First Steps to Solvency

alt80

@annabanana82 / @foxgloves thanks both. I was thinking about lowering the limits myself. Tbh doesn't appear to be that good news so probably leave them as they are. Just need to stop being a !!!!!! with money and so does my Mrs. 

@mark55man my dad remembers it and was in London that year in a kitchen working so didn't even see the match lol. 

alt80

Day 39 through. Really not feeling too well this evening anxiety symptoms through the roof - get that particularly bad when I don't sleep well then get anxious about sleeping and am whacked; talk about cycle of !!!!!! behavioural actions in perpetuity ha. Also ate a massive amount for dinner and now feel sick. Still not managed to bin any of the 3kg weight gain off with how much I'm eating no real surprise idk what's wrong with me there. Always liked my food but not to the extent of eating like I am currently. Hoping to get to the gym tomorrow morning, didn't go this morning after having another bad night's sleep I started the day whacked - needed my energy for work.

Managed to keep my Mrs out of trouble today and no Love Island going on tonight she's promised. She's been crying about the football again tbf more about how the three young lads have been treated by some individuals. Linkedin been going !!!!!! mad.

Going to take this week to think about what to do with the cards - reducing or not reducing limits etc.

mark55man

Ironically DD2 is home for a few days and watched my first Love Island episode, which was nice.  Certainly not worse than the football, and all the dreadful stuff alongside.  Big trend on Twitter saying our 2030 hosting chances have taken a blow.  I'm not sure about that given some of the countries that have succeeded and that its mainly about the money - but its still pretty ugly out there.  Good luck with your diet and getting to the gym - I'm struggling as well - lets do a deal, both go tomorrow at some point and do something / anything!!   

Purplelady65

alt80 said:

Going to take this week to think about what to do with the cards - reducing or not reducing limits etc.

You could just ring the bank up and ask them if it makes a difference to your credit score if you ask for the credit limit to be reduced. I don’t think it will but can’t say for sure. At the end of the day banks make money by getting their customers to buy items that they then can’t afford to pay off in full and then incur interest charges. Increasing the credit limits is a way of enticing customers who the banks are confident will make the repayments to spend more. It’s all a marketing exercise. I keep meaning to reduce my credit limits or close the accounts as I have credit cards that I rarely use that have high limits just from a security point of view but never seem to get around to it. I am going to action it this week now! 

alt80

@mark55man I'm not gonna lie I find Love Island !!!!!! hilarious get chance tomorrow I'll probably catch up with it over the course of the day 10 mins here and there ha. Few of the girls are very easy on the eye; new one Lucinda fml she's absolutely stunning. Wife needs to be off it rn. 

Only twitter acct I really follow is my son's school lol. Never really got that into it. LinkedIn gone mad or mine has; one of the culprits was outed as working for Savills (absolutely massive concern in the property world). 

Yeah I def need to get to the gym tomorrow, you've got a deal. Will also be back on the mfp I think don't keep it in check at my age there's only one way it's going know that much.

@Purplelady65 I'm probably more concerned about future creditworthiness than most on here tbh - don't want to wind up with issues on the commercial side from choices made on the personal side (unlikely as things are tbh) and don't want to wind up not being able to get decent rates in the future on the personal side either. Advice from the ref companies seems to point towards it tipping towards not being a good thing from a utilisation pov - that makes sense but I wouldn't reduce so much as to tip my utilisation over the 50% mark on cards individually and collectively. Idk could just be paranoid about it tbf but good call re bank they are usually very helpful - suppose I don't want to give them some kind of red flag. Possibly half my issue is a 'safety net' of the available credit if required idk I'm having a hard time imagining not having some kind of access to the amount of readily accessible credit that I have currently iyswim fml can't win; damned if you do and damned if you don't ha.

getmore4less

The people that lend money don't care about your "credit score" the important lending is mortgage and they all use their own systems to look ta the data.

There will be an element of utilization but with clean history that will just reduce the affordability, not a problem when borrowing multiples and LTV are in sensible limits main stream lender high street  rates are there. 

The safety net issue is a something to work on, it's part of the planning what do you need it for to work out how big it needs to be and in what form

The main one is emergency cash to cover something unexpected that cannot be met from cashflow.

For most that will unexpected bills for something essential like the house or transport, your cars are all covered so should be nothing there for a while, the house keep on top of maintenance and limited chances of a massive costs.

I liked to have enough for the emergency flights to relatives and any cash flow to meet a planned spend like a bigger holiday.

Combined £10k is plenty anything bigger than that starts to need loans.

These days we have a stash of premium bonds that just do their thing(reinvesting) with near instant access to cover everything and that drops the need for credit(most of your asset base is not liquid).


The big one other is temp loss of income, having a personal line of credit is probably not the best option to cover that problem, 
I think I would go down the personal retained route with some easier access more liquid assets, maybe a decent recent to look at ISA along side your pension review.


It might have been needed before when you were running projects on the personal side but that need should be gone.


Ask yourself what safety net use have you made of your credit in the last 10 years, buying handbags does not count.

Reality is once this current crisis is over you will have so much free cashflow(if you want) that with a bit of planning you could cover just about anything that crops up within a month or two  anyway so won't need massive amount of credit.


A very simple way to get most things covered is to build up a buffer in the income stream.
(you can do this through when you get your divi)

For mortals the idea is you start the month with a full months income in the bank when the new one arrives.
you could adjust your to take account of some of the fixed costs so would not need to be the full £8k, £4k should be enough

You could do this now as all you debt is 0% 

mark55man

Thanks @getmore4less - an essay on how to do it properly - will have another read when I'm finished working and see how I stack up.  Now my CC are nearly gone and I have a an initial EF of kind, I will look to get that in shape by the end of the year
 

alt80

Day 40. Full work diary today, no chance to do anything stupid. I've sat down with my wife and asked her to plan a schedule of her own for the coming week and we'll review it - she's fine when she's kept busy, off IG and no real time for the shopping. Still in agreement the bag is going back.

Did at least get a bit more sleep last night - had about 6hrs but still don't feel great. Cumulative effect of not sleeping well for a few days now I know - going to try doing what I did last night, bed early-ish, have my tea and herbal pills. Not really sure how much it does think it may be as much a psychological thing as anything. 

@getmore4less I'm more concerned about how what I do on the personal side affects the data they actually use. I know the numbers generated by Experian et al aren't exactly what the lenders use but represent an indication of how a lender will profile an application. In all likelihood I'm worrying about nothing tbh.

I do account for building a bit of personal savings but that is currently redirected to debt payments - yes the debt is all 0% (apart from my RR) but there are deadlines for me to meet else it becomes interest baring or transfer fees start to come in. I am planned through using 0% purchase (thank you) which is allowing me to extend things a bit without incurring interest in addition to my spending which has been cut A LOT from pre-pandemic times. Can't believe I'm actually making a dent in it tbh and a good one at that; I've spent far too many years spending more than I was earning on a month to month basis, needing to take additional money in divis at the end of the year just to keep personally afloat that I'd have rather kept retained and still winding up in silly amounts of card debt. Idk for the future I don't want to have a load of balances outstanding on cards 0% or otherwise; not to say I won't use cards to plan purchases but I don't want to continue constantly being in a lot of credit card debt and overspending. 

The idea of moving away from having easy access to large figures of credit is a new one to me and yeah I think part of the massive anxiety is a hangover from my days of doing personal projects I accept that. Although not a problem now - any projects I finance through the business, I get to the stage of thinking about closing lines of personal credit and never quite manage to do it. I know the idea of being able to load a bunch of cards up is a stupid 'safety net'. From the crunching I've done for the best part of a year now, I can easily work out what I need to keep afloat counting the min payments. Idk what's wrong with me probably just getting old or been there and done that too many times - don't want to keep getting into an overly risky and precarious financial position whether that be personally or in business. !!!!!! craving stability for once in my life ha.

RelievedSheff

Nothing wrong with you. You are just growing up  

KxMx

I think you are doing brilliantly and take things one step at a time. 
You may not be ready yet to close cards but you are thinking about doing so which is a great step. Give it some time & you may feel ready and comfortable to close.

I started taking small steps to lose weight 3 years ago and only recently was I ready to cut back on my last vice.
I've not been on the scales but it's clear from my clothes it's working. 

I don't feel bad about taking so long as I had to be in the right place mentally for it to be successful.