£50k to zero - made it across the finish line

One-step-at-a-time

Friday update:

• Still £12.37 + £7.50 vouchers left in grocery budget. Soup stock and dough on the go as I type. Fabulous leftovers for lunch today!
• £5 Prolific cashout done and sent to card
  
• Parcel dropped off for collection
• Garden bin & recycling done
• Lots of annoying little work loose ends tied up this morning. I really like going into a weekend without anything hanging over my head.

One-step-at-a-time

Sunday update:

• £10 plus £2.50 vouchers left in the grocery budget with 10 more days to payday. We're going to make it comfortably
• 4 small craft sales this weekend - just stocking fillers but cleared more than £20 between them. It's a good time to start pushing the small items.
• Cleaning, tidying and painting! Utility area has had a scrub and a fresh coat of paint on the windowsill, all downstairs interior woodwork and glass has been cleaned, dusted and polished. Just having a breather then painting another window frame.
• Lots of lazing about too - film night with DH yesterday.

I got curious about our total progress this year, so looked up December 2019 totals. We've paid off £11,315.50 in ten months! My original goal was to pay off £10k this year; I'd forgotten that completely. This was helped by selling a couple of things that went for a few hundred each, but I'm still pretty impressed with the total. Just goes to show that my Nov 2021 target may not be total pie in the sky (touch wood, cross everything, hope for no financial mishaps!). Need to remind myself of that whenever I get frustrated at the slog.

One-step-at-a-time

A new week. I've just been out and gathered the last of my tomato 'harvest' (a dozen of them and still green). Found a recipe for a green tomato & lentil dal so they won't be going to waste.
The book parcel has been received, so that money will hopefully be in the bank before October is done.
I'm currently £95 away from 75% paid, still hoping to get there before payday. We've got a MM CD parcel to finalise tonight, just got to check that all the albums play properly.
Whether we overpay more or not, there are more positive little milestones that will be reached in November, which I'll talk about then. This time next year we'll be in the final stretch! Until then - head down, chip away, no melodrama allowed. 

enthusiasticsaver

Excellent progress so far then and still over 2 months to go until the end of 2020.  It looks like you will be able to get rid of the rest of that debt by next November all being well.  Just over a year to go. Well done. 

One-step-at-a-time

There will definitely be some form of celebration when we're done, maybe a ceremonial melting of a few credit cards in a bonfire and the inauguration of a new spreadsheet  

mark55man

That's a good thing to think about - I will start to do that when I do my monthly figures.  I always said the month after my last mortgage payment - I would blow the equivalent amount on a super posh weekend away - that's in about 4 years time and I may have MSEd myself out of that thinking by then, but it still makes me smile 

One-step-at-a-time

Hi @mark55man - haha yes, I sat here thinking 'What will I do?' and dismissed the first half-dozen ideas for being too un-MSE-friendly I'm going to savour the first month of no debt - the first financial things on my list are upping my pension AVCs and increasing standing orders to savings and mortgage overpayments, but as for the rest - who knows? 

astrocytic_kitten

One-step-at-a-time said:

There will definitely be some form of celebration when we're done, maybe a ceremonial melting of a few credit cards in a bonfire and the inauguration of a new spreadsheet  

The new spreadsheet made me smile, someone after my own heart! 

One-step-at-a-time

Hi astrocytic_kitten! I have spreadsheets for everything, they are my best debtbusting weapon  

More baby steps today - an eb&y auction just finished that will bring in £15 after costs, and this week I've done some work that will be £80 after tax (though probably won't be paid until November). <£10k by Christmas is not yet out of reach! 

remote_control

Your baby steps have meant giant leaps this year though! It is very inspirational. What else can you find to ebay this weekend?