The Debt Free Roll Of Honour

For the first time in 25 years, I am debt free! I made my last payment to PayPlan on Friday, so as of 9th August 2019 I officially don’t owe anybody anything at all and it feels great.

Lightbulb moment - January 2014
Debts at their highest - £5.5k
Debt-Free Date - 09/08/2019
Your one pearl of wisdom - Keep chipping away at debt, every penny helps towards debt freedom. First of all I felt ashamed, but once I started using this forum, I realised that I was far from alone.
Which forum threads helped you - Debt-free Wannabe kept me inspired and on the straight and narrow.

Maybe the mods will delete this post, I do have another account on the site but some of this is very personal and my main account links to a lot of other sites that I use. However I would still like to post my story

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I suppose I never had what you might consider 'hard debt' it never seemed totally insurmountable and was all interest free. But knowing what position I had got myself in made me feel very down and I genuinely lost sleep over it.

It all started when I went to went to Uni at 18. I had never even had a debit card , just an ATM card.

A bank (no names, but lets say its has a very Spanish name by UK high street standards) were standing in the students union giving anyone who would sign up for a bank account £50. Obviously I was very pleased by this windfall, I also got a debit card!

I was offered an overdraft, but I said no - I had never had debt (or money to spend) in my life, the balance of my student loan in my account already made me feel uncomfortable without taking on debt. The line 'are you sure? its 0% for years and basically free money' was used. I was asked about the overdraft again the next time I was in the branch, silly 18 year old me had already turned down this free money once but lightning wasn't going to strike twice.

Predictably silly 18 year old me enjoyed living away from home for the first time in his life and quickly burned through all of the money in my account and basically maxed the overdraft. It also automatically increased three times. At one point I was behind on an O2 phone bill, thank god I sorted it before it got to a default or anything like that - not that I knew what a default was at the time.

Basically I lived in my overdraft, when I got some money i was just less far into the overdraft. I knew this was bad but as I still had like 6 more years interest free I never really stressed about it. Eventually I got a full time job but the interest was still 0% and I kept putting off sorting it out - when I would get a small bonus etc someone (or me!) would always suggest spending it on something else 'useful' (or otherwise) and using the next one to sort the overdraft.

Then at some point I rang the bank to discuss some other issue and at the end of the call they asked if i was aware that I was guaranteed to be accepted for a credit card. I had never had a CC, to be honest I didn't really like the idea of it. But it was interest free and useful for a rainy day, so naturally I took it...and used it.

Eventually I grew up a bit (I am still not 30) and started to pay off the overdraft. I got it down from a couple of thousand to under £400 manually. Then a bank error put it back to well over £1000 at the exact same time I was expecting a couple of different payments to come into my account. I didn't pay enough attention to exactly where the balance had come from and spent more than I should have on something genuinely usefully - thinking that I was still in the black at the end of the day. I literally cried when I discovered the issue. The bank admitted the error and paid a token amount of compensation but the overdraft remained. They also started to charge me overdraft fees.

This annoyed me deeply I was determined to get my finances on track once and for all. Even though my partner and I bought a car on finance and we were forced to move to a house with higher rent I really started to take care with everything related to my fiances. I also took a second job on a !!!!!! BR tax code (losing 20p in every pound in Tax + paying a contribution towards both a pension and student loan from the remaining 80p) and worked in the evenings after my other job and at the weekends - on top of generally being better with my spending.

I cleared my entire overdraft within a couple of months, the credit card was also reduced to zero and for the first time I was not only in the black but have savings - something that I am very proud of. I still have the overdraft (genuinely in case of emergency, I have not left the black since the day I got back into it ) and both credit cards (interest free incase of a rainy day and cashback for purchases) are at 0 balance. Because I have bought loads of things on 0% finance over the years but never missed a payment (aside from those couple of O2 payments many years ago) I actually have a brilliant credit rating.

A few stupid months as an 18 year who had just got independence and money (plus I had a bank literally throwing free money at me despite not having a job!) for the first time in my life set me back for years. But I learned my lesson and am very grateful that it didn't cause any long term harm.

I am about to enter home ownership for the first time and honestly feel ready for it despite being under 30. Technically I have a (PCP) loan from Volkswagen and I am about to enter a 30 year mortgage so I still have debt on my house and car - but both are long term, carefully chosen and very affordable. Aside from that I don't owe a penny and haven't for what feels to me like a long time and I do feel debt free

I've finally made it and completed my DMP today. For the first time in 25 years (since 18) I am completly free of consumer debt.

I was lucky in that when I started I was at the bottom of my pay grade and for 4 years I had small increments which I saved. These enabled me to make several lump payments and reduce my DMP by two years.

I still have a mortgage so not 100% debt free but I see this as a massive step towards that and plan on using the payments I was making to the DMP for the mortgage

a. The date of your lightbulb moment
08/08/2014

b. Debts at their highest
£21,200 (loan, overdraft and 2 credit cards)

c. Debt-Free Date
23/08/2019

d. Your one perl of wisdom.
For me budgeting was key. Ensure your budget is realistic, not optimistic, otherwise you will struggle to stick to it.

e. Links to the MSE guides that helped you
NA

f. Which forum threads helped you
The DFW forum in general has been an invaluable resource, but as I used a DMP the DMP support thread(s) were not only extremely informative but also a great source of encouragement and reassurance.

WOW can't believe we made it. So many sleepless nights and robbing Peter to pay Paul for at least two/three years before we admitted we could no longer service our debts and live.

Me and DH commenced a DMP with Stepchange in 09/2015 and had a relatively worry free 12 months. Following this DH was unexpectedly made redundant. We spoke with Stepchange who advised he commence a DRO, now discharged. They advised me to take an alternative debt solution but I refused wanting to continue with my DMP (time to DFD increased considerably).

I was then lucky enough to be promoted at work twice in two years and increased payments to Stepchange, DH also found work in this time (reducing time to DFD).

Having now paid half of my DMP, this month a family member offered to gift the rest of the money, hence me writing this.

Both myself and DH have learned invaluable life and budgeting skills during this time. We have not taken on any further credit and we now save for anything we need to purchase, including Christmas.

This forum has been invaluable for advice and budgeting/savings tips and most of all knowing you are not alone. I honestly believe it would have been so much harder for us without it.

If someone had told me at the start of this journey that we would be debt free in 4 years I would never have believed it. Just shows what can happen when you take steps to resolve your debt problem. For anyone struggling with debt who is reading this, don't wait any longer. My only regret is that we didn't do it years earlier.

I would like to thank everyone who takes the time to run threads or offer advice or support in any capacity, you are all amazing.

A very happy Stormpassing.

a. The date of your lightbulb moment 09/2015

b. Debts at their highest £37,394

c. Debt-Free Date 09/2019

d. Your one perl of wisdom. Never give up and keep communicating. We had a few setbacks (redundancy DH had to look at an alternative solution for him). We kept talking to Stepchange and they helped up stay on track.

e. Links to the MSE guides that helped you Several gave advice on the below forum threads

f. Which forum threads helped you Debt Free Wannabee and DMP & Mutual Support Thread

g. And if you had a debt diary on the Debt-Free Wannabe board (DFW), a link to it I didn't have one but read several