Seeing zero balances are fab - where I am now and where we want to be

Chrysanthemum5

Hi All

I have been following these threads for a while and have to say the support from the majority seems very warm.

My husband and I have some debt and have been paying it off.

We currently have:

Me
Capital 1 - £750 - minimum is £25 a month but will pay £100 a month till next may when it should be gone
Barclaycard - £840 - minimum is £17 but will pay off £100 a month to also have this shifted by may next year.
Overdraft -£1500 but will put £20 a month to chip at it.

Husband
Barclaycard -£11000 - minimum is £230 but we are going to start paying £530 a month to get rid

Sooooo hopefully by next May we should only have £8500 of his card left and my overdraft which sounds a lot but I have just paid off vanquis - £2250 by saving and Aqua -£1500 by saving hard.

We are managing all bills and payments fine with this plan but having to live very basic until next year when we can pay more once my cards are done. Feel fortunate to manage it ourselves but needed to share as compared to real life friends I feel the poor relation!

Credit rating is shot but hoping over next year with all the payments mine will rise a bit

It felt amazing to have Zero balance on vanquis and aqua. It seems a hard slog but so worth it guys so keep it up xxx

katy_ann

Hi there and welcome to the forums and good luck on your DF journey

Its good that you can manage the bills and payments, we have also been living a very basic lifestyle here, try the oldstyle board which is full of fantastic ideas

Nothing better than seeing a zero balance!

Chrysanthemum5

Thanks Katy

I will try the other boards for some tips. Anything to help is great

Verbatim

what are the interest rates on the cards? Concentrating on the card with highest rate and paying minimums to the others until it's gone will pay down your debt quickest.
Good luck
V

Chrysanthemum5

His barclaycard is the lowest

My capital 1 and barclaycard are the highest and almost same interest rate so that's why £100 on each of those x

crazy_cat_lady

Best of luck with it all. There's a lot of support and sound advice on here to help. And the frugal living will be well worth it once those cards are gone.

asparagus1968

best wishes to you, you have made a good start!


As well as having a zero balance on the two cards you have paid off, I do hope you have closed the accounts down altogether?


Do you not fancy posting your SOA on here also? may give you some more ideas?

Chrysanthemum5

I haven't closed them as I thought it looked better to have credit available and not used rather than close accounts down as it may then look like you can't trust yourself?

Please correct me if that is total rubbish x

asparagus1968

Chrysanthemum5 wrote: »

I haven't closed them as I thought it looked better to have credit available and not used rather than close accounts down as it may then look like you can't trust yourself?

Please correct me if that is total rubbish x

There is that I suppose, but whilst you have the open accounts you have that much "available" credit, so, say if you wanted to get a mortgage for instance, that would affect how much you would be loaned.

uncreative

It helps your credit to have them open in my experience. To have them and not run up any balances on them shows you can control yourself when it comes to having a line of credit open. Also if they have been open a long time then it looks better as the length of time that a credit agreement (thats not a short term loan or a mail order/catalogue) has been successfully managed adds to the overall "picture"

I have now approaching £60k of limit on 5 credit cards taht have an average life of longer than 72 months (6 years) so I have 6 years worth of history on those cards, all "greens."

Having said that, if you are feeling tempted to spend the money and don't trust yourself then closing could be better to avoid temptation. Remember a good credit history is only really useful for getting MORE credit. If you don't need more credit then its a bit of a moot point...

pennystretcher

Chrysanthemum5 wrote: »

Thanks Katy

I will try the other boards for some tips. Anything to help is great

Look our for the old style thrift MSE forum posts - there are some golden nuggets there that I had never even thought before and after reading them thought d'oh, how much money I have wasted...