Finally got my finger out, please be nice!

EssexHebridean

Catapillerry said:

[font=courier new][b]Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet[/b][b]

Household Information[/b]

Number of adults in household........... 4 

Number of children in household......... 1

Number of cars owned.................... 2[b]

Monthly Income Details[/b]

Monthly income after tax................ 2700

Partners monthly income after tax....... 0

Benefits................................ 0

Other income............................ 0[b]

Total monthly income.................... 2700[/b][b]

Monthly Expense Details[/b]

Mortgage................................ 603

Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 0

Rent.................................... 0

Management charge (leasehold property).. 0

Council tax............................. 206

Electricity............................. 100 This and the gas most definitely aren't low! Assume you're on your providers SVR rather than having been forced to an expensive fix? 

Gas..................................... 150

Oil..................................... 0

Water rates............................. 57.15 

Telephone (land line)................... 0

Mobile phone............................ 130 Agree with others - this is a lot of money for two phones. In fact it would be a lot of money if you were paying for phones for every member of the household! Check for contract end dates and note to call up a month before they finish to switch to SIM only deals. If your daughter at uni complains that she wants a new phone then cordially suggest that she can take out her own contract paying for it then...  

TV Licence.............................. 13.37 well done getting the exact amount here! 

Satellite/Cable TV...................... 40 Can this switch out to a much cheaper Netflix or similar once any contract is up? Or can you at least downgrade or haggle the price down for what you have?

Internet Services....................... 30 This may be quite high unless you have a super-duper powerful connection (and if you do, do you actually need it) - worth shopping around when you approach contract end.

Groceries etc. ......................... 0 You never pick up a cheeky takeaway or stop off for a top-up shop which doesn't come from the main grocery budget?

Clothing................................ 20 

Petrol/diesel........................... 50

Road tax................................ 15 Are you paying this monthly? If so you need to save from that surplus to ensure you can pay it upfront when it renews - monthly is an expensive way of doing it. 

Car Insurance........................... 40 As with the "road tax" - look to get this to paying annually and budgeting a monthly amount ASAP. 

Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 20 A) is this actually enough? Think servicing, MoT test, tyres, screenwash, other consumables, the occasional trip to the jetwash or car wash... I get that some of this for one of the cars might be included in the lease though.  where is it being saved allowing there are no cash assets showing? You need to be really careful about showing things on an SOA as being budgeted for when they're actually not - an aspirational SOA does nobody any good! 

Car parking............................. 0

Other travel............................ 0

Childcare/nursery....................... 0

Other child related expenses............ 0

Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 8

Pet insurance/vet bills................. 5

Buildings insurance..................... 9

Contents insurance...................... 9

Life assurance ......................... 23

Other insurance......................... 45 Is this definitely needed, and have you ensured you're getting it for the best price possible?

Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 0  No presents for anyone, ever? 

Haircuts................................ 0 No haircuts for  anyone, ever? 

Entertainment........................... 0 As per the groceries question - you never pop to the pub after work, or pick yourself up a magazine in the petrol station, or go out without your wife so pay the costs yourself rather than it coming from the entertainment budget?

Holiday................................. 100 Again though - no cash assets - is this really being saved?  

Emergency fund.......................... 0 £100 a month allocated to holidays but nothing in the emergency fund spells trouble - you have to start building something here. [b]

Total monthly expenses.................. 1673.52[/b]

[b]

Assets[/b]

Cash.................................... 0

House value (Gross)..................... 390000

Shares and bonds........................ 0

Car(s).................................. 8000

Other assets............................ 0[b]

Total Assets............................ 398000[/b]

[b]

Secured & HP Debts[/b]

Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR

Mortgage...................... 130000...(603)......0[b]

Total secured & HP debts...... 130000....-.........-   [/b]

[b]Unsecured Debts[/b]

Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR

Zopa Loan......................8732......266.......6

Creation Fin (Sofa)............1278......25........0

Virgin Money cc................6901......104.8.....17

Very...........................1455......100.......29 Pay this off first, then either close the account or agree with your wife that only what can be paid off immediately gets put on it in the future. 

Halifax........................475.......15........20

Nationwide CC..................745.......30........20

New Day (AO)...................888.......35........0

PayPal.........................2416......101.......20[b] I flipping LOATHE PayPal credit.  Make sure that if buying on platforms that use PP in the future you don't use the credit option otherwise this will simply never go down. And remember that they will make it easier to just click on the credit option than to do the opposite! 

Total unsecured debts..........22890.....676.8.....-  [/b]

[b]

Monthly Budget Summary[/b]

Total monthly income.................... 2,700

Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 1,673.52

Available for debt repayments........... 1,026.48

Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 676.8[b]

Amount left after debt repayments....... 349.68[/b]

[b]Personal Balance Sheet Summary[/b]

Total assets (things you own)........... 398,000

Total HP & Secured debt................. -130,000

Total Unsecured debt.................... -22,890[b]

Net Assets.............................. 245,110[/b]

[i]Created using the SOA calculator at www.stoozing.com. 

Reproduced on Moneysavingexpert with permission, using other browser.[/i][/font]

Comments in bold as usual - but the first and most important question - where is that £349 a month surplus going? Do you actually have that left over? If not, then you urgently need to track it down as that's over £4k a year you're "losing".

I'd say that the first thing I would want to tackle on there once the surplus has been found is the energy use - that's a lot of money on heat/light etc already, and allowing that in jut a couple of months that's going to increase from £250 a month to almost £400 - you have to start finding out why you're using so much. 

The phones can be brought down massively but it'll take time. Once contracts are up though you should be looking at around £10 a month SIM only - budget a small amount to get saved against future replacement phones though.  My last iPhone lasted me 4 years and had I needed to I could have stretched it longer, the battery was becoming problematic but a powerbank carried with me fixed that issue. If cared for phones last a lot longer than people tend to let them! 

My gut feeling is that at the moment that SOA probably isn't quite the true reflection of where you're really at - but that's part of the process, and the feedback from folks on here will help with that. 

I take it your wife is completely aware of the level of the debts? If not then you need to tackle that conversation first. If the debts have been accumulated through joint spending, then you need to work together to pay them off - that might be by both contributing money to clear them, or it might be by agreeing to do things like cut back here and there, scrap a holiday for this year etc. 

Priority 1: Find the surplus and give it a job
Priority 2: Refine the SOA and use it to create a budget you live by
Priority 3: Stop using credit - if your budget is right then your figures say it shouldn't be needed
Priority 4: Direct every spare penny to getting shot of first Very, then IMO PP Credit

Alongside this, keep an eye on whether you can get any interest bearing debt onto 0%, and start working on driving costs down. You can do this but it IS going to take time and teamwork. 

Ebe_Scrooge

Catapillerry said:

However, last year, I was made redundant from my job of 20 years.  I got something else almost right away

Did you not get any redundancy pay?  If so, would it be feasible to use that to pay a (hopefully pretty large) chunk off your debts, prioritising those with the highest APR?  You could then divert the amount you were paying to them towards the other debts, this should allow you to hammer them down in reasonably short order.

DrEskimo

You say you have put your car lease payments in as part of your loans, but Im struggling to see which one it is?

I would add it as a line for your outgoings to make it clear.

flipflopflo

Who are the other adults in the house?

foxgloves

Hi, As with previous posters, your very high energy costs jumped out at me. You have a bigger household than me, so probably live in a bigger property, but just for some sort of comparison, for gas & electricity in our 3-bedroomed 1930s house, we currently pay £119 per month. As I'm sure you'll be aware, when the new energy cap begins at the end of next month, energy bills will increase by around 50%, so our monthly payment will shoot up to around £180. As your energy payments are already very high, an additional 50% is going to whack you soundly in the wallet. You need to tackle this pro-actively. One of the big wastages is having the central heating blaring while people sit around in t-shirts. Our thermostat is set at 18°. In the coldest months it comes on at 19° just once in early evening. We put on an extra layer of clothing before we willingly give extra hard-earned cash to energy companies. Then look at all the smaller savings which, combined, will be worth making. Are lights always switched off when you are not in the room? Are appliances routinely left on when not in use? I. e - The TV is on for little more than background because everyone's looking at their phones. Does anyone fill the kettle when making a single cup of tea? Is anyone taking ridiculously long showers or umpteen baths a week? Is as much of your laundry as possible washed at 30°? Do you make sure you peg it out to dry when the weather allows rather than using expensive tumble drying?
There is money to be saved here & with the coming rises, you all need to be onto it as a household project. It's certainly something my partner & I are re-visiting because we never envisaged a situation where our monthly energy bill could leap by 50% in one fell swoop. 
I wish you well with sorting out your finances. We also kept our finances separate before we began debt busting over a decade ago. It was much easier to tackle both the debt & everyday household budgeting once we'd combined them. 
F