Take 2, a shopaholics diary

londoner2019

Just hopping on to say good luck on your journey! Sounds like you have a plan in motion ☺️

shoppingobsessed2020

planning on paying that off his mbna card and reducing some interest as that card with the hefty balance is not interest free ive realised so that means having a little rethink on the order in which i pay things off.

TSB............................13675.....281.9.....0 loan

His MBNA.......................16598.....165.......0  - clear jan 23

tesco loan.....................1447......361.7.....0 - last payment september 23

my mbna........................7552......190.......0

next...........................3000.........100.........0 - 

tsb overdraft..................2000......0.........0 clear june pay day 23

lloyds overdraft...............850.......0.........0 - clear may 23

lloyds loan 2..................11700.....332.4.....0 

lloyds loan ...................2900......448.8.....0 last payment november 23

lloyds credit card.............3500......50........0 - 

virgin money 0% card - 8000 - 200 - 

so new plan is as follows on his pay days

2K surplus May pay day to lloyds overdraft and tsb overdraft
2K surplus June to tsb overdraft and 1K to mbna
2K surplus July, August, September to mbna 

that should leave approx 10K on mbna to pay,

2.4K surplus october to mbna - 7.5K remaining
2.4K surplus november to mbna - 5K remaining
2.8k surplus december to mbna - 3K remaining
2.8K surplus january 24 to mbna - balance just about clear.

that then leaves 3K to throw at the rest.  im hoping to use some play money thats left over, food shopping etc to then throw at things alongside the general surplus each month over the coming few months, so whilst my main focus is the big mbna card, ill also have some separate side goals for the play money.  im keeping my barclays open as its got a hefty limit and i might fingers crossed in a few months get a balance transfer offer so that i can shift a bit more interest bearing debt.

TSB............................13675.....281.9.....0 clear feb/march 25

my mbna........................7552......190.......0 clear june 24

next...........................3000.........100.........0 -  clear feb 24

lloyds loan 2..................11700.....332.4.....0 clear nov 24

lloyds credit card.............3500......50........0 - clear march 24

virgin money 0% card - 8000 - 200 - clear august 24

feb 24 clear next
march 24 clear lloyds card
surplus april to my mbna
surplus may to my mbna

then in 1 year there will only, and i say only like its nothing be 2 loans, 1 interest free credit card and my car loan outstanding.  not fussed on my car loan, thats the last thing i want to pay off!  

virgin is interest free until october 24 so thats good 

then its june, july, and august surplus to virgin clearing that before it runs out of interest free period.

then its clear the remaining 2 loans (continuing to ignore my car loan) 

all goes well, should be clear by march 25!  im going to set myself a target of 18 months to clear everything bar my car loan and the mortgage so may pay day is day 0 so target date to clear everything is 1st December 2024, that then gives me 6 months to stash cash for emergency fund as mortgage is due for renewal july 25. 

shoppingobsessed2020

pay day for me tomorrow and i cant wait!!!!

ive done some shuffling round and moving funds, so my mbna card is now rather full as is the virgin card.  forgot home insurance was being automatically taken off my barlays card today.  just slipped my mind with everything thats happened this month, usually i do shop around rather than auto renew so rather cross at myself.  

barclays card is clear bar £200 which i will pay tomorrow payday.  tsb card is clear, but balances transferred on 0% offers to mbna and virgin.

tsb i dont know to keep open or close, im leaning towards closing, balance is actually 40p in credit as i dont know what i did, but interest next month will cancel out the credit and then i can get the account closed.

have to go to costco at the weekend, but going to take cash with me and when its gone its gone, taking a friend that needs some bits and im going to get some steak whilst up there.  

plan for tomorrow pay day is clear lloyds overdraft & barclay card - 1K approx.  then that leaves me £500 in my new natwest current account until his lordship gets paid at the end of the month.  im also owed £110 from the hen night, ive booked the room so my room mate needs to transfer me her half thats not yet charged to my card.  not planning a grocery shop till wednesday when i look at how full the fridge and freezers are, might even cancel wednesday shop depending how the week goes.

that £500 is to cover me for food & fuel until my june pay day.  i will need to fill both cars, his car is on empty and mine has 2/3rd of a tank left, i unfortunately dont have enough in his car to get me to costco so might just stick a fiver in it at the local garage and then take his to costco to fill up, ive never actually filled his car from empty so i dont even know what it would cost, be interesting as mine is approx £65 from empty at costco.

shoppingobsessed2020

spendy weekend for me!  

lloyds overdraft is done and gone, barclaycard hasnt been cleared, ive put more on that!  hen night related but ill get the majority of that back in the next week.

£160 at costco yesterday, £30 on lunch, £30 on fuel and £60 on fuel today.  

both cars have full tanks, so that will do me till mid to end of june in my car and probably end of august in his car.

food shop at costco was ridiculous but have 240 for the month left, very full fridge, freezers and cupboards.  lunch will come out of fun money but temporarily out of food budget for now.  last week on school dinners for monkey boy, he wants packed lunches so weekly grocery budget might need tweaked slightly given that now need to buy sandwich stuff each week, regardless it will probably come in about the same kind of cost as his school dinners.

shoppingobsessed2020

got my natwest £200 switching today just going to leave that in my current account for now and reassess when his lordship gets paid.  went out saturday night just round a friends.  took a bottle of plonk with us and ended up being out all night.  i need to give them some money as we all got pizza and i just had my phone and no cards with me as genuinely wasnt planning on staying but they spotted us the pizza and the kids all went out together, i had a few quid cash in the car, but the husband gave each of the kids £10 to go to the shop and round the village with.

they are lovely friends but i need to square up with them as id hate them to think i was taking advantage.  might end up being an argument and me getting the pizzas next time, and bringing a few more bottles round or a crate of cans of soft drinks for the kids. 

i dont mind a friend buying me a cuppa when we are out as that all tends to even out but when we ended up drinking all night and getting a take away i feel awful about not contributing anything.

sunday and today were no spend days so thats good.

shoppingobsessed2020

another no spend day yesterday, today will be a spend day, but needed unfortunately.

i need to pay to get my garden bin emptied, forgot to sign up earlier in the year and its getting rather full.  i also have to order monkey boy some clothes so thats gone on next as i did that this morning before i got up.  shorts and tshirts were needed as this boy has had a growth spurt all of a sudden again.  no wonder he is complaining that his legs and feet are hurting, hes not far off being taller than me and im not exactly short!

checked the husbands payslip, £7542 hitting the bank next week!  a chunk of that is his expenses, but its a hefty paycheck, plus i have approx 600 still in my current account.  food shops have gone on my barclays card so need to sit and look at the accounts and work out where everything is going.  i do need to keep some funds back for hen, stag and weddings but i might be able to split that over the next 2 months rather than take it all out of this pay.

i know its the wrong way to think, but im not going to count my pay in the budget for the month as a chunk of that went to clearing the lloyds overdraft.  im going to look and say right we have 8K for the month of june and this is what needs to be paid.

had a quick play with my spreadsheet, and im going to be also able to clear the tsb overdraft in full this payday.  next month, im going to clear the lloyds loan iin full just to get rid of it and free up another £450 a month and that includes giving £350 for the hen & stag, plus what im owed for bridesmaid activities, and ive put £700 next pay day aside for the wedding.

i am going to be raiding some of the fun money and home emergency funds to do this, but ive had no emergency fund or play money fund for so long, that it isnt going to make a difference really and id rather have things clear than some money sat there.  i know emergency funds are important, but i need the short term buzz of clearing a couple of debts more than the safety of a few hundred in the bank.

GeorgianaCavendish

It’s great the switch bonus came through already! I really need to get DH to do his switching now that I’ve come to the end of the offers. It’s so frustrating to me because it’s literally free money! 

I know how it feels when those unexpected social costs just seem to appear from nowhere! What if you allocate yourself a proper social budget and have £20 set aside each time you are meeting up with friends? What you don’t spend can either be left in the social fund or used to do an overpayment for something. 

It’s great that you’ve got a lot of money available this month to do those payments, but maybe think about doing them towards the end of the month so you aren’t forced back into putting things on credit because you’ve been so ambitious at the start. When I started I tried to just get through the first month without any extra borrowing, the hardest thing to break was my reliance on credit and telling myself it would get sorted out on payday. And yet there were always things that popped up to surprise me, so my plans never seemed to work out. 

shoppingobsessed2020

that sounds like a plan as my plans never work out the way they are supposed to.  i might keep the pot funds in their allocated pots as its seconds to move the funds around really when i need to.  plus its half term next week so despite having some training booked, i will still have some things to do with monkey boy and its never cheap even if we go to the park, there's drinks and snacks etc.  i have got the drinks covered, my past couple of shops they have had crates of fizz for 3 for £24 so ive got 6 crates of fizz which will cover us for next half term and most if not all the summer holidays, and i have a freezer drawer full of ice lollies.

i should be able to clear a huge chunk of the tsb overdraft when his lordship gets paid, then when i get paid next month i can then raid the pots and throw then at something.  i do have to mot his car this month so thats the car fund not able to be used for anything else this month.

i dont see me spending much more on misc this month (famous last words) but i should be ok given that im keeping £350 to one side for hen/stag parties.  his lordship doesn't yet know if he is here or not for the stag and the wedding so his stag if he attends wont cost half as much as the hen.  i cant see me spending more than £150 when im away given transport, accommodation and an activity has been paid for and we are then drinking, although the girls im away with its bottles of champagne!  i

my main plan this month is to get through to june payday without going back into any overdrafts and no more than the food, fuel and hen night budget on my barclays credit card.  i do need to try and get into in advance rather than arrears on the food budget, so might squeeze a little more and set up another pot for food and fuel so that its there to cover the credit card each month.  need to see what works best for me so its going to be a learning curve the next couple of months.

i do like to ramble and i need plans for plans for plans but given only his lordship and myself know the mess we are in, its nice to ramble away here even if its to myself most of the time

shoppingobsessed2020

couple of no spend days, however gave in and got chinese tonight.  was not worth it!

in other news i need to tweak the budget to add a conference in, his lordship has his annual work conference and spouses are invited, this is the first time in 15yrs that ive been able to go with timings of childcare and location!  previous few have either been when hes been at sea when they have been in london or have been in india and there was no way i was flying all that way for a long weekend, but europe in summer i can do.  will probably just need to cover my flights but ive googled and they shouldnt be that expensive so childcare is arranged and subject to his lordship being home we are going

got an ironing mountain to do tomorrow so will be a no spend day and im hoping to get on the treadmill for half an hour.  my back has been so iffy recently that ive done nothing and my jeans are getting tight so need to get sorted.  thankfully my stomach issues are settled at the moment but i dont like gaining weight as im happy with the size i am wearing now.  

alt80

I remember you from a couple of years back. Looks like you're getting a grip on sorting the debts again now - good luck!