Put away your purse & become debt-averse

foxgloves

Thanks Thick n Thin, that's kind of you. Yes, our attitude to money could not be more different to how we used to be. We owed about 35k at its highest & didn't even really regard it as debt. We earned decent money & were never in a position where we couldn't meet our payments. I could never go back to that attitude. To reach a position where £35k of other people's money has been spent......well, on 2 full time professional salaries, that can only happen with either a huge disaster or years of constantly outspending our income, & of course we were in the latter category. It was fortunate that the major LBM struck well in advance of my redundancy because we'd have been in trouble if our income had halved while we still had all that debt. The fact that we can live just as well on one income AND save an emergency fund shows just how wasteful we were before. We don't feel deprived, parsimonious or as though we are endlessly having to count every penny. We actually feel happier & as a knock on effect of ditching the overconsumption, we also feel that we are living in a more ethical & environmentally conscious way.
LBMs (the real ones) come when you are ready to change. I wish you all the best for your new financial start. There's that saying about us needing to BE the change we want to see, isn't there? It can be done & you'll find that NOT spending money can actually become as addictive as buying things.
Best wishes,
F x

foxgloves

Booooo to rotten headaches. I woke up with one this morning & whatever I try to improve it, it is grimly hanging on. Shall shortly take up poorly position on the sofa with a hot water bottle, box set & some toast. Anyway, before that, I have dropped in to say that I received a rather welcome email this morning from our energy provider. We are apparently 'Paying too much' which makes a change from the last email I received from them of this type which informed us we were 'not paying enough'. As I said in a recent diary post, I feel that several of my funny little energy saving measures haven't been carried out quite as rigorously as usual, but that despite this, we had built up a fair wodge of credit on our account. Now I'm cracking down hard on all my energy saving habits again, but this is only over the last week or two, so I've been thinking about this & I can only conclude that it is must be largely weather-based. We had such a hot dry summer, I barely used the heated airer to dry laundry at all. It all got pegged out & was dry so quickly. Also, it's been a really mild autumn. We didn't have any heating on in September (that's normal for us) but we didn't need to use much in October either. This wasn't because we were being tight with it, but more because once we'd sat down for the evening, we just didn't feel sufficiently cold to justify paying for heating. Even just last week, I went round all the bedroom radiators & turned them down a notch - they are back up again now, though, ready for this colder spell, but I think it is easy to get into a habit of just having heating 'on' or 'off', when actually, turning it down even a little, can have an effect on energy bills.
So this has come just at the right time - if I keep up my good energy habits, maybe these new reduced monthly payments will hold steady for a few months, which will be good for my budget.
We were previously paying £106 pm for electricity & gas combined. It has now dropped to £87, so a monthly reduction of £19. I'm always happier when it is below £100 pm, but I think energy policy in the UK is pretty poor on the whole & I think rising energy costs as the next decade progresses will be fairly inevitable. At least it was a bit of good news from them this morning, though.
And now I'm off to find some toast.
Love to all,
F x

Onebrokelady

My energy supplier increased my payment in the same week it was announced that the most they could charade was £137.....they put it up to £134.......call me cynical but that's terribly coincidental

crazy_cat_lady

Hope that you're feeling better soon Foxgloves :grouphug:
Any recommendations for a box set? I need something new to watch...

joedenise

Onebrokelady wrote: »

My energy supplier increased my payment in the same week it was announced that the most they could charade was £137.....they put it up to £134.......call me cynical but that's terribly coincidental

Do you live in a mansion:rotfl:. I live in a 3/4 bed bungalow which isn't insulated particularly well and pay about half that - £68 a month and my latest bill showed that I'm still on track!

Denise

foxgloves

CCL - I'm watching Series 1 of 'Outlander' at the moment - I'm a sucker for long-haired men in historical dress & big boots, lol! Have also watched lots of series of 'Vikings', 'Beck' (I really like Scandi-crime series) & in the summer, I watched a Spanish drama set in a women's prison - 'Locked up'. Mr f & I are watching 'Man in the high castle', which is good, but if you stop concentrating for a couple of minutes to sort your knitting out, you can easily find the plot has left you behind. I really enjoyed 'Deutschland '83' too. I think there is a 2nd series of this on its way. I'm not sure what sort of box-sets you usually enjoy, so these may or may not be your kind of thing.
F x

foxgloves

OBL/Joedenise - Yes, OBL, that does sound a high monthly payment. I think I remember you saying that being very cold causes your fibro condition to flare up, so it's possible that you have your house warmer than us? And that's likely to be important if it helps keep you well over Winter. We live in a 1930s three bedroom semi. The heating badly needs an update - we have old storage heaters (which use most power overnight on the cheaper Economy 7 tariff) & our downstairs doesn't have sufficient heating for the winter months. Our lounge is heated with a living flames gas fireplace, which looks lovely but is not very heat-efficient. We are planning to have a new system installed hopefully next year, but we haven't yet, as I refuse to borrow the money to do it. I am hoping for new more energy-efficient modern storage heaters in all rooms except the lounge where I would like a log burner. Anyway, I can think about that when the time comes.
Is your monthly payment carrying any arrears, OBL? Energy companies are absolute b*ggers for not noticing that customers are falling into arrears then suddenly announcing it when it's built up into quite a large amount. The only other thing I can think of, is trying to minimise your energy use on stuff other than heating, if cutting that would affect your health. I'm just trying to think of ways to reduce that £134 a month, as that is a lot of money to find & I wouldn't be happy with it either.
F x

foxgloves

And now for today's thoughts, which are all about the coming final week of our November grocery budget, which if you follow my ramblings, you may recall took a bit of a hit in week 3 when we shopped at a different supermarket & went over budget. To get back on track, we needed to stick to £70 for the rest of the month. Our last shop (back at A*di) came in at under £35, so just the final one to go this coming weekend & we could do with a similar spend to keep our halos intact.
OK, so no way are we going to achieve this without a tight meal plan, so I've chatted to Mr f about this over a coffee this afternoon & we are going with the following: (Do ignore this if you have no interest in somebody's tightwad meal plans!)
Sat: Roast chicken, roast potatoes & veg (which will include the unused cabbage in the veg basket & some home grown green beans from the freezer)
Sun:Cold chicken with home made chunky jacket wedges & salad (which will include some coleslaw using from some of the above cabbage)
Mon: Chicken stew using l/o chicken, home made chicken stock, a round-up of veg & served with mashed potatoes.
Tues:Spicy chickpea burgers in buns with salad (plenty of chickpea burgers in the freezer from the batch I made the other week, also 2 l/o bread rolls in freezer so will use those).
Weds: Hairy biker butternut squash & lentil curry with rice - 2 leftover portions of this frozen last time I made it, so this one's a cheapo no-brainer.
Thurs: Veggie fajhitas & salad ( Will need to buy tortilla wraps, but have sliced peppers in the freezer plus a l/o portion of smoky black bean chilli I made in the slow cooker earlier this week. Still have some fajhita spice in a little jar from the last batch I mixed up. We always have cheese in, so that will be a tasty meal from mostly stuff we already have in).
Fri: Soup & cheese on toast. (Several different home made soups in freezer, so we can choose what we fancy. I bake bread 2 or 3 times a week & I think a chunk of crusty bread or couple of slices of sourdough goes lovely with a warming soup).
OK, so that's the plan as it stands. I shall use it to write my shopping list tomorrow & will be looking for further opportunities to keep it to a minimum. We get through a lot of yoghurt. We do go mostly for what's on offer, but I don't like a lot of the big brands which are full of aspartame or too much sugar, as I prefer yoghurt in its more natural sour state, so I can be quite easily tempted by the better quality ones. I think we can shop from home to replace a good few yoghurts with other desserts including some of the poached pears I have in the freezer, home made rice pudding with home made blackberry & apple jam & slices of home baked apple & cinnamon cake. I've already noticed we have an unopened bag of coffee, so that's another item I shan't need to add. You can tell we're feeling determined to come in on, or as close as possible to budget as we can, can't you?!
Well, I'm off to the kitchen now to listen to a bit more of my audiobook while I mix up a sourdough for baking tomorrow morning. I've done quite a few other frugal things today - I think my head is definitely in the right place now, after such a chaotic few months - but I can bore you with those another day.
Big jumpers on, everyone. It's turned really chilly. Remember not to succumb to turning your heating up if there is anyone in your house only wearing a T-shirt!! (Though I admit to lighting the fire 2 hours early this afternoon simply to stop our cat biting my trousers, a course of action he fully intended to keep up until the fire was on!!)
Love from F xx

foxgloves

Some thoughts about 'Black Friday' from She Who Used To Be Spendy:
Like many people, I've come to the conclusion it's all a bit of a rip-off. It's only a bargain if you actually need it & had actively been researching best prices, if it doesn't have to go on credit as the interest will wipe out any saving & if it really is GENUINELY a good offer. I've read about a 'Which?' report this week which found that many Black Friday deals are the same (or higher) prices than can be found at other times of year. I remember watching a ridiculous Black Friday scrum on the news where a woman had bought a new Dyson.. In the interview, she admitted she didn't need a vacuum cleaner but had got carried away with all the hype about amazing prices. I can't recall what she paid for it, but I do know it wasn't even a good deal, let alone an amazing one, because we had replaced our burned out Dyson only that previous summer at a big electricals retailer & we paid considerably less.
I think the big online retailers probably benefit most from this U.S import, rather than then high street shops. They might be busier on Black Friday weekend, but it probably brings festive purchases forward so that they take less money at the tills in December, which probably used to be their best trading time. And of course it isn't just Black Friday & Cyber Monday.....I have been receiving promotional emails all week from the small handful of companies I am signed up to on their mailing list. Some of them are decent offers, but none of them are better than offers I've seen at other times of the year, & while I do shop online for certain things, I always prefer to support real shops because I think they help keep the community vibrant, provide local jobs & I enjoy the social side of a town or city centre trip.
So tomorrow, the only purchases made by this household will be:
I. Grocery shopping as per budget discussed earlier.
2. Postage for 1 ebay parcel
That is it..I refuse to engage with it. So many people will be sucked into the hype this weekend & will end up with more credit card debt. I know from my old Spendy Days how easy it is at this time of year to tell yourself you'll 'sort it all in the New Year', but I remember those truly heart-sinking January & February bank statements & I won't go there again.
That's my thought for the day - what do others think about Black Friday? I'm agin it, but someone somewhere might have procured a fabmongous bargain?
F x

PurpleFairy26

Totally agree with you foxgloves it's all a load of hype, unless you know for sure it's a better price than it would be at some other point of the year and you can afford it and need it. I'm amazed by the so called offers, which are often just because they are under a banner detailing such! It does give me an opportunity to unsubscribe from some spam type emails though so that's always good for the soul albeit that's obviously not the retailers purpose :rotfl: