Scrimping behind the scenes - with debt of £31,000!

Chrysalis1976

Glad you had a lovely evening at your friend's, and great work coming under budget this month.

I only have the entertainment package with Sky and occasionally buy the kids a film, it's not something we are prepared to give up at the minute but definitely something to monitor.

Hope all is well, C x

Seasidegal58

Hi there Chrysalis and Happy! I do think you get a much better picture quality with Sky as well Happy. I know there’s a big difference from when I just had the terrestrial TV – at least where I live anyway. I was thinking about when I was growing up as a kid in the 60s and the awful picture we used to get sometimes with our funny black and white TV and its weird indoor aerial. I remember when England won the World Cup in ’66 – we had a long thin aerial that looked like a rod and my dad was frantically trying to stick it on different parts of the living room wall with sellotape so he could pick up a good picture during the final. Ah those were the days! :rotfl:

Wow tizer – you’ve been doing fantastically well with getting your loan down – and I totally agree with you – you must have nice knickers! M&S are the best! Plus you were very MSE in using your voucher so pat yourself on the back!

Had a good day today moneywise – just my paper and some cards bought in M&S (again this came out of the Gifts budget) – filled the M&S greetings card loyalty card up so will get a nice free card next time! Doesn’t say on the back of the loyalty card that there is any limit on price so can pick up one of the more expensive versions!

Had a nice surprise in that my friend bought a Clinique powder compact recently, used it once but didn’t like it as much as her old brand so gave it to me today. I always use that particular brand and was going to downgrade when I finished my own in order to carry on being very MSE, but I can now go on using it a bit longer so good result there!:D

in_need_of_direction

You could put the cost of the cheaper brand in a little pot. When your donated Clinique runs out, the potted money plus the cost of the cheaper one may allow you to stick with your preferred brand.

asparagus1968

********** 25 pairs of knickers!! ***********

roomontheend

Been following you on your journey and you are doing so well

Seasidegal58

Hi there!


Good make-up idea inod. I’ll checkout the price of the lower brand of powder I was thinking of getting.:T

Thanks very much for your support roomontheend – do hope I can keep it up – still - just looking at all my credit card debt laid out on You Need A Budget will keep me going I think!:D

Yesterday just bought my paper and a birthday gift for my friend.Bought a nice vase from Laura Ashley online via quidco where I’ll get cashback of 7% - the vase was 30% off as well so got a good discount there. My daughter ended up staying with me last night as she had a seminar in London this morning so we had MSE chili con carne from the freezer for dinner!

Interesting in that after buying the vase I’ve gone £3.13 over on the Gifts budget. It’ll readjust itself next payday, but I carried out one of the You Need A Budget rules which is “Roll With the Punches” and funded the deficit with another spending category for now, i.e. the Christmas budget, as I wont be dipping into that yet!

Today had a bit of an unplanned blip in that my friend was having a bit of a work crisis and was a bit depressed so we went out and had a spot of lunch and drinks to cheer her up – ended up spending £24! :eek: .Also bought some indigestion tablets (70p off though) – well I needed them after the cheeseboard!Ruined my fast day on the 5:2 diet as well!:(

Seasidegal58

Evening all!

Well my last minimum payment on the credit cards was calculated yesterday so I then knew how much extra I could pay off on Santander 1 card. The debt here stood at £512.50 and, together with the £96.12 I paid off on my last pay day, plus an extra £10.29 I’ve taken from this week’s spending money, I have been able to finally clear it! :j

In addition, I had a small debt of £248.05 at 6.9% on my Barclaycard CC 1 when I had my LBM. This has also been cleared now due to the high minimums I have been paying on the whole card (the other balances on the card are higher but at 0%).

So two lines of debt now cleared !I’ll update my signature on the 17th which will be two months since my LBM.:)

I was thinking about tackling the next smallest debt, which is the Dave Ramsey way so that you get a psychological boost of seeing each debt paid off more quickly, but I’ve decided I’ve got to make the Halifax my focus for the next big monthly payments as the percentage is a horrible 21.9% and the balance quite large currently at £4,992! :eek:

You may remember I applied for a Post Office 0% card the other week and they have written to me to say they are considering my application, but I have had to send them four pieces of different paperwork re. identification, bank statement etc before they will confirm so I sent all that off to them today. With some luck they might grant me one and I can get some more of the Halifax paid off.:D

So all in all very chuffed indeed today!:j

dawnybabes

Brilliant - well done x

HappyNow

Wowza, good progress .

I completely agree with focussing on the Halifax at 21.9% first. Personally, I lump all my debt together in my head and just think of it as one (somewhat huge!) figure. That way it makes absolute sense to pay off the highest interest first, and I give it some context by keeping track of my percentage paid off. Have you tried inputting all your figures into www.whatsthecost.com and comparing your debt-free date for each method? Anyway, no matter which way you do it, you ARE doing it so well done you!

Fingers crossed for your PO card.

tizerbelle

Well done seaside, you are making such super progress.

I'm like you and happy, focus on the highest interest stuff first. If you stick with YNAB, you can use the Net Worth report to get a visual guide to your progress month on month. (It gives a snapshot of your accounts at the end of each month) You can select which accounts it reports on rather than show everything - I use it to show my on budget accounts and just the off budget loan as that's what I'm working on paying off at the moment. Its a bit of a boost to see the red debt bar come down month on month.