Tondella's (epic) debt-free journey

8pnoodles · 28 July 2006 at 1:32PM

Nice to see you back! We get hitched in seven weeks as of tomorrow, how freaky is that? We're 16th September.

We managed to keep our wedding budget down to £2k. Scottishspendaholic - PM me if you wanna know how we did it! I reckon we could have done it for £1.5k but we got a bit greedy with some stuff. lol

Our debts are now down to £5600 for me and about £20k for OH (still need to get him to work it out exactly). We've paid a ton off whilst paying for the wedding too.

Have you worked out a budget for living together yet - is that what you're gonna do?

I'm going to hopefully be moving into married quarters with OH which will save us a fortune on rent, food, his petrol and phone bills!

Tondella · 28 July 2006 at 2:32PM

16th of September for me too! Crikey you have got cracking, when you first came on here you weren't even engaged! The wedding is an MSE one, but more in the sense of getting value for your money than doing it the cheapest way possible. I can hand on my heart say that we have put our money where it counts to us the most and I am really looking forward to the big day, expecially as OH has been feeding our wedding cakes for the past two months - cannot wait to get my teeth around that!

It's going to be quite hard to budget in advance for us living together. rent will go down heaps, especially moving away from london. However, OH gets such a bargain in the mess (food, council tax, utilities all for approx £250) that i think our food bill will shoot up. He is getting better at turning appliances off though. Petrol will go down and we'll try and get a joint gym membership. The biggest thing for me is that my wage will almost definitely decrease, possibly quite drastically (£8k ish

). I'm considering retraining as a chartered accountant. Any MSE-ers out there who are in the process of getting their ICAEW and can PM me with the lowdown on what the training contract and day to day work is like?

Well done on the debt total btw, didn't you start off on something like £18k???

Tondella · 28 July 2006 at 2:34PM

I should add also that on marrying OH I get a forces spouse rail discount card - upto 30% of fares. yes! yes! yes! How i have missed that since i finished my studies!

8pnoodles · 28 July 2006 at 3:05PM

Tondella, 18 months ago, I owed £10649 and he owed about £32k. He's sold him motorbike recently to wipe his credit card debt, and he was nearly in tears doing it. He then sent me a text message pic of his card cut up.

More recently he's been saying it's good not to have to find somewhere to store it where it won't get knocked over, and it's saving him lots on not only the credit card repayments, but also in servicing costs.

We're getting there, I intend to get debt free asap now, as once I move to be with him, my job security isn't guaranteed any more with him gettig posted even next year maybe. His debts can tick over more nicely with his salary. he's going to help me pay off mine, then we're gonna finish his off together.

Tondella · 28 July 2006 at 3:38PM

aah yes, I remember our spooky conversation about both dating motorcycle riding military men. Mine's just sold his too (dance of joy!), if we weren't getting married on the same day then i really would start to wonder?!! Unless he's thinking of dashing from one church to the other? He's not persuaded you to get married in Lancashire has he? !!!

dinkylou · 28 July 2006 at 5:21PM

Nice to see you're back Tondella, I always enjoy reading your posts and was wondering how things were going.

getting close to the wedding now, you must be getting excited.

Tondella · 30 July 2006 at 6:37PM

Hi there! Thanks for your post, good to see you on here.

Yes, we're getting sooo excited about it all, had a few wedding chores to discharge this weekend, including choosing our readings, which was a lovely thing to do together. Big changes are afoot after the wedding too, I am considering a career change when i move to live with OH next summer, however alot hangs in the balance. More on this later, perhaps!

Looks like you are making great progress on your debt, when was your lightbulb moment? are you going to overpay your student debt when your personal debts are over or will you let them take their course and start saving?

Tondella · 31 July 2006 at 5:21PM

I won't clog the official grocery challenge thread up with this as i think it is too detailed, but I wanted to post my meal plans and shopping list up as this is one area that i am having real trouble with. Any advice greatly received!

OK - meals for saturday 29th to friday 4th

sat lunch - tuna sandwiches, crisps, for two
sat dinner - homemade pizza with cherry toms and herbs, for two
sun lunch - tuna sandwiches, crisps, for two
sun dinner - halved jacket potatoes with insides scooped out and mixed with cheddar (catchy name!), broccoli and carrots, leftover salad, for two
mon lunch - left over potatoes, salad from work
mon dinner - gillian mckeith's chickpea burgers, carrots
tues lunch - tuna sandwich
tues dinner - leftover chickpea burgers, broccoli
wed lunch - tuna sandwich
wed dinner - green tagliatelle with cherry toms, olive oil
thurs lunch - tuna sandwiches
thurs dinner - remaining pasta and cherry toms
fri lunch - tuna sandwich

shopping list for this week as follows
market shop
strawberries £1.00
cherries 1lb £2.00
1lb onions, 2lb carrots £1.00
toothpaste £1.00
total £5.00

sainsbury's (herefter shortened to JS) tinned tuna in spring water x 4 £2.29
JS tinned kidney beans £0.45
JS porridge oats £0.57
JS fast action yeast £0.65
taste the diff salt and vig crisps £1.29 (large bag)
JS tagliatelle £0.82
JS vegetable oil £0.60
JS 7 seed mix £0.78 (for on top of my porridge)
JS buffalo mozarella £0.63
JS cheddar £1.42 (couldn't hack the basic one, had to go back to this one)
JS harvest grain loaf large £0.72
4 baking potatoes (poor selection at market) £1.15
4 pink grapefruit £1.00 (on offer)
cherry toms £1.41 large punnet (none at market)
bananas £0.76
JS non bio washing powder 2 for £2.50
fairy liquid £0.98
toothbrush 2 for £1.99
bodyform 2 for £2.00
washing up sponges £0.45
total £22.46

i'll need to buy milk, bread, and broccoli in the week. It looks better than i had thought, I'm sure i bought more at the market, but i cannot think what!

Faith_Lady · 31 July 2006 at 7:04PM

Hi 8pnoodles

Could you post some details of your £2k wedding budget? My daughter is planning to get married next year and would love some money saving ideas to help with our planning.

Thanks.

Tondella · 1 August 2006 at 9:43AM

Faith lady - have you tried the homes, family, relationship board? There is a special sticky thread there for MS weddings, with loads of tips and constantly updated. You'll need a comfy chair though, it is an epic thread!

Tondella's (epic) debt-free journey

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