£67,031.92 is a frightening number indeed....

Treadingonplaymobil

wishingthemortgaheaway wrote: »

Is all the debt increase due to business costs? Are you balancing your day to day budget?
How does the increasing debt affect the minimum payments?

(Not questions you need to answer here, but just the questions I would be asking myself?)

You do 'sound' so much happier and generally more relaxed, I really do hope it's income up and debt down from her on in.

Yes, the debt increase is all business stuff. The minimum payments are manageable with some juggling. I'm lucky to be able to manage them while I wait for the business to reach a level to start to decrease the debt, and I'm really looking forward to that point!

Spendy_Spenderson

I think it's understandable that the debt will increase with the planned business expenses (brandings, product design, packaging, software etc). However I imagine it will be key to ensure the day to day budget balances so that debt isn't accrued from this area also and adds to the business debt. From my experience it's easy for this to also creep up if debt is increasing in other areas so good you've got an eye on this. But out of interest how are you making it balance? £625 on food is a lot more than you previously budgeted, so what has been cut or reduced in order for this figure to fit into your monthly budget and not be an overspend / end up as debt?

Sea_Shell

Has the holiday booking not increased the debt too? Or is it only deposit paid so far?

wishingthemortgaheaway

Treadingonplaymobil wrote: »

Yes, the debt increase is all business stuff. The minimum payments are manageable with some juggling. I'm lucky to be able to manage them while I wait for the business to reach a level to start to decrease the debt, and I'm really looking forward to that point!

Phew, pleased to hear that. I mean, I know I don't 'know' you, but somehow I think we are all invested in your journey. Your writing style engages everyone in the same way as a novel does (urgh, feel like I'm digging myself in a hole here...) but, it's because you are a writer in real life, so this blog is just an extension of that. You've hooked us all into every twist and turn so naturally (because writing is in your dna)
Will stop digging now and just say,
Great news, keep going. And banish that debt forever!

PositiveBalance

Delighted to hear about the franchise, ToPM!


Just be careful. You are doing well, but so much could so easily go awry so easily at this stage.

Treadingonplaymobil

I've been wondering when the concern would begin to creep up! I'm going to take this opportunity to reiterate something I wrote at the beginning of the year.

Treadingonplaymobil wrote: »

I finally had a LBM, not of the sort that is usually discussed on here, not of saving more, of cutting back, of overpaying debt by scraping here and there for extra pennies and pounds and watching our debt free date inch closer agonisingly slowly. Instead it has been a LBM of 'is this it? Is this how I want to spend the remainder of my children's time at home (because DC1, at least, will have left home before we clear the debt at our current rate of progress)? And the answer was a big fat resounding NO. So I looked at the variables, at how I spend my time, my energy, DH's work, our family time and our general priorities, and chose something different.

Put simply, I'm going to earn more. I've had enough of scraping £10k, 11k, £8k each year. I'm going to earn a real income, while doing work that I love (so no, I'm not about to go and get an office job). I've avoided ever thinking about earning more during the debt repayment process thus far, because to do so in a way that wouldn't compromise my mental health entirely meant (a) shutting down the very limited income streams I have and throwing myself heart and soul into the website I set up and (b) investing some money in getting it off the ground. It also meant trusting that because I made a bad choice once about training for a limited income career, that I won't do that every time I invest in my career.

I've talked here before about my website and earning some money off it, but the fact is it isn't going to happen at any stage in the next five years without me forking something out to get it to the stage of being able to earn money rather than inching there slowly. And it definitely isn't going to happen while I'm trying to maintain a paltry income stream that takes up 80% of my working hours.

So I'm ditching everything apart from my core contract work so I have a small income coming in, and investing a chunk of money, agreed between DH and I, in a business which I know I have the passion and expertise to make decent money in.

You'll notice I'm not filling this post with 'and if it doesn't work I'll do this' or 'and here's how we'll manage our budget during this time' and that's because I am genuinely 100% confident in my business and its prospects. I have the skills and ability to make it work and I'm perfectly happy that it will. I finally feel like we have a life of abundant income, prospects and joy ahead of us, rather than an endless drudge of going 'well this is being a grown up then, better suck it up and crack on until we get to have a rest in our late retirement.'

I don't know how that will affect my diary here. I have always found this place a hugely important part of my journey and the endless support of so many of you has kept me going through the worst of days (months!), but I have struggled over the almost two years I've been posting here with the mindset of posters who believe that there is one 'right' way to a good debt free life and one 'right' view of how that life should look, and the instant criticism if I broach the idea of doing things even slightly differently. This has led to me losing confidence in my internal compass telling me the best way for me and my family to tackle this journey.

I want to keep posting here because I so hope I will give someone else who feels 'hang on, this isn't the right solution for me' the confidence to go about this process in the way that works for them, not necessarily using the way dictated by received wisdom (which I fully accept works for many, many people), but equally I don't know how I feel about the inevitable criticism I will receive for not doing the 'right' things. I would so love to hear whether you'd be interested in my 'non-standard' process for debt repayment and working towards a good, sustainable, joyful and (relevant to this forum) wealthy life.

Sea_Shell

I think the concern is greater than what's been said here. It's just not been expressed.

Sea_Shell

Just been looking at your figures....is this a fair assessment of the current position. (this might help other readers who haven't picked up on all the numbers, now that we're on page 201)

LBM you had in (round numbers):
Unsecured - £38600
Parental loan - £20000
Mortgage - £173200
Total = £231,800

Sept 18, you had (as per your sig):
Unsecured - £12220
Parental - £19940
Mortgage - £191000
Total = £223,160 (Overall debt reduced by £8640!!)

As at Feb 19 you had:
Unsecured - £19650
Parental - £19835
Mortgage - £189300
Total = £228,785 (up by £5625 - mainly due to new business investment)

To do the extension you've said you'll need to increase these figures by £30000, £20000 and £10000 respectively (at least), giving revised totals of:
Unsecured - £49650
Parental - £39835
Mortgage - £199300
Total = £288,785

Suffolk_lass

If I were in your position, I would be looking to re-deploy my existing kitchen (the essentials) into a garden building. When we built an extension at our last house, we had to eat out for literally months because we had no usable kitchen. Apart from the fabric of the building, everything was covered in pink dust, every day. Having a little refuge is the garden in which to make the occasional meal would have reduced stress and expense for us.

mfmaybe

Sea Shell might be right. I'd drafted a long response which I've decided not to post.

Perhaps talking to the bank about business borrowing officially might help you to segregate the issues? That way you could grow your business but still ensure the household purse strings were tight enough to be effective.