Tired of this cycle!

theruffles

foxgloves wrote: »

Hello The Ruffles,
Sorry you are feeling so worried about your debt situation. You explanation of how it has happened, with your partner's mental health problems, is understandable. I also think you've identified the current issues well. The spending on credit cards which began then, has carried on, & you know the debt will simply increase if it continues. I had my light bulb moment about paying off our debts before my husband, so I have experienced the situation of desperately wanting to start tackling it, but finding partner not on the same page!. My husband is now a reformed character with money, as am I. Neither of us led extravagant lifestyles, either...we didn't smoke, have holidays abroad, buy designed clothes or eat out at expensive restaurants. As you have found out, you don't need to do any of those lifestyle things to find yourself deep in the debty doo-dah, all you actually have to do is exactly what I did for decades: Fail to budget.....& spend more than I earned. Just a £50 overspend a week is a £2,600 debt by the end of one year. A weekly £50 overspend is REALLY easy to do......a takeaway, some carry-out beers, a lipstick or a DVD, & that's the £50 gone! If you overspend by £100 a week.......so all of the above items plus you might buy yourself a new top......that's £5200 debt accumulated in a year.....& so it goes on.
I had a mantra which really helped me when we were learning to budget & paying off our debts: "If I have to put it on a credit card, take out a loan or extend my overdraft to buy it, that's not my money, that's somebody else's money, so I obviously can't afford it" . Even thought I now budget hard every month, I still say this to myself when I'm tempted to just bung an impulse buy on my credit card.
Learning to budget is EVERYTHING. It doesn't matter how you organise this. I simply use an A4 notebook which I call 'The Money Book'. I work out my monthly budget in that book & update it regularly, I also have a basic Excel spreadsheet with all our monthly outgoings on it. I use the envelope system for little savings pots for car maintenance, clothes, entertainment, presents, household maintenance & holidays and pay a little into our general emergency fund every month.
I do all the finance/budgeting, but my partner is still very much on board, as like me, he's discovered he's much happier if he isn't overspending & running up credit card debt like our bad old days. I set the budget on Pay-day each month, but we always talk about it & make decisions together. One thing that has really helped is that each month, we both have £60 cash for our 'Personal Spends'. If we are on holiday, or it's a special occasion (such as a Festival, where I'd rather we controlled what is spent), I will often budget to increase this to £100, but the important thing is that it's our money to spend on whatever we want. If mr f wants to go & blow the lot on some obscure muso box-set, that's fine, but when it's gone, it's gone, there isn't any more until the following month. We both used to be shocking fritters of money & it's amazing how this system makes us prioritise what we actually do really want to buy. Even if I can afford it, if I don't TOTALLY LOVE IT & it looks like it will last me a long time, then it stays in the shop.
So, I think getting a budget in place is really key for you. The money you have coming in every month is your money. There isn't any more, because as Ii finally managed to explain to my husband when we first embarked on this journey.....ACCESS to credit, is not the same as having money. He used to say he'd got £900 towards something or other, & it was a while before I discovered he was referring to the amount of credit left on one of his cards. Not the same thing at all!!
Good luck with it all. There is no bag of tat I could come home with now that would make me as happy as getting on top of our finances has done.
Best Wishes,
F
P.S Our household income is around the same as yours, so I don't have huge spare amounts of money to play with on budgeting day - it's just a case of the income we have really having to work for us x

Thank you; the things you've said are really helpful. I think I just need to tackle the big budget discussion with my husband and make him see how much stress this is causing me. He doesn't care much for the idea of 'pocket money' but I think it'd be much easier for me to process and allocate money to each category so the bank account wasn't a surprise each day!

foxgloves

I thought my husband would feel the same way about having a monthly amount of money, but he loves it. We never refer to it as 'Pocket money'. It's always called 'Spends' in our house, & I think psychologically, that sounds a lot more positive. Because we have the pots of money under various categories, we don't need to use our 'Spends' for clothes & other stuff, so it really is just there for spending on whatever we fancy....coffees & cakes out, DVDs, make-up, whatever. I think 'Spends' sounds more like Oooooh, it's spare money for treats, rather than it's restrictive & a reminder that we are constantly working to a budget. That's just my take on it, anyway. For 2 people whonused to be such shocking wasters of money, you'd probably be surprised to know that we often have Spends cash left over at the end of the month (told you it makes us prioritise!), if that happens to me, I put the leftovers in a tin & if I see something more expensive I want at a later date, I've got that bit extra waiting.
You will feel so much happier once you get a grip on your finances. Start today x

Mnd

Nothing more to add to the above, all good advice, the one thing that needs to change is your husbands attitude, if you set your groceries budget to say £50, get that out in cash the day you do your shopping, (to your list!)and what is left is what's available for his trips to the shops cos he fancies it!

D_M_E

Water £35 - is this on a metered supply?

If there's just the two of you and you are not on a meter, ask to be put on one.

If the bills turn out to be higher than you are currently paying then you can revert to the old system in the first year.

Our water bill was around the same - £35 monthly - we got a meter put in and the bill now varies between £12 and £15 a month.

theruffles

D_M_E wrote: »

Water £35 - is this on a metered supply?

If there's just the two of you and you are not on a meter, ask to be put on one.

If the bills turn out to be higher than you are currently paying then you can revert to the old system in the first year.

Our water bill was around the same - £35 monthly - we got a meter put in and the bill now varies between £12 and £15 a month.

It's not on a meter, but standard supply. I wonder if a meter would be cheaper for us. Can you have your water switched to a meter if you rent? Sorry if that's a daft question!

EssexHebridean

theruffles wrote: »

Thank you; the things you've said are really helpful. I think I just need to tackle the big budget discussion with my husband and make him see how much stress this is causing me. He doesn't care much for the idea of 'pocket money' but I think it'd be much easier for me to process and allocate money to each category so the bank account wasn't a surprise each day!

Something you've said here - you're right about needing to tackle the conversation - you've supported your husband through a time of trouble, and he now needs to understand that while you in no way resenting doing so, it has come at a price, and that price is him now needing to support and help you to get the financials back in line. while it wasn't his fault that he was ill, it is as a direct result of that situation that you've found yourselves where you are now - honestly, you shouldn't be having to do two jobs when he's barely got one, looking at that income. It certainly isn't fair of hi to "not take an interest in" the meal plan and then decide what is on it isn't good enough for him and he needs to go and buy something else!

What works for us might well work for you, in the longer term if not immediately - we have the joint account - all "central" living expenses come from there. An amount of personal money is swept across into our own accounts each month - and that is ours to do what we want with. That way we maintain a degree of privacy on our spending - presents for the other can be bought without feeling we're "robbing" the other for example, and we don't feel that we have to account for every penny to each other. All annual expenses are divided up and money set aside monthly to cover those into separate savings accounts designated for the purpose - means it's less likely that money gets spent accidentally.

Candyapple

Your husband earns £600pm and spends £180pm getting there - so in essence he is only earning £420pm. Can he not get a full-time job?

Sounds like as long as he has his head in the sand, all the budgeting you do and sorting out your finances will be sabotaged by him so you need to speak to him urgently about getting a better paid job and also getting on board with the budget.

You can't !!!!!foot around him forever because sooner rather than later those 0% deals will come to an end and if you can't reshuffle them to another 0% deal, what are you going to do then?

theoretica

Having a variable or seasonal income as you do, can be hard. The good news is that you can just about break even with the minimum earnings you entered in the SOA. I suspect the bad news is that if more comes in one month it gets spent, and possibly overspent.

I suggest you work out a plan for a minimum budget, as you are doing, and also plan what happens to any earnings over the minimum. Some people find it helpful to put the variable income into one bank account and set up a fixed amount to transfer to the everyday one every month. That cuts down on the uncertainty of how much you will have in the account. You could split the money over the minimum earnings between debt and annual or big bills, and only a little for a treat.

[Deleted User]

If you really can't bring yourself to part with the second car, could you perhaps SORN it, until the debts have been paid off?

tori.k

theruffles wrote: »

Monthly Budget SummaryAmount(£)
Total monthly income 2,000
Monthly expenses (incl. HP & secured loans) 1,737.74
Available for debt repayments 262.26
UNsecured debt repayments 279
Amount short for making debt repayments -16.74
Personal Balance Sheet SummaryAmount(£)
Total Assets (things you own) 5,000
Total Secured & HP Debt -10,000
Total Unsecured Debt -12,804.58
Net Assets -17,804.58

Household Information

Number of adults in household 2
Number of children in household
Number of cars owned 2

Income, Expense, Debt & Asset Details

IncomeAmount(£)
Monthly income after tax 1400
Partners monthly income 600
(this is the minimum due to seasonal work)
Benefits 0
Other income 0
Total monthly income 2000

ExpensesAmount(£)
Mortgage 0
Secured/HP loan payments150
(this is my car, which will be paid off in Feb)
Rent 495
Management charge (leasehold property) 0
Council tax 98
Electricity 40
Gas 40
(gas and electricity is an average. We pay quarterly and a joint bill)
Oil 0
Water Rates 35
Telephone (land line) 0
Mobile phone 45
(2 x phones. Mine is £10 PAYG, husband's is a contract)
TV Licence 12.25
Satellite/Cable TV 26
(NOW TV subscriptions and Netflix)
Internet services 6.99
Groceries etc. 250
Clothing 40
Petrol/diesel 180
(my husband has a lengthy drive to work)
Road tax 0
(paid some months ago upfront)
Car Insurance 28
(for husband's car, my insurance was paid upfront)
Car maintenance (including MOT) 0
Car Parking 0
Other travel 55
(monthly bus pass)
Childcare/nursery 0
Other child related expenses 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentists, opticians etc.) 0
Pet Insurance/Vet bills 5.5
Buildings Insurance 0
Contents Insurance 6
Life Assurance 0
Other Insurance 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc.) 10
Haircuts 40
Entertainment 175
(an estimate but I know this is higher than necessary)
Holiday 0
Emergency Fund 0
Total monthly expenses 1737.74

Secured & HP Debt
Description Debt(£) Monthly(£) APR(%)
Mortgage 0 (0) 0
Hire Purchase (HP)
Debt 10000 (150) 0
Secured & HP Debt totals 10000 - - (my car - payments will finish in Feb 2018)

Unsecured Debt
Description Debt(£) Monthly(£) APR(%)
Natwest CC 4400 150 0%
Virgin CC 3787.5 55 0%
M&S CC 3767 99 0%
MNBA CC 850 25 0%
Unsecured Debt totals12804.58279 -

Asset DescriptionValue (£)
Cash0
House Value (Gross)0
Shares and bonds0
Car(s) 5000 (husband's car)
Other assets (e.g. endowments, jewellery etc) 0
Total Assets5000

That's a great first try, is your overspend each month about right?
It will take a while to get the budget correct for your needs, it took us 6 months of rejigging the figures to get it correct, once you do everything just falls into place.
Time to dig your statements out and account for all your annual bills as well as your monthly, and need to get something in the car maintenance and emergency fund.

Until you have a true accounting you won't know how much you actually have to pay your debts, you can rob Peter to pay Paul for so long until Harry turns up and demands paying then it all falls to bits, so you need to find where every penny been spent.

Once you have then get jiggy with the budget check to make sure your electric/ gas bills are correct, slim down the luxury items do you really need £40 a month clothing allowance could this be cut to £20 for the time being, could one of the cars be sold or sorn and so on.

What's on paper has to match what in your purse then you will know how much you can service your debts with then the fun start with the snowball calculator which will show you the order to pay your debt off to reduce the amount of interest you will end up paying when the 0% end.

You've taken the first step on a long road but it does end and can and will be challenging and fun along the way
Good luck