Stop me please

Ilona

Hi Chandelier. I'm glad you got the car thing sorted out. The deals available now go right over my head, I do not understand any of it. I know it's important to have a car fit for purpose, but I do despair at those who just want something shiny and new as a statement. I have never had a new car in my life. Worked my way up with various bangers, now can afford something decent and save up for it.

I do feel for the younger generation in this consumer rampant age. The evidence on this forum that debt can destroy lives is very worrying. Youngsters are not getting the information they need to lead a happy debt free life. By the time they come here, the damage has already been done. Personal finance should be taught in schools from the age of five years old.

Ilona

Ilona

culpepper wrote: »

I used to get down to the library quite a lot in our debt days. The feeling of having a pile of 'new to me' books to plough through was a very good one and they went back at the end of the month and were replaced by another pile ,plus I learned some really handy stuff from the reading of them.
Much better than splashing out on magazines which I know is a problem for some .

Great idea. I always have a pile of library books in my house, we have a mobile library visiting weekly. Free books, free learning, no need to buy them.

Ilona

Smodlet

Ilona wrote: »

Hi Chandelier. I'm glad you got the car thing sorted out. The deals available now go right over my head, I do not understand any of it. I know it's important to have a car fit for purpose, but I do despair at those who just want something shiny and new as a statement. I have never had a new car in my life. Worked my way up with various bangers, now can afford something decent and save up for it.

I do feel for the younger generation in this consumer rampant age. The evidence on this forum that debt can destroy lives is very worrying. Youngsters are not getting the information they need to lead a happy debt free life. By the time they come here, the damage has already been done. Personal finance should be taught in schools from the age of five years old.

Ilona

More great posts but I think personal finance should be taught by parents, personally.

Why does it seem so many parents these days abdicate all responsibility for teaching their children anything other than that the world owes them a living? I'm pretty sure I had grasped the basic idea of, "if you have already spent it, you can't spend it again" by the time I went to school.

One thing I remember my mother telling me, which should be on a bumper sticker or something is, "Money is like fire; a good servant but a terrible master."

OP, it is, as Ilona and Chandelier have said, all about taking control and with it, responsibility. Unfortunately, while we all wish you well, no-one else can do this for you; you have to do it for yourself. If you believe you can, you can. HTH.

Chandelier.

Ilona,

You're right in what you say.

At the age of 20, passing my test, single parent about to start university (to better my life), I couldn't afford to buy a car outright. At the time my I was studying full time, working part time and juggling family life. I had no savings at all and was just making ends meet.

Due to the course I was on I had a bursary and within this managed to budget and at the time a PCP deal suited me. I was aware of my incoming and outgoings and was able to learn alot about money management.

I then met a person whom I had a relationship with and who managed his money well. He used to save around 2/3 of his wage and live off the other 1/3 (he was in the army/no other responsibilities). He inspired me to have goals and save money for the future even though things were tight. That's one thing I am grateful to him for. He used to pay for alot of things which I didn't like but kindly accepted. I think he took pity on me being a full time student and a parent. Even to our last meeting he didn't want me to pay for our meal due to 'my circumstances', but I did because my life is different now. He just taught me alot of basics and to look at where I was spending more or could save/cut back. I.e. Drive economically to save on fuel.

Although my outgoings could never match the whole save 2/3, I managed to save a good chunk and now have an emergency fund/help to buy isa set up for the future.

Any extra money at the moment is allocated within budget and towards overpaying debt.

We still have treats and luxuries. We live in a town with a big attraction. I've bought annual passes for many days out over the next year which brings fond memories for me and the boy. We also have annual M3rlin passes which we also use for days out and when I visit my relatives in London. I save up for these over the year and do overtime to cover these costs. It balances everything out and gives me and the boy lots of things to do and options. We also do alot of free stuff as well. We have a good balance.

The boy is 6. He is aware of money handling and is good at maths. I'm pretty realistic with him. He asks questions and I answer. I tell him the reason why I prefer to take picnics on days out or snacks to the cinema. I show him the difference in cost and how much we save which enables us to do other things. He even suggests to take picnics/snacks wherever we go.

I tend to watch programmes about money management and he watches them with me and asks questions. He also questions what I spend and asks what I've saved. I tell him the difference between good spending and bad spending. And about saving up for something you want. He has a bank account and can see what's in there. Sometimes I've borrowed a couple of quid off him (for parking etc) and told him but I always pay it back the next day. I want to teach him ways to think about what he spends and what he saves.

When I finished my university course we went on a two week cruise to the carribean which I'd saved up for. He understood that it had taken me three years to do this. We had a great time. That was a well thought out spend.

I do think sometimes as a younger generation we are set up to fail if not correctly informed. My close relative joined the military, had endless opportunities infront of them but has poor money management skills which ended up with him in lots of debt but he would still seek opportunity in front of him because he didn't want to miss out.

However I'm rambling here now.

Finallydebtfree, what are you over spending on? What sort of items? Do you set yourself a budget?

Smodlet

Good for you, Chandelier; if only all parents took the same initiative.

EssexHebridean

In fairness, not everyone has the same ability to grasp the same things. Someone might be quite capable of managing their own finances, but utterly unable to get the message of how they go about doing so to other people. Conversely, I know for a fact that there are people on here who do a brilliant job of explaining to others how to budget, and yet are in debt themselves.

I agree totally with Ilona (and with Martin!) that the basics of personal finance should be taught in schools - AND homework should be set. The reason for that second bit is simple - it's education on a second layer as a lot of the parents get involved too - in fact my feeling would be that the homework should actively involve encouraging pupils to speak with their parents about it!

There are some brilliant posts on this thread - this may have to be the new "go to" when others raise the same question!

One trick that might be worth trying to try to curb impulse spending. Get yourself a little notebook. Better still, search at home for one you've bought previously and not used. When you see something you want - the first question is "Do I need it?" if that's a yes - then delve a little deeper to make sure that you'red not finding an excuse for "needing" it - so what will happen if you don't buy that thing, for example? if it's a genuine need - then that's fair enough. If the answer to the first question is no, that you just want it - then write down what it is in the book - with the cost and date. Resolve to wait for a month, and the if you still want it, to start researching where it can be bought for the best value. After a month, you cross through date 1, write a new date and a new cost - the best value one you've just found. You then wait another month. If 2 months down the line you still want the thing, then put a plan in place to save for it, and if you still want it once you've saved, go ahead and buy - you've earned it. The idea is to stop yourself buying immediately by stopping to enforce a thought process. If you can form a habit around doing that, you'll be on your way to solving your problem.

Smodlet

Whilst I dislike this new expression, fair one, EH. What happened to "fair enough" or to "good point"?

Pedant attack over.

Bumblebear

Wonderful posts from Chandalier and Ilona here - some inspirational stuff. I feel I ought to make some practical suggestions for my own experience, as my Achilles heel is online shopping, and some additional techniques can be needed.

I shall be brutally honest, when I overspent, as I've said before, I was newly married, left alone for months and sad about it. It is very easy to turn the laptop on, and pick out some stuff to buy to make myself feel better, to have something to look forward to. When I realised that actually "the odd thing" going on the credit card was getting out of control, I had to take some action.

The avoidance tactics I used were:
I "emptied" my baskets on shopping sites. I unsubscribed from any emails from retailers. I unlinked my cards from any sites, removed my credit card from PayPal (bank account still linked, I use it for sending and receiving money). I deleted my "wishlists" on sites that had them. I deleted all shopping apps, apart from MySupermarket (I do use that to save money). I put my banking app on the front page of my phone.

The distraction techniques I used were:
Reinvigorating a hobby which takes my mind off online shopping. If I find myself drifting, I turn the laptop off, and pick up something else I can do sitting down (if indeed the reason for my sitting down is that I'm shattered. If I'm not shattered I kick myself up the backside and get on with some exercise). If you are online and find yourself on a shopping site, you could always come here to remind yourself that you're a moneysaver If I have a desire to shop, I use that time to research where I can buy the things that I need to buy to survive most economically.

But for both of these categories of "self help", I have already identified my problem and the cause of spending above my means. I think that has to be why they are working for me. I've had debt and cleared it before, but I only addressed 90% of why I had the debt to start with, and it's the 10% that came back to bite me on the backside.

Two final points, I'm also another fan of my local library. I actually taught myself a new skill from some library books, a local course I found in said skill would have cost £130. On a similar vein, if you enjoy having "new to you" things, try cycling your wardrobe round. I know some on the crazy clothes challenge do the 333 project, so they put some clothes away for a while, use a capsule wardrobe, then use their own things to swap items out and get a whole "new" wardrobe. I certainly do this with handbags and coats, which can be expensive.

Best of luck again

FinallyDebtfree2017

Now thank you so so much Chandelier and ilona super helpful. I will try all of these ideas out, it seems a common thread here, stop and think before impulse buying

FinallyDebtfree2017

Thank you bumblebear, I have heard of the 333 project, that be super drastic for me