Taking control

DWhite

I’ve decided I’m finally going to take control of my finances! At the age of 36.5 it’s time.

I bought my house on shared ownership in Dec 18. What I knew then but didn’t do, is that I needed to budget and stick to it.
I’ve never been good at it, ever. But I never had the worry of paying a mortgage either. I was fortunate (in a way) that I lived in above work for a long portion of my adult life where rent and household bills weren’t a thing. So I never learned.

My plan is to start small, I’m reducing my optional spending. I reviewed the places I’m spending money and can cut down and starting there.
Groceries, car park etc...

Then when that’s under control I’ll turn to putting an emergency fund together. I have some stashed as cash, it would be enough to pay bills or buy food and petrol for a month. But it’s there for true hardship to make sure my DD. 12 can eat.
Once I have a few months of emergency fund sorted to at least pay the bills. I’ll start working on my house. It needs a lot of work, some was done in ‘19 but it stopped when the money got too tight. That will be the next priority.
My debt is 2 x small loans (biggest is £4800) and a CC debt of £600 so not awful but I want them gone. I was debt free for a good few years and I want to be back there!

I’ll post as and when to keep a diary of where I am and keep myself accountable

DWhite

I was in a car accident last night, someone hit the back end of my car quite hard and drove off. Left me to pick up the pieces - physically and mentally. I’m not hurt other than stiff and sore and headache. Car is written off.
I need to sort finance and get a valuation from them to pay off the PCP. The car was in good condition prior to the accident so I’m hoping that counts for me.
I’ll have to get to the business of sorting out a new car.
I also hope the new job comes through with more salary than I’m on now, I might need it!

Purplebonnie

I hope you are okay and that the soreness etc disappears soon. What a pain, having to sort out the insurance, get a new car etc all time consuming. I do feel for you, have been there myself a few years ago. Fingers crossed for the new job.

DWhite

Today was a better day - for my mental health and for my finances.
I parked in an estate and walked to work, saved £2.20 of parking and added half a mile of walking each way to my daily exercise.
My car was written off in the accident on Friday last week, the finance company called today. The car was valued at the current market price, but with my excess (I have to pay it as it was a hit and run so no insurance details of the offending driver) I owe £350 to the finance company. It could have been worse financially but it leaves me without a car and I don’t have a deposit to put down on a new one. I’m thinking I’ll gave to get a second hand one, but without a deposit the monthly payments will likely be higher than I was paying for my new car and I won’t have the benefit of 5 years free services, no MOT

DWhite

Parked for free at work again today, another £2.20 saved.
Spent £25 on petrol but that’s the only spend in the last few days.
Counted my loose change bottle tonight with DD - £113 in there. Not a bad little stash of emergency money. It’s there for true emergency of zero access to cash and needing to buy food/petrol/pay the mortgage.
Online shop done for tomorrow- I was trying to use £10 Morrison’s fiver but the code wouldn’t send still it will be enough for a few weeks with one or two little bits to top up so it will be ok.

DWhite

Spent my day off yesterday out looking at cars. All I spent was £1.20 for the car park for collecting my glasses from the opticians.
Visited a few car places and managed to get coffee from them whilst chatting so no need for buying coffee whilst out and about
Will likely need a loan or finance for the car, trying to work out which will be the better deal with apr etc. As much as I hate adding to debt I am trying to find a lower repayment/overall spend so that I put myself in a better situation overall.

DWhite

I accepted the offer of the job today, an extra £2000 a year plus the benefit of no parking/petrol costs. I worked out I’ll have approx an extra £250 a month from all of that.
New (old) car is sorted, tax is £20 a year compared to the £140 on my old car.
My plan once sorted in my new job will be to get an emergency fund sorted. Ideally I want 2 months worth of bills etc saved up as a just in case fund.
Then I’ll start clearing the debt. Starting with the credit card, then the small loan as that’s really quite small.
Once I’ve done that I will sort the house out. Starting with getting rid of the carpet downstairs and getting laminate that I can keep clean a lot easier with the dog.
Fingers crossed I can stick to my plans!

DWhite

Back after a 12 month hiatus! 

Very quick recap on the last 12 months then onto my plan for the next.
So I had a new job, which I’d been in for 4 weeks when lockdown happened. I was furloughed until June when I was made redundant.Thankfully I was incredibly lucky and found a new job before my redundancy ended. So I’m financially stable at least. I just passed probation this week! 

Financially it was a roller coaster year, I managed to do quite a bit of work to my house which was needed. Still a way to go but it’s getting there, I’m planning to sell this year to but something together with my partner so finance and sorting the house out a quite important now.
So I have some debt I need to clear. I have a loan - for the car I had to buy last year after mine was written off. A second small loan from when I was furnishing the house initially and my credit card which I put my car insurance and divorce fee on which is now £3,500
I’ll be going though my outgoings and looking at what I can drop, then with what’s left I’ll work out savings and debt repayments.
I feel like I want some savings as when I was made redundant I didn’t have anything and I was very scared about how I’d pay the mortgage. I at least want to be able to keep the roof over my head.
I am actually considering giving my bank card to my other half to keep safe to prevent me buying things I don’t need. I’ll have cash for diesel and my groceries are bought online mostly so I’d have a set amount of cash for extras each week and that’s it.

craftyali

Happy to hear you got another job quickly.  2020 (and still 2021) has been a scary time.  I would definitely take your debit card out of your purse, if that would stop you spending.  I rarely leave our farm now (since March last year), and 99% of shopping is online.  Could be dangerous,  but actually I hate spending now.  Just want to get debt-free and start saving/budgeting.