Champagne Lifestyle, Lemonade Wages

LemonadeWages!

Decided to create my own diary, after reading so many of your amazing journeys you have really inspired me to take control of my debt!

I have made so many positive changes to my spending in the last 6 months but still left with the debt from my past mistakes.

I am used to having a lot more income to splurge on pointless things that I don't need. In September 16 I had a career change, going from a highly paid sales role to my dream career of a Personal Trainer. Its going great I love every minute of it! Cue lemonade wages! With a decrease of almost £1800 a month, things are pretty tight for me! I manage it and make things work but I want it rid of !!

Me and OH are hoping to start our family this year and currently me and my debt are the only things stood in the way!

Iv created this diary as I am hoping it will motivate me the way a lot of the diaries have worked for everyone else!

Any advice, ideas or money saving tips greatly appreciated !!

I think my debt is currently around £7000. I will post below. ( Please bare with me, I am so new to all this and still finding my way around the site) :j

UncannyScot

Hello and welcome aboard

Lots of help and support here. Join in and see...

A personal trainer? Oooooo maybe you could give us some tips on health and fitness?

Looking forwards to updates and progress...

LemonadeWages!

Thank you !

I am very excited to be taking steps in the right direction!!

Ofcourse ask away!

LemonadeWages!

Car Loan - £3344.08 - monthly payments of £294.16

Barclaycard - £2776.48 - 0% ends march 18. Will look for new 0% but don't want to rely on being accepted.

Littlewoods
- £55 - BNPL ends 2/3/18
- £190 - BNPL ends 30/3/18
- £187 - BNPL ends 22/6/18

I owe my Dad - £170 he was kind enough to book a villa for the whole of my family this year in Sept and I only need to pay for flights. I would cancel this however I haven't had a holiday in three years and it means a lot to him to have all of us there.

I owe my mum - £55 yes silly me again spending, I needed a new TV stand as mine was in bits and she offered to pay for it until I had some spare money.


Holiday spending - so I barely have money left at the end of the month to put towards my holiday so need to get a small pot together. I wont need a lot, there is 8 adults and my nieces. The villa is paid for so we all will put in some euros for food and drink for the week, our holidays are pretty chilled out so I wont need much more the £100.

Total - £6777.56

On the plus side!

Because of my job I do get a reasonable basic and extra for classes and PT which can be anything up to an extra £25 - £100 per week.

Recent car sale - so I still had my old car which I didn't sell after buying a new one as my younger brother was interested in for when he is home. (he is in military and lives abroad). However he has brought it is paying in monthly installments of £200 which I am putting straight towards my car loan!

Julie67

Congratulations on your shiny new diary.
Lots of us with lots of experience on here so a great place to be.
I've just started a new diary today, (empty nest, empty pockets)
Good luck with your journey

LemonadeWages!

Thank you Julie!

Brilliant, just sat down with a cuppa so will have a read

UncannyScot

Looks like you have a good idea of what you need to tackle and clear off first.

Fitness and strength training? Building up muscle mass in all the right places and not forgetting to work the legs too...

I do my own training via a well know 24hr Gym chain... I also do some training at home.
Have a background in martial arts...

I am looking to build up, without becoming too big as I don't want to look like a gym-gorilla-thug kinda guy and want to keep supple and agile. Have seen a few friends bulk up and they lose their speed, if you know what I mean, not as sharp as they were when sparring...

As well as gym work I do a lot of walking (big outdoors enthusiast) and have just got myself an old mountain bike that I'm working on to get about with...

Training is circuit based, weights and cardio... my eating is... erm... could be better, yeah

So any tips on training plans would be most welcome

oh, if you fancy a read my Diary is "Rambling On..." you're welcome to pop round anytime

LemonadeWages!

UncannyScot wrote: »

Looks like you have a good idea of what you need to tackle and clear off first.

Fitness and strength training? Building up muscle mass in all the right places and not forgetting to work the legs too...

I do my own training via a well know 24hr Gym chain... I also do some training at home.
Have a background in martial arts...

I am looking to build up, without becoming too big as I don't want to look like a gym-gorilla-thug kinda guy and want to keep supple and agile. Have seen a few friends bulk up and they lose their speed, if you know what I mean, not as sharp as they were when sparring...

As well as gym work I do a lot of walking (big outdoors enthusiast) and have just got myself an old mountain bike that I'm working on to get about with...

Training is circuit based, weights and cardio... my eating is... erm... could be better, yeah

So any tips on training plans would be most welcome

So an athletic build then.
Research calisthenics I think that would interest you, a lot of body weight exercises its about body control and agility. Sounds like you have a lot of knowledge already, keep your cardio up, most people tend to forget this and focus on weights. I know to many 'gym gorilla thugs' (love that BTW) that have biceps the size of my head but couldn't run 100 meters without passing out. Start making small changes to your diet with things that will be nutritionally beneficial to you. Its quite simple just cut out any processed foods and fuel your body with what it needs. Depending how much you want to change it might be worth having a read about macro counting. There is so much information on the internet you will find something that suits you.

UncannyScot

Thank you...

Will get searching once I've put this bike back together again... taking it to the local bike hospital tomorrow...

LemonadeWages!

Good luck with the bike!

LemonadeWages!

So I am very keen to get myself started with a Emergency Fund! My goal is to have £1000 sat in here before I start making any extra over payments on my debts!

So far in my holiday pot I have £79.50 , by the time I go on holiday I will have at least an extra £250 on top of this in the holiday pot! £329.50. I will only need around £150 of this for holiday which will leave me with a nice little sum to put straight into emergency fund! Adding this to a regular saving from my basic pay I should hopefully be near the £1000 mark towards the end of the year!