Debt free by 40 -- 19 Months and counting

Puzzcat

Goodness me... I don't really have anything to add that hasn't already been said, but well done on recouping the money..


Over the years I've been rubbish at being strict about 'losses', as in I've lost my school jumper.. mum buys a new one.. I've lost my english text book.. mum buys a new one... Maybe if I was as strong and savvy as you I may not be in such a pickle now..


So well done.. and I must confess to a little at the lego comment..


Do you have any old junk for a boot fair that he could then assist with and maybe share some of the profit towards his next XBox? or maybe teach him to craft?? Or maybe keeping him away from all electronic goods where you can spend money may be a better plan..


Onwards and Upwards..
Puzz. xx

sweetpea26

Tough week for you Steph, so many emotions raise their head after an incident like this.

Congratulations on acting so quickly and making your son realise the consequences of his actions. He will learn form this. Not easy being a parent.

You are doing so well and you will be back on track in no time. Take care of yourself.

Verbatim

As under 18s can't make a contract in law I wonder if you could get the money back by contacting the sellers and explaining what happened?

StressedSteph

Thank you so much everyone for your kind words.


Maybe if we were not in so much debt, I could have just given him a strict telling off, but as we are scrimping and saving every penny, it just felt that selling some of his goods to cover the cost was the ONLY choice we had.
Quite good in a way, because I am prone to being VERY soft with the children and if we could have afforded it, I would have dealt with it differently. Think this has definitely taught him a good lesson though.


Quite nice to see him using his imagination with the Lego again, hopefully this summer will be spent outside making dens and exploring instead of being couped up in his bedroom staring at the TV.
As you all say, onwards and upwards. He still owes us £88 at the moment but hopefully things will sell on Ebay and we will get that covered.


Nothing much happening on the debt front. Just all of my sons spends coming out of the account at the moment and the Tesco delivery for the week. Hopefully next week I can afford to make a couple of payments to my debts so I can start my April totals moving.


Hope you are all having a good week. I will be so glad when the children break up for Easter this Friday. I need a rest from the school run chaos. xxx

debtfreewannabe321

Morning Steph! *ouch* to the spends from DS My ds2 did this on my phone a little while back but my bank stopped some of the payments going out and put a block on my card thinking that it was fraud (THANK GOD!) They called me up after around £30 had gone out and asked if I had made these purchases to which I was unawares of at the time and so I said no! I've had fraudulent activity on my account before (people stealing my card details and money !) and so I got all the money back that had gone though and later went to look at emails and saw around 20 from google play saying thank you for your purchase !!! I was so shocked! I had a password on my phone (pattern one) and my 4 yr old son had memorised it and bought all these games :wall:!!! I agree with what you've done though by selling his stuff, i've done similar with my ds1 when he's broken something and it needed replacing! He's pretty good with his money now so I think i've taught him more than I knew at his age at least

StressedSteph

debtfreewannabe321 wrote: »

Morning Steph! *ouch* to the spends from DS My ds2 did this on my phone a little while back but my bank stopped some of the payments going out and put a block on my card thinking that it was fraud (THANK GOD!) They called me up after around £30 had gone out and asked if I had made these purchases to which I was unawares of at the time and so I said no! I've had fraudulent activity on my account before (people stealing my card details and money !) and so I got all the money back that had gone though and later went to look at emails and saw around 20 from google play saying thank you for your purchase !!! I was so shocked! I had a password on my phone (pattern one) and my 4 yr old son had memorised it and bought all these games :wall:!!! I agree with what you've done though by selling his stuff, i've done similar with my ds1 when he's broken something and it needed replacing! He's pretty good with his money now so I think i've taught him more than I knew at his age at least

Hi DFW


I wish my bank had stopped my card. Didn't happen unfortunately and I haven't attempted to reclaim it because I had seen it reported on the news so many times and they haven't gotten any money back. I guess it was our stupid fault for leaving the password in an accessible place, but you just don't think your children will be so stupid!!! :wall:


I do hope like you said that maybe the memory of this event will stay with my son and will give him a life lesson that everything has a price. xx

StressedSteph

Quick financial update.


With all the chaos of ebay sales etc lately I thought I would double check that there wasn't any surplus in my paypal account after fees and postage.
Well, I found the massive amount of £11.30. So I have paid that against my Barclaycard. Every bit helps I guess. (Total now £283).

I have been a little worried about how April will pan out, especially after my sons little indiscretion. So I logged into YNAB and did a little fast forward through the month to see how well the bills will be paid and whether there is a shortfall.

Well.... after all the bills are paid there is about £150 left over which is tight as there are ALWAYS extras each month that I don't account for (Easter eggs etc, end of term holidays).
But it does look like I can make the 1k debt payment this month. So pleased about that and it gives me the incentive to be extra careful to not over-spend on anything and ruin my chance of reaching that 1k target.

I think at the end of this month, I will REALLY start to feel the difference of my Snowballing and debt payments.

If all goes to plan I will have paid off and closed the Barclaycard and my debt total will be around £16500. Which is 4k paid off since December :T.

At that rate by the end of the year I will have a debt total of around 8.5k. wow what a feeling that would be .

I do have a LARGE stumbling block of 2 MOT's on an old car & van this July. I am saving towards it but I don't think I will have much more than £300 by then.

Think I will put the vehicles in for the MOT's around 2 weeks early, so that if there are simple things like brakes, lights etc that need changing then hubby has time to do it himself.
It's tyres that scare me, but I am preparing myself to be without the car for a few weeks and try to raise that money without adding it back onto credit. (not that I have any available credit).


We live about 2miles away from the school, and it will be the Summer, so I am planning on us walking to school and back if the car is off the road. At least at the end of July the children break up for the holidays and even though I would like to have the car on the road for us to have some day trips, we will just have to have a simple fun time within walking distance of home. .


I have never been more determined not to wreck my progress. I have gotten to this point MANY times before and then lost the will to fight and its has VERY quickly gone back to 20k +.


Sorry for my massive ramble this morning. I find typing out my thoughts really helps concrete my resolve to keep fighting. xxxx

debtfreewannabe321

:T I think it's great you are foreseeing possible problems that you will need money for (MOT for example) and budgeting for it now rather than throwing it on a credit card :T This is the way forward and I think you've changed your mind set completely over the last few months, I can't see you going back to how you were now....well done Not to say it will all be plain sailing but I think if you are thrown an obstacle I think you will be able to deal with it without getting further into debt again (like ds's spends over the last week)!

xx

StressedSteph

debtfreewannabe321 wrote: »

:T I think it's great you are foreseeing possible problems that you will need money for (MOT for example) and budgeting for it now rather than throwing it on a credit card :T This is the way forward and I think you've changed your mind set completely over the last few months, I can't see you going back to how you were now....well done Not to say it will all be plain sailing but I think if you are thrown an obstacle I think you will be able to deal with it without getting further into debt again (like ds's spends over the last week)!

xx

Thank you for having faith in me hun xxx


I think the big change I have had, is that I am now prepared to suffer some inconvenience and hassle etc (by walking kids to school), rather than always looking for the quickest most painless solution, which has always been yet more credit.


xxx

maddiemay

As dfw says, you are in a completely different mindset now and I am sure that you can do it:D Good idea doing the MOT checks early.