Journey to £0 by 2020, with a few bumps along the way

£12.84 paid to Lloyds credit card today, balance will update overnight so tomorrow will be £3,187.16

Sent £500 to wedding savings today and still have £650 to last until payday on Friday.

But need to pay for new tyres tomorrow that's £114, plus £120 to NEXT (I clear the balance in full if I ever order from them).

Plus £120 to Barclaycard (this is the only actual physical card I have and pay it off in full if I ever use it).

So that will leave £296. Not sure whether to transfer this to savings or pay it off a card??

DEBT

Lloyds: £3,187
Sainsburys: £1,352

Invoice from the nursery received! Gone from paying £850 a month to....... £472

So the childcare bill is now cheaper than the mortgage payment for the first time!

Might blow some money on a Chinese tonight to celebrate :rotfl:

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

Excellent news that childcare bill dropped by so much and that will help with your savings pots. I think as you have a lot of expenses next year and the cards are at 0% I would stop spending on them and pay enough every month to clear within the interest free period. Once your savings are at a high enough level to cover your wedding, holiday and car then redirect to the cards.

How did the debt accrue in the first place?

Yes that's the plan.
The Sainsbury's card of £1,300 is when my partner went through a total idiot phase and basically lived way above his means. It was originally on a Capital One card that was about 20% interest (!).
So we BT'd it over to Sainsbury's 0% for 40 months, the card was destroyed as soon as it arrived.
Also my partner now does not have a credit card at all

The Lloyds one is from when we first moved into our house last year, we had to have some work done on the roof (I did used to have £40,000 in the bank but put it down on the house as a deposit)

Before last year the most I've ever owed (not including mortgage) is about £500 so this £4k plays on my mind all the time!

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

Why have you not put anything on the holiday or car maintenance category in your soa? How much do you need to save for wedding, car and holiday?

What I do is whatever is left the day before payday gets put into one savings pot and I pay anything for the car etc out of that.

For the wedding we still need £6,000. But £2,400 is coming from my Dad and £1,000 is coming from mother in law.
So we need to save £2,600. Should have that done before Christmas and the wedding is in June.

Need to save about £5,000 for a car. Partner gets his bonus in February and I get mine in March, both together will be about £5k (unfortunately tax and NI gets taken off!)

enthusiasticsaver wrote: »

It looks like around £90 a month would clear the Lloyds card by 2020 depending on what time of year the deal expires. I think I would increase the direct debit to £90 as you have plenty of disposable income and then hit both cards hard in 2019 after your expensive year.

We have separate funds for car, home improvements and holiday. It forces us to budget and divide the cost by 12 so it is less of an issue when they need paying for. We factor in car depreciation, white good depreciation and decorating to the home and car funds. This might be worth considering for you. I would not touch your s and s isa. Saving for the future is important too and the earlier you start the better. If you have £1600 spare every month now the child care is reduced that is an extra £50 to LLoyds and £1550 to savings. You don't seem to have put your £25 a month into your isa on the soa so I am guessing you do not normally have the £1222 spare each month? Have you left off insurances or are they included in mortgage payment?

Lloyds ends in February 2020, you have hit the nail on the head with regards to increasing the direct debit. I will increase it to £90 today.
At least then I'll know it will be cleared by 2020 and by the time 2018 is over I'll be able to pay them off quickly

The buildings insurance I paid in full in February, life insurance we have through work.

I really need to update my SOA.

Thank you enthusiasticsaver for your advice

I started a new job in January and they have at last set up a Childcare Voucher Scheme, so from this month will be paying £243 of the nursery bill with the vouchers.

I've already started looking up the cost of local after school clubs for September 2018 when my son starts school :rotfl: