Debt free by 30!?

wannabedebtfreemum95

I’ve been frantically reading lots of diaries over the past few days (and years!!!) and decided it’s time to start my own. I’m staring into the future and realising I’ve got 15 months until I turn 30 and need to get my !!!!!! together!

Background: I’m a mum of 2 (4 and 10 months) and I’ve got a few weeks until I go back to work. I’ll be paid 4 for 4 days until Xmas, then dropping officially to 3 days. My partner starts a new job too which will be a huge payrise, and I’m already nervous at how spendy he will want to be. I’m also apprehensive about feeling constantly skint even with (on paper) a lot more money. 

CC1 (joint) £2,466

CC2 (joint) £2,850

CC3 (mine) £5,025

PayPal (joint and mine) £905 

The story of our debt is simple - we spend way more than we make!!! It hasn’t been helped by 2 maternity leaves. We didn’t realise we were eligible for UC the first time, so I used money transfers for topping up my savings and I’m still paying this back very slowly now. I’ve never learned to stop spending though. 

Plan going forward: we have created a budget that allows us to pay off £300 a month to joint debt (all of this is interest free for another 13-18 months). This will clear this down in 18 months but aiming to do this sooner. The personal debt is more of my worry! I’ve moved it to a(nother) 0% card that gives me 13 months. I am not expecting to pay off £5k in this time but want to give it my best shot! My leftovers after proportionally paying into the joint account is £600 so I should be able to make good headway, but worried my spending habits will get in the way! This will drop once I go to 3 days (probably to around £450) so I’d rather get things on track now. Hoping a daily diary of what I’m spending will help keep me on track. 

Goals going forward:

3 NSDs a week 

Make a coffee before I leave the house!!! 

Big spends coming up:

Birthday party £60 

Birthday gifts £40

Scott_Weiland79

wow that will be a tall order but a dent in it could be possible. 10368 in 15months is 698 a month off debt.

Have you done an SOA to review things properly? If you have and have it maybe post it here and we can look it. The main advice I can give if you want things done quickly is be honest with yourself and look at what you can cut.

ie

Do I really need Netflix/NowTV/Disney and Amazon Prime each month

Could I review things like mobile phone contracts and switch them to better deals/sim only maybe

Am i optimising things like my day to day spending ie am i using cashback sites when buying online/do you use receipt apps to get extra money in. 

Could I boost my income? My other half is now a convert she used to spent along time on here phone after work looking at facebook or random junk online. She now spends half an hour to an hour in front of the box some nights on prolific academic or curious cat or qmee making money. Have a look at the boosting my income thread i have posted below

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/family/boost-your-income/

Brie

Hopefully your OH is aware of the debt and onboard with nuking it all.  Otherwise things may not go according to plan.

And are all the CCs at 0% or just one?  It would be great to see the full details in the SOA to get a better understanding.  

Best of luck!  And remember it's a marathon not a sprint!!!

Sarahwithlove

Does your partner know how much personal debt you have and is it all yours? Because if its stuff for the family/kids it should really be a joint debt and tackled together. Is your partner on board with the budgeting and getting debt gone. Sounds like between you there will be a good amount of disposable income. You don't want to get into habit of spending it all and try and save some in future if you can. 

wannabedebtfreemum95

Today’s planned NSD didn’t go very well (although could have been much worse!). I did manage to take a coffee with me today as the big kid has back to back sports clubs 9-11. After this, we ended up doing the Big Shop (£82 for the week) but realised immediately after leaving that I’d forgotten baby wipes and honey. Topped up on honey, some ice cream and Yorkshire puddings (£8) on way home from a party. Got £10 left in the grocery budget for the week so will probably spend this on more fruit and potentially garlic bread, depending on how my bread making goes later in the week. 

Meal plans for this week:

• enchiladas 
• Roast ham (extra to be used in sandwiches)
• Chicken pesto pasta 
• Mac and cheese with leftover ham 
• Sausages (realising as I type this I don’t have a side for these unless it’s alphabites….)
• Pizza

Trying to eat a bit healthier but must have forgotten that when I planned the menu!!! The £82 also included lots of fruit and fruit juice for smoothies, and own brand crisps for packed lunches for my partner Mr WDF. Took a holey pair of boots to Timpsons today to see if they could be repaired but no luck - will need to add to my list of things to buy over the next few weeks because who knows when winter will hit in Scotland!?

Back to nursery this week for big kid, baby still home with me all week. We’ve got no major plans as our baby class is off this week, but he has 2 playgroups to go to with family members so that’s free, and we’ll have a few home days planned. Fingers crossed we get to 3 NSDs this week!

Amended “things to buy” list: 

• winter boots
• Books for party bags (2 big kids and a few babies)

wannabedebtfreemum95

To answer a few questions: 
- Mr WDF aware of the debt yes! It is all 0% and we’ve budgeted £300 per month to pay this back. That should pay off the credit cards that are joint in the time. For mine, some of this potentially is joint but a lot is just silly spending from me. 

He’s on board with budgeting as much as I’d hoped, but I’m very much the cook of the house so hoping keeping to £100 or less a week for food (and many many less takeaways) will give us a good start. 

Sarahwithlove

I'll keep my fingers crossed for you then that you are able to make those repayments amd sort both joint and personal debt. 

wannabedebtfreemum95

Another spending day today, but still think 3 days this week is achievable (aiming for Tuesday - Thursday). I had a lovely day though, my mum treated me and the baby to a coffee out and a new outfit for each of the kids. Bought some boots for myself too. Feels frivolous and felt slightly guilty when I paid, but I’m on my feet constantly with the kids and can’t be having holes in my shoes! Picked up some wipes too, more potatoes and some flash dry mops. Can’t tell if I love or hate them (at £7 for 40 dry wipes I’m hoping I don’t enjoy too much!!!) but can’t keep mopping floor all day and hoping the baby doesn’t slip! Ended up with strange number left in bank at end of day so rounded down to nearest £10 and popped the rest on my personal card. Also found £4 in coins tidying up today so that’ll offset the fancy dusters! 

Total spend (planned) - 75.15 + 20.88 

Total debt pay off - £4.47 

wannabedebtfreemum95

Finally - a NSD for me! Took the baby up to playgroup with my gran, took some very overdue library books back and got some new ones out for me and the kids. Luckily no fines, happy days! 

The meal plan for the week is going well. Managed to use up loads of veg today with dinner and will do the same tomorrow with the enchiladas. My plan of action for tomorrow is to tidy the house, make sure the baby has a good nap and finally get my bread made. I’m also going to make a list of what we’ve got to be used up for next week - would like to reduce the groceries budget to below £100. 

Sarahwithlove

Sounds like a good plan. 

wannabedebtfreemum95

Have had a spendy few two days but did pay off £1.15 of my credit card (tiny wins). O2 priority had tickets for an event for big kid for his Xmas, so booked that (£150). This will be his main present from us and means he gets a day out rather than endless stuff that I’ll inevitably moan about being around the house. I paid for this with 0% PayPal so debt has gone up, but we are expecting a significant income boost at end of the month with Mr DFW new job, and me going back to work, so not too worried about this. 

I treated myself to a haircut too from my weekly budget. The hairdresser asked when I’d last had my hair cut and I realised that it was while I was pregnant… so it was definitely overdue! Don’t mind £50 expense on my hair if it’s an annual treat. 

The weekend is looking to be expensive: we’ve got 2 birthday parties, four kids clubs for the big kid and hopefully some downtime in between the chaos for sorting out the house.