2024 - Let's go again

Lonelygambler

Hey you are doing great. Well done. 

wildheart83

Lonelygambler said:

Hey you are doing great. Well done. 

Thanks, it's good to hear some words of encouragement. 

I had my private dental consultation to see what can be done about the missing teeth. £2.3k per tooth implant, but I suppose one good thing is that they can only do one implant so I know it won't be anymore than that and I won't get the hard sell. 

Malale

You're already on the right track by paying £700 a month. Thinking about slowing down the process and paying less may make sense if it will allow you to better manage your finances and maintain financial stability. As for the plans for 2024, these are wonderful goals. Addressing your weight problem and ensuring financial security through car insurance and maintenance sound like important steps for your well-being.

Prodigal50

Hi!

I just read through this thread and it seems you are dealing with many of the same issues we have. 

It's not easy keeping up those monthly payments with the many bills coming at you and the higher cost of everything. 

You are doing amazingly well to have gone from £50k to 30k. 

That's a massive achievement when you think how much of change that has been from building debt to reducing it.

We have done something similar - from 70k down to 40k or so with a few setbacks since 2022. 

Someday you will be free of this.

All the very best!

wildheart83

Prodigal50 said:

Hi!

I just read through this thread and it seems you are dealing with many of the same issues we have. 

It's not easy keeping up those monthly payments with the many bills coming at you and the higher cost of everything. 

You are doing amazingly well to have gone from £50k to 30k. 

That's a massive achievement when you think how much of change that has been from building debt to reducing it.

We have done something similar - from 70k down to 40k or so with a few setbacks since 2022. 

Someday you will be free of this.

All the very best!

Thank you for the encouragement. It's hard when everything has to come from one salary so everything is tracked and accounted for.

I've cut everything that I can, but with almost ever bill going up I feel like I'm chasing my tail at times. I'll get there though, and as you say, someday I'll be debt free.   

wildheart83

I'm having a think about switching to the snowball method of paying off the debt now that everything has defaulted and I'm not paying interest on balances. 

At the moment my debt repayment looks like this:

CC1 £6015.66 paying £261
CC2 £7666.09 paying £70
CC3 £2013.68 paying £20
CC4 £880 paying £50
CC5 £4212.69 paying £42
Loan 1 £3266.44 paying £210 
Loan 2 £5275.22 paying £40 into a separate account, this seems to have disappeared post default. 
I can pay an extra £107 per month which brings my total to £800 per month. All apart from CC5 and Loan 2 have an agreement in place with the creditor/DCA for these amounts so it would just be an email to each company to tell them of the new proposed amounts I guess. 

Although I can see the balances coming down it's still 7 cards/loans to clear so I'm hoping I can clear CC4 quickly, then CC3 etc. 

At the moment my DFD is November 2027 with defaults due to start dropping off my credit file mid 2028. 

I'm still Vinting and surveying so any extra goes towards debt and bringing that date forward. Although I desperately need a new kitchen (even if it's just new to me I'll be happy!) so I'm sorely tempted to just pay enough to see the DFD of Nov 27, and keep putting the extra to my new kitchen fund.... tough decisions 

MatyMoo

My sister found a new to her kitchen on eBay. It was a kitchen showroom company refreshing their displays & she got it for the bargain price of £250. She then paid a chippy £500 to fit it, still a bargain!

Prodigal50

Going for the Snowball method has worked for a lot of people. Getting that feeling that the you have a achieved a victory is such a motivating thing!

Everyone is different but I moved the credit cards around on 0% deals so I wasn't paying standard APR on as much as possible. It sounds like you have arrangements in place with your creditors and that's not such an issue for you?

In that case snowballing seems like a really good decision. 

With regard to the kitchen I'm sure you can give that a good bit of careful thought and perhaps find a way of getting an amazing bargain as mentioned above. I suppose the obvious question is will it do until you have enough cash  to buy one you would really love when you are debt free?

All the very best!

wildheart83

MatyMoo said:

My sister found a new to her kitchen on eBay. It was a kitchen showroom company refreshing their displays & she got it for the bargain price of £250. She then paid a chippy £500 to fit it, still a bargain!

Yes, that's exactly what I'm looking for! Once I'm ready to actually do something about it, I'll be on all the sites looking! At the moment my appliances are all pretty new (other than cooker) so if I can do it before they also need replaced it should be ok. 

wildheart83

Prodigal50 said:

Going for the Snowball method has worked for a lot of people. Getting that feeling that the you have a achieved a victory is such a motivating thing!

Everyone is different but I moved the credit cards around on 0% deals so I wasn't paying standard APR on as much as possible. It sounds like you have arrangements in place with your creditors and that's not such an issue for you?

In that case snowballing seems like a really good decision. 

With regard to the kitchen I'm sure you can give that a good bit of careful thought and perhaps find a way of getting an amazing bargain as mentioned above. I suppose the obvious question is will it do until you have enough cash  to buy one you would really love when you are debt free?

All the very best!

Arrangements are in place for all except two, which I'm putting a token amount into another account to go towards them should the creditor be in touch. So I'm thinking snowball will work better, it's all psychological seeing the debt paid off, rather than just seeing the balances drop. 

The kitchen (actually the whole house) was done on the cheap by the previous owner and is rapidly falling apart. All integrated appliances failed within a couple of years and most have been replaced with the exception of the cooker. At the moment I don't have a working oven, I just use the air fryer, mainly because to replace the integrated oven is too expensive and I hate where it is. I want a freestanding cooker and to do it needs the kitchen reconfigured first. 

I'll be keeping an eye out for kitchens on selling sites once I'm in a better position to do something about it.