Tidying up the mess

BabyStepper

Moneywhizz, thank you for having so much faith in me. I really appreciate it. :A

The work on the house has been completed and looks amazing, really pleased with that, money well spent. Budget is on track, emergency fund intact, small buffer in business account, even smaller one in bills account but it's going to take time.

I don't anticipate any changes so here is an update for this month. I've changed the order of debts to reflect the new repayment plan. 11 months x £1,400 then 1 month x £400.

[STRIKE]Barclaycard (1) £3,044.54[/STRIKE] PAID OFF
[STRIKE]Lloyds (1) cc £434.33[/STRIKE] PAID OFF
[STRIKE]Barclaycard (2) £517.12[/STRIKE] PAID OFF
Overdraft £2,000/£2,000 0% Sept 2020
Hitachi loan £970.60/£506.40 0% March 2020
Santander cc £3,435.67/£3,085 0% Dec 2019
Barclaycard (3) £1,250/£1,210 0% Feb 2020
MBNA cc £5,325.99/£5,180 0% Feb 2020
Lloyds (2) £907.57/£840 0% Nov 2020
Halifax cc £3,342.25/£2,960 0% Oct 2020

Total May 2018 £21,228.07
Total Feb 2019 £15,781.40
£5,446.67 paid off :T:beer::j:D

Need to update my signature now the debt has gone below £16k.

enthusiasticsaver

Great update babystepper and glad the work on the house has been done and not increased the debt and looks good. Am cheering you on from the sidelines until all this debts are showing paid off. You sound very focused.

DrSpendLittle

Fantastic work, Babystepper. Your focus and organisation is great! Glad the house repairs are lovely - must be nice knowing they were done with real cash and not debt!

BabyStepper

Thanks enthusiastic saver and DrSpendLittle, it does feel good to have everything in order and have paid for it all cash. It would never have occurred to me before to wait until I had cash available, it's a whole new world.

Nothing much to report except that we are on track with the budget, there is still enough cash in the food pot and I am nervously waiting for the end of the month to make the first big overpayment. The house maintenance fund is slowly building, everything is strangely calm, and I am more determined than ever to get this plan going.

I'm off to get some inspiration from the diaries.

enthusiasticsaver

Soon be the end of the month and the start of your big repayment plan. Good your budget is on track too.

BabyStepper

Payday is only 5 days away and I'm now on tenterhooks. I really just want to nail this debt so badly! :money:

I had a moment of self-pity when I left work the other day and walked past a row of very new, very shiny, expensive - looking cars (on my way to the train station where my 40 minute journey home turns into 1 hour and 30 mins when you include waiting and transfer times). Me and OH work so hard and deserve nice things, and public transport is a pain in the neck, and I just wanted to go out and get us a car. Immediately.

So I put a Dave Ramsey podcast on and listened to him all the way home. He was having a good rant about how debt is stupid and buying things you can't afford is stupid. It helped a lot even if I still felt a bit miserable about it all. I know I will be so very glad I didn't buy a car when my overdraft gets cut in half in less than a week. :j I can enjoy being overdraft free for a lifetime and the time to buy a car is coming, just not yet. I can do this.

SavingAFuture

Listening to a couple of Dave Ramsey podcast always gets my head back in the game!
When I want to buy something, I always imagine having to justify it to Dave and then suddenly to desire to buy just melts away haha.
Cars are lovely but debt free will be even better. Stick with it!!
SaFx

enthusiasticsaver

Hopefully you will be debt free in a year and can then make a plan to buy a car with the spare money you will have.

BabyStepper

Yes I got over it pretty quickly when pay day arrived and I was able to make a start on the new plan.

Talking of which, I have strayed from the plan a bit already. I needed a quick win for motivation so I paid off the Hitachi loan. It's gone! :j:j:j The first debt to be paid off in full! I sent £700 to my overdraft and reduced it immediately by that amount. Adding in minimum payments there is a few quid leftover that I will send to the Santander card. The best part of all this was deleting the loan payment from my budget spreadsheet, I'm on a mission to simplify everything and it's a good start.

So now my minimum payments will be £180 then £1,220 available for overpayments. This is not quite enough to clear my £1,300 overdraft next month so I have started a bank account switch to First Direct for £100. (Not the account with the overdraft.) I'm hoping it comes through in time for next month's payments but we'll see. As long as I know it's coming I can skim £80 off the emergency fund and pay it back when my switch reward arrives, but a month should be long enough.

I still have some envelopes to fill and various things to do to get the cash organised, DDs to go out, so I'll do a full update next week. The debt however has dropped to the low £14ks. :T:T:T I need to get colouring in the thermometer. I'm so pleased with all this!

Kitten868

One debtor gone never to be seen again. Great work. And youve set yourself up to clear the overdraft next month. Amazing work. Really impressed with you. Any other way you could raise that £80? Selling things? Surveys? Just a target for this month. Very jealous of how well youre doing well done xxxx