500 days to debt free-achievable????

117pauline

As people warned, your initial budget was too tough. Now you have two choices:

1. Give up
2. Make a realistic budget

An initial SOA is the start. Most of us have had to alter and amend our budgets until we get one that works for us.

However on the bright side, you have reduced your debt by £1100 and not increased it. So that's a bonus.

In your situation I would do the following:

• get a glass of wine or a cup of tea and go back through you bank and credit cards for the last three months and item use your spending
• from this list were there things that you had forgotten to add into your budget or were they impulse buys?
• draw a big fat line and start again
• keep a spending diary and write purchases down as soon as you make them
• look to see if there are patterns emerging in your purchases - are you tired, fed up, short of time, with the same people etc etc
• focus on the overdraft, just think of that extra £10 per week.

And lastly, keep posting as that will give you immense support and ideas. Don't try to do it all at once.

So congratulations on lowering the debt and coming back - that takes guts

Good luck
Pauline

Buffythedebtslayer

Rule 1 of debt busting, you are only allowed to lose hope for 1 evening. After that it is back to having hope.

Rule 2 NEVER under any circumstances say your car is running like a dream. EVER. You may say it is "ok" "It is doing alright" but any more than that is a sure fire way to invite some crucial bit of kit imploding.

I speak from experience as my car which I confidently had planned to replace in about a year (and told this to my Mum! - see you can't even tell you Mum!) has cost 580 and then the exhaust fell off (as I was leaving my mechanic!) and that was fixed along a with a brakes surprise for 290.....

I would try FB for selling stuff and Preloved, I would also look into Music Magpie to sell unwanted DVDs and CDs.

Either keep to paying off the cards and make extra money for the overdraft. OR Pay minimums on the CCs and make a huge effort to pay off the overdraft?

Also post and read everyday. It helps to know even tho it is our individual debt we are all here working towards the same goals. XXX

500daysaway

So as you said I have been through my bank statements and credit card statements on Thursday from Jan to April 4 and can definetly see the problem!
Beauty £134
Food £311
Lunches/coffee £106
Shopping £763
Petrol £490
Fees £392
Travel £58
Entertainment £796
Cash £380
Gifts £155
Car £885
Yesterday I didn’t buy a coffee at work and took my lunch from home. I did go to the shops on the way home to buy some essentials but ended up buying three items of clothing and shopping total was £98. I am actually worried that I have some sort of problem.
I need to sort my overdraft and credit card as £392 is crazy amount to be paying in fees. I also need to stop the shopping and entertainment.
I have drastically reduced the Beauty spending as I would have spent more than that per month before so happy that is over three months. I have to keep up appearances after all.
I had budgeted for £50 a month for gifts so on the right track with that, a little silver lining.
I need to get on top of the petrol spends and stop taking cash out the machine as I appear to just fritter it away. I am at an ultimate low!

500daysaway

So after a bit of a whirlwind year I now have a baby and I am now earning very little on maternity leave however I have
managed to reduce me debt by £5939 but still have a long way to go to get rid of 23k of debt but I am now a lot more careful with money since becoming pregnant. I just started reading the forums again today for some inspiration

charlotte1988

500daysaway wrote: »

So after a bit of a whirlwind year I now have a baby and I am now earning very little on maternity leave however I have
managed to reduce me debt by £5939 but still have a long way to go to get rid of 23k of debt but I am now a lot more careful with money since becoming pregnant. I just started reading the forums again today for some inspiration

Congratulations on the baby and well done for decreasing debt, and not increasing it! It is easy to add to debt when life changes, you should be proud that's not happened for you

500daysaway

Thanks. So 22 months in and I have managed to reduce my debt by £10383. I still have a long way with £19034 still to get rid of. I just don’t get the time to look on the forums anymore for inspiration.