Road To Financial Recovery

FootyFanDan

Morning MSE world
hope everyone having a great weekend

Nice early start for me, last night I committed to myself that I’d go gym. So gym session ✔️
Now sat having a nice coffee whilst the other to do (car wash) gets done. 

I need to look at my week ahead and see what that’s looking like. Work has been manic but got a big project pretty much successfully complete after 14 weeks of intense work on it so that’s a win

Finances are pretty much in decent shape so far. Today I will review YNAB and sort out this weeks income. I’m still struggling a bit with the whole budget to zero as I always have the what if moment but realistically I’ve got savings (more than ever) to fall back on so maybe I just need to bite the bullet with it 

alt80

Just caught up with your diary, glad to hear all is good for you and your family. I bet the views over the Peak District were amazing by air. 

It’s good to hear you are starting to have some savings to fall back on. I’ve told my wife that we need to start saving a personal emergency fund rn any unexpected expenses mean that I take additional dividends at the expense of the SSAS. 

FootyFanDan

alt80 said:

Just caught up with your diary, glad to hear all is good for you and your family. I bet the views over the Peak District were amazing by air. 

It’s good to hear you are starting to have some savings to fall back on. I’ve told my wife that we need to start saving a personal emergency fund rn any unexpected expenses mean that I take additional dividends at the expense of the SSAS. 

Cheers mate, hope you are all good.
It surpassed all my expectations to be honest and isn't something I will forget easily.

It is a bit strange because for a long time i never worried over savings and just paid for stuff as it happened, but even though it isn't a massive emergency fund it is enough to get over an hurdles if we need to. I enjoy the feeling of seeing it go up that little bit more every month. I have found having that little bit of resiliance has helped mindset as well

FootyFanDan

Hello to the month of June.
Hope everyone is doing good.

May brought a few additional items I wasn't expecting, primarily a parking fine (dang) and also another school trip....I swear this wasn't the case when I was young (a while ago 😂). The car fine was paid with no issues or without too much budget switching.

Today has been a clearing the London savings fund kinda day, I dunno I absolutely hated seeing that big figure in savings slowly drift away, but I suppose that is what it is for. I do know that not so long ago we would never have been this prepared. We will have time to refill this up to a decent amount before we travel.


The joint budget has held up pretty well, I think I do need to start trying to pin down every penny to the budget, it is great that we aren't having to micro manage it but it does also mean there is areas that could be better utilised. We have been out a few days in May and had unplanned eat out / takeaway days. My personal budget though as totally gone out of the window, I have my usual Direct Debits - My Playstation Subscription, Phone Bill, Gym and a few others, but the extra spends on Cost-a-fortune coffees and grabbing lunch on the go is just insane and isn't healthy on me or the wallet. There is no real excuse either as I buy food in the weekly shop and also have a travel coffee mug so I need to prepare better.

Health wise, I am really starting to feel the benefit of the taking the magnesium and other vitamins, my sleep is starting to balance out. It is meaning early nights and early wake ups but this is seeming to work. I now find myself waking up before my 5am alarm.  This is hopefully going to help me in the next 6 months as I go into a really hectic time at work. I do need to try get into a bit more of a routine with tracking my work stuff and projects but that is work in progress.

Food Spends this month were within budget - Just about, this is going to need to be increased as we seem to be getting less value right now. Although admittedly us cooking from scratch would really bring this down. This is hopefully the intention along with proper meal preparation. 

Savings currently stands at £500 which is mainly emergency funds. This figure I am more than happy with at this stage, so we are going to slowly drip feed this now and starting ramping up in others pots from June payday. 

alt80

Glad to hear all is going well, I definitely wish I could get up at 5am after a proper night's sleep ha. 

Be glad your daughter isn't at my son's school. First year of seniors next year amongst a load of other trips there's skiing in the US - £2500 per kid on top of all the other expenses - I reckon they have less !!!!!! uniform in the army. 

FootyFanDan

alt80 said:

Glad to hear all is going well, I definitely wish I could get up at 5am after a proper night's sleep ha. 

Be glad your daughter isn't at my son's school. First year of seniors next year amongst a load of other trips there's skiing in the US - £2500 per kid on top of all the other expenses - I reckon they have less !!!!!! uniform in the army. 

It Is mental, it is rubbish as well as there is going to be parents that can't afford it and the kid loses out. I don't really know what the answer is but yeah, kids missing out due to finances is not something that sits well with me.

My sleep as always been a mess but lately I am getting there.

FootyFanDan

Today wasn't a NSD - we had some birthday gifts to buy so these have no been purchased. 

So far this week I have managed no coffee and takeouts for lunch. I think I am going to try go down route of potentially maybe just having a drink out on Friday as a treat hah.

Also, sitting and reflecting on how far we have come with our finances and the work that we have put in to it, but It really highlighted just how much this place and the amazing people on the board do make such a positive impact and drive people to make changes and see that a bad debt situation can be resolved

Hope everyone having a decent start to the week -  I have been literally in teams meetings all day which is never good for the ever growing to do list  

Sarahwithlove

I try to stick to once a week coffees but that rarely happens! So if you find the answer let me know please haha. 

FootyFanDan

Sarahwithlove said:

I try to stick to once a week coffees but that rarely happens! So if you find the answer let me know please haha. 

Haha, I think if you are waiting on answer from me you could be waiting a while 😂

LzzyIsGod

FootyFanDan said:

Today wasn't a NSD - we had some birthday gifts to buy so these have no been purchased. 

So far this week I have managed no coffee and takeouts for lunch. I think I am going to try go down route of potentially maybe just having a drink out on Friday as a treat hah.

Also, sitting and reflecting on how far we have come with our finances and the work that we have put in to it, but It really highlighted just how much this place and the amazing people on the board do make such a positive impact and drive people to make changes and see that a bad debt situation can be resolved

Hope everyone having a decent start to the week -  I have been literally in teams meetings all day which is never good for the ever growing to do list  

I completely agree with this - it's still hard but without this board and all the people here I would find it a million times harder. 

We all have our weakness (mine is a pint!) It's the little things though that keep us going and make life a bit nicer