Dear debt, it’s not you, it’s me...

[Deleted User]

I’ve finally had my LBM & I’m simply sick of playing the debt game, so this is my ‘Dear John’ letter to debt as the time has come for me to make more appropriate choices & stop wasting money on interest rates & spending more than I earn. My debt levels have swung from very high to very low over the past 20 years & now stand at just over £10’000. I’ve spent the last few days reading some thought provoking diaries & decided its now or never in sorting my finances out. I think posting my own diary will hold me more accountable & help keep my ‘eyes on the prize’. My goal is to at least halve this debt by June 21 & to be DF by June 22. I partially know the reasons why the debt occurred, I definitely had a shopping addiction but have followed KonMari over the last year so this has helped calmed my spending right down. Also I moved into a new home fairly recently so we had quite a lot of items to buy & rooms to furnish. If only I had set up an emergency fund before moving At least I can see the error of my ways although I still have a lot of learning to do & changes to make. Thanks to everyone who is posting their own debt diaries, they really do help others to take stock of their own debts.

findingthisdifficult

Welcome to the diary section, reading on here really helped me when I started my journey.  It also helps me when I feel that I'm going off piste on my journey.
What's your plan of action?

MidsHollie

Welcome, and well done on your LBM. I agree with the above poster, a plan of action is a great idea. I have a pretty good idea of when most of my debts will be paid (I'm doing the Dave Ramsey snowball method), and working to those targets are useful. I also find it helpful to keep a spending diary, so I know where every penny has gone, and use some of the challenges on the DFW board. I particularly like the 1 debt vs 100 days challenge.
Essentially your debt free journey will be an adaptation of the KonMari principals related to your finances. Simplifying things so that your finances are less complicated and easier to manage. I also love (although don't consistently live by) the KonMari method. Good luck on your journey!

[Deleted User]

findingthisdifficult said:

Welcome to the diary section, reading on here really helped me when I started my journey.  It also helps me when I feel that I'm going off piste on my journey.
What's your plan of action?

Thanks for commenting. My plan of action is to snowball the debts & pay off the highest interest one first. Coming on here will keep the debt & plan of action in mind as I fall foul of the ‘out of sight, out of mind’ school of thought  I know it’s ridiculous to even think like that though. On a positive note I have made serious changes over the past year in regards to limiting my purchases & I’ve finally stopped spending on credit cards but I’m ready to ramp it up a gear & get rid of the debts for good. Any helpful advice is much appreciated.

[Deleted User]

MidsHollie said:

Welcome, and well done on your LBM. I agree with the above poster, a plan of action is a great idea. I have a pretty good idea of when most of my debts will be paid (I'm doing the Dave Ramsey snowball method), and working to those targets are useful. I also find it helpful to keep a spending diary, so I know where every penny has gone, and use some of the challenges on the DFW board. I particularly like the 1 debt vs 100 days challenge.
Essentially your debt free journey will be an adaptation of the KonMari principals related to your finances. Simplifying things so that your finances are less complicated and easier to manage. I also love (although don't consistently live by) the KonMari method. Good luck on your journey!

Thank you, I love the KonMari method as it has changed the way I view material things & the way I shop. I don’t follow it completely either but If I could apply those principles to my finances it would be perfect Ooh I haven’t read the 1 debt vs 100 days challenge, that sounds very interesting so I will definitely check that out. I recently bought one of Dave Ramsey’s books in preparation for starting my debt free journey so will be reading that shortly & hopefully be absorbing as many debt busting tips as possible! I want to snowball debts but still need to do a snowball calculator & work towards those targets too. Thanks for the advice to both of you, it’s much appreciated.

[Deleted User]

I had a chat with the DH last night regarding our finances & how much money we waste. We never set budgets as such for food shopping etc so decided we’d look through our bank statements to see how much money we spend popping into our local mini supermarket & other food shops. We also added up how much money was spent on takeaways. In Feb alone we spent over £450 on food & £120 on takeaways. This is only money spent on our debit cards & not any cash transactions. We are a family of four & quite frankly the amount we spent in such a short month is ridiculous! We don’t smoke, or drink much alcohol either so goodness knows what our money goes on   We’re going to set a budget of £300 for the month for food & £50 for takeaways & see how we get on. I’d ideally like to start a bit of batch cooking & using our slow cooker as this might stop those silly spends on junk food because you haven’t got anything prepared. We’ve also got quite a lot of food in at the moment so I plan on running that stuff down before buying more. I’ve still a lot to learn & have a lot of changes to make but I am
determined to be much more savvy with money & stop wasting my hard earned cash on debt.

[Deleted User]

Batch cooking is a good idea, I cook 2 eat one, freeze one, works well. Another little trick I have is to buy the largest pack of meat,mince whatever and divide it into bags, 3 ozs of meat per person. I can then add something like tinned beans, cannelloni beans to up the protein content when I come to cook it. I do also freeze small amounts as a 1 person serving. You can also add a couple of tablespoons of stuffing to mince, it bulks it out and also the sage adds flavour, one the mince is cooked you cannot tell there is anything in it.
Good luck on your journey, my mother used to say look at every penny twice before you spend it!!

[Deleted User]

Sounds good Deleted_User. Am looking forward to cooking more & trying different recipes. 

FootyFanDan

Welcome Well done on wanting to fix things. It seems like you have been slowly making progress and made changes prior to this diary so you are a step ahead already. This place is perfect for ideas / inspiration and sometimes a general place to write down your thoughts. Its amazing sometimes how been held account on here can help. Best of luck with your journey, I will be cheering along. 

Its amazing how much stuff that you kinda forget to account for until you starting being more aware, you then notice just how much an odd spend here and there soon adds up

[Deleted User]

@FootyFanDan Thank you! I’ve been in the silly cycle of spend too much, pay most of it off, spend again etc. It’s exhausting & makes me feel ashamed I was unable to apply self control & had to rely on my DH to clear some of the debts I’d acquired. I have changed so much over the last 18 months or so, the spending has calmed right down & I am looking forward to the day I have no debts...well apart from the mortgage which might take a wee while to clear   

FootyFanDan

MrsLincoln said:

@FootyFanDan Thank you! I’ve been in the silly cycle of spend too much, pay most of it off, spend again etc. It’s exhausting & makes me feel ashamed I was unable to apply self control & had to rely on my DH to clear some of the debts I’d acquired. I have changed so much over the last 18 months or so, the spending has calmed right down & I am looking forward to the day I have no debts...well apart from the mortgage which might take a wee while to clear   

I know exactly how you feel, a lot of my debt came when I was younger and got money thrown at me...of course its free money right! haha. I then got into a habit of saying 'ah well I work so of course I deserve nice things' or ' Yeah we will just pay extra to that debt next month' and the cycle just continued. I always had in my head I would never need credit for anything so just buried my head in the sand until my LBM last may. I just couldn't keep going not knowing if the next knock at the door was a bailiff or the number of letters coming through ready for court action, plus endless other issues. I sometimes get upset I am not more debt free as there was really no excuse for it apart from a rough 6 months I have always had income, it was just pure stupid behaviour but I am in such a better place now and it seems to me like you are confident your spending is under control so it puts you in a good place to get your plan rolling