First Steps to Solvency

mamamu

Worth it or not tip from me.

Whatever I buy, spend my money on I stop and calculate how long ( hours, days, month, years) I need to work to earn amount it costs. 

Does wonders to me. 

mark55man

good call on the CB - and perfect decision to just stick it into an HMRC pot.

theoretica

I do the 'how long would it take me to earn that money' thing too - but also from the spending side, I'm unlikely to spend an hour of my precious time to save £2.   Also, I have a few benchmarks in my life which I enjoy and feel are good value for money at different prices.  Will buying this give me as much use and pleasure as a weekend at a sports event/evening at a concert/new pot plant.

Somewhere on this site there used be a calculator which added up 'it's just a daily coffee' or whatever to show the annual total. Also, you and your wife need to be alert to the risks of mentally spending money more than once - how much of the money she makes from selling bags or unused trainers will go to her Apple watch or eyebrows and how much to pay the cards back?  It is good to have some immediate payback to motivate doing the selling, but too easy to start thinking all the money will go to both uses.  Also, of course, when your wife isn't working she has more time to fill and spend money.

enthusiasticsaver

Wow, what a turn around in attitude from you over last week or so and you seem to be applying the same business sense to your personal finance as you do to your business so I have no doubt you can sort this out. I cannot tell you how refreshing it is to read you told your wife that you intend to make this sustainable long term rather than paying off debt the building it back up again. With your income you could have plenty of disposable income for cars, gadgets, make up etc if it was not for the debts, school fees and generally living up to a luxury lifestyle. We all have to make choices where we spend money even those who are well off. Making your wife realise that an average salary will not even keep her in make up is a good idea as is taking the cards off her. She needs to grow up a bit and I think she may find rich Russians and Arabs are not around every corner and it may not be as easy as she thinks to find someone else to fund her.

LizzieM16

I know you've talked to your wife about the debts but have you sat her down with the actual figures? Could you have a monthly spreadsheet that you both use to see if you are keeping within your means? She might buy into it a bit more if she can see the figures balancing or not balancing on the spreadsheet, rather than leaving it all to you. 

getmore4less

All good stuff, the value comparison is a good one but needs to be rationalised to comparative value sometime to the more important stuff. 
How many
Mins/hours of work
Loaf of breads
Pints of beer
Tanks for the RR
Meals out 
Next RR

Work out your list. 

alt80

21/9/20

1. Yolt everyday: 1/7 🙂
2. Make most of long weekend but not spend more than £100: n/a
3. Activity with son everyday: 1/7 - silly 10min dance workout wife found, 15min dog run, 10min run out in the car and bedtime story. 
4. October budget: spending a bit of time on that in a minute - just do a little bit each night to set the spreadsheet up rather than spending an hour in one go.
5. 3x workouts, 3x 5km: 1/3 workouts.
6. Plan weekend in advance: told wife and son to have two things written down each by end of Wednesday and I will write two things down too.
7. Switch off work number/ email apart from twice a day to check when off: n/a

Candy0107

theoretica said:

I do the 'how long would it take me to earn that money' thing too - but also from the spending side, I'm unlikely to spend an hour of my precious time to save £2.   Also, I have a few benchmarks in my life which I enjoy and feel are good value for money at different prices.  Will buying this give me as much use and pleasure as a weekend at a sports event/evening at a concert/new pot plant.

Somewhere on this site there used be a calculator which added up 'it's just a daily coffee' or whatever to show the annual total. Also, you and your wife need to be alert to the risks of mentally spending money more than once - how much of the money she makes from selling bags or unused trainers will go to her Apple watch or eyebrows and how much to pay the cards back?  It is good to have some immediate payback to motivate doing the selling, but too easy to start thinking all the money will go to both uses.  Also, of course, when your wife isn't working she has more time to fill and spend money.

It was called the demotivator tool (I think)

alt80

How many hours worked / comparative value calculator - this could be good to try, put into perspective a bit thanks all. 

@theoretica spending more than once - this may well be one of my biggest challenges in some ways I've been used to living on credit for practically all my adult life. I've told wife we need to be able to clear off whatever we're spending on them hence just one for purchases now which I can manage through the yolt - seeing the transactions I can make sure no new debt is incurred.

@enthusiasticsaver  I'm trying to. Can't keep yo-yoing in and out of debt for the rest of my life because there's going to become a point I won't be able to keep refinancing property to get out. I'm ashamed how much I struggle with my personal finances and my need to feed my ego but can't keep pretending what I've been doing is ok. Not been the best dad or husband over the years the guilt of that feeds some of the spending and turning a blind eye to wife's spending- can't change the past but I can make more time for my family now and in the future.

@LizzieM16 yeah she's seen the figures. Working on the spreadsheet told her she could put that £3k MacBook to some use lol. 

alt80

Not had a bad start to the day, got up with wife and son. Reasonable bed time might have helped lol. Already checked the yolt app forcing myself to now tbf as it’s not great. Caught myself browsing autotrader after checking the app feeling annoyed I can’t buy an AM told wife to take my phone off me and spent a bit of time with son instead. 

Quite a lot of work today so got some emails out. Good to have made a generally better start to the day. Still convinced tackling my issue with spending is mindset.