Time to start a Fresh part 2, 2022!

BlueJ94

Thanks both! I can almost taste the debt freedom!

On another note, the guy who's been trianing me to refurbish screens says he's pretty impressed with me!

Im going into my main job tomorrow as over time for a 6 hour shift, so £60 isn't bad. Plus I'm at sainsburys in the morning which is time and half as bank holiday! I really enjoy refurbishment and may even consider switching to doing it full time if the opportunity is there. 

LittleMissDetermined

Sounds like you're doing really well in the new department. It's always lovely to get positive feedback too  The way you're going you will be debt free in no time 
LMD x

BlueJ94

Afternoon all, 

A little update. Debt wise I'm doing good, money budgeting has gone down the drain and I need to kick myself into gear again.. I'm back to not knowing where my money is going or just wasting it. So tomorrow I'm going to sit down and rebudget again.

Sainsburys is going good, I've got a 16 hour contract with them now. So Wednesdays, Thursday Friday and Sundays. Plenty of over time as they're very short staffed again. I messed up, I put myself in for over time twice and confused myself and now I'm 3 days in of a 10 day straight with Sainsburys. BUT before anyone says anything, I do obviously appreciate the concern. I am 100% making sure I get enough sleep and rest. I'm not being robot of work, eat and sleep. We go on walks after work now the weather is nicer. I do need some black out curtains as going to sleep at 8/8.30 and it's still light it a little annoying also with working at a different department at my other work I'm not as stressed or tired. 

LittleMissDetermined

10 days straight is a lot, glad you’re aware you need some self care in there too xx

EssexHebridean

Good for you ensuring you get rest and downtime - and as you say the long stretch of working days this time is due to a muddle so it should be a one-off. 

It's a good plan to sit down and check through budgets etc every few months, and particularly as you begin to make the transition between clearing debt and building savings, too. It's not a straightforward switch of mindset at all, I think most of us have found that!

LittleMissDetermined

EssexHebridean said:

…particularly as you begin to make the transition between clearing debt and building savings, too. It's not a straightforward switch of mindset at all, I think most of us have found that!

THIS ^
Any wise words on how to approach it? I’m longing for the day I pay my last credit card payment but I also don’t want to see all the money in the bank and waste it…

I would like to think the years of thinking twice before buying means that I’ll not just blow my wages each month but the worry is still there

MrFrugalFever

It’s a difficult one for many to adjust mindset for sure. I feel like I’ve possibly gone too far the other way now whereby I’m almost scared of spending money which is a bit odd I admit and I need to tell myself when I reach debt £0 that it is OK to have the odd luxury.

Getting a balance is key, don’t go mad and spend what you don’t have but equally don’t punish yourself - going to take a while to get that right for me atleast.

BlueJ94

Agreed! Thanks all, my meal planning has gone out of the window again but I'm starting that tonight. Also picked up some extra shifts here and there from the end of the month onwards. Not loads, but enough to notice a difference in my Sainsburys pay.

I think I will set myself a budget on what I can spend within each category such as food, clothes make up etc and then whatever I don't use from each budget I could either adjust for example say my budget is £50 for make up for the month, if I don't use it I can either choose to save it or put it towards clothing instead.

My debt is looking nice at a low £1840 compared to the 6.5K when I first started debt clearing. 

FootyFanDan

MrFrugalFever said:

It’s a difficult one for many to adjust mindset for sure. I feel like I’ve possibly gone too far the other way now whereby I’m almost scared of spending money which is a bit odd I admit and I need to tell myself when I reach debt £0 that it is OK to have the odd luxury.

Getting a balance is key, don’t go mad and spend what you don’t have but equally don’t punish yourself - going to take a while to get that right for me atleast.

100 percent this!

EssexHebridean

LittleMissDetermined said:

EssexHebridean said:

…particularly as you begin to make the transition between clearing debt and building savings, too. It's not a straightforward switch of mindset at all, I think most of us have found that!

THIS ^
Any wise words on how to approach it? I’m longing for the day I pay my last credit card payment but I also don’t want to see all the money in the bank and waste it…

I would like to think the years of thinking twice before buying means that I’ll not just blow my wages each month but the worry is still there

Don't know about "wise" but the thing I found that has been the biggest "driver" since clearing first debt, then the mortgage is that I get a huge buzz out of seeing savings building. We still budget as though we had debt payments to make - for example our original mortgage payment amount is still diverted each month across to regular saver accounts as once we've set these up we see them as a commitment for the year so there's no temptation to dip in - then when they mature after a year we tend to put one of the accounts proceeds somewhere like premium Bonds, and the other gets split between longer term savings and funding any big house projects we might have at the time, or last time it was put towards the money we needed for replacing MrEH's car. one of the big things I think is ensuring that when you redo budgets after clearing debts you ensure that you do budget sufficient for the fun stuff - including those things you've been not doing previously for the sake of clearing the debt. That will look different for everyone - for some folk it might be increasing the grocery budget a bit, for others it could be a holiday, a budgeted for day out with the family, or replacing clothes that have been "make do and mended" while cards or loans are being paid off! The main thing though is that it IS all budgeted for.

If you know that potentially using credit cards might be a weak spot for you then have a single card for the purpose of maintaining credit history, set it to clear in full each month and then either use it just for things that you budget separately for, or on the day-to-day spends that would otherwise come from whichever account is used for your regular monthly expenses. We use ours mostly for grocery spending now and I use the statement arriving as a trigger to clear it down- if for any reason that gets missed the "pay in full" instruction would mean that it got paid ahead of any interest being incurred anyway. 

One final tip - as soon as you are able to, look to get any "big annual" expenses paid as a lump sum rather than by monthly direct debit as this reduces the costs you often pay for such things. So car or house insurance costs etc - work out your annual expenses on these, divide by 12, add on 10% to the figure to account for inflation then start to budget that amount to save each month towards the renewal dates. 

I think it's safe to say that for most "long haulers" on here the stop and think before spending mentality is so ingrained it would almost be harder to not still behave that way - and indeed MrFF makes a very valid point about it being a risk that it can become almost obsessive!