Our long dark road towards the light of freedom

Lizloz

Evening all, hope everyone is well and is enjoying bonfire night!


I've been a bit quiet the last few days as I've not really had anything interesting to note down - I haven't won the lottery...I haven't found a stash of cash...I haven't made any savings, I'm just, well, plodding along.


DD2 is not at all well bless her - she's got an awful cough and can hardly breath, I think I've bought every medicine I can possibly get her, plus I've bought a plug-in menthol thingy but she's still suffering and I really wish there was more I could do for her but she's just got to ride it out. She is also on anti-biotics from the doctors.


We've had a lovely bonfire evening. What was meant to be just me, him and the DD's, turned into a big family and neighbours affair!! Everyone contributed though so it wasn't a massively expensive night.


Next week is my last full week off....I'm so not happy


TTFN

Lizloz

Dear Diary...blimey, what a few days! They almost read like a comedy sketch and I'm sure, one day, we'll look back and laugh about it!


We went to a wonderful bonfire party on Saturday at our local safari park - we paid £12.99 each, this included a wristband for the rides and because we went early, we managed to go on loads, then the fireworks display took place which was totes amazeballs!


Our money saving journey took a little turn on Monday, when we had a visit from a financial adviser, who believes that even with our debts, we have a very good chance of moving to a new provider. Although we didn't want to add any of the debt on to the house he advised that it would make sense to pay some of it off, free up the cash we were paying out in monthly payments each month, by which time we will have finished paying off our bigger loans...it all snowballs basically in to being the best way forward and we are extremely happy (well...we will be if it all goes through ok!!).


Today I got a free can of de-icer (thanks to O2), and I'm going to make a special journey tomorrow to WH Smith to claim my free Star Wars lollipops!! (I know.....I'm a child at heart!).


That's all for today folks...I'm on tenterhooks, waiting for DD2 to wake up!


TTFN

Lizloz

Dear Diary...omg, do I feel as sick as a parrot!...(why do we say that?!...have you ever known a sick parrot??...apart from the one on the Monty Python sketch?!).


Tonight, I have been looking in to what we (me and he) are paying out on insurances to cover our income should we go off work sick or lose our jobs.

What is happening is this - we pay most of our bills through MoneyWay who take a set amount off us each week, divvy it all up and pay who we want paying ie: council tax, Water, Gas, Electric, Loans etc etc but they also take a 'management fee' for doing so, plus an accidental death fee, plus insure my husband only incase he is off sick...... As of today (ie: with no mortgage going through this service, which will commence again in January), we are currently paying out £147.45/month or £34.03/week.....ouch!! When the mortgage gets added back on, I reckon this will go up to around £200/month...bigger ouch!! We also pay out another £65/month to another insurance company to cover more of his salary as the MoneyWay account does not cover the full amount of his salary and as he has a pre-existing condition, the chances of us being accepted with another insurance company, I would say, are slim, however, having read the T's & C's, we may be ok but I need to call to clarify.


I have been browsing t'interweb and have got some quotes from various providers, just out of curiosity really, and have been quoted £97/month to cover pretty much what we need to be covered against his salary alone...with all my workings out, we could potentially save (drrrrrum roll please...):
£143/month, £33.05/week!!


Add this to the savings I have already made over the last few weeks, we could potentially be saving:
£262.87/month
£60.66/week
£3154.44/year!!!!!!!!


How I wish I could swear on here right now but....holy freaking Joseph!!!!!!!! Why on earth I make it a habit to find this information out so late at night when I can't make any phone calls and I have to go to bed with all this information buzzing around in my brain, I do not know!!


I am dying to get on the phone in the morning, I really am!!


Oh my days....watching the clock is going to do nothing for me so I'm off.....watch this space, I will update ya'll tomorrow!!


TTFN!!

Lizloz

Dear Diary - well, my bubble has been well and truly popped


I made some enquiries with the insurance firm we wanted to go with as I was sure that their T's & C's stated that they would cover my hubby even though he has a pre-existing condition but hasn't had any kind of medical intervention for at least 12/13 years but they said nope....darn it. However, the company we're currently with would be willing to up the amount we're currently covered for and it would still cost us around £30/month less. There is no way we could not pay for sickness cover as it would take us ages to save for even one week's worth of his wage. Maybe in the future, we will be able cancel it but not yet.


We haven't yet heard back from our financial advisor even though we saw him last Monday - I was hoping that he might have a little bit of news for us re: moving our mortgage but nothing - I've had his business card lying around for ages but now I need it, do you think I can find it?!


I have a dream...that one day, my husband doesn't have to work permanent nights any more...I really wish that for him because I really fear for him.....


TTFN

Lizloz

Dear Diary - well hello there stranger!! It's been a couple of weeks since I last posted....oh my days how busy am I now I'm back in the world of employment! It's not been too much of a shock to the system but it has been ruddy hectic!


Well...a couple of developments have taken place since my last post. We have changed one of my husband's a/s&u cover and have knocked approx' £80/month off what we were paying out and we are getting more cover than before so that's good. One day, we won't have to pay out for this at all.....fingers crossed!


We have had a new mortgage agreed in principle. Just got to get a couple of payslips from work and the ball should hopefully start rolling more so that we can get rid of some of the debt we have.


Bad side....now I said I'd be honest and I will...we have had a bit of a splurge on one of my cc's.....I know, we need a good slap on the wrist for it and there are some very good reasons why we have had to do this but for reasons I'm not going to go in to right now as all I want to do is go to bed, I am exhausted.


What I will do first is update our o/s balances for December...probably going to be depressing....well..let's bite the bullet! Back in a jiffy!

Lizloz

Right....here goes the depressing part and where I actually need to give us a good talking to:


Santander loan = £3328 / £208/month - finishes Jan' 2017
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £3120
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £2912
Father-in-law = £9892 / £390/month - finishes Oct' 2017*
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £9502
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £9112
Barclaycard (in my name) = £6986 / £160/month (0%)
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £6852
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £6701.74
MBNA (in husband's name) = £3968 / £148/month (0%)
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £3889
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £3981 (someone's been having a spend..!!)
MBNA (in my name) = £1083 / £40/month (29.9% APR)
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £1175 (we had a little spend on this)
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £2240 (was not expecting it to be this much!!)
Tesco loan = £11,094 / £258/month - finishes Summer 2019
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £10,836
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £10,578


LBM amount: £36,351
Outstanding balance Nov' 2015: £35,374 (£977 paid)
Outstanding balance Dec' 2015: £35,525 (£826 paid = £151 added to overall debt)


Not as mega bad as I thought but we have still added to the debt Need to get our backsides in to gear and sort this out!!

Puzzcat

Hi Lizloz,

I have been reading your diary and a couple of points jumped out at me..!

Can I ask and ignore me if I have the wrong end of the stick, but you say you pay someone to pay your bills for you? I realise there appears some insurance provided with it, but you have you checked that you couldn't get a better deal or even the same deal online? After all paying priority bills by dd straight from the bank doesn't actually involve any work once they are set up and then you could free up some more money?

Congratulations on your new'ish family member, and hope your doing okay now you are back at work and have sorted your childcare for March and beyond.

NOW.. you need to cut up that credit card.. in fact all the credit cards...!! I have been in debt since my 20's and now I am in my late 40's and I am in a dmp (free!). When I started this in 2013 I had 60k of credit card/overdraft and loan debt. Including the dreaded consolidation which doesn't work unless you get rid of the credit cards and budget... sorry I am nagging!!!

I will subscribe to cheer you on...

Puzz. x

Lizloz

Dear Diary - Happy New Year!!


As you can imagine, the last few weeks have been utterly stressful - it's been a combination of kids, a husband, Christmas and all the blah, blah, blah's that come with it.


Over the last couple of days, I seem to have found my money saving mojo again and am back in the land of money saving.


We have managed to get a re-mortgage offer in principle, we're just waiting for confirmation from their surveyors to see what they think the house is worth....keeping everything crossed that they agree with our estimate!


Right....it's update time and it might not be pretty but please don't judge...I am determined this year that I'm going to save £10 a week in time for Christmas '16 so that I'm not paying for it all over '17!


Santander loan = £3328 / £208/month - finishes Jan' 2017
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £3120
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £2912
Jan' 2016: o/s balance £2704
Father-in-law = £9892 / £390/month - finishes Oct' 2017*
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £9100
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £8704
Jan' 2016: o/s balance £8308 (just realised I've been putting the wrong o/s balances on so this should make the total owing look a little bit prettier!)
Barclaycard (in my name) = £6986 / £160/month (0%)
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £6852
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £6701.74
Jan' 2016: o/s balance £6551.00
MBNA (in husband's name) = £3968 / £148/month (0%)
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £3889
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £3981 (someone's been having a spend..!!)
Jan' 2016: o/s balance £4112.91
MBNA (in my name) = £1083 / £40/month (29.9% APR)
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £1175 (we had a little spend on this)
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £2240 (was not expecting it to be this much!!)
Jan' 2016: o/s balance £2878.22 (damn Christmas....no more!)
Tesco loan = £11,094 / £258/month - finishes Summer 2019
Nov' 2015: o/s balance £10,836
Dec' 2015: o/s balance £10,578
Jan' 2016: o/s balance £10,320

LBM amount: £36,351
Outstanding balance Nov' 2015: £34,972 (£1,379 paid)
Outstanding balance Dec' 2015: £35,116.74 (£1,234.26 paid = £144.74 added to overall debt)
Outstanding balance Jan' 2016: £34,874.13 (£1476.87 total paid - £242.61 paid since last month's o/s balance)


So....not brilliant but I am mega determined now that this year, we are going to clear as much of this burden as we possibly can. As I said earlier, my mojo has returned and it will get better! #thinkpositive!!

brizzledfw

Well done on facing up to the detail :grouphug: Its brave and means you are dealing with it all. Well done.

Here cheering you on your way :T

Lizloz

Thank you brizzled.....I call it 'not getting to the stage where I'm about to bury my head in the sand' and it's all I can do.


Tonight, I have switched from Sky to Virgin...I'm a tv services tart and don't care who knows it! Trouble is, we'll be stuck with them for 18 months but we're saving money by switching so hey-ho. One of the things they offered us was a £100 voucher for M&S, Amazon or John Lewis so whichever we go for, we're getting a tonne of new clothes for our girls (it will most likely be M&S we go for), and the voucher has to be spent within so many weeks of us receiving it so it's not like we can keep it back for Christmas.


Had some great news about the valuation - it's come back at what we were hoping for so fingers crossed it should all go through very soon!


My birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks and just before Christmas, I bought myself (and my sister who owes me) a concert ticket to see Mariah Carey - it was quite expensive so I'm asking people for the money towards it and I can pay it off my card. The last time I went to see her, I was a member of her newly formed on-line fan club and was awarded a backstage pass to meet her, which was amazing! This time around, she is selling concert tickets with a meet & greet included but they are mega mega bucks so I've given them a wide berth!


I've recently applied to go on Catchphrase :EEK:....the closing date is soon so keeping everything crossed that I hear back from them!


TTFN