First Steps to Solvency

Legs21

You will never be happy with anything until you are happy with yourself! 

The less you spend the more you can afford.

warby68

Everything starts with the business, key to your goals is pursuing that effectively.
Very simply, if you are now making coke fuelled business decisions, you are risking it all.
I don't think you can manage to come off it alone.  Don't bite my head off, but I don't think re-reading a book is enough at this stage. Ramp up your professional help - its your single biggest issue.
All the other stuff already works better when you're not either craving or using. Do you see that?

Hope you have a better weekend and can start to see the wood from the trees soon.

getmore4less

I can't fix you just keep sowing  seeds and hope they germinate.

picking out four things, 

You say you earn good up here.....you earn more than good for anywhere in the UK.  top 2% and can get to top 1% without much work.

You say you have lost the ability to make good decisions.......  don't think so unless on the sauce then you make really silly ones.

There is no shortcut, you get a few weeks good business and then go off spending it like it was years worth already in the bag.

When you get a slight downer you compound it by retreating into yourself, reject family and hit the stuff.


There has been a lot of progress since this thread started,  but there is a bit of 2 steps forward then 1,2,3 back.

I though there was a pretty decent plan in place.

Starting with the house, you recognised what you have is pretty decent, family like it, handy for the school and work, big enough for now and that the next move should be driven by needs and wants not just a number.
Key element of the plan a 5 year fix and park it while the rest gets sorted.

BTL business, need to return to growth and reduce the gearing to get the PG off, that needs more retained and target good projects, decent yield either up front or on the back of development, going to be slower while still drawing  but that can be fixed.

Family,  as lockdown one showed they need more of your time, plan was to balance business hours  free up weekends and reduce evening working.
Some pretty good progress there but this needs to be sustained you can't go turning it on and off especially with the stuff.
I don't think you have caught on that there is more to life than property and cars and need to engage in people a bit more as people, show more interest in what the wife is up to and particularly the kid, they are core to your well being and you need to put them first,  even the FIL saw some progress and put out a lifeline

The other positive from this is you have to plan business better and share the load to make that time, you can't do everything, scaling up is critical and can't  be done if you are busting a gut on day to day, you get people to do that and do the heavy thinking and planning.

Main business this is where it needs to happen, you need a plan to grow sustainable business and see that in place for at least 6-12 months before over stretching on commitments that need that sustained growth,  remember the first increment of growth is to fee up the drawdown on the BTL business. 
You say that last month and this are booming on residential,  how sustainable is that we are in quite turbulent times and I suspect that there is an element of lockdown and SDLT holiday that is propping up residential in the short term and normal volumes will return at a lower level for much of the year unless there is more stimulus.
that aside you need that 6 months at least before building plans of that increased income.

Scaling up is going to need more people and you may even need to increase the brain power at director level to make this happen.
Your sole ability to drain all retained for a couple drug driven projects is not a good business model. 
Any progress on restoring contacts with your old mentors and finding new ones?

projects I would review your strategy, personally I think you need to have visibility of the cashflow to complete without  the need to refinance that project, if that means smaller project and/or  more retained in previous projects  to bail you out if they don't work then so be it.
Once complete they can be sold on or if retained then refinance can happen into the BTL business to fund the next project  

what's new 
You go off and do silly things when not thinking straight, so something needs to be done to stop that, I would think over these side/hobby projects they are fundamental to your future.
I am not sure if this is right but you seem to have more self control with the business stuff and the people within it, maybe you go off on one at work but you not really mentioned it .
 
Maybe these projects  should be done as part of the main business with all the checks and balances that you can build into that operation,  it might be a decent complementary diversification that can help the scaling up.
Once in the business they get ringfenced into business time and not eat into family time.

On the family, needs saying again, this is all about the time, the wife has thrown a few lifelines over the last week or two and your immediate response has not been good, borderline rejection especially on that date night thing,  you need to be more supportive of these ideas and if you don't like them come up with something better yourself.

I also think you may benefit from engaging in your child's education these are formative learning years and you may be able to provide some valuable input to an enquiring mind, with lockdown there is some good stuff on TV and then there are loads of really interesting informative programs across the channels many OK family viewing where you all could learn something and find new topics to talk about.
As an example we quite like inside the factory, covers some serious engineering, food science and food processing.


Cars: left this one to last, my views have changed on this over the weeks. 
Bottom line for all your "I am a car guy" talk you have made a pigs ear, dogs dinner, right mess on that front.
Not sure you really know what you want but your car choices  have been pretty lousy this time round because they all needed finance. even the current talk is trying to justify another with the "good debt" story. ATM with all the stuff going on in your head you are just not very good at this car thing, time to do sensible for a while.
Stick to the plan that was identified weeks back  sort out the RR finances and 2nd car a sensible option(one the wife gets to pick this time). 

If we take this on face value
Honestly what I want is business on fire, good place with the family, lots of units, 7 figure res home, AM on the drive, only debt on units/ res home. No more self destructive stuff. Who doesn’t want that?

You can have it all just no instant fix will take some time.
Without realising you have probably got them in the right order

Business, is on fire, the uk is falling apart and you are doing ok.
Family, they have not given up on you yet, door is open, that's yours to fail now.
units, Block on its way, opportunity to add a couple and put the management into the business for the whole block, hall conversion next........that's good progress just needs a well managed pipeline not crazy projects.
7 figure res home  parked for 5years with the current res mortgage fix,(might even be close to 7 fig by then anyway)
AM that's a 5 year+ project paid in cash or sooner if you can live with your current house for a bit longer.

Then you added 
Going for balance feels like it jeopardises that above. Longer I owe money for stupid stuff, longer this !!!!!! cycle carries on. 
The balance is spreading a few £10k's over a few more months  no more stupid spends but there are things that will benefit from a slightly looser plan that won't impact the rest which is £100k's stuff.

Problem is you still want it all yesterday, you tried that a couple of time using debt and it did not work, no short cuts just stick to the plan and it will happen.

(that got a bit longer than it should have been, read the other post before submit some really good points made)

alt80

Thanks all. Still not feeling right so much for doing much not long woke up lol.

Im doing more than reading a book. Counselling is through my pmi specific to substance problems. Just hope it works. Could very easily get back on the stuff today not gonna lie but not worth it spend some time with family instead. 

I don’t generally lose it with my staff half reason I think is don’t want to embroil them in my problems/ worry them about jobs etc. Some of them know I use the stuff not during the week etc though I don’t think. Business ticks over without me sometimes feel like a spare part but struggle letting go to work on next level. 

Lots for me to think about thanks. Going to just try parking it for today though - not in a great place mentally. No wonder there ha.

RelievedSheff

A day off chilling out and spending time with the family will do you the world of good. Get out in the fresh air.

theoretica

alt80 said:

Honestly what I want is business on fire, good place with the family, lots of units, 7 figure res home, AM on the drive, only debt on units/ res home. No more self destructive stuff. Who doesn’t want that?

Someone said you are in the top 2% of earners - have you thought about why you got there?  I am pretty sure it is in a very large part because you wanted it unusually much and were prepared to devote what sounds close to every waking hour to work for it and take risks for it.  The other 98% aren't all looking at you and realistically wishing to be in your shoes.  A few will be working to similar aims but lots are in very different situations because that's what suits them. Lots of people don't want that - or don't want it enough to make a realistic attempt to get it.

Business on fire - possibly language to think about as what you need is the business doing well, stable and sustainable.  Not screams, shouts, people running for help and left with ashes.

getmore4less

theoretica said:

alt80 said:

Honestly what I want is business on fire, good place with the family, lots of units, 7 figure res home, AM on the drive, only debt on units/ res home. No more self destructive stuff. Who doesn’t want that?

Someone said you are in the top 2% of earners - have you thought about why you got there?  I am pretty sure it is in a very large part because you wanted it unusually much and were prepared to devote what sounds close to every waking hour to work for it and take risks for it.  The other 98% aren't all looking at you and realistically wishing to be in your shoes.  A few will be working to similar aims but lots are in very different situations because that's what suits them. Lots of people don't want that - or don't want it enough to make a realistic attempt to get it.

Business on fire - possibly language to think about as what you need is the business doing well, stable and sustainable.  Not screams, shouts, people running for help and left with ashes.

the latest data is for 2017-2018  before and after tax( after is probably the better measure for divi based income)
97% £98,600 £73,000
98% £121,000 £84,500
99% £175,000 £116,000

it will have gone up a bit, so ~ £96k  is top 2% give or take,
top 1% in reach.  the next measure tends to be the top 0.1% that probably need £500k by now  

Onebrokelady

alt80 said:

Thanks both. Ups and downs yeah just most done involve doing coke. FML wish I’d never touched the stuff, feeling tired, unproductive and generally !!!!!! all I want to do now def isn’t speaking to counsellor. Know I need to. Know I’m an idiot for doing it again starts the whole crappy cycle off again. Sound like a !!!!!! addict. No work today still in bed feeling like !!!!!! all I’ll want to do tomorrow is work try to make up for it know I might end up back on it work like a !!!!!! when I’m on that !!!!!! amazing if it lasted without the comedown. No !!!!!! idea why I’m writing this on here haha because wife won’t listen to me rambling on probably lol.

New day agreed try to leave it alone try not thing about debts today I think too. At the moment just get excited want to !!!!!! them off ASAP haha. One day at a time I’m not very good at.

You need to admit to yourself that you are an addict, you might not look or behave like how you think an addict behaves but you are a functional addict. My ex partner was the same with drugs, no one would have known or guessed because he was still functional and hid it very well but it did eventually destroy his life, please get some help to deal with this before it's too late 

ladyholly

I think alt thinks addicts are down and outs  not nice middle class family people. Unfortunately until he admits to himself he is an addict and wants to stop being one it will continue to the detriment of his family and himself. 

theoretica

alt80 said:

Definitely don’t give things consideration they deserve now. Did back then because I was doing ok but had much less income/ access to credit also felt I had time on my side too.

So you feel under more pressure (time) now?   That makes me think of another book type which you might find some useful points in and that is some of the stuff written about the psychology of sport.  High level sport has a huge aspect of being able to keep your abilities up when you feel under pressure and not doing stupid things. I haven't read all that many, but one I found interesting was Josh Waitzkin's book the Art of Learning - he explores the mental aspects of competition and acting under pressure, but also in his own life deciding which path to take and what he would aim to excel in.