New Mission, New Diary

MoneyMission2015

I went grocery shopping this week. I made a shopping list & stuck to it, which I'm getting good at now : )

I also picked up a good idea from another thread on here (although I can't remember which one unfortunately). In the past if we ever bought mince to cook spagbol we would just cook the whole pack & end up throwing the leftovers away. But I read on here that the best thing to do is buy a large pack & then split it into portions. So I bought 1500grams when I went shopping, split it into 250g portions, which was the recommended amount for 2 people on the thread that I read. I then put them into freezer bags, kept a portion in the fridge & put the rest in the freezer.

We made our own burgers today out of the mince that I kept out and I must admit they were a million percent better than any pre bought burgers! I will definitely be making them again.

I also tidied up my freezer properly. There was some stuff in the back that I forgot were even there. I admit to throwing some things out because they had serious freezer burn & had obviously been in the freezer for a very long time going by the best before dates. I kept a lot of the food that was in there though & just organised it so we can actually see what's in there now. Then when I went shopping I bought the few things I had put on my list & the freezer is now full again.

MoneyMission2015

So it's been all go today. I don't like Mondays but at least the sun came out for a little while, so glad it didn't rain while I was doing the school run!


Anyway, it's been a busy day in regards to money. I got paid on Friday but none of the Direct Debits came out until today so I was checking all the account balances, ticking off the bills that have gone out & transferring my own money over to my account.


I am loving YNAB. I've reconciled the accounts on it & have now added my savings account as an off budget account. In my budget I have money budgeted for Clothing, Christmas, Birthdays & Emergency Fund, which I have transferred over to the savings account and it's all making sense to me. I've just got to find room in the budget to buy the program now :rotfl:. I have actually budgeted some spending money for the month and also budgeted money for household spends, so I might have to use one or both of these categories to go towards paying for it.


I've also got some good balance transfer plans at the moment which I am going to jot down in a second so I don't forget what I've done!

MoneyMission2015

So, on to the balance transfers.


Card 2 has a balance transfer rate of 10.9% and a really high limit on it, with a large available balance.


Card 1 is completely maxed up to it's limit but I noticed when I was logged in today that they are offering 0% on balance transfers.


I also have Card 3 which has no offers but is almost to it's limit and is actually the highest of the 3 interest rates.


So tonight I have transferred the whole of Card 1 over to Card 2, so that balance will now be on 10.9% until March 2016.


When that transfer has gone through I will transfer Card 3 over to Card 1 and will have 0% on that for 18 months.


I'm really pleased that I've managed to get these offers and also it means I won't have the high balance all on one card, which was my psychological blocker.


I'm so glad I will be able to save a bit of interest and that will mean getting the cards paid off quicker.


I'm also very pleased with myself that for once at the beginning of the month I have set aside the money in savings accounts and budgeted for everything. I've decided with groceries & fuel I am going to go with the envelope system, so tomorrow I am going to withdraw the cash for both categories & split them in to the corresponding envelopes. I think this is going to be the best way for me because when I just leave it in my account I sometimes lose track of how much I have spent and have left in the categories.


Oh and one last very important thing, I took lunch to work with me today, so it was a no spending day today. That's 2 days so far this month (I know we're only on Day 2). I must admit I lost track a bit towards the end of last month & definitely had a few days last week where I bought lunch when I really shouldn't have. So slap on the wrist for me & back on track.


And sorry but that wasn't the last thing. It occurred to me earlier when checking my accounts etc that last month was the first month in I don't know how long that I actually didn't go in to my overdraft. My overdraft has always been something that was there & never mentioned. At one point it was up to £2000 and used constantly!! I did slowly manage to get that down and told the bank to then reduce it down to £250. For probably the last 18 months or so I have been constantly at the £250 limit. But when I was reconciling balances earlier & checking budgets I realised that I am not relying on it anymore, I'm not even counting that £250 as available money (in the past I would look at a £20 balance & think, oh it's ok I've got £270 available to spend). I am so pleased with this as it was actually the thing I was going to concentrate on last once I'd got rid of the cards.


So yay to me :T

snowscreamer

Hey MM, really glad you are enjoying YNAB. I am also totally addicted. This is going to be our first month paying down credit card balances in earnest as like you at the end of February month not only did we gave a positive balance in our current accounts, but it was also enough to cover all our expenses for March (and then some), so bye overdrafts!! You won't be missed

Been playing with YNAB tonight marking our existing credit card debts in the budget so I can allocate money towards paying them down and it was damn depressing going back through previous months (using YNAB to track finances over a year but only recently started using the budgeting feature - very silly!). In previous months thousands of pounds taken out of limitless credit card pots to fund spending sprees NO MORE.

MoneyMission2015

Hi SS, yes I think I am well on my way to becoming so addicted to YNAB too. It's so simple though & makes me mad that I have never tried to live this way before. I had to do a bit of grocery shopping & get fuel today & before I even went to the shop I checked my available balance in the budget and then after I'd paid for everything I was using my calculator to work out what was left over in the budget (haven't got the YNAB app yet). I love it!

Currently still waiting for the balance transfer I requested yesterday to go through, so I can transfer the other balance over to 0%. Can't wait to see that balance going down so quickly.

MoneyMission2015

I almost had a no spending day yesterday because I remembered to take lunch to work with me, but then had to do a bit of grocery shopping in the evening. It's all good though, all budgeted for so I'm not too bothered about not having a no spend day. I am pleased that I took lunch to work with me though, saves me so much money!


I still haven't managed to get to an ATM to get the cash out for the fuel & grocery budgets. I did try & get money out when I went to Mr T yesterday but the cash machine was out of service. What's annoying now though is because I couldn't get cash out I had to use my card to pay for the groceries & fuel, so the outstanding budgets for both categories are now odd figures, so I can't withdraw the complete amount unless I go in to the bank, which I can't do today because the one closest to work is a pain for parking.


So basically I've got £99.55 left in the fuel budget & £148.08 in the grocery budget, so I'm going to withdraw £210 today. I'll put £80 in the fuel budget envelope & £130 in the grocery budget. At least then I will have a small amount in the bank just in case I forget the cash, I can still use my card for small purchases & an emergency fuel top up if I ever get stuck.

MoneyMission2015

Just another boring update!

Everything seems to be ticking over nicely. I'm on budget on most things, under budget on some which I'm pleased about. Luckily not gone over budget on anything yet, but we still have a lot of month to go.

I did my balance transfers. I'm hoping it will all work out now with saving interest, otherwise I'll have paid transfer fees for nothing.

I've found the envelopes for the budgets work in some ways but not all the time. I've found it handy having the cash in my envelopes when I've been out & about doing shopping, but this weekend I didn't get to go shopping & because I've got a busy week this week I had to order online in the end (click & collect in between finishing work & school run tomorrow) so have had to use money in my account that was supposed to be for other categories, so I will now have to try & get that cash paid back in to my account to cover it. I think next month I will maybe take half in cash & the other half in my account.

We had a lovely weekend. The weather was so nice on Saturday which meant we were able to get outside. We spent the whole morning outside, tidying up the front & back gardens and cleaning our cars. This is good for us because we usually pay to get the cars cleaned so it's saved us money (we did have all the car shampoo & cloths already) and we got outside for fresh air and sunshine. The kids also got to play outside for the first time in ages without them having to wrap up so much they can barely move! In fact it was so warm in the sun they were warm enough with just a cardigan on.

I've got a little bit of spare money left over this month because I had budgeted £130 for the childminder but she was sick for a few days last month which obviously I'd already paid for and she realised she'd overcharged me in February because she got some hours mixed up during half term, so she very kindly credited those days so this month was only £68. I was really pleased with this because our previous childminder never did this. If she was off sick it was either tough, or she would sometimes offer to do the school pick up on a different day. I'm going to put the money aside now for the Easter holidays because I might need the childminder for some full days over Easter.

I almost lost my YNAB budgets earlier! I synced it to Dropbox today but it wasn't working on my phone, so I thought deleting the files might work. Opened YNAB again & it said there was a problem with it & gave me the option to start a new budget. I was panicking but restored the YNAB files from the recycle bin to the Dropbox & it was fine then. Have to remember to save local if I have any problems with Dropbox again.

I am having a problem on the app though. I logged into Dropbox & synced but when I try opening the budget it comes up with an error message. I'm going to check it out later on the internet. Don't know what I'd do without the internet, I use it constantly for everything from work stuff to googling random things like today when we were having a conversation in work about how they get the lead in to pencils : )

MoneyMission2015

Quick update first to note my good news. I decided to risk it & apply for a new 0% balance transfer card. My logic was that I actually will not be applying for any sort of credit for a while anyway, so even if it was rejected it wouldn't be too much of a problem.

Anyway I put my details into the. MSE eligibility checker & it advised that I would be eligible for the Halifax balance transfer card. So I applied & have been accepted. The limit is £3500 & is on 0% for 18 months.

So now all the balance transfers means I have a few cards & different rates which I'm going to note now to remember it.

Card 2 was the card with the high limit, a balance of just under £5k on 27.9% apr & an offer of a 10.9% balance transfer. So I transferred card 1 to that which meant just under £5k on 27.9% and £1,800 on 10.9% apr.

Card 3 had £1621 on it at 29.9% apr but card 1 was offering 0% for 18 months, so I transferred card 3 over to card 1. So card 3 is now completely cleared & card 1 has £1621 at 0%.

So the new card I've just been accepted for has the limit of £3500 at 0%. So I'm going to transfer the maximum from card 2 over to my new card.

So I'll have around

£1800 on card 2 at 27.9% apr
£1800 on card 2 at 10.9% apr
£1621 on card 1 at 0% apr
£3500 on new card at 0% apr

I'm so pleased about this. It means I'll get these debts paid off so much quicker because the interest charged will be so much lower. On card 2 for instance with the highest balance & highest limit, the interest on my last statement was over £75! This will be a lot lower now & the other cards will have no interest at all.

So big woohoo to me for just biting the bullet and trying. I'm so glad I did because even as I was putting the details in I was thinking there is no way I'd be accepted. My credit file is fine in regards to always making payments on time etc but I know that the high amount of credit doesn't always look too favourable.

My next target is to do something about my Next account. Although there is something strange going on with that account. Last month my minimum payment was just under £340 (I know, shocking!). I rounded the payment up to £340 so not a huge dent in the debt, but this month the minimum payment is only £174. No idea why but just to be on the safe side I paid £340 onto it again. If for some reason they have been kind & lowered my interest rate (although it would have to be a drastic drop to make that much difference), then as long as I carry on paying £340 per month I will get rid of that debt in about 10 months.

MoneyMission2015

Ok, I'm on a roll now. I applied for the barclaycard 36 month 0% balance transfer card & accepted. Yes I know a lot of applications don't look good but as I said above I am not looking to apply for any sort of credit any time soon.

So the limit on this one is £8,800!!! So I'm going to wait for all the other transfers on the other cards to be completed & then see where everything stands but I am going to transfer whatever is left on the card 2 (27.9%/10.9%) on to Barclay card & then I'm going to pay the Next account with the card 2 then do another balance transfer over to barclaycard. This means absolutely all my debt will be on 0%. I am so so excited about this.

And don't worry, all cards will be cut up so they can never ever be used again. Well, I'll keep one somewhere as an emergency card or in case I want to use it to get protection on a purchase, but I might even give the card to my Dad so it's not easily accessible.

Some other good news is that I have been reconciling YNAB today & checking bank accounts and it looks like somehow I will have around £400-£500 leftover at the end of the month.

I'm going to pay it towards a debt again.

snowscreamer

Awesome MoneyMission, good work! Last week I also applied for a balance transfer card - new foray for me as previously OH and I had one CC each, the only ones we've ever had, both with cash back benefits but 15.9 / 16.9% APR.

I was nervous too but I gritted my teeth and pressed apply - was offered the full length 0% BT 0% fee for 13 months with £8500 limit :eek:
So I transferred all our debt onto this one, well the balances we have budgeted at the end of month (round numbers £2600 from CC1 and £3150 from CC2) so now it's a challenge to ensure we do manage to completely clear the existing cards this month
As existing cards are cash back cards we will continue to use them but put them back into full balance direct debits and not let our spending exceed the budget. The new card - plastic will be going into our safe and locked in... We should clear it by the end of the year hopefully so with a few months to go before the 0% expires.