Trying to Hide a Secret £20,000 Debt is as Tricky As it Sounds! (:#)

SusieT

It may be worth you looking at the totals and setting a standing order to pay to the nearest £5 above the minimum payment on all of them a few days after the statement date. That way they will be easy to budget for, will be paid at more than the minimum so hopefully avoid any other persistant debt problems and reduce the outstanding balance slightly more each month as the interest goes down by a few pence. Then when the first one goes you simply roll that payment into the next highest interest one. When I was trying to get rid of the cards I listed them in order of interest rate, with the highest a the top instead of by the highest balance first, so that I could see that I was getting closer to the top one going from the list, and the next interest rate being lower and therefore faster to clear. 
Good luck, I hope you can keep getting the total down the way you are  

CMD79

SusieT said:

It may be worth you looking at the totals and setting a standing order to pay to the nearest £5 above the minimum payment on all of them a few days after the statement date. That way they will be easy to budget for, will be paid at more than the minimum so hopefully avoid any other persistant debt problems and reduce the outstanding balance slightly more each month as the interest goes down by a few pence. Then when the first one goes you simply roll that payment into the next highest interest one. When I was trying to get rid of the cards I listed them in order of interest rate, with the highest a the top instead of by the highest balance first, so that I could see that I was getting closer to the top one going from the list, and the next interest rate being lower and therefore faster to clear. 
Good luck, I hope you can keep getting the total down the way you are  

Hi Susie,

That's a good suggestion. I will probably not do that for this or next month because it's all too close not being affordable, so I'm going to continue to pay any extra off as I encounter spare money, but when the minimum payments have come down slightly as I've stopped using the credit, I will definitely do this. The minimum payments are about £800 a month at the moment, so in a couple of months time, this will hopefully be more like £750, then I will be able to do as you've suggested

xx

CMD79

Hi DFWs and Friends,

I've sort of half fallen off the wagon... but not exactly!

I had a load of Sainsbury's Vouchers from TopCashback. One for £90, one for £57 and then a £5.00 Nectar. I had intended to buy a few bigger clothes to get my daughter through our imminent holiday, Spring and Summer over the course of the next few weeks and spend the vouchers to keep my food shopping covered whilst I'm close to running out of cash. 

Long story short, there's lots of new pink clothes and not a lot of food and just £21.21 remaining between the vouchers.

Now. I haven't spent anything on credit, nor the cash. I did need to get these (though not today!) and I still do have some cash in the current account.

I have a load of Ebaying to do, I've caused an injury (seriously) to my shoulder from doing the blooming surveys and I still have 2 mobile handsets to sell! I've also got £20 from a mystery shop on it's way next week, plus a further 2 mystery shops worth £40 which would get paid around 25th whcih would just about keep me going for payday.

So, this isn't dire, but my Payment A Daying probably needs to stop until April Fool's Day when Very are going to not know what's hit them!

I did see something on Step Changes website about a 2 month thing to take the pressure off. They seem to contact your creditors to give you 2 months to sort your options out with the interest and any other action paused. I guess this is for people who are in dire straights and deciding whether to enter IVAs or whatever, but I am thinking that would be £400 of interest saved if I did that and would help me take the edge off each of my debts. I'll speak to them this week. 

Hope everyone has enjoyed some sunny spells and dafodils this weekend. We're looking at offering a Ukranian family a home, so I've been mostly organising our storage out in our spare room in case that becomes a reality.

xxx

BlueJ94

CMD79 said:

I did see something on Step Changes website about a 2 month thing to take the pressure off. They seem to contact your creditors to give you 2 months to sort your options out with the interest and any other action paused. I guess this is for people who are in dire straights and deciding whether to enter IVAs or whatever, but I am thinking that would be £400 of interest saved if I did that and would help me take the edge off each of my debts. I'll speak to them this week. 

I believe you're talking about a payment holiday/ breathing space. You can set this up yourself on some apps on certain credit cards

Amber1980

Wow that’s amazing that you’re looking into offering a Ukrainian family a home,how wonderful,I was saying to my dad earlier if I had a spare room I would be looking into it,at the moment I just feel so useless and guilty at not being able to help, I admire you xx

IndiJonesi

Hi @CMD79, just popping in to say well done on all your payments.  I also had debts, which my husband new existed, but I wouldn't tell him how much they were (12k).  When I finally paid them all off, he was delighted that I had managed to clear my feet and he didn't bat an eyelid when I told him how much they had been.  We live a frugal lifestyle nowadays and his careful money habits rubbed off on me.  Cheering you on, Indi x

CMD79

Hi everyone! 

I haven't even looked at my money for days, but the good news is, I haven't spent any!! It's still 10 days until pay day, so I don't want to get ahead of myself, but I'm doing pretty well.

Very little money left in the account, but very little to get spent either, so that's okay.

I have still to sell my mobile handsets, and I might save that until next month now to give me a head start for April! 

I have sposored a refugee, and one of my biggest problems is thinking, that's okay, I'll just pay for that (flights, hotels, spending money!!). And I haven't. I haven't been able to to be honest because everything is maxed out of course, but have been very realistic and not spent anything at all, which is real progress for me. 

Hopefully won't fall off the wagon when they actually arrive with a small rucksack each, and try to find help from the community instead.

I have just caught up with my accounts and the interest has now been added, so they have gone up and not down now!! Must get around to calling Step Change.

Hope everyone else is getting on okay and enjoying what feels like a very long awaited sunny few days.

xx

mr_stripey

Thanks for the update - nice to hear back from you and good to hear you sounding positive 

CMD79

mr_stripey said:

Thanks for the update - nice to hear back from you and good to hear you sounding positive 

Thank you Mr Stripey! I've still got a little buffer in my savings account, so....who knows, I might just do it!

CMD79

Well, happy it's finally spring - the heating has gone off and is staying off until November...(unless it is actually -8 next week!)

I am literally limping over the line that is pay day. I do not know how I've done it, but above and beyond my minimum payments - which I didn't think I earnt enough to cover when I started this DFW post - I have paid an extra £900!

I've done this by trying to earn an extra £20 a day and then making a payment a day - until I nearly ran out of money! I've had about £20 in my current account for what seems like forever! I did need to move my holiday savings into my current account in the end, but I've not spent a penny on credit. 

I had set myself what seemed like a ridicous challenge to make £20 a day, £640 for March. I am currently at £621 and have 4 days to go - Not sure where the £19 is going to come from, but probably going to spend 10 hours a day on the old surveys to be honest to make sure I get there!!

I have listed a LOAD of stuff on Ebay this weekend. It won't sell until next weekend, but this actually works for me because I'll enjoy getting a good head start for April now - and I kind of need to replace my holiday money really...

I have a day off on Monday so am going to finally make the call to Step Change.... 

MY plans for April to keep the momentum. I'm going to stick with the aim to make £20 a day. I'm going to try much harder to get some of these study group things to make a bit more in a shorter space of time. I have actually done my neck in from the blooming surveys, and they are doing my head in a bit!! I've been getting on okay with the mystery shopping, and I think I've got a potential £400 with Ebay sales and the mobile handsets if al goes well there.

Hope you're all feeling optimistic with the weather warming up a bit! 

xxx