YNAB - 1 year of budgeting, I can see why I'm in debt now

Sharon87

So end of the year. As mentioned my debt's gone down by over 2.5k this year.

I've done the 'reports' on YNAB and here's some differences this year in terms of monthly spends:

Groceries: £156/month - saving of £8/month compared to 2018
Eating Out/takeaways £77.75/month - saving of £15.87/month on 2018
Entertainment: £90.46/month - up by £6.60 from 2018
Taxis - 0 spend! (any taxis for holidays are in the holiday budget) - same as last year. I've kicked the unnecessary taxis habit.

Holidays - ok, so I've spent 3.8k on holidays (for this year's holidays and next year!). I kind of went a bit crazy on holidays this year - Tenerife, Ibiza (festival), North Wales, Naples Italy and Bloodstock festival. This amount also includes Ibiza for next year (spent around £200 for 5 nights - hotel, flights and airport transfers!)

2020 I have a strict budget for holidays. I have a short weekend break away in January (£100 for flights and hotel for 3 nights - thanks to ebookers bonus!). Ibiza - mostly already paid for, and 3 nights in Amsterdam (still to book), as well as Bloodstock (already paid for ticket).

2021 - there'll be maybe one short break!

One thing to note is my take home pay did go up by another 1k this year - it's gone up 5.5k since 2016. I'm hoping it'll go up again next year if I get the job I'm going for as it's another £75/week or more extra! (I work short term contracts, I've just finished one)

Now I need to reduce my costs still in terms of restaurants and entertainment. My alcohol spend has also gone up, but i'm probably stocked up for at least 6 months because of Christmas presents and Virgin Wine offers - I've stopped Wine Bank as I have about 30 bottles of wine at home !

So here's to 2020 - I hope to reduce some spends and pay off more debt. I'm also going to try some of the free things to do in London that I've not done yet (11 years in London and there's still major museums I've not visited!)

Have a happy new year everyone!

Dandytf

Mser's think I've asked this before.
As an Ex ynab'r is the free windows version long gone.
If not what's the cost of re subscribing.
Though I'm doing reasonably well with mse excel budget sheet, though doesn't have the spending detail of YNAB.

Sharon87

Dandytf wrote: »

Mser's think I've asked this before.
As an Ex ynab'r is the free windows version long gone.
If not what's the cost of re subscribing.
Though I'm doing reasonably well with mse excel budget sheet, though doesn't have the spending detail of YNAB.

I still use YNAB4. But the tech support has just stopped for it, so hopefully I can use it for another couple of years - I've saved the setup file on a cloud server! I refuse to pay a subscription for something I've bought!

Dandytf

Sharon87 wrote: »

I still use YNAB4. But the tech support has just stopped for it, so hopefully I can use it for another couple of years - I've saved the setup file on a cloud server! I refuse to pay a subscription for something I've bought!

Re downloaded ynab.4
Previous budgets did part load though it has proved faster to use fresh start option.
Only unsecured lending to add-though I have included car finance.
Not much time I suspect to take some positive persistent debt rules action from help2save.
I'll then in maybe 2-3 months approx re add unsecured lending balances.

think ynab4 is another 34 day trial version- then I'll decide if I continue via paid version

Sharon87

Update: New tax year!

Whilst in the midst of the Coronavirus I'm so far so lucky. I've been working from home, which means my expenditure is down. £140 on travel saved, £100 of entertainment/meals out per month saved. This might help me break my habit of eating out too much - or it might make me want to go straight to a restaurant after lockdown! We'll soon see. But seeing my debt go down is a great motivator.

My debt is now below 10k and my savings are over 2k! £1400 in my HTB ISA - which is technically my emergency fund, but if I don't use it, it'll go towards my future. I need to figure out of a 'cut off point' for my emergency savings, I know we should have 3 months put aside of expenses, which would mean for me of around 4k savings!

I've got an AMEX recently to earn air miles whilst I spend and I'm good at not overspending on it, I use it for day to day things and pay it off in full every month. I've earned over 11,000 avios already, let's hope BA doesn't go bust/changes air miles!

I have had to replace my laptop recently, which I've had to put on a cheap credit card deal, but it was essential, especially for working from home! I've put £800 of it on the credit card and will pay the rest out of this and next month's wages when my CC statement needs paying. It should be paid off within a few months. I was thinking of using my emergency fund, but decided against it. I'll just work hard to pay it off within a few months.

In May I'm being furloughed for 3 weeks as we are having a production break, so that'll mean my wages are a bit less, but I may be able to sort out things like selling old stuff on ebay. I'm hoping it's only 3 weeks and we can get back to production in June! My contract has also been extended by 3 weeks. I finish end of August, so hopefully TV production will be back in business properly by then!

Andyjflet

Have you ever heard of Dave Ramsey ? I would recommend looking up his podcasts and you tube videos, you could be well out of this in no time using the Baby steps.
I dont see the point of having £2k savings with 10k debts ? 
Also cut up the cards for good. 

Sharon87

Andyjflet said:

Have you ever heard of Dave Ramsey ? I would recommend looking up his podcasts and you tube videos, you could be well out of this in no time using the Baby steps.
I dont see the point of having £2k savings with 10k debts ? 
Also cut up the cards for good. 

I've heard people talk about him on here, I'll see what he says to see if it's something suitable for me.

My debt is on 0%, my savings are on 5% fixed and 2.25% (soon to be 1.75%). Also I work as a freelancer, so £1400 is savings in case I'm out of work. I can't pay rent with my cards, so that's to help pay my rent if I'm ever unemployed. And I'm earning more interest than my debts. I NEVER use the cards that have balance transfers, and the only credit cards I used are my AMEX to earn point and my Halifax Clarity for overseas transactions, and they're both paid off in full each month. I won't cut the cards up as when the balance transfer runs out I normally just transfer it to existing cards, so need those cards active. It's worked well so far!

I've got money under control now, 5 years ago I wouldn't have trusted myself with the AMEX card, but now I don't overspend and my debt is going down, I've paid off 5k off already. My budget is looking good and I'm in a position to pay off a big purchase within a few months.

Sharon87

So I've had a quick look at a youtube channel who translates Dave Ramsey's methods to the UK. I actually do some of his suggestions anyway. I work to a 0 budget, all my money is accounted for each month, I make a budget using YNAB, I save up for yearly spends like TV licence.etc. Step 1 - emergency fund, that's my £1400 in savings. Step 2 - pay off debts using snowball method. I'm sort of doing this. I am paying off my cards, I try to pay off the cards with the least left on their 0% deal first by increasing my direct debit. For me I class each balance transfer as debt as oppose to each card as it helps me focus on what needs paying off first. My Halifax card has £666 left and expires at the end of the month. I'm going to move this to another card and increase the amount I pay on that card to have it paid off within the next 0% interest deal or transfer it to a 4.9% deal with 0 fee and pay it off even quicker to minimise my interest I pay (I haven't decided yet, I need to look at my budget/snowball calculators)

The rest of the steps I will worry about in a couple of years when I've paid off my debt! My aim is to be debt free by June 2022. So that means I'll be paying off just under 5k a year or £384/month. I've been paying off a minimum of £290/month with additional payments to the most priority debt when I can afford it, so I'm not too far off the £384/month. In fact this month I'm paying £481 due to the savings lockdown is making for me!