When it's good, it's fun. When it's bad, it's funny.

BrotherUuurgh

Payday again. I managed to get the car fixed and re tested last weekend, and now have another 12 months with it. All in all it cost £207 to get it through MOT. Very happy with that, as was expecting a good 5-600 for a 17yr old car. Tax will be due at the start of March, and seeing as I actually made it to payday with some good money in the bank and a little saved, I've already got the tax money ready

Financially things changed a bit as well. Long story short I was offered a loan from a previous CC provider which was quite a bit lower than the rates on my current loans, also no arrangement fee. It got me thinking, and I ran the numbers through the snowball calculator and it worked out that I would be debt free a month sooner than if I carried on as before. Same amount of money available for debt repayments, but instead of December being my DFD, it's now November, and a good few hundred further saved. Another consideration was, while the newly started emergency fund is small, this lower monthly repayment will allow me some wiggle room should something come up.

BrotherUuurgh

I rearranged the payment date on the consolidation loan to be closer to payday which meant there wouldn't be a payment due for Feb, but made a £400 overpayment anyway. This lowers the "first payment" amount a bit, but the loan will still be receiving the same total payment per month overall, regardless.

Starting to stress again about the future, really struggle with it sometimes. I've wasted so much time... 

BrotherUuurgh

Checking back in as it's payday again

I feel like I've been very busy the past few weeks, taking in a lot of new information. I'm really trying to educate myself and get prepared for the future, and how best to use what I have available to me. I've settled on, and opened up, a couple of new saving accounts - a Cash ISA and a Stocks and Shares LISA with Hargreaves Lansdown. The idea of this is really just to keep forming the good habits and make saving a normal, even autonomous thing. With that said, I've started myself off with just under £200 across both of these accounts, and my wife and I now have £600 in an emergency fund between us (I'm sitting here now feeling quite amazed how we've managed to make £600 appear out of nowhere). Now, it may cost more overall by not allocating this money toward overpaying debt, but I'm happy to soak that (relatively small) cost up and consider it the cost of financial education and preparedness. After all, they do say that the best time to start investing was yesterday, the second best time is today. As for investing, I've been putting a lot of thought into what sort of pot values that I need to aim for, and playing with compounding interest calculators is helping a lot to make it really clear what I need to put away each month based off the usual factors (growth, time in the market etc).

The first round of normal monthly payments will be going out over the next few (working) days, and once that's sorted and an overpayment made, I can catch up and evaluate where I'm at for the month. I made a real effort to bag some overtime in January and have come out today with the highest amount I've ever cleared. It feels great I must be honest, part of the reason for getting the extra hours in is because there's an exhibition this month that I have been looking forward to for a long time, and I wanted to try and treat myself to a little something while I'm there. 

Prolific has felt very quiet this month yet I've only come out with 70p less than January, and that felt pretty good. Strange. I'm going to start drip-feeding my Cash ISA with Prolific money from now on, and will probably just leave £100 or so in the Nationwide Regular Saver in order to qualify for the Fairer Share Payment (that is, if they do it again this year).

Still battling between feeling positive, hopeless, lost and pointless about the future, but breaking it down and putting some time and thought into the topic has been helping a lot. Happy days.

Take_a_hike_Elon_and_Jeff

I too have found myself educating myself, may it continue!!
I won't criticise you as we are entitled to research advice and then put our own plan together however, I too am desperate to save and invest however I have been advised by more than one IFA to pay off the debt first because the interest is always going to be higher than potential investments and savings, the only exception being mortgages as in general the interest rate on this type of debt is lower. I realise that if I try to invest first what I am actually doing is throwing money away if I follow this approach. Again this is your choice and possibly your debt is on 0% interest but nevertheless making this a priority means one can wipe this out quicker leading to an earlier date when freed up cash can be diverted into investments.
What I am doing is making sure my emergency fund is in an easy access account with a slightly better than average interest rate so at least over time it's not losing value due to inflation.
A pat on the back to you regardless as you are pumping in the overtime thus accelerating the process to being debt free. As my brother once said to me, everyone is an expert at how others should lead their lives and his opinion is take the advice, nod quietly and process the information and draw up your own conclusions. Wishing you the best of luck at managing your debt free journey. Isn't it amazing how we can change our mindset and as you correctly mentioned education! This is the foundation and by being on these diaries we are slowly learning to control our money and not the other way around letting it control us! As they say Rome wasn't built in one day

BrotherUuurgh

Thank you @Take_a_hike_Elon_and_Jeff (what a great name lol).

Indeed my approach will cost me a little bit, but as I say, I believe the saving is a proportionally valuable action - it's going to stop me feeling that I have to take out credit for something in the future, and literally save the interest on that. In the long run I believe this is best for me. Thankfully, I now only have one interest bearing debt which I opened a month or so ago to consolidate two higher interest loans, so that itself has saved me some money. I managed to get the two credit cards I had onto a 30 month 0% deal, and then family of course is also 0%. The education and taking a gamble with credit applications has already saved me hundreds 🙂.

Our emergency fund is in a 12 month easy access account with Nationwide, which offers 6.5% AER and up to 3 penalty-free withdrawals per year. I felt this was perfect for an emergency fund. It should stand that we make about £50 in interest overall by depositing the maximum £200/month. My workplace pension is underway which will be complimented by a LISA, as well as a regular Cash ISA for the medium term. Contrast this with a couple of years ago, no savings, a lot of debt all high interest, and opted out of the workplace pension? We've come a long way 😊.

Have a lovely weekend. 

BrotherUuurgh

Within a couple months it's all gone to hell again. It always does. Why do I always do this?

I had a bit of a mental breakdown a couple of weeks ago and it's lead to undoing all the hard work I'd put into trying to get my finances in order. I've spent on my 0% BT Credit card, what little savings I had are hugely depleted, and I'm really kicking myself now. I've forced myself to come back on here and get back to it as it was all working really very well, so hopefully can start again. 

Debt is still coming down, all bills still being paid, but a lot of unnecessary damage done. To make things worse, I'm now going to have to pay the whole household bills on my single wage. Overpayments are going to slow, if not stop. 

There's something undiagnosed going on here and this has been making my life so difficult for so long now  

dawnybabes

Stop beating yourself up, we’re all only human.

perhaps see the GP for a referral (expect it to take years but at least you’d be in the Q) for a neuro assessment.  

Is your wife looking for other work ? Can she claim UC in the interim ? 

Overpayments are nice but so long as you’re meeting the basic payments that is also fine ! 

BrotherUuurgh

Thanks @dawnybabes, it's so hard not to beat yourself up. I will carry on as before. My wife is looking for work again, but no UC in the mean time as I earn too much - it works out she's entitled to around £0.50.

I'm back to doing my surveys and studies and have withdrawn £10 today so it's a start getting back to better ways.