After Advice Please

onarollsaver

on the original post?

ellenvan

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82077912#Comment_82077912

Here might be easier. Or on original post and state here you have done it.

If it's here more people will see it.

onarollsaver

Income a month (after tax)

Me - £2190 - Wife - £2500 = £4690

Outgoings

personal - Me - £68.32 - Wife - £155.92

(Goes towards car tax, car insurance, subscriptions etc)

Fuel-135

MONTHLY TOTAL - £359.24

NEEDS

Nursery Costs (finish in January) - £450

Food Shop - £600

House Insurance - £12.33

TV Licence - 12.97

Council Tax - £182.90

Energy - £138.34

Broadband - £29

Welsh Water - £78

Mortgage - £693.08

MONTHLY TOTAL - £2,196.62

DEBTS

2bigloanspaidoffbelowwithit

Got in to debt mainly due to paying off 0% credit cards (couldn't be trusted with them) & big wedding we had, paid off our car finance and a few other thingsthis

money owed to mother in law is paying back a holiday

Money owed to Mother in Law - £100

M&S Personal Loan - £434.75

Amount Remaining - 26,466.35

Settlement Figure - £19.888.36

Admiral Personal Loan - £680.60 a month

Amount Remaining - £28.584.13

Settlement Figure - £25,373.36

MONTHLY TOTAL - £1,115.35

WANTS

Aviva Life Insurance - Me - £49.94 - Wife - £35.48 (changing October to £70 for both of us)

Pet Health Club - £22.99 - Pet Insurance - £11.47 - Dog Walker - £15 per week (x2 - 1 hour walks)

Spotify Family - £17.99

MONTHLY TOTAL - £399.87-

SAVING-£204.99

FROMLASTSOA

Family Spends

Daughters Clubs - Dancing - £47 - Acro Aerobics - £17.50 - Swimming - £52 per month

MONTHLY TOTAL - £116.50

SAVING-£98

Mortgage

Halifax - £139,000

Help to Buy Equity Loan (20% of current house worth) - £56,000

House currently worth £280,000

£85k Positive Equity

ROUND UP

INCOME - £4,690

OUTGOINGS - £4187.58

LEFT OVER EACH MONTH - £502.42

ellenvan

That's excellent savings from the last SOA.

So the question now is what are you doing with the leftover £500.

Overpaying the loans with £250 if no overpayment penalty.

Then saving £200 into an emergency fund, by transferring on payday is what I would suggest. Then you have a safety net of £50 per month for anything that crops up.

But of course it's up to you. Just don't fritter it away. Which is easy to do.

onarollsaver

do you think I should just put the full 500 in to emergency savings each month until I get the full amount needed to then smash down the loans?

joedenise

If you're paying interest on the loans then I would use £250 to pay off and then £250 into an Emergency Fund as suggested by @ellenvan. How big an Emergency Fund are you planning to build?

onarollsaver

I’m not sure how much to have as an emergency fund. How much do you advise? How much do people try to have?

ellenvan

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82078826#Comment_82078826

At least 3 months of earnings is the ideal.

But meanwhile you are paying a high rate of interest on the loans.

So if there is no penalty on repayment I would definitely be making monthly overpayments

onarollsaver

yeah your right. I will start overpaying. The term should come down significantly then

joedenise

I would say that the initial Emergency Fund should be £1,000 then if white goods for example go kaput you can at least pay for them.

Are you saving into sinking funds for your annual expenses or is everything going to be coming out of your EF? If so then your EF needs to be larger.