Would you do it?

Rob5342

Have you checked that they are enforceable?

kimwp

I wouldn't sacrifice eating healthily or having fun with the kids and creating memories. But if you can eat healthily with your reduced budget and your food store and do fun free things with the kids then it certainly sounds like a good challenge to see the back of that first debt. 

kimwp

You can have a lot of fun melting cheap chocolate and spooning it into paper cases in different patterns to make mini nests or layering different colours of chocolate. Eat or melt into milk for hot chocolate. Not free but a reasonably low cost chocolatey activity.

GreenCat80

Rob5342 said:

Have you checked that they are enforceable?

It was an overdraft, I don’t think they have the same rules 😣

GreenCat80

kimwp said:

I wouldn't sacrifice eating healthily or having fun with the kids and creating memories. But if you can eat healthily with your reduced budget and your food store and do fun free things with the kids then it certainly sounds like a good challenge to see the back of that first debt. 

I’ve already got Easter things in and we live by the beach so it won’t be utterly miserable. Their favourite thing is to play in the garden anyway, and their dad might take them out once or twice (actually if their dad actually contributed at all we wouldn’t be in this mess but that’s another story 🙄) I’ve got until the middle of the month to pay off the big debt so I’m going to make sure everything is on track and then hopefully get rid of that one 🤞🏻

kimwp

GreenCat80 said:

kimwp said:

I wouldn't sacrifice eating healthily or having fun with the kids and creating memories. But if you can eat healthily with your reduced budget and your food store and do fun free things with the kids then it certainly sounds like a good challenge to see the back of that first debt. 

I’ve already got Easter things in and we live by the beach so it won’t be utterly miserable. Their favourite thing is to play in the garden anyway, and their dad might take them out once or twice (actually if their dad actually contributed at all we wouldn’t be in this mess but that’s another story 🙄) I’ve got until the middle of the month to pay off the big debt so I’m going to make sure everything is on track and then hopefully get rid of that one 🤞🏻

That sounds like an excellent plan. 

EssexHebridean

That sounds like a solid plan to me as well - as does having a great time over the Easter holidays with the fantastic resources you have around you already. (And absolutely if you can get their Dad to play ball then do it - make sure he feeds them as well for goodness sake - that'll help with the grocery budget!) 

GreenCat80

I’ve done it 🙀🙀🙀

I paid off the big debt as planned, and literally as I put the phone down westcott called me. I had a debt managed by them for £365, they’d offered a £275 settlement which is what I’d budgeted my super tight month around, I offered £100 thinking they’d say no, but they said yes! So I’ve now got £175 wiggle room in my budget and I'm debt free!!! I think this is the first time in about 20 years I haven’t had any debt! 

Now to try to get a mortgage to pay off my ex and then I’ll have another kind of debt to worry about 😹

kimwp

Yey, that's brilliant!!  Well done!! What are you going to do with the £175?

GreenCat80

kimwp said:

Yey, that's brilliant!!  Well done!! What are you going to do with the £175?

Probably put some gas on the meter and maybe be a bit more generous with the grocery budget (everything is so expensive 😱) and the boys really want to go to the cinema in the holidays so we can do that now. I’ve already put £50 into my emergency fund (that was already budgeted)