Advice on ways to budget better/cut expenditure

enthusiasticsaver

The soa does not show a massive deficit so that is good but before advising further can I ask if the figures are accurate or aspirational? Were the loans for debt consolidation after the DMP was taken out?

You will have difficulty getting a mortgage on those figures so what happens if you have to stay with your current lender? 

tealady

Hi

i would check your electricity and gas suppliers to see if you are on the best tarif.

Also make sure nothing is left on standby, it might not cost much but it all mounts up.

Do you batch cook? That can help as well.

TheAble

In the current market your mortgage rate is high but not crazy high. Is that 7.5% a fixed or floating rate? BoE base rate likely to keep nudging up for the foreseeable future is something to bear in mind...

The same question as ES had occurred to me also - how did those additional loans come about if you were on a DMP? While your SOA looks otherwise reasonable you do need to stop using credit as it's only going to make the situation worse.

Rob5342

The boiler cover seems high, homeserve cover boiler only for £8 a month or heating and plumbing for £14.50.

Also have you looked at other mobile deals? Smarty have some very reasonable rates and you get 10% off each SIM if you have them all in their family plan.

Cable/TV seems high as well. You can get Now broadband for £23 a month and get Netflix for £4.99.

InAPickle76

kimwp said:

Hiya, it's a very sensible SOA, you could cut back by not saving for a holiday, emergency fund (one school of thought is it doesn't make sense to have an emergency fund when you could be using it to pay off debt), cancelling your cable subscription, trying to go longer without haircuts and thinking how to reduce your energy bill. All fairly small dents but they'll get you to a position where your income exceeds your outgoings and you can start overpaying your debt. I personally don't pay for boiler cover, preferring to self insure, but sod's law is that if you cancel, your boiler breaks the next day 😞

Thanks so much - yes it may be worth just using these 'pots' to overpay the debts and get them down. It's the big loan that is the killer at nearly £500 per month! Plus the high interest rates meaning we are making little inroad into the mortgage debt. Just feel a bit stuck in a rut at the mo x

InAPickle76

Floss said:

£20 for car maintenance doesn't feel adequate - a new tyre can be £60+, an MOT is £57.50 without a service, and £280/m on fuel equals high mileage.

Can you negotiate your TV package? I take it that include your broadband?

I guess your food shop includes those brands familiar to your son so probably not much reduction there.

Are the professional fees claimable from your employer? 

Hi Floss - thanks for your reply. I work in the community so travel to home visits as part of my job so my fuel costs are high. These can be reclaimed though and have been added into the monthly income. I can claim back tax relief on my professional fees but not the whole amount which is done through my tax account online. We will definitely look at a cheaper broadband package once the current contract runs out later this year. Yes, my son does like specific foods bless him so we have to buy certain things for him but I think we could tighten our belts a bit further with regards to the weekly shop if we tried x

InAPickle76

enthusiasticsaver said:

The soa does not show a massive deficit so that is good but before advising further can I ask if the figures are accurate or aspirational? Were the loans for debt consolidation after the DMP was taken out?

You will have difficulty getting a mortgage on those figures so what happens if you have to stay with your current lender? 

Thanks so much enthusiasticsaver - I have done the SOA as accurately as possible. Unfortunately yes, we needed to replace my car for work (bought a second hand car but needed to be reliaible so spent approx £3k on this. We also did some home improvements as we were thinking of selling our property last year - all done on 0% credit cards but then these deals came to an end so we took out a loan at a cheaper APR to consolidate the debts. Really regret this now and wish we had looked at remortgaging this time last year instead of taking out the loan but interest rates were lower then and we were doing ok. I am really concerned about the remortgage options - I feel we will be trapped with The One Account paying pretty much £1000 per month in interest and not getting the balance down x

InAPickle76

tealady said:

Hi

i would check your electricity and gas suppliers to see if you are on the best tarif.

Also make sure nothing is left on standby, it might not cost much but it all mounts up.

Do you batch cook? That can help as well.

Thanks so much - yep keep checking our suppliers offers - no fixed deals yet but we are paying more than we use at the moment so could reduce the direct debit - however I like to build up a bit of credit to take into the winter months. We have a smart meter which has really helped us cut our usage. I definitely should do more batch cooking, but sometimes it is tricky with my son as he only likes certain things so we can end up having different foods which can cost more x

InAPickle76

TheAble said:

In the current market your mortgage rate is high but not crazy high. Is that 7.5% a fixed or floating rate? BoE base rate likely to keep nudging up for the foreseeable future is something to bear in mind...

The same question as ES had occurred to me also - how did those additional loans come about if you were on a DMP? While your SOA looks otherwise reasonable you do need to stop using credit as it's only going to make the situation worse.

Hi TheAble and thanks for your reply. The 7.5% is a variable rate - we are on one of the offset mortgages so were told it is not a SVR as such but is not fixed and the One Account seem to do whatever they want with the interest rates!! We cannot remortgage with them as the account as it currently stands is no longer available as a new mortgage. We would have to complete a full remortgage application with RBOS/Natwest and one of our DMP debts was with Natwest so I very much doubt they would accept us even if our affordability was much better!!! x

InAPickle76

Rob5342 said:

The boiler cover seems high, homeserve cover boiler only for £8 a month or heating and plumbing for £14.50.

Also have you looked at other mobile deals? Smarty have some very reasonable rates and you get 10% off each SIM if you have them all in their family plan.

Cable/TV seems high as well. You can get Now broadband for £23 a month and get Netflix for £4.99.

Hi Rob - thanks so much - I definitely need to look at boiler cover - unfortunately ours isn't due for renewal until October but I will be shopping around! That's really good re: Smarty - I didn't know the offered family discount so will look into this. We are definitely looking at new broadband deals once this current contract ends later this year x