The Mental Debt Struggle...

Makingabobor2

Having a buffer is a good idea. Mine has gone a bit heywire lately though..lol

Keedie

The buffer is a godsend at times. It's really helped me out in the past.

I'd brought the travelcard with my debit card @vampirotoothus, so I'm at their mercy to get a refund. If this 10 day period ends with no refund, then I'll make a complaint.

My sister's sofa was delivered today and the electric recliner isn't working. I don't know if it was damaged in transit or in general. But I now have two sofas in my living room that don't work properly as I've not moved the old one out as yet 🥴.

Keedie

THE (BELATED) SUNDAY SUMMARY

(Week 9 ~ 2 Marcg 2025)

Debt Regrets

I'm still doing a little girly giggle and kicking off my metaphorical feet about being debt free and it is slowly starting to sink in...

Goal 1 - 100% repayment to Argos Card - due 30 April 2025
🎉 Achievement Date = 7 February 2025 🎉

Goal 2 - Clear Barclaycard Plan 1 (£1,506.20) - due by 31 October 2025

🎉 Achievement Date = 9 February 2025 🎉

Goal 3 - Pay £750 off my MBNA balance in 2025 - due by 31 December 2025
🎉 Achievement Date = 9 February 2025 🎉

Goal 4 - Pay £2,500 off my overall debt balance in 2025 - due by 31 December 2025
🎉 Achievement Date = 9 February 2025 🎉

Saving Grace

Goal 1 - Save £1,000 emergency fund - due by 31 December 2025
Progress Checker = £600/£1,000 (60% saved)
This has been moved from Goal 2 to Goal 1, as I want to have this in place before I concentrate on anything else. The £150 automatic transfer from the current account to the Digital Saver has gone through for March 2025. So now £300 is in the current account and £300 is getting decent interest. When my freelance money comes through, I'll put some money into this account, and some towards Goal 2 and the rest towards April 2025's budget.

Goal 2 - Build a Buffer of £500 - due by 31 December 2025
Progress Checker = £0/£500 (0% saved) ⛔️ ON HOLD ⛔️
I have moved this from Goal 1 to Goal 2. I've also changed this goal from £250 to £500 as it will have a variety of potential uses and extended the target date from 30 April 2025 to 31 December 2025. I have a freelance invoice that is due for payment this week, so I should be able to kickstart this, even if I don't fully fund it. I had a long think about things, and realised that I do need this buffer, as it will be the last line of defence before dipping into the emergency fund. Also, as I try to use cash more, if somewhere doesn't take cash, and I need to use my card, I need to have allocated funds for that purpose, that I can then reconcile at a later date. And if I don't have enough at any given point in a relevant sinking fund to pay for something, then it will come from here. I won't be able to use it just because I've not managed my money properly. So it will be like a mini homemade overdraft. And it can't be used again until it topped back up to where it was prior to tapping into it. So if it has £130 and I use £50 and it drops down to £80, it's not available to me until I get it back to where it was and continue saving. Once it reaches £500, it will be capped.

Goal 3 - Save £750 for 2026 Subscriptions - due by 31 December 2025
Progress Checker = £0/£750 (0% saved) ⛔️ ON HOLD ⛔️
I've got the Thames Water bill, but still waiting on the council tax and rent values for 2025/26, and then I will be able to work out how much I can put towards this weekly. I've decided to start budgeting annually by tax year, as I will know what the bills are, and this will determine how much I have left for variable expenses and savings. It also means that some of the subscriptions are already taken care of, as I've funded the 2025 fixed and aspirational subscriptions already. I just need to sit down and work all of this out properly, so the figures below are provisional until I can check if I am on track. I also need to check the date order as well.

This goal is split into fixed subscriptions (set due dates) and aspiration funded subscriptions (a year's worth upfront). The overall amount is £1,331 as I have added TV Licence, Parent Care and NOW TV, and these are rounded amounts in case the prices increase. The aspirational ones are funded annually upfront, with the exception of the TV Licence which I will pay annually from 2026. So there's £1,055 to fund up to 31 March 2026.

• 3.1 Fixed ~ EA Access = £36/£36 (100% saved)
• 3.2 Fixed ~ Amazon Prime = £95/£95 (100% saved)
• 3.3 Fixed ~ Apple Care = £85/£85 (100% saved)
• 3.4 Fixed ~ Playstation Plus = £60/£60 (100% saved)
• 3.5 Fixed ~ TV Licence = £0/£175 (0% saved)
• 3.6 Aspirational ~ Parent Care £0/£300 (0% saved)
• 3.7 Aspirational ~ Kindle Unlimited = £0/£120 (0% saved)
• 3.8 Aspirational ~ Crunchy Roll = £0/£60 (0% saved)
• 3.9 Aspirational ~ MGM+ = £0/£55 (0% saved)
• 3.10 Aspriational ~ NOW TV = £0/£120 (0% saved)
• 3.11 Aspirational ~ Apple One = £0/£225 (0% saved)

Goal 4 - 50 Envelope Challenge (£1,275) - due by 31 December 2025
Progress Checker = 0/50 Envelopes = £0/£1,275 (0% saved) ⛔️ ON HOLD ⛔️
I've nearly finished designing my 50 envelope challenge, I just need to get a better handle on the envelope sizing to go in my savings binder. I've got some money set aside for this, but I've not officially started it yet. But I will start this next month and see what I have in the budget left over once the increases bills are taken into account.

Goal 5 - Penny Challenge (£667.95) - due by 7 January 2026
Progress Checker = £14.85/£667.95 (up by £3.57 since last week)
This is being done automatically via Monzo's Penny Challenge and they move each consecutive daily amount from my current account balance. Yesterday's amount was £0.54 so things are stepping up. It will be just over £18 by this time next week. 

Balancing the Budget

This section of my weekly check-in will focus on how I am preparing for the upcoming month, so that I can stay on track and be more successful in meeting my targets.

Income Tracker - £2,100 for April 2025's Budget
Progress Checker = £1,666/£2,100 (79.33% accumulated)
I am unsure of what next month's budget will be as I don't have all of the 2025/26 bill increases as yet. But I've kept the budget at £2,100 and will adjust this by the mid-March 2025 once I know what is required and I can plan accordingly.

Freely Debt Savings - £0 Goal
Progress Checker = £0/£0 (0% saved) ⛔️ ON HOLD ⛔️
This is not likely to happen in 2025, unless I stick to a smaller budget (which isn't always easy with my lack of discipline) and then accumulate any surplus I may have in a few month's time.

beanielou

I am old. I don’t know what some of these subscriptions are! 

Keedie

The subscriptions are a bit confusing @beanielou, especially as most of them are not annual ones, I just choose to pay upfront and let the . But I'll try to summarise them based on who uses what.

My son - Gaming - it is cheaper to pay these annually
EA Access - allows him to play games that are made my EA Games on his Playstation
Playstation Plus - allows him to game with people all over the world, gives him discounts and holds his account in the cloud so he could access his account on another console

My son - Streaming - these are billed monthly, but I try to save a year's worth so that I don't have to think about it
Crunchy Roll - he watches a lot of anime, which this channel mainly shows
MGM+ - this is linked to Prime Video and allows him to watch some of his favourite shows that you would otherwise have to pay by the episode for
NOW TV - I dunno what he's been obsessively watching, but he's hooked on some series at the moment. But this is likely to get swapped with Disney+ at some point

Me - shopping
Amazon Prime - by paying annually, I also get Deliveroo Plus (which I don't really use as I've broken the habit of ordering take aways but my son sometimes uses)

Me - technololgy
Apple Care - this is like insurance cover for my MacBook in case it gets damaged
Apple One - we have an Apple Family which is me, two of my sisters, my son and one of my nephews and via the shared licence we have a shared storage allowance (but we can't access one another's files etc), Apple Music, Apple News, Apple TV+ (which is kinda rubbish to be honest), Apple Arcade (my youngest nephew plays games via my sister's account) and Apple Fitness (yeah, I'm not using that but I think my older nephew does).

Me - entertainment
Kindle Unlimited - I pay monthly, but set aside the money for the year so that I can just enjoy it and not think about it

Me - family
Parent Care - my siblings and I contribute per month towards the financial management of our parent's affairs. This is how we saved to pay for the probate (UK and international) for my dad's estate, pay the land taxes in Jamaica, maintain his grave and paid for the memorial. We'll continue saving once the international probate is sorted, and that money will then be used to cover my mum's affairs when the time comes (hopefully several years from now).

I'm still crunching the numbers, but I will definitely be moving towards an April to March budget. As I've funded a fair few of the subscriptions for 2025, I will have to find the money to cover January to March 2026. Then I can move towards a proper annual budget from April. So the numbers in my Sunday Summary will differ this week once I've done the maths. As the amounts for those that are due monthly, that I save for in advance, needs to be 15 months (January 2025 to March 2026) instead of 12 months (January 2025 to December 2025). So I need to figure out what the remaining amount would be to cover the whole 2025/26 tax year. 

Also, I got my rent increase letter today and it's going up by £1.95 a week which was a giddy relief. I'd expected the jump to be higher, but they've reduced the cost of some things like communal lighting and the door entry system. The letter I got states that the rent is increasing in line with the Consumer Price Index as of September 2024 at 1.7% and then a further 1%. I don't really understand the CPI. But I googled and I can see that in September 2024 it was 1.7% whereas in September 2023 it was 6.7%. Which would explain the drastic increase in April 2024. I'm very grateful that the increase was more manageable, as it allows my benefits to stretch further.

beanielou

Thank you for explaining Keedie.  

in_need_of_direction

Have you or your son watched slow horses on Apple TV? I think it’s great

Cherryfudge

That's very good news on the rent increase!

Regarding subscriptions, as your son is now an adult, once he starts earning could he contribute towards the ones that are for his benefit? Not only to ease the pressure on you but also to help him have realistic expectations about budgeting once he is independent?

Keedie

I'll ask him if he's watched Slow Horses @in_need_of_direction. I had a look at the trailer and it looks good. Thanks for the recommendation, as it made me go on Apple TV and I realised that they've got more content now than they did before, that doesn't require you to pay for some of the episodes.

My son will definitely be contributing to the subscriptions and expenses when he's working @Cherryfudge. He pays now for the NOW TV Boost (so that he has no adds) as I take it out of his allowance. Once he's got a job, he'll pay for all of his streaming choices and gaming subscriptions. He seems really eager to go out into the world of work. I don't have the heart to tell him that it can be rather sh*t if you have a toxic workplace, or you're just not feeling it, but you have responsibilities and have to keep grinding. He'll have a little window where he can earn for himself, before he has kids and a household to run/maintain, so he might as well enjoy it before he gets older and life means that he has no choice but to work. 

Oh and TfL finally got their act together after a month and have refunded the travelcard, so £82.20 came into my account. So I've topped up the pay as you go on his oyster and I'll do his monthly travelcard from next week Monday as today is his last day at college for this week.

Anyways, one of my friends that I worked with at the council is leaving there after 20 years, and so he is having leaving drinks today. So I will be going to that after I go to my women's group. I'm looking forward to seeing my old colleagues and having a mini reunion of sorts. But it does necessitate some grooming on my part, as I need to wash my hair. It's a lot of effort as my shoulder is hurting quite a bit today. So we'll see how I end up. 

My direct payments have come through, and my old carer starts on Monday. Yippee! I'm so excited. She's coming over today to do her right to work check and to sign her contract. I can't wait for things to go back to how they were in terms of quality care, but different, because it's a direct relationship that carries more flexibility. I've been going to the training courses about direct payments and it's a mammoth amount of information to get on top of, and compliance things to implement. But the support team at the council is really good, and they've handled most of it for me and having a HR background has helped me as well. But nonetheless, boring paperwork aside, things are looking up.

beanielou

Great news on your PA.