I'm new & I cut my credit card up last night!

manicpink

Hello!
My name is Lisa & I am horrendous with money!
Currently I have £300 OD on 1 bank account & about £250 on another. I owe just over £5000 on a loan. Have £1300 on credit card. Also a £500 NEXT bill.
TBH my biggest problem is I just buy stuff if we 'need' it, any excuse really. I have no set budget for anything at all.

The cutting up of my credit card is scary but I have to start somewhere cos if I am depressed then I spend money, hence the loan, thats paying off an old credit card that I ran up.

I don't work (my husband does!) & he gives me £700 a month. I also get £150 in benefits so I get £850PM for everything householdy. I do not have to pay mortgage or any bills. I buy the food, clothes & pay for the childrens stuff like nursery, ballet etc...

My silliest expence was magazines. I think I was spending bout £50PM on them!!!! No joke! I have stopped. Its silly & also I wasn't reading them. It was like an addiction just buying them (perhaps I am nuts :rotfl: ) I now get loads of library books.

Anyway I look forward to all the money saving tips on this site. I will certainly need then now as its only the 3rd & I have approx £50 to last me the month, although an extra £300 if I count the overdraft

Thanks for reading

Lisa

honey

Welcome to MSE and well done cutting your ccard up :j

Maybe you could have a go at the budget from the main site. It really helps to see what you are spending.

Also try having a look in the Oldstyle forum, they have a storecupboard challange which might be good to try as you only have £50 til the end of the month.

I'm the same as you - buying stuff because I think we "need" it. I still want to do it, but I now feel extremely pleased with myself when I resist (think bank manager is pretty pleased too!) I keep a wish list now, anything I think we need/want I put down - some things get bought but some just get crossed off.

Good luck and have fun getting to know the site

Queenie

:hello: Welcome Lisa :hello:

I've been a mag-o-holic too so I can empathise .. but yes, the library (and addiction to here) has curbed most of my mag-o-holic ways

honey has given you some great advice ... use Martins Budget Calculator to see if you can focus on what is going where. It's *the* most important first step really. Yes, also the challenges in Old Style, Marriage and Relationships and, well, everywhere that is pertinent to your circumstances really! LOL

Good luck!!

ceegee

Crikey, £800 per month and you don't have to pay bills out of it :eek: .....you should be loaded with dosh! Honest...some people only have a bit more than that and have to pay everything out of it,including the mortgage!

So, you should do absolutely fine if you follow all of the excellent advice available on this site.....from where I am sitting, the your financial future is looking extremely rosy!

Welcome, BTW. :cool:

Lucie_2

:wave: Hello Lisa. Good on ya girl!
It was just over 12 months ago when I realised I had no idea what I spent my money on. I did a detailed breakdown & was shocked at how much money we wasted on nothing very much at all. Nowadays I am very good at asking myself if I really do "need it"? The answer is invariably no. I start a new job next week & need new work clothes (having spent the last 5 years in tracky/trainers). Before MSE I would have gone out & blown a fortune without thinking about it. Instead I have spent £50 at La Redoute (sale plus discount code) on 6 things that can be worn with my existing clothes.

Quick thought: have you kept all your magazines? Some people sell them on e-bay, so you could make a few quid out of your extravagance.

manicpink

Thankyou for your replies!

ceegee, you are absolutly right, I should be loaded with money. But thats what stupid spending does eh! I hope to be 'right' in a few months.

Now I have cut up the dreaded credit card I have started to worry about how to pay for Christmas! Which is silly as it isn;t for 6 months, I will also be working by then & also my children have lots & lots so can have a 'frugal' christmas this year.

I have been reading the June budget thingie & also a thread about using only whats in the pantry & freezer. Both are excellent & I def have lots of food & only been milk (for my son who is a milk monster!) today!

Lisa

lou_martin

Hello Lisa

I know where you are coming from. I live with my boyfriend and lucky for me he pays 90% of all the bills, i pay him no rent or anything but i do our monthly food shopping. I work full time and should have around £800 basically spare every month to do as I please but due to my own stupidity i have always spent more than i earn and i guess tried to keep up with everyone else, new stuff all the time, new stuff from the Next catalogue (aarrrgghh!!) every time i got bored with what i already had, plus past loans and credit cards i had to pay off but just paid the minimum amounts. I am on the road to recovery now but it's hard slog, it's almost like an addiction and i can feel the pull of the shops every time i go past but if i am going to buy something now i always give myself a couple of days to think about it and generally i realise then that i don't need it after all. I wish you luck and keep up the good work!

dougk_2

Firstly dump the Next catalogue! Go shopping for clothes at ASDA instead (after all George was an ex-Next designer!).

kingfisher1961

First of all, well done for cutting up your credit card. We haven't used ours since last November when we discovered we were going to be on about £400 less per month due to a job change. It is now much better that we only spend what we have in the bank. If you are worrying about Christmas why not save something each month towards it. We put away £75 a month and find it is plenty for us (we have two children). You'll find lots of great ideas on here - Good Luck

ceegee

manicpink......if you don't know "where it all goes", a good idea is to get a cheap notebook and keep a note in it of every penny you spend, and what you have spent it on. For instance, if you have just come back from grocery shopping and have spent, say, £15.82, write it in your notebook. Then is say, you popped down to the post office and bought stamps, newspaper and choccy, all totalling, say, £1.82, then list that underneath your grocery entry. It is so easy to do, once you get into the habit......quite a few people here do it, including me. It doesn't half show you where it all goes and it doesn't half mount up quickly if you are not careful!! :eek:

ceegee

lou_martin wrote:

i can feel the pull of the shops every time i go past

Thankfully shops have the opposite effect on me! When I have no choice but to go into town (Christmas and birthdays and school uniform replacement) I see them as irritating lumps of bricks and mortar who are trying to part me from my hard-earned dosh. How stupid that sounds! But they won't get the better of me...the little blighters!

I do get a great deal of satisfaction knowing that despite all their best efforts, these advertising gurus and "wonderful" displays can't make me spend anything that isn't absolutely necessary. Makes me feel quite smug when I think about it.