Starting Over - Debt and DeCluttering

mismatch

Can I ask r u using a spreadsheet u have made itself in excel or is it an app or program it using like the budget tools u can get?

ClutteredWife

They are spreadsheets I made in excel. It took a little tweaking to get the formatting right so it does what I tell it, but it is worth it now.

I try to avoid using apps for stuff like this, because if I lose the app I lose the info. By using excel I have it backed up and on laptop as well as home computer so it is easily accessible for me and hubby to view/update. I mean yes I have to update both of them but since it is set up so all I add is payments and debts it is no big deal and will take moments to do from now on.

I have just finished setting up a monthly SOA one for helping us budget. So that we can check how we are doing each month. We are going to update it on pay day and then we can see how much money we have left for the month and decide where to allocate it. And we can see what we are supposed to have and give ourselves a sharp reminder when we are being bad with our money again.

I'm just trying to think how and where to tweak it so it factors in overdraft. So that if we go overdrawn one month it is automatically factored in the next month so that we don't STAY overdrawn if that makes sense.

ClutteredWife

I also plan to break the week into sections of No Spend, Low Spend, Medium Spend and High Spend.

So I will allow One High Spend, One Medium Spend, Two Low Spend and Three No Spend Days per week. I mean obviously won't complain if High Spend/Medium Spend get replaced with Low Spends across the board.

Low Spend will be around £10 budget, meaning £20 for the two Low Spend Days.
Medium Spend will be around £25.
High Spend will be £40+ (Thinking filling up car with petrol for example).

Jo4

ClutteredWife wrote: »

Also there is a nifty thing I found online that we plan to do. Which involves facing your coat hangers the wrong way in the wardrobe. Then putting them the right way after wearing something. After a season or a year, depending on if you switch out seasonal clothes or not, you sell/give away/dump anything still facing the wrong way as you haven't used it and so don't need it.

Oh I love this idea - I am definitley stealing it. :eek: :rotfl:

Good luck on your debt and decluttering journey!

ClutteredWife

Today is a lazy day as I have a lot of pain. It is not just my back today, but my shoulder and leg have decided to join in. Along with that I have a lovely headache and am stressing waiting to hear if we have got the house we wanted to rent, we were told we would know this week and so I am itching to find out. Even though we know that it is barely this week yet and so we probably won't find out today.

My to do list today is to do a load of washing, and have my husband load it onto the airer when he gets home from work. Loaded up ready to go, just got to press the button. Which I will do a little later so it is not left sitting for ages until he gets home.
I would also like to catch up on the dishes. One bowl of dishes done, next on soak and then one more bowl will finish it. It would b less but we have used some big pans so that split one bowl into two.
Wipe down the kitchen sides and scrub the hob. Not attempted yet, but will probably take about 15 minutes when I do it.

In the mean time, I am snuggled up on the sofa watching Bones on the laptop and trying not to fall asleep. I am exhausted today!

Pay day is not far off, so we will be able to update the debt spreadsheet at last. I hope everyone is doing well.

The cats have been jumping in and out of boxes all morning and my munchkin is with family until tomorrow. So trying to rest up/recover today x

ClutteredWife

Well we are now under £11,000!!!

And we are busy packing to move house. But we have continued to de-clutter. We have two boxes full of DVDs and books. And two smaller boxes full of books and DVDs to sell!

We have priced up against MusicMagpie for the DVDs (£7) and searched the internet for the books and they aren't worth much. We are listing all of them for sale on facebook selling groups in our area until this time next week. Then the DVDs go to MusicMagpie and the books will be donated to the charity book store.

This gives us a chance to get a little more money for them, but either way they will not be coming with us to the new house.

We have also taken 4 bin bags of clutter that was worthless to the dump so we are feeling good about that!

How is everyone else getting on? x

dawnybabes

Presume you got the house you wanted ? I hAte packing but it's a perfect opportunity to declutter ...