First Diary

mnkone

So, this is my first day with a MSE account and my also my first post/thread. I thought it would make sense to start with my journey to trying to become debt free. I have been reading through and taking some inspiration from other on here for a good few months and really need to take the plunge myself, not just for me, but for my family as well.

I honestly can’t remember being debt free, I started with an overdraft at 18 and things slowly got worse and worse, until things really spiralled when I was 22/23 years old, now 10 years later and I am still feeling the impact as I have only in the last 2 to 3 years really got myself on solid footing with a job I love and wages that really are helping again. Since making a small amount of progress it’s given me some clarity on why I am how I am with money and what got me here. Whilst I can blame people around me or companies lending when they probably shouldn’t, I really have myself to blame and I have come to the point that only I can resolve this, which may sound obvious, but is a big step for me.

This is just something where I feel like I can vent and just distress about my finances, while hopefully making some progress. I am quite erratic so things may be all over the place, so looking in from the outside if I keep this on track, may not make much sense over time.


I keep adding to the first 2 posts because I keep needing to add things as I remember them, so this may get longer as well.

mnkone

So this is how I have come to my finances below;

Adults in the home – 2
Children in the home – 1


I am working on the below on my wages alone, which is why the bills section is so short, all bills for the house go out of the wifes account, so I just transfer that as well as the holiday and food money to her on payday.


Unfortunately that means I am doing this alone with the paying off the debt, as it is my debt before we met and she doesn't want to sacrifice the lifestyle my wife and daughter have, which I understand, plus I do believe I can pay it all with my money alone, albeit it will take longer.


Ingoing

Wages – £2,448

Outgoing

Bills

Mortgage and House Bills – £800
Food – £250
Holiday Bills – £150
Denplan – £19
Prescriptions – £9

Total Bills – £1,228


Transport

Bus Pass - £52

Debt
Monthly
Overdraft – £3,000, monthly £50 (interest only)
Loan1 – £15,800, monthly £331
Loan2 – £1,250, monthly £167
Loan3 – £840, monthly £155
Loan4 – £1,300, monthly £100
Credit Card - £500, monthly £50
Total Debt – £22,690, monthly £853


SUMMARY

Ingoing – £2,448
Bills – £1,228
Transport – £52
Debt – £853

Remaining – £315

This all seems more reasonable when I put it down in writing, with Christmas coming up, I think the money left will go mainly on presents, so the paying down the debt, whilst I will try and use at least £50 extra for the highest interest loans, will drop slower than it can until end of January’s wages.

If anyone has any advice, please let me know, I am more than happy to look into things. I do also have an affordability claim with a payday lender and that could potentially be up to around £3,600, but I have classed that as a write off, so if I do get anything there I will use it to pay off some of or all of the smaller loans where I can.

mnkone

So after posting this I had a look through everything, including what I have in the cupboards and what I will need that doesn't come out of the regular bills/food money.


Clothes is the biggest thing (excluding presents), I realised I will need new work shoes and trousers. The shoes I have been putting off for about 3 months, but its come to the point where if it rains, I imagine they have worn to a point where I could have a chance of noticing a bit of wet. Trousers are just because of weight, so I kind of need some. Max I want to spend for the 2 together is £35, £25 for shoes and £10 for trousers, which I normally get in sales.
Shoes I used to get from Primark, but they have only ever lasts a month, so slightly better shoes that I last had which lasted 6 months, would make more sense again.

Iwantanewlife

Good Morning and welcome to the forum.

Happy New Diary!

We are similar ages, and have had what seems a similar history with money. Im about 3 months into my journey so far, and I have to say having a diary has been a god send for floating ideas, getting inspiration and motivation from others.

The only thing i would say, although doable for you to attack these, for you to be able to do it quicker it would be so much easier having your partner on board. I understand she wants to maintain a lifestyle, but surely if you can sort this it would benefit your whole families lifestyle in the future?

For me, I managed to pay a lot in a short space of time, from cutting a lot of my household bills such as food shop etc. If you pay a fixed house bill to your partner, then you wont have this opportunity. Especially as £250 per month is a lot on food for a family of 3 and thats without her contribution! Through cuts ive managed to get our weekly shop down to £30 per week (meat and alcohol included!). This was through meal planning and shopping in Aldi. What it has meant is that extra £20 per week from my food budget ive managed to throw at debts as an over payment. Without your partner being involved this is going to be tougher to do.

Just my initial thoughts!

I wish you the best of luck and I will subscribe to cheer you on!

mnkone

Good afternoon, and thank you!


Yeah I have tried to explain that if we can even get rid of all the debt excluding the large loan and credit card quicker, it would mean we would actually be almost £500 better off per month. But it isn’t something that seems negotiable.

I am hoping to get the £840 loan paid off by the end of April with overpayments from my own money alone (4 or 5 months early as it is very high interest), its somewhat optimistic, but it would free up £155, which could then move to another loan.

Food I would like to cut down, it used to be £200 all in with kitchen and bathroom products, but over the last 6 months or so we have gone over, so I put the extra from my own disposable money. I tried to persuade my wife for us to start using Aldi, as there is one just outside out estate, less than 5 minute walk away, but we trialled and she didn’t like their meat or veg, the only things we stuck to really were the rice and baby wipes. But that alone has saved us maybe £15 a week.

I just looked at your diary and reading through the first few, posts so far does sound familiar and really interesting, I have always been very much, buy now then deal with the aftermath. Which is why I am where I am. I will be taking more of a look to see if there are any ideas I could implement too.


The ideas on this forum is one of the big things, as one thing I already noticed is a lot of people try to make a second small income from selling and such. Which made me think about when I moved out of my moms, I left a lot of clothes and barely worn trainers, there must be a good 20 pairs of Nikes which have only ever been worn once or twice. They will all be going on somewhere like ebay very soon, although I will pace it a few at a time as I don't want to overdo it and accidently mix posting up to different people.


Really appreciate the thoughts! Thank you.

Iwantanewlife

mnkone wrote: »

Good afternoon, and thank you!


Yeah I have tried to explain that if we can even get rid of all the debt excluding the large loan and credit card quicker, it would mean we would actually be almost £500 better off per month. But it isn’t something that seems negotiable.

I am hoping to get the £840 loan paid off by the end of April with overpayments from my own money alone (4 or 5 months early as it is very high interest), its somewhat optimistic, but it would free up £155, which could then move to another loan.

Food I would like to cut down, it used to be £200 all in with kitchen and bathroom products, but over the last 6 months or so we have gone over, so I put the extra from my own disposable money. I tried to persuade my wife for us to start using Aldi, as there is one just outside out estate, less than 5 minute walk away, but we trialled and she didn’t like their meat or veg, the only things we stuck to really were the rice and baby wipes. But that alone has saved us maybe £15 a week.

I just looked at your diary and reading through the first few, posts so far does sound familiar and really interesting, I have always been very much, buy now then deal with the aftermath. Which is why I am where I am. I will be taking more of a look to see if there are any ideas I could implement too.


The ideas on this forum is one of the big things, as one thing I already noticed is a lot of people try to make a second small income from selling and such. Which made me think about when I moved out of my moms, I left a lot of clothes and barely worn trainers, there must be a good 20 pairs of Nikes which have only ever been worn once or twice. They will all be going on somewhere like ebay very soon, although I will pace it a few at a time as I don't want to overdo it and accidently mix posting up to different people.


Really appreciate the thoughts! Thank you.

Thats exactly what i did, sold everything in sight. I stared off in July having £3.5k debt, one was a near enough payday lender. As of Monday im down to £1770 having cleared off 4 creditors. That is how i know it can be done, and it can be done quickly, but i think as im single its easier for me to make cuts as i dont need to discuss it with anyone. My only thought is that your wife is actually making your journey harder by not supporting this short term lifestyle cut for a long term gain. Does she know the full extent of the debt and how much it is worrying you? I cant imagine she would purposely put a nicer cut of meat in front of clearing something thats worrying you. Might be worth a chat!

Also if you get time, download 'Dave Ramseys Podcasts' if you havnt heard of him already he is an American financial expert and although is shows are based around the USA, his baby steps principals are amazing. His shows feature people that have cleared hundreds of thousands in a matter of months. Really inspiring and i now live and breath his principles. Stick with it, i promise you you can do it, you just need to realise that your lifestyle will change, but it will be so worth it when we get there in the end.

enthusiasticsaver

I agree that it would be better for you and your wife to tackle this together but I guess that is her prerogative if most of the debt occurred before you got together. I suggest that you tackle getting the food down as £250 for half the food bill for just you, your wife and daughter is a lot. Does your wife also contribute £250? Using Lidl or Aldis will help and in your situation that would be non negotiable for me. If your wife wont help you clear the debt she cannot expect you to foot half a very expensive food bill. You could suggest she pays out for the expensive meat from wherever she goes and you cut your contribution to £150 which should be more than enough and buy the basics from one of the budget supermarkets. Also ideally you would not be doing holidays while you are in debt and the quicker you get on top of this the quicker you can start to keep more of your money rather than paying it off debt especially if the interest rates are high. I agree a chat is in order and while your wife may have some non negotiables then maybe you should too to prioritise paying off your debt. I do not wish to cause a marital rift though so your call but that is just my take on it.

A spending diary is helpful if you are new to budgeting and an emergency savings account is essential to stop you turning to debt if you need money. You also need to consider the difference between wants and needs and be prepared to stand your ground if your partner is booking expensive holidays, paying out for expensive items and expecting you to pay half and not getting good value for the household bills and expenses.

twiggy86

Hi

Well done on starting a diary!

Have you looked into ways to cut the amount of interest you're paying? Although I've done that through balance transfers and as most of your debt seems to be on loans, I'm not sure if you can do that?

Whilst the bills come out of your wife's account, are any in your name/joint that you can look into trying to reduce the monthly amount? Even if they're in her name would she be on board in seeing if there is a way of reducing them so that your proportion can reduce and you can throw more at the debts with the only impact on her being you free up cash quicker by getting rid of your debts quicker!

Also, other ways to make extra - surveys and snapping receipts! I've made £95 on surveys and £5 for simply taking pictures of my receipts in 3 months. Some people go all out on surveys but I must confess I don't have the patience for that, so these amounts are with fairly little effort!

It really is important to remember that all the little bits really do add up quickly!

darrannah

Good evening mnkone, well done on starting the diary, thats the 1st step, Im not sure I can be much help as I am quite new to this debt busting lark myself, I'm just winging it at moment trying different things. I have just changed from monthly shopping to weekly shopping and that seems to be working for us to stay in budget, picking a certain coin (20p's and 5p's for me) and just saving those.
I am going to try the "payment a day" challenge also from next week.
I think it is just trial and error to find out what works for you, but as everyone else has said, having your wife on board will make things easier.
Good luck in your journey xx

mnkone

Thanks all, really didn't expect this much of a response! Yeah she knows what there is to pay, but its been a cause for arguments because I have had to somewhat put my foot down so to speak already, with holidays mainly, we only have holidays which were booked at the start of this year for next year which we cant cancel now, were at the stage where we would still have to pay for them. But I am sticking to no booking holidays, which will be relooked at August next year, which is when 3 of the loans will be paid off without overpayments anyway.


Sorry the food is £250 in total, I pay the food, mortgage and nursery fees with that money I transfer to her, the remainder which is about £80 after those bills goes towards whatever else needs paying, but that leaves her with a similar amount to pay (slightly less I believe, but only by about £100).


I am opening a Starling bank account this weekend as a savings account and am starting off by only putting £20 per month in, as well as any money for things I sell (unless I pay loans with the money from selling, which most will be).


With the £315 I have left at the end of the month, I think I only actually use £50 of that, which is for days out for my daughter. other than that, the rest has always gone one paying off the holidays since January sooner or on presents. I love my clothes and trainers, but I have only spent £30 on 2 trousers this year as a whole, I only get clothes and shoes for Christmas and my birthday, which works really well.


I will definitely have a look at that podcast! I have been looking for a new one as I only listen to one which is only 1 every other Sunday.


Thanks all! apologies if I haven't replied to any certain parts of what's been said, I am just starting work, so have to leave my reply as this for now.

twiggy86

Have you double counted for holidays? As within the budget above you've accounted for £150 "holiday bills"?