Tomorrows Jam. 31 October 2015 at 3:20PM in Debt free diaries 25 replies 2K views

SpamTomorrow

I've taken a lot of inspiration from other peoples diaries on the forum so I'd thought I'd have a crack at writing my own. If nothing else it will be a place to let off some debt steam and maybe share some debt busting plans.


Rough situation as follows. Total debt £75,212 Made up of a mixture of CC's, Loans and PDL's. This mountain has accumulated over the last 18 years or so, mostly made of holidays, socialising and the odd motorcycle but in recent times it has grown purely to fund living expenses. Enough is enough.


Where am I now? Light bulb moment 5 months ago and since then I have decided to tackle this oozing pile of debt slime with a self managed DMP. Just about to make the second official round of full payments to 15 of the 16; the remaining one is being a pain and generally not communicating; no great issue as it is at the small end of the portfolio. I'm in good spirits, I feel like I'm regaining control of my life, I'm no longer ignoring post, and the debt is beginning to slowly shrink.


I have 89 months if I follow the plan exactly. I'm hoping to reduce this with some F&F action, some creative money saving and maybe generate some additional income somehow.


Some issues to deal with. If I'm going to save some cash I'll need to break some habits. I work in a big city most days and I spend way to much cash on rubbish food, coffee, other, that seems to be on sale every 10 metres; this has to be knocked on the head. I'm also too generous with cash paying for drinks and the like. I need to stop getting bus lane fines, I need to pay the fines straight away when I do get them. I need to plan my spending beyond tomorrow. Takeaways are also an issue. I guess a lot of the classic problems.


Anyway. There it is, warts and all. __________________

minkyr

Hello!
There is definitely plenty of support here.
You are in for a long haul - it's important to remember the debt didn't appear overnight, so it's not going to vanish overnight either.
Good luck!!:)


Subscribes...

SpamTomorrow

minkyr wrote: »

Hello!
There is definitely plenty of support here.
You are in for a long haul - it's important to remember the debt didn't appear overnight, so it's not going to vanish overnight either.
Good luck!!:)


Subscribes...

Thank you Minkyr, I'm definitely buckled in for the long haul, my expectations are realistic but I would love to shave a few months of the debt free date. Need to come up with some neat ideas. In the meantime I need some small wins to get rolling. My 'coffee' spending is probably an easy win so this is where I will start. TODAY.

SpamTomorrow

Quick update, November payments completed. Over 1/30th of the original amount now gone (OK, a sketch milestone, I know)

SpamTomorrow

Any reduction of my daily spend will of course help this situation. There's not tonnes of cash left after the DMP so I need to spend as carefully as possible, the first priority is getting to the end of the month but ideally saving some money to put towards F&F's in the future.

I mentioned before that coffee is a real weakness for me; I drink probably 6 cups a day. The first cup of the day is the MSE issue, this will almost always be from a takeout in a fancy cardboard cup on the way to the office. I've never counted but including weekends it's easily 25 cups a month or £50 per month. The strategy this morning was simple - boil kettle - make coffee in a cardboard cup - leave house. Coffee nowhere near strong enough but kept me going on the journey which involved walking past 9 coffee ships. A small, £2 sized win.

In other news. Final PDL has decided to play ball with the DMP. This means, I will hopefully get a reprieve from their thoroughly irritating automated calls.

An OK day.

SpamT

SpamTomorrow

Feeling quite strange today, almost like there is some kind of void in my like. All the debts have officially agreed to the DMP there is no more chasing to do, no more we're going to boil you in cat sick if you don't pay in full now letters and no more spikey calls. I can’t remember the last time there was nothing debt related to be attended to, of course there is the small matter of the remaining £72,609 but there is a plan and I can see some progress.

freshcotton

Hi SpamT


Well done for taking such a positive "get on with it" attitude with your debt.


I remember I amassed a significant amount of debt after I graduated which was out of control and quickly got on a DMP. Because of overtime, I was able to save lump sums to settle quicker.


The positive to being in debt for me is that I adopted a simple lifestyle that is less focused on spending. The money I earn now is saved, for me and spent sensibly.


The point being that enjoying life and spending money are two completely different concepts with a slight overlap. So even if you are on a budget, there is no reason why you cant actually enjoy your DF journey

glass_half_full

Hi SpamT


Good luck with your journey. I totally get your coffee decision, I'm with you on that. Small steps.


All the best.

FinallyGettingFree

Good luck with your journey! I will be following your diary :-)

lisa110rry

I'm backing you with my thoughts SpamT. Is there anything you can sell to help with the paying off of debts? I cleared a range of wardrobes a couple of months ago and found loads of clothes which had been left in there (not mine!) so on to ebay they went in batches of 20 (free listings). So far I have sold £194! In my case this (in my mind) went toward the cost of the replacement wardrobe (a lovely solid wood one) from a charity shop which replaced the falling-apart MDF ones I removed.

SpamTomorrow

freshcotton wrote: »

Hi SpamT


Well done for taking such a positive "get on with it" attitude with your debt.


I remember I amassed a significant amount of debt after I graduated which was out of control and quickly got on a DMP. Because of overtime, I was able to save lump sums to settle quicker.


The positive to being in debt for me is that I adopted a simple lifestyle that is less focused on spending. The money I earn now is saved, for me and spent sensibly.


The point being that enjoying life and spending money are two completely different concepts with a slight overlap. So even if you are on a budget, there is no reason why you cant actually enjoy your DF journey

Thank you!

It's so true about enjoying life even whilst living on a small budget. The experience of the last 5-6 months has helped me enormously to life's priorities in order.