mind to get us in this situation :mad:.

Just got to hold our breath and hope to scrape through without any disasters.

I will definitely be putting anything I can find into that savings account though, to hopefully tide us over. xxxx