Should we do this?

cymruchris

It sounds like you've made some positive progress - and that's really encouraging - you obviously had previously saved for the kids at a time when you were able - and now you're in a bit of a pickle - I think you're doing the right thing to use it for your short term plan - but you need to have a long term plan. How will you:

- Make sure you never get back to where you are now (or where you were)

- Top up the kids savings again so that by the time they are 18 - there's something there for them?

Will you have the willpower to avoid the 'Very's of this world? (And that's not being patronising - it's a question you have to ask yourself!) 

I do hope you can work it out though - taking small steps forward - just don't let yourself get into the situation of one step forwards, two steps back!

natlie

Hi,
As some others have suggested i think you should look at your budget again now you have had a couple of weeks of getting used to it. Its taken me 6 months of getting used to my budget to make sure I don't overspend in a month. 
Keep the kids savings as an emergency fund. I raided my own savings of £15k to pay off my Barclaycard and then spent it all again. It is easy to do. 

wannabe_a_saver

The question, are the children's savings in accounts in their names or yours?  If they are held in the children's names then its not as simple as just withdrawing them I don't think.  

t4mof

I borrowed from my eldest's savings account years ago. Felt very guilty but we paid him back and added in a bit extra as a thank you. He got the savings when he turned 18 and was none the wiser.

warren80

Thank you for the responses. I must admit I have found the last month a real struggle. I am usually very laid back and not a particularly stressy guy, but last month I felt rubbish about the debt and found myself thinking about it excessively. 

Over the last month we had a few setbacks. First of all our boiler packed up. My cousin is a gas engineer and confirmed that it was beyond repair. It was very old. He fitted us a new vokera boiler for £1100 which we paid for out of the £3000 savings that we had built up. A week later my wife's 14 year old car packed up. Again, we were advised that was beyond repair and that the repairs would cost more than it was worth. My wife does 76 miles a day so she has to have a reliable car. Her aunt recently had to stop driving and offered us her car for £3000 ( about 1.5K under what it's worth) so we took the offer and used £3000 of our savings leaving almost nothing in the pot. 
On a positive note, we have PAID for a boiler and a car in CASH. In the past both of these things would have meant additional debt. 

We have borrowed the kids savings and clearned some of the high interest debts. We are also working on building back up our emergency savings although we don't envisage anything else packing up just yet ( famous last words)

In terms of our LBM - we have 100% had our LBM. I want to pay off this debt more than anything. 

Jamesyb123

Stay positive you’ve done what you had to do. Just keep your head down now and start building up those savings again.

Naomim

You should be really pleased you have been able to cover the costs without credit.

You'll be able to build up the funds again. 

Well done.

Naomim 

enthusiasticsaver

Well done on being able to cope with those two emergencies without adding to the debt.  You will find yourself in a much better position in a year from now when the budget is engrained in you and hopefully you can build up some more emergency savings.