Pay off debts before Baby number 2!!

crunch_time

Morning diary!


Pay day today! My pay rise meant an extra £100 today!!! Woohoo!!


So far I have:


- Paid £371 into the house moving account so we have an £1000 emergency fund. (It makes me sad that we cant slush it on the overdraft as we originally planned before we decided to move but hopefully we wont have to use it and we still can later on this year.)

- Paid £300 off husband overdraft bringing it down to £1300 - such an achievement!!! And next week it will go lower hurrah!!


- Slushed away my credit card to £100 which is the final part of my car repairs from the beginning of the summer. This will be paid off when husband gets paid next week so then IT WILL BE CLEAR! My first debt cleared!


I'm having a break from ebay now since don't want to feel stressed about posting stuff off if baby makes an appearance but I posted the DVDs to music magpie yesterday so hopefully a cheque for about £16 will be winging its way to me soon - they can go on Husbands credit card!


Signature updated, spreadsheet updated! Here is to a frugal weekend and roll on next Friday.


Feel like I'm on a roll now. It will slow down a bit as I wont be paid so much from now on but its good to have got a big chunk of the overdraft paid off. Husband said last night that he cant remember a time that he hasn't had it. Neither can I and we have been together for 10.5 years so this is a massive thing for us!! We were also talking about how great it will be when we just have the loans...
Hoping that will be early next year. Then we can make some long term savings goals - how very exciting!!!


Off to catch up on other diaries and now and give toddler breakfast.


Happy Friday everyone!!!


Crunchy xx

MrsSmith2013

Hi Crunchy, well done on paying £300 off the overdraft - thats brilliant!

Also go you, only having £100 ish on the credit card is good going. I'm excited for you to clear it, I love it when you get rid of "whole" debts if that makes sense! One less thing to pay each month!

I think you're quite right slowing down with the ebaying with the babys arrival pending! Do you have long until your due date?

Hopefully get my diary updated this week, and keep my momentum up too.

Looking forward to your 2015 diary too - hopefully these will be our last debt free diaries - then we can start savings ones!!

Mrs S x

crunch_time

Hi Mrs S - thanks yes it does feel good to finally clear one off. This time last year I didn't even have a credit card. I only got it so I could buy some bits for school (I'm in teaching) and before I knew it I had racked up debt of my own. NOT ANYMORE! I survived before so I know I can survive again. Im going to keep it for online purchases but those I know I have the money for in my spend accounts and also to keep up a good credit score.

Baby is due next week so could come any day now. I'm booked in for a c section next week so it will definitely be here next week. Will of course keep you all posted!!!

Just had a big nesting instinct and cleaned the kitchen and the bathroom......maybe this is the start of things.!!!

I'm trying patiently to wait until husbands payday on Friday. He is due a payrise which will mean an extra £100-£130 a month which is great!!!

I scared myself the other night by working out how much childcare will cost when I go back to work in September next year....... worst case scenario is £900 a month!! We could just scrape through and afford this so long as the overdraft is paid off and we are managing to stick to budgets and if I go back 3 days a week as I was.

Obviously I will look at ways to get that cheaper by seeing if husbands family can help out, childcare vouchers from husbands work etc but it was good to work out a worse case scenario so we know where we are heading.

As we seem to be making lots of progress with the debt since the September blip I have allowed myself the little luxury of 'thinking ahead' and making plans for the future....

Husband and I both really love travel and camping and getting out and doing stuff. When the children are old enough we want adventure sport holidays and to visit Australia where we have lots of friends and family and go camping on the coast with the dog every 6 weeks or so. We are content with non-fancy cars, a small house that we can afford the mortgage on, no fancy consoles or gadgets, a frugal way of life etc in order to achieve our 'adventure' dreams. This year was the first year we actually saved up for our holiday in a cottage in Wales as before holidays have all been mostly on credit.

I am therefore desperate to have an 'adventure fund' however small it may be - £40 a month for example - to start saving for these adventures. Eventually I see us with no debt (apart from perhaps a small affordable loan for a car paid for by husbands car allowance), an emergency fund, long term savings funds etc and any money we save from things being slushed away to our 'adventure fund' instead.

My dilemma is I'm torn between starting this fund after we move or waiting until we have paid off the credit cards and overdraft and energy debt before saving up for the next dream.

What do you guys think? It would feel so nice knowing that there was some money aside for little adventures next year (as much as you can with a 2 year old and a baby) but things like a night away in a hotel for us, visiting Peppa Pig world for toddler, visiting zoos etc, starting to upgrade our camping gear to family stuff.

It is also our dream to get debt free (apart from the loans for now) so maybe the sensible thing is to stick to that and suck it up. We will be moving to a new area so will have lots of frugal exploring to do. We love walking as a family so will be able to do this again once baby is here.

What would you do..... debt payoff vs having a little bit of a life and achieving dreams?????

Sorry - been whittling on but it feels good to get my thoughts out of my head and out there.

Lastly - Frugal challenges this week.

Sorry I was a bit rubbish last week. Went to Lidl with husband on Saturday. Supermarket shopping with him is always a worry and I usually come away with at least an extra £15 more than I would without him. He was restrained ha ha!! and we still only spent £60!!!

My only frugal challenge this week is to take the food we bought and turn it into a fantastic meal plan for the rest of the week ready for a food shop again on Saturday!! I was inspired last night by the October Grocery challenge thread realising how little people spend on food and how much we do and throw away. I cottoned onto this ages ago but I'm only just realising how much it could make a difference to our future plans. Will let you know how it goes.

Hope everyone is doing well with their budgets!!!

Crunchy xx

MrsSmith2013

Hi Crunchy, write away, it definately helps to get it all out of your head and written down on here, I do it all the time! It chops and changes but it all helps to get it out and get viewpoints on it.

I feel your pain with the childcare costs, ours is astronomical in the school holidays, but we just have to grin and bear it and keep it in mind that we have less than 12 months of it left. I think you're right to go with the worst case scenario as that way if its not that much, you'll have some spare cash.

With regards to your fun-fund, I'm not sure what is best to do, whether to start a small fund or clear the debts. My head is telling me pay the debts, but then the fact that you had started a small fund might be enough to help you think you're not spending every penny on debt, and that there will be some funds as a "light at the end of the tunnel" type thing? Does that make sense?!

I guess you could always start it, and then if you decide its not the right time you could chuck what you'd saved up at the debts.

Oooh exciting to think that you'll have your baby in your arms next week! Can't wait to hear the news when he/she arrives!

Mrs S x

mum2one

i know it not really mse, but I would start the adventure fund, I know myself that if I didnt have a break/holiday i would be going stir crazy,

hard to think you've got less than a week, you takae care xx

t2rry

I completely understand your dilemma as I'd feel like I want to throw it all at debt BUT I think Mrs S's suggestion is a good one, save it, then if you need to have an adventure it's there to do it, and if you don't and find you're managing well, you can put the adventure off and use some or all of the saved funds for debt.

crunch_time

Thanks Mrs S and mum2one for your comments!! It does feel weird to think that this time next week I should have a baby in my arms!! Arrrrrrggghhhhh!!!


I tend to set myself really high goals that are sometimes unattainable so its good to hear what others would do about the adventure fund!


I've been thinking so much about it since yesterday (prob since all I am doing all day is looking after toddler and waiting for baby ha ha!) I think I need to break it down into priorities.


Priorities for the rest of 2014


1) Not getting into anymore debt
2) Sticking to our new £350 a month grocery
3) Paying off as much as we can off the overdraft.
4) Buying a bed for toddler (in the sales - very MSE)
5) Sticking to our Christmas budget - £200 (for 4 of us including stockings).
6) Not blowing our budget by eating out or getting takeaways.


Because so much is up in the air about the house, I feel like I cant plan too much further than this. I can then reassess our priorities once we have moved and with the new year in mind and again weigh up our priorities.


We will have had 2 dreams come true in 2014 - moving house and baby number 2... I cant have everything I want at once, I have to be more patient!!!


In other news, I haven't started on the food plan yet despite it being Wednesday!! I got distracted last night reading the Mr Money Moustache blog. If you haven't seen it have a look for it. Its written by a Canadian living in America who is in his 30s or 40s and already retired through frugality and not living in excess.


Although I have no plans to retire early, (as I have said before I would like to live as simply as possible and have money for adventures and raising the children the best I can), I found some of his points of view really interesting particularly about cars, daily coffee habits and housing.


Husband and I are hoping that moving out of the city and into the country again will change some of naughty habits when it comes to money, make us happier therefore less likely to spend money on treats to make us happier. My parents live in the country so I am a country girl at heart and husband and I did live in the country for a year before we bought this place 7 years ago and found we were happier and spent less. I'm looking forward to fresh air, fields and views, gardening and getting involved with village life


There is still no news on a move date but things seem to be progressing more with our purchase so I'm hoping to be in before Christmas.


I'm about to go on the October grocery challenge thread to get some inspiration for recipes for the week using up what I have got in the cupboard.


Crunchy xx

crunch_time

Morning diaryland!!


Husbands pay day today! Woke up today like an excited 5 year old on Christmas morning ready to see husbands pay rise in his account........but hasn't been paid.


Its in his contract to go up after 6 months from his promotion. I did ask him to double check with HR but he never got round to it. Bit cross because we could have got the overdraft down to £1k this month but I guess we will have to wait until next month now.


Good news - MY CREDIT CARD IS PAID OFF!! Woohoo! So one debt down!! Also, we have paid off £1k off the overdraft since we started this journey. Woohoo!!! Also, the total debt is now under £20k - woohoo!!!


Doing some rough calculations, since our journey began we have managed to pay just £2011 of immediate debt which is below our target of £3600 odd. Its great news to have paid off £3756 in total but the difference is scheduled loan payments. Trying not to let my high standards make me feel disappointed with this. We are moving house and finally have a £1k emergency fund which I'm determined not to use to pay off debt once we have moved - it shall go in my ISA for emergencies.


So our new challenge from now on is to continue to pay off the immediate debt - now standing at an non-offensive £1827 and then reassess our plans for the future, in our new house with our new baby. Ill start a new diary for this new chapter in the new year but will continue with this one for now.


Signature amended to reflect this new challenge. I have taken the loans off now as we will just be paying off the minimum payments till I go back to work in Sept 2015 and the important thing is they are decreasing and we have a rough plan for them but want to concentrate on this immediate debt at the moment.


Frugal food challenge is going well..!!! I have made a list of everything we have in the cupboards, freezer and fridge and am trying to use it all up and plan a few days ahead. Going to Lidl again tomorrow and will stock up for the following week. It looks like it will be cheap shop as we will be using stuff up we already have!!


Hope everyone is meeting their targets!!


And thanks t2rry for your advice on the adventure fund. I think we cross posted so didn't shout out before, I will have a think after this baby comes. Life is going to change a lot in the coming weeks!!


Crunchy xx

MrsSmith2013

Woo hoo!! Massive well done on paying off the credit card, thats amazing!! I bet it feels great! :beer:

Hope you're managing to take it easy before baby arrives and not fretting too much about money, you'll get there in the end with your determination, I'm sure of it!

Talk soon!
Mrs S x

abba1772

Well done on getting the naughty credit card gone xx