Crunchy pays it down....£20k...the final chapter

crunch_time

Hi I’m crunch_time (Crunchy) and welcome to my shiny new diary!!

My first light bulb moment was about 5 years ago when I finished uni for the second time (1 year professional course) with no job and at the same time, my husband was made redundant. I owed nearly £11k spread across a loan, a credit card, a store card and 2 overdrafts. Husband was about the same with £10k of credit cards) so £20k between us. I got savvy with a spreadsheet and started my money saving journey.

Fast forward 5 years, a (frugal) marriage, 2 kids and a house move and although at our lowest our combined debt was £14k, we are now hovering around the £20k mark again. I know exactly what our debt consists of…

Loan - £16,190 - £8k of cars, £4k of old uni debt and the rest is husbands historic debt.
Overdraft £1800 – to pay for the house move as we didn’t have enough equity in the house
Bank of mum and dad £500 – same as above
Husbands credit card - £300 – new suit, and watch
My credit card - £2112 – Home office deposit (£900), new camera £485, rest is some clothes bits, food and over budgeted petrol.

A year ago I discovered this forum and started a diary with the focus of paying down about £3-4k of debt before our second child was due in October, so we could then chuck more money at the mortgage so we could move. The diary is here…

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4995877=

A few months in we decided to move house sooner than expected and although we did eventually pay off the £3-4k of debt, we now have gone backwards slightly with the costs of moving and my then being on maternity leave. The diary is here…

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5144876=

I am about to go back to work after my second lot of maternity leave and now feel even more determined to become debt free. Why? I want to have adventures I’ve been putting off these last few years because we couldn’t afford them and show my children the world. We also want to pay down our mortgage so we can move to a bigger, more rural house in the future.

I’m not setting any time limits on this as life will happen. Life is steadier these days and we are not planning any more children. We will need a new car and I’m sure other obstacles will come up but I am determined to do this for my children’s future and myself to prove to myself that I can live without debt.

Who is with me???

Crunchy xx

Monthly achievements


Start debt - £20,936
25th June 2015 - £20,552
25th July 2015 £20,339
28th August £20,722
28th Sept £19,393
28th Oct £19,089
28th Nov £20,248
28th Dec £19,304
28th Jan £17,238
28th Feb £16,574
28th March £15,881
28th April £14,708
28th May £13,667
28th June £13,365
28th July £12,220
28th August £11,875

belleandthebudget

Hi Crunchy, best of luck with the debt busting! Sounds like a good steady plan you've got worked out.

crunch_time

Thanks belleandthebudget!!


I've been delving a little deeper into my plan this evening by re-reading an old book of ours called 'How to be Brilliant' by Michael Heppell.
I have highlighted money as one of my areas of concern in my wheel of life giving it a score of 7. My goal is 'I want to live a debt free life.' I surprised myself when I looked down the list of possible things that are holding me back and 'lack of confidence' was the one that resonated most. When I thought a little deeper I realised that although I am not frivolous with my money, I lack confidence that what I have is enough. My attitude with some things seems to be when I have 'that,' I will be happy and be able to deal with life a little better and therefore achieve my goals etc etc. E.g. I have recently bought a brand new bookcase (not on credit) which is needed and on the list of things we needed to buy for the new house but I panic bought new a few weeks ago as I wanted things to be organised in the house so that I would feel better and get more organised. It cost £235 and if I had waited and made a more measured purchase then I'm pretty certain I could have got it cheaper and guess what, it hasn't made me more organised!!!!


This is very deep thinking for a Sunday night but I needed to put it down as I do really think it is my down fall. I am therefore going to challenge myself to make more measured purchases this month for the things that we do need or not purchase them at all.


My first mini debt free goal is to do with the shed. Long story short, DH needs an office to work from home in by the end of July, a month sooner than we had planned. He put down a deposit for a (carefully researched) one yesterday on my credit card and we need to pay the balance on delivery which will be £2150.


I am expecting my half pay from maternity leave as well as 1 months wages on 19th July. Half pay was over £2k before tax and one months wages = £1200 after tax. So it should be covered and hopefully enough to pay the deposit off too.


Instead of paying down our debt with any extra money until then I am going to slush this money into savings account to go towards it. Hopefully this will be over £2k.


Husband gets paid on Thursday and I need to check our bank balances to see how we are doing so far.


Have a lovely evening everyone!
Crunchy

hummingbird

Hey crunchy, welcome to your lovely new diary!!

Just a thought......would it be possible to avoid buying the shed? Do you have a spare bedroom you could use as an office? I use my dining table that enables me to look out through the patio doors onto the garden LOL (I work from home). Although I'm thinking of converting my spare bedroom into a dual purpose guest room/offfice.

When I was married, we had a summer house (shed!!) which we turned into an office, but I didn't like working in there LOL!!!

Anyway, just thought I might be able to save you 2K:D Probably too late now though!!

All the best with your debt-busting!!!

Hummingbird x

abba1772

Subscribed...... :-D again xx

:hello:

t2rry

Happy Shiny New Diary Crunchy!!


Always good to have a 'new' start


Subscribed again, of course! Couldn't not!

crunch_time

Hummingbird - thanks for posting!! The office shed is unavoidable I'm afraid. My children are 3 and 8 months so working in the house would be a nightmare for him. He would get interrupted by them or the noise - not good when on the phone to clients!!! We have no spare bedroom and husband wants the separation of home and work. He is also very tall so the company are adding in some extra height and it is bespoke to the space we are putting it in. We moved in January and deliberately bought a house with a big enough garden to put it in. This is definitely the cheaper option compared with building an extension!!


Thanks abba and T2rry for subscribing again!!!

hummingbird

Hi crunch - happy Tuesday! Yes I can see exactly why he needs the shed now lol!

I'm sure it will pay itself back many times over and that you'll get it paid off the CC quickly.

I used to have that book you mentioned "How to be Brilliant" - I found it in a charity shop and thought it looked good - not sure if I still have it but will have a look to see!

crunch_time

Morning diary


Right, I have just checked our bank balances and slushed £60 out of husbands account into a savings pot which is the start of the 'shed pot.' I then rounded all our accounts to even numbers and added another £5.99 into the pot!! (That could become addictive!)


I'm going into town later to pay a cheque in so that will be another £60 ish when it clears.


Husband gets paid on Thursday and after everything is taken care of in our budge,t it should be another £178 to slush into the account.


I have £50 to my name to last till 19th July - this is only another 3 weeks this Friday. This needs to cover petrol to and from work but I'm going to use husbands car when he is looking after the kiddos.


Have a lovely day everyone!


Crunchy xx

crunch_time

Hummingbird - its a brilliant book ha ha:rotfl:


xx

t2rry

I love that you are rounding things down. Definitely addictive!! I remember my dilemma a while ago between putting every spare penny available to overspend to the first debt to be paid off whilst maintaining minimum payments to the other or to overpay each one a little to make them nice round numbers!!!! Round numbers always wins for me!!!