Stop overspending and wasting so much dosh diary

sambuca9

I have been paying off my debts for years, I am fortunate that I have always been able to service them and have chipped away at the total debt slowly but surely. Our mortgage was paid off a few months ago as well so all is going well.

BUT I am still wasting so much money. I downloaded my bank statements to see where my cash was going each month and it is embarrassing to say the least.

Having worked so hard to reduce my debt, I am worried that I have not dealt with the core problem of over spending and I will end up back where I started if I dont tackle this head on. So although this is still a journey to becoming debt free, I also want to deal with core issue of my spending habits. So, I am putting this in writing as I hope that it will keep me on the straight and narrow!

I am going to set myself weekly targets and will cross them off as I achieve them. I apologise in advance for this being self centred and monotonous but I have realised how therapeutic writing things down are only very recently.

So this weeks targets:

1. Take out weekly allowance and leave cards at home

2. Do not buy my daily coffee

3. Use up the food in my cupboards and freezer before doing any further shopping this week (there should be enough to get through the week!! apart from milk)

4. When I spend ANYTHING, write it in my note book to keep track as I will be using cash.

5. Swap energy suppliers (I have been with BG for 10 years) !!

6. Ring Sky/BT and see if I can get a reduction in my subscription

7. Start saving money in my unused ISA (Currently only £1 in it)

8. Keep emptying the change from my purse into my mega bottle (one good habit I have got into !)

moneyonmymindsam

Good Luck ....Well done for tackling the debt


Wishing you well!! Your target date is awe inspiring ...!


xx

roxy7699

You seem like you have a great action plan, good luck.

x

sambuca9

Update on my targets so far:

1. Take out weekly allowance and leave cards at home - done!

2. Do not buy my daily coffee - no coffee bought so far!

3. Use up the food in my cupboards and freezer before doing any further shopping this week (there should be enough to get through the week!! apart from milk) - had to buy bread but that's it!

4. When I spend ANYTHING, write it in my note book to keep track as I will be using cash.
Done – I have downloaded YNAB, this app is fab and am expecting great things from using it !!!

5. Swap energy suppliers (I have been with BG for 10 years) !!
Done – and saving myself over £300 a year !!!


6. Ring Sky/BT and see if I can get a reduction in my subscription
Done – they reduced my bill by £21 month for 10 months without changing any of the services !!!

7. Start saving money in my unused ISA (Currently only £1 in it)

8. Keep emptying the change from my purse into my mega bottle (one good habit I have got into !)


Going well so far, even if I don't win a free copy of YNAB, I am still better off by £483 in the next 12 months, awesome :beer:

cakeforbrains

Wow! You've paid back a huge amount of debt already. Well done!

sambuca9

Thanks cakeforbrains, it's been a long road but I was lucky that I was always able to service the debts so I didn't have the problems that a lot of the people on here do. I now want to learn to budget properly, I'm sure I would have paid this off quicker if I had done that in the first place (or never got into the mess in the first place!!

sambuca9

Don't you just love it when you sort through your bags/purses and find a £10 note wrapped up in a receipt lol

sambuca9

I downloaded the free trial of YNAB and just finished setting it up ready for payday on Friday. I have done one of the online tutorials and it is starting to make sense. I have high hopes for this in helping me stop wasting so much money. I know its the small amounts that are adding up so this should help me track this far better.

Onwards and upwards :j

sambuca9

I have put all of my details into YNAB and am ready to go! Its weird how exciting something like this can be !! I am already avoiding spending money that I would not of thought twice about on payday!!

Hope everyone is having a great day ))

sambuca9

Done my weekly shop today. I planned my meals for the week, looked through my cupboards to see what I already had, then wrote my shopping list. I also decided to try Aldi, which was a pleasant surprise. They didn't have everything I needed but they had most of it. I sadly decided to do a price check myself with Tesco prices and I have saved £10.38 !! That's on one weeks shopping so a potential saving of over £500 a year which is pretty awesome.


I have already put it into YNAB (my first time doing a split transaction which worked perfectly). This is probably the first time in ages that I have not gone out spending randomly on payday weekend which meant Sunday night was spent trying to stretch what I had left. Bizarrely I am feeling liberated by the whole process, not restricted. Who could have guessed eh !


Hope everyone is having a good day.

sambuca9

1. Take out weekly allowance and leave cards at home - done

2. Do not buy my daily coffee - no coffee all week at work
3. Use up the food in my cupboards and freezer before doing any further shopping this week (there should be enough to get through the week!! apart from milk) - had to buy bread but that's it!

4. When I spend ANYTHING, write it in my note book to keep track as I will be using cash.
Done – I have downloaded YNAB, this app is fab and am expecting great things from using it !!!

5. Swap energy suppliers (I have been with BG for 10 years) !!
Done – and saving myself over £300 a year !!!


6. Ring Sky/BT and see if I can get a reduction in my subscription
Done – they reduced my bill by £21 month for 10 months without changing any of the services !!!

7. Start saving money in my unused ISA (Currently only £1 in it) - payday, I transferred £500 into my ISA, I can only make 3 withdrawals a year so am pretty confident it will stay there !

8. Keep emptying the change from my purse into my mega bottle (one good habit I have got into !) Due to my lack of spending, there was not so much to put in there, but I think that's a good thing!



:rotfl: