I have an overactive brain...

elfy1807

...which causes me to think too much, and then I get confused and overwhelmed, which brings on my anxiety and to calm it, I end up doing nothing.

Which is why I'm not much better off now than I was when I was perusing the boards last June time.

I'm not in exactly the same situation as many people are on here, I don't really have debts as such.

I have a car finance with 39 months left on it, and a loan from my mum (which she has written off, but I haven't)

Some people would class these as debts, and I understand why, and I'm not in denial, but I don't quite see them the same as the likes of overdrafts, bank loans, credit cards etc. I don't know why, I just don't.

Anyway, that doesn't mean that I don't want to get rid of them. Especially as I want a house of my own

My outgoing so are almost half what my incomings are, so I have plenty spare to chuck at things.

I have a nice little pot sitting in my current account right now, and this is where my overactive brain comes in.

I have the following list of things I would like to achieve by the time I'm 30 (July 2019)

:starmod:Have a £2000 emergency fund (currently £800)
:starmod:Pay off my car before it's finance finishes (January 2019)
:starmod:Pay off my mum (currently stands at £2655 owed)
:starmod:Have a house deposit of at least £15k.

Also, I would like to have a pension pot started and building so that I have money to live on when I retire. I know it seems like a long way away right now, but there's no point leaving it til I'm 60 and then wondering where I'm gonna get all my money from.

So the problem I have is do I split the money I currently have into percentages and put a bit into everything.
Or do I tackle one and then move onto the next.
Do I focus mainly on one and play a little with another one or two??

I'm struggling. And because I have all these thoughts going round and round in my mind, I've ended up not doing anything and just kept to my minimum repayments on my car and doing nothing else with the rest.

My current thought is to possibly stick £200 into my emergency fund and get that sitting at a nice round number.

Then I'm planning on throwing a good chunk of my wages each month (looking at double my finance payment) into a savings account, to build a settlement fee for my car, whilst still paying the minimum amounts for my car.

This method should see me completing my finance within 12 months, rather than the 39 months that are left.

But I'm still struggling to decide what to do with the chunk that's in my bank currently after topping up my emergency fund.
Part of me thinks just chuck it in the settlement fee.
But the other part of me wants to keep it cuz it looks such a pretty number.

Anyway, I think I've rambled enough.

Advice and opinions always welcome

denialanderror

elfy1807 wrote: »

...which causes me to think too much, and then I get confused and overwhelmed, which brings on my anxiety and to calm it, I end up doing nothing.

Which is why I'm not much better off now than I was when I was perusing the boards last June time.

I absolutely understand this problem and wish you every success in beating it!


If it were me, I'd take the approach of doing one thing at a time, that way you've only got one thing to be anxious about at a time, and the number of things to be anxious about reduces quicker...

PeppaCoin

I think I'd like to go the opposite way and see all the pots of cash growing at the same time.


However if you are going to prioritise, I would say pay back the car loan first, then your mum, then build up the house deposit and the EF at the same time.

elfy1807

Hi guys

Thanks for popping in.

Either way of doing it I'm going to feel anxious and/or guilty.

If I focus on paying my car off first, I'm going to feel bad that I've not done anything towards my other goals.
But if I work on them all at the same time, I'm gonna feel anxious that I'm not paying the car off as soon as I can.

I'm holding out til payday (a week today) until I make my final decision, but I am actually thinking chuck everything I've got at the car, get rid of that, and then that extra money can go towards saving for my house deposit.

As for my mum, I have little bits stashed here there and everywhere that I can gather together and give to her to start paying her back.

elfy1807

So, hi.

I really want to try and make this thread somewhere I can jot down everything that goes through my mind. Because if I don't note it down, I'll forget it.

In order to try and meet my goals, I am trying to save as much money as possible.
To do this, I need to stop my spending.
I have a terrible habit of buying little bits and pieces (especially stationery) because I like them, or snacks, because, well, because I like them too =D

To help me do this, my OH has kindly removed my debit cards from me, and I have to ask his permission to buy something.
Sounds a bit controlling, but it's not at all. He's trying to help me, and it's actually working.
I'm barely spending anything these days.

However, it's not all work and no play. Each payday each of us puts £50 into a "fun fund" to spend on things to do together, like going out for meals, the odd scratchcard, visiting places etc.
We spend the money doing these things anyway, so might as well have a set limit to our pot.

Because I have limited cash to play around with, I'm trying to accumulate as many NSDs as possible. We only really use our fun fund at weekends, so weekdays are pretty easy.
I'll start to count them properly starting Sunday, but so far, since Monday...

Monday - Spent £16.50 - SIL's 30th birthday, went out for a meal
Tuesday - NSD
Wednesday - NSD
Thursday - NSD
Friday (Today) - So far, spent £2.95 on lunch. Wouldn't have spent that but I didn't bring any lunch and it is cheat day after all (explain that in a mo).
I say so far - I don't plan to have any further spends today other than the gym.
I've arranged a one off personal trainer session for £25.

I'm in the process of trying to lose some weight and Friday is weigh day. So I call it cheat day because it's the furthest away from weigh in day you can get, so the most amount of time to get the weight off.
This week I lost 4lbs through fasting.
I'm not religious, but this year I thought I'd give Ramadan a go, and resulted in my biggest weekly weight losses of the year. I didn't do it the whole way through due to change of job and routine, but for the couple of weeks I did do it, I was losing well.
And I remembered this so have been giving it a go again the last couple of weeks for a last push before the Christmas feasts.
So today I thought I'd treat myself to some breakfast, but skip lunch. But hey... I didn't fancy skipping lunch either so popped and bought some pasta & a hot sausage roll.

The gym later - I know it seems like a lot of money to pay out for the gym, but currently I'm on a 4 month contract which has cost me nothing as I referred two people and earned myself a free 4 month pass. That's normally £50, so I've saved half.
But also, I did some dog sitting for a some friends of mine, and they gave me a cash gift when they returned, to say thank you. I tried refusing, but they insisted.
So that cash is going towards my gym session and the bedroom furniture I'm planning on buying this weekend from that lovely blue & yellow swedish designer.

When I go to the gym, I'm ok in the classes, but I'd like to be able to do more in the actual gym. I don't really know which machines target which areas best, which is why I've asked a professional to help.
I gave him the three goals of -

* I want to tone
* I want to lose weight
* I want to be able to do a pull up

I have no upper body strength whatsoever, and would love to build on that. So pull up is my goal.

I've babbled on so much, so..

TL;DR

NSDs Monday 26th - Friday 30th - 3
Weight loss 23/10/15 - 12st8 30/10/15 - 12st4. 4lbs lost.
Nothing to update on debts/savings

Finally, I want to keep track of my online savings accounts

Impulse Saver - £72.80
Christmas Presents - £185.00
Pension Fund - £55.17
House Deposit - £111.00
Car Finance Settlement - £11.00
Holiday Fund - £11.00
Emergency Fund - £21.00 (the £800 in my signature is official and in another account. This might move)
Mum Payback - £11.00 (again, not official, might move)
Car Insurance - £401.00
ISA - £62.21

Thanks for reading