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

[Deleted User]

Hi ToP,


Welcome to the boards, they're a really friendly supportive bunch this lot


Good luck on your journey, will be following with interest.


Pmo2
xx

enthusiasticsaver

Good start. Re the childrens clothes/shoes. You have a budget of £100 per month (unless you have reduced that to get the shortfall cleared) so that is a reasonable monthly amount to pay out. I would cost all the items needed and put which is priority and then decide what gets bought this month, what next month and so on. Just make sure you keep in budget or if you go over then borrow from another budget.

KxMx

One thing you may well have to do is say no when parents book you in for holidays and stuff. You can't afford it with so much debt. Keeping your finances private is your call, but try to come up with some plausible reasons in advance.

Treadingonplaymobil

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

Good start. Re the childrens clothes/shoes. You have a budget of £100 per month (unless you have reduced that to get the shortfall cleared) so that is a reasonable monthly amount to pay out. I would cost all the items needed and put which is priority and then decide what gets bought this month, what next month and so on. Just make sure you keep in budget or if you go over then borrow from another budget.

I've had to cut £30 off that budget to make the new SOA line up, but I think I should be able to manage what we absolutely need for the remaining £70.

KxMx wrote: »

One thing you may well have to do is say no when parents book you in for holidays and stuff. You can't afford it with so much debt. Keeping your finances private is your call, but try to come up with some plausible reasons in advance.

Definitely going to do that from here on in!

Treadingonplaymobil

Thought I'd post the updated budget (in the form of a new SOA) while I think about it. I've shaved bits off everywhere, most notable entertainment, clothes and food, so those are going to be the areas where we really feel it in the coming months.

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet

Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 3
Number of cars owned.................... 1

Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 250
Partners monthly income after tax....... 2711.86
Benefits................................ 192
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 3153.86

Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 698
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 174
Electricity............................. 52
Gas..................................... 52
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 104
Telephone (land line)................... 18.5
Mobile phone............................ 85
TV Licence.............................. 12.12
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0
Internet Services....................... 0
Groceries etc. ......................... 460 (£60 cut)
Clothing................................ 60 (£40 cut)
Petrol/diesel........................... 225
Road tax................................ 16.27
Car Insurance........................... 25.22
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 20 (£10 cut here, will put back up in April when council tax reduction comes into place)
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 50
Childcare/nursery....................... 70
Other child related expenses............ 81.85
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 5
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 27.07
Contents insurance...................... 0
Life assurance ......................... 16.26
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 70 (£20 cut)
Haircuts................................ 20
Entertainment........................... 80 (£55 cut)
Holiday................................. 75
Emergency fund.......................... 25
Total monthly expenses.................. 2522.29


Assets
Cash.................................... 0
House value (Gross)..................... 21000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 800
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 21800


Secured & HP Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 173733...(698)......3.14
Total secured & HP debts...... 173733....-.........-

Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
barclaycard....................6880.21...156.......0
MBNA...........................9614.71...98........0
parental loan..................20000.....0.........0
Tesco loan.....................21000.....377.......10.29
Total unsecured debts..........57494.92..631.......-


Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 3,153.86
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 2,522.29
Available for debt repayments........... 631.57
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 631
Amount left after debt repayments....... 0.57

Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 21,800
Total HP & Secured debt................. -173,733
Total Unsecured debt.................... -57,494.92
Net Assets.............................. -209,427.92

Created using the SOA calculator at https://www.stoozing.com.
Reproduced on Moneysavingexpert with permission, using other browser.

I'm pleased with how I've trimmed it - it doesn't feel unmanageable (although it does feel like it's going to be a heck of a challenge), but it puts us back into a surplus for each month (of a WHOPPING £0.57 :cool: ). Crikey. Deep breath. Now for the hard part; sticking to it.

JoJoC

Wow - well done on trimming your budget so much. I think once you implement the changes and you can see the difference that these changes are making, it'll then become easier to do things like trim your grocery budget further or when you have extra on the clothes budget one month you can pay that as extra to the debt. It's amazing how addictive it can be! For me, i almost become in competition with myself

Are you able to start using your new budgets immediately or do you need to wait for a new month?

Treadingonplaymobil

JoJoC wrote: »

Wow - well done on trimming your budget so much. I think once you implement the changes and you can see the difference that these changes are making, it'll then become easier to do things like trim your grocery budget further or when you have extra on the clothes budget one month you can pay that as extra to the debt. It's amazing how addictive it can be! For me, i almost become in competition with myself

Are you able to start using your new budgets immediately or do you need to wait for a new month?

Yes, I am hugely competitive, so I can see it becoming a game of one upmanship against me-from-last-month!

I can pretty much start immediately - I've adjusted all my YNAB figures down already and even if I don't make every single one of them this month, I think I'll manage to come in well under my old numbers, which isn't a bad start considering I'm making the adjustment halfway through the month.

ani*fan

Wow, 57p, that's the tightest budget I've ever seen, but entirely doable and all you need! Well done.

enthusiasticsaver

As you say the budget has little leeway in it and the difficulty will be in sticking to it when you are used to spending when you feel like it rather than if you have free money in the budget. Presumably at some point the £75 holiday money will be able to come down as although that lets you pay minimum payments ideally you want to be able to overpay when you can. I guess if you make more than your base income this is spare to either put into your emergency fund or overpay the debts.

Treadingonplaymobil

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

As you say the budget has little leeway in it and the difficulty will be in sticking to it when you are used to spending when you feel like it rather than if you have free money in the budget. Presumably at some point the £75 holiday money will be able to come down as although that lets you pay minimum payments ideally you want to be able to overpay when you can. I guess if you make more than your base income this is spare to either put into your emergency fund or overpay the debts.

We'll actually only be this tight for this month and next month; I am 99% sure that our council tax overpayment stops in March (we had arrears to pay off after completely forgetting to pay it for 3 months when we last moved :embarasse so we'll have £50 extra in the budget. Child 3 will also get her free nursery hours so another £70 will free up. So this 1.5 months of total strictness (unless I suddenly earn some extra) will be our baptism of fire, and then we can jiggle things a bit as necessary. Holiday payments will stop in July.