Wedding and honeymoon debt

swimminginaseaofdebt

Storm89 wrote: »

Thanks robin9 my target then is for the debt to be £17000 by June and I WILL do it. I don't want to give myself a long term target of when to pay it all off cos I will be so disappointed if we don't make it. I like the idea of little targets along the way

Why don't you pop along to the DFW challenges board and join the 1 debt vs 100 days chapter 25 challenge. It ends on the 31st May so would be perfect for you.

Storm89

Thanks everyone - ok sticking to supermarkets for clothes and looking forward to reading all those threads on the link I did have a look at that debt in 100 days but I thought that was about clearing one particular debt rather than a certain amount off the debt as a whole?
I have had another NSD today which is good. We're not doing very good this month though because I spent a lot of money on birthdays the last few days of feb after wages went in so we're really going to have to struggle through to just make the minimum payments and then go at it full pelt next month.
I'm having such a stress though today because we had a gas leak which I thought was covered with the £26 I pay to british gas but because it was from my hob we aren't covered and I needed to have been paying an additional £9 a month. I have to pay £80 for them to come out and fix it. Hoping I can sell enough stuff on ebay to make up the money. Then I'll just pay them the additional £9 a month for peace of mind.

Storm89

Not been on for a while but things are good. *Temporarily*
I have shifted all debt onto 3 cards so it's all 0% interest now. Had to pay a fee total of £225 but better than hundreds of interest.
So now it stands as follows
Barclaycard £2200
Sainsburys £8600
Post Office £7700
Total
£18500
Not entirely sure what to do now with the other cards though because the Post office is only 0% for another 12 months & Sainsburys loses the 0% in November 2018. At that point I will need another 0% card so don't know if to apply for another or hope the other cards that aren't in use offer us a deal. Anyone with any advice please let me know
We're going to pay £500 a month on the debt. £250 on Post Office, £200 on Sainsbury's & £50 on Barclaycard. This *should* mean we are debt free in about 3 years (if we keep it all at 0% somehow) but we still have enough money to 'live' with a couple treats each month.
Onwards and downwards (for the debt!)

Honeysucklelou2

Hi Storm,

I use supermarkets to buy clothes for my children and have picked up a couple of items of clothes for work for myself. The children had pyjamas from Primark as presents one Christmas and they were great, washed really well and were warm. Haven't got a branch locally which is why I use supermarkets more.

Have you considered a separate account for Christmas and birthday presents? I have an S/o to a savings account for £10 a week which mounts up over the year.

Storm89

Thanks honeysuckle. I was thinking of a birthday and Christmas account & putting £100 a month in. It would reduce what we have to spend on 'luxuries' each month but means Christmas doesn't creep up on us. OH gets a bonus of £300 in December but it gets paid in November so that should help a lot too. We do have £400 on Very which I didn't count with the debt but with saving £100 a month we should clear that when it's due in November and still have money left for Christmas. The good thing is , if OH meets targets each year at work then his salary goes up by £100 a month every year so every little helps.
Mother's Day today & OH has just gone to fetch me a Mcdonalds breakfast . I hate that its unneccessary spending but will be nice as a treat! I have no cards or presents (apart from ones the kids made at school) so we have saved money that way.
Even though I don't have as much money as I would like each month - at least we aren't breaking even. Would hate to spend everything on the debt so even having £200 a month is brilliant.

Happier_Me

Hi OP and well done for tackling these dets, you will get loads of support on these boards!

In terms of your monthly budget there may be some options to reduce your send further. Here are my thoughts:

• Mobiles - assuming you have two, this is high. You can get sim only contracts with loads of data and minutes for £9 or less. When you are out of contract why not keep your current phones and move to sim only.
• Your home insurance looks high to me - have you shopped around? I pay £225 for a 4 bed, just arranged this (and I get £40 in vouchers)
• Gas insurance - this is a personal choice. Many don't bother but if your system is old maybe is with it. This is alot of money to not have your entire system covered. Have you considered adding emergency cover to your home insurance policy - the £225 I pay for my home insurance includes this (and I suspect it would have covered your gas leak). At the very last shop around, I think you can save money here.
• Broadband/landline - we pay £54 for 150mg broadline/any time calls and a basic TV package. We don't have nextflicks but we do have kodi;). Again shop around, consider losing any TV package if you're paying extra for netflicks. Using quidco or topcashback, you could move to anther provider and get £££'s back in incentives.
• You don't list life insurance. You both need this with kiddies:)

I would keep a spending diary to see where your money goes. If you can get a good handle on any waste then you can redirect this towards debt repayments or family treats.


Getting a job would be the biggest boost to your debt repayments of all. Part time hours working evenings and weekends will probably bring in more than a full time 9-5 after childcare, so try to choose wisely.

Torties2

Hi Storm,

Happy new diary!
Your story is very similar to us, I just wanted to say you are definitely not alone.

We too got married in 2015, we already had some credit card debt and had just bought a new house. We were very careful with the wedding spends but added to what we already had we still ended up with over 13k debt all on credit cards.
Its good that you've switched to 0%, we've done that to ours a few times and will continue to do so until it's paid.
We are snowballing ours, paying the smallest first and working our way up, are you familiar with Dave Ramsey?
We've found it really helps.

Storm89

Thanks for the tips. We have super fast broadband , full entertainment package and unlimited anytime calls for £47 so I should probably have adjusted that since we switched.
I have been looking for jobs since August because I need something that won't cost too much in childcare . Occassionally there will be an influx of promising jobs e.g recently I applied for 13 hours at Brantano & 13 hours at Store 21 and 8 hours at home bargains. Got an interview for home bargains but 'on this occasion was unsuccessful' it is somewhat disheartening to have been searching for so long & nothing coming to anything. But thankfully we are managing ok and aren't 'desperate'. Youngest starts school september 2018 so that would free up childcare costs somewhat if I find work.
I feel like we have life insurance attached to the mortgage but not sure - OH will know. Will def look into the mobile thing when the contract is up in June 2018, thanks I actually think our spending is ok now since we started the budget. We don't buy coffees out or go out for tea etc we have been doing really well . Do the shopping on a Monday and dont go out at all for top ups . Then on a Friday we have a budget of £5 for some snacks to watch a film with so its like we are at the cinema lol. Food bill is more like £250 for this month which is good. I earned £30 on swagbucks this month so not brilliant but ok I think.
I like the snowballing idea but currently the minimum payments mean we have to split it between the 2 as there are similar balances on each. Once cleared enough on sainsburys I will add barclaycard to it . As long as I see the debt as a whole going down I should feel happy...just unsure what to do with unused cards torties2 did you manage to get new 0% deals easily?

suki1964

If you can get out of the entertainment package, do so. Get shot of Netflix and Disney as well if you can and buy a Kodi box for around £40 one off payment. You can watch what you want, when you want for no further outlay

Food shopping, that can be cut back even further believe it or not. Shopping in lidl, meal planning and cooking from scratch saves me a fortune. We waste nothing, anything can be turned into a soup or pie

Do pop over to the oldstyle boards for inspiration, meal plans, help and advice. There's some on there that have to feed a family for as little as £20 a week. Their inventiveness is amazing

Storm89

Problem is, if we get out of the entertainment package then the broadband and phone goes up to £60 . Not sure why, I think its part of the deal- we are tied in for 18 months now anyway. I would get rid of netflix but we are disney mad as a family (our honeymoon was disney world). We NEED the kids channels disney junior, nick jr etc although we can go without our shows (we said goodbye to sky boxsets when we moved to Bt but it was worth it for the savings). I will look at this kodi box for when we are out of contract and see if it has the channels the kids like. Don't want them to go without unneccesarily for something that is our fault. We have decided no holidays for the next 3 years.
We shop in Aldi and have done for about 7 years now probably spend about £45-50 and then the added fiver on a Friday night in supermarkets end aisles what treats are on offer going out of date that day. We do meal plan also so I go in with a list knowing what we want. I never buy snacks because we bake everyday.
Wow £20 a week is AMAZING! However, I am reasonably happy with where we are now tbh. Debt free in 3 years time & still enough money for a few treats each month seems good. With OHs salary increasing each year by the time the debt is paid off we could be another £300 a month better off anyway.
I will get on it with cancelling netflix though