A welcome wake up call

twiggy86

So I had a lovely day out yesterday but feel incredibly guilty for spending money! I went paddle boarding with my friend, something which we've been saying for years we would do, so that was £25 for the lesson. We then intended to grab a sandwich from Mr T and sit down the beach but it was quite windy and paddle boarding was harder work than we anticipated and felt we deserved a drink! So we went somewhere lovely for lunch and I decided to treat my friend - £28.20. Plus £3 parking, making a total spend of £56.20.

Definitely feel like I'm being too hard on myself, so I need to be somewhere in the middle of 'frugal' and 'foot loose and fancy free'!

twiggy86

In light of my previous post above, my spending looks quite high this week!

General - £119.25
Groceries - £53.17
TOTAL - £172.42

Quite a bit higher than previous weeks but if I take yesterday off the total it makes £116.22 which brings it more in line with previous weeks! I have to remind myself how much lower this probably* is compared to previous months!

* Probably as I'm clueless as to how much I was spending and on what!!!

twiggy86

I just took the plunge and decided to use £200 left of lodger's rent (who now isn't moving!) to pay towards ne*t. I was happy that it means I only have £45.21 by the end of the week to meet my first goal!

However I then twigged that it takes my total debt into the 12's! Whilst that's still a high number that I'll be happy to see the back of soon, it's a landmark in this debt busting journey!!!!

clearmydebts

twiggy86 wrote: »

I just took the plunge and decided to use £200 left of lodger's rent (who now isn't moving!) to pay towards ne*t. I was happy that it means I only have £45.21 by the end of the week to meet my first goal!

However I then twigged that it takes my total debt into the 12's! Whilst that's still a high number that I'll be happy to see the back of soon, it's a landmark in this debt busting journey!!!!

Well done! I love when I break into a new number too so know exactly how you feel

twiggy86

Thanks clearmydebts! Such a good feeling and hopefully spur on my debt busting efforts!

twiggy86

So it's pretty much been a month since my LBM and today is payday so thought a quick review was in order.

This month I have managed to pay off £797.72 off my debts!!! Go me!!! After paying off any interest that was added this month, this meant a difference of £603.40 between the starting and closing balances! Wow! Don't mean to blow my own trumpet but I am seriously impressed! (But also thinking if I can do that why I am even in debt - but we won't dwell on that just now!)

Debts at 31/7/19 - £13,418.33
Debts at 30/8/19 - £12,814.93

I spoke to my OH last night (although I thought the total was about £700, not £800) and I asked him what we haven't done or missed out on this month that we would normally. Other than a few takeaways he couldn't think of anything! And the only thing I can think of is that I'm making my lunch to take to work rather than buying lunches. So where was all my money being frittered away to?! The main difference, apart from feeling determined, is been putting all my spends into my spreadsheet so that I can see where it goes, although I did fail slightly the last week - maybe feeling a bit too confident so must watch this!

I also reached my first goal yesterday and cleared the balance on the ne*t account!!! Although a small amount of interest will probably be added this month, but shouldn't be very much at all.

I would love to match my success for August into September but I don't think I'll be able to. September is an expensive month and because I haven't been organised and put money aside, will have less "spare" money to throw at the debts. However, I will still try my best at reaching my second goal of clearing Bcard this month which has a current balance of £612.23.

I do have £300 from my lodger which I could throw straight at Bcard but given that I'm not 100% sure how much my car insurance will be this month and need to make sure I can make the minimum payments on the other debts, I've got this sat in a separate account at the moment. Once I've got a better idea of how the month is going, then I will really attack it!

But for now, I'm congratulating myself on my progress so far!

clearmydebts

Well done Twiggy that's amazing progress! Good idea to keep the £300 to one side for now.

twiggy86

Lovely frugal weekend!

Saturday we popped to a local museum which was free entry - not something we'd normally do so made a nice change although only a small collection for the period we're most interested in. OH bought us both a cuppa and he had a slice of cake, so I just paid £1 for the car park. Then came home and did some de-weeding in my jungle (aka backgarden!)

Sunday did some more de-weeding, so it's mostly done but still needs some more sorting out there. The garden is partly renovated (do you say that about a garden or just interiors?!) but probably won't consider finishing it this year, so needs a general tidy up to make it look someway presentable! Then I went to watch my cousins daughter play football - haven't see her for a few years, so felt nice to make the effort as she was playing locally to me and they won! Cost was £3 and I took a bottle of tap water from home, although I was tempted to buy a pop but resisted!

So apart form buying some new tortoise dirt, I spent £4! Plus I talked OH out of buying a takeaway last night and cooked instead - I hate cooking so am normally very easily persuaded!

Having a non-spendy weekend helps ease the "pressure" this month as lots of things to buy/ pay out for. Although I did managed to get part of my dads birthday present for £1 and I know he'll like it!

clearmydebts

I find Sept so expensive as well with all the back to school stuff, groups etc. DD's birthday is in Sept as well so that just adds to the stress as well.

twiggy86

Quick update!

CMD - I don't have any little ones so fortunately I don't have the back to school expense at the moment!

Had a letter from Santand*r that they have no record of my account in response to my PPI claim. Not surprised and have no idea if I ever had PPI on it but doubt it would have been a lot in any event.

Had my car insurance renewal price - actually is the lowest quote and lower than I was thinking having looked online for quotes, so that's a good thing! I'd put money aside to cover it (majority this month although I had some saved) so decided to re-allocate that rather than pay off CC. Maybe I'll change my mind as it's an extra £100 which would help me meet my target but currently nothing put aside for... (I won't say the word but it begins with C!)

Currently up to £36.10 on onepoll so keeping an eye on that to try get it to the £40 cash out mark! Also got £9.74 payable on Prolific and another £5.25 pending - will wait until Thursday to see if any more becomes payable and cashout (payout on Fridays).

I guess the bigger update which I don't think I've confirmed is that it looks like the lodger is staying - at least for the foreseeable future! So that's £300 a month which I'm going to target straight at the CCs!

Only made a small debt payment so far this month which took Bcard to a nice round £600 - so that's the goal for the month, although will still have to make minimum payments on other debts which might make it unrealistic. But if you don't try, you'll never know!