Put away your purse & become debt-averse

Onebrokelady - I do understand, because if I find myself thinking about it, I feel the same. We didn't need to do a DMP....we owed around 30k at its highest (I suspect it may have been a little higher, as we kept our finances separate pre-LBM, & my partner could be a little vague about the state of his credit cards back then). We were lucky that back then, we earned enough to tackle most of our debt by overpaying. I was then able to pay off a bit by cashing in a useless life insurance policy I should probably never have been sold. The final bit was paid off using my redundancy money. I try to concentrate on the fact that we have totally changed our attitude & whole behaviour around money. If I let myself overthink the sheer amount of money I have wasted in the past, I would spend too long beating myself up & that can be a very negative thing to do long term, can't it? I do understand where you're coming from though, as we now live on one salary. If we are able to do that & stay solvent, plus save a little for an emergency fund, I can't help but think how much of my salary when I was earning, could have gone into savings for our long term security. We would also have the funds to do some of the work on our house which badly needs doing. So I do think about it, but I think people like you & I have to concentrate on the fact that we did finally see sense. You are probably younger than me, but I think my generation is the first real 'multiple credit card/loan generation' & those heavy borrowers who haven't seen the light along the way will face still owing a lot of money well into retirement. It must feel wearysome being on a DMP, but you really are doing the best thing to get shot of the debt & it won't be forever. I know my past behaviour with money was frivolous & wasteful. I know I should have dealt with it a lot earlier, but I can't go back, only forward, & dwelling longterm on past mistakes puts my head in a bad place, so onwards with our good habits & behaviours.
It does help to know I wasn't the only one.
Try to stay positive. It's an amazing feeling when that last bit of debt has been paid x

Onebrokelady - Yes, it will be a frustrating 8 years, but that will see the back of it & you'll have learned so many good financial habits by then.
P.S - I am the same age as you (well, I will be, next month).

Welcome anita55 - thank-you. Hope you find something useful among my ramblings. Most of our debt was paid off by us discovering budgeting. I have emerged as the budgeter in the relationship, so I do all of that (except wrangling with broadband providers) but mr f, who brought more debt to the relationship than me, is now very good at saving for stuff instead of spending on cards & what was a very big, permanent overdraft.

One thing that's really helped is having a monthly amount of money each for our 'Personal Spends'. I know lots of people do this, or a variation of it. We usually have £60, but I do budget for more if we are away for the weekend, at a festival or on holiday, because it is much easier to keep control of what is being spent if it's cash we take with us, rather than using cards & cashpoints.
Our personal spends money is paid out on my Big Budget Day (which takes place on payday or as soon after payday as I can get it). We have a separate savings piggy for clothes, so our Spends money doesn't need to cover those. We also buy basic toiletries from our grocery budget - stuff like deodorants, bath bubbles, soap, etc, but if we wanted something more expensive - for instance, I love nice skincare stuff, then we would buy that from our personal spends money. The idea is that we can spend it on absolutely whatever we want. If mr f wants to blow the lot on blu-rays & beer, that is totally up to him, in the same way that if I decided to buy a pot of something gorgeous for annointing my wrinkles, that's fine too, BUT our rule with Personal Spends is that when it's gone, it's gone. Back before the LBM, I liked cash in my purse for smaller purchases, but also used cards a lot & so had no real sense of just how much (of the bank's) money I was getting through on a shopping trip or over a weekend. And I shudder to think back to what I could get through on holiday. With our Personal Spends money, it's cash, so we can see it disappearing. Being cash-aware has made us much more evaluative about whether we want to buy something or not. mr f will often spend ages deciding, then put the item back on the shelf. Using cash puts each decision into perspective. "Do I want to buy this item more than I want to keep this cash in my purse in case I see something I like better?" or more simply, "Do I want this thing or do I want my money?"
Amazingly for two big ex-spenders, we sometimes have personal spends money left at the end of the month & we both pop it away in a tin ready for when we need or want something, or simply save it towards a bigger purchase. We have really taken to this as a system. We both came to recognise that we had a problem with irresponsible spending & the great thing about Personal Spends is that any spending is utterly guilt-free. Today we've been out, had coffees & warm cheese scones in a fab cafe before going on a lovely sunshiney spring walk. Later we popped in a 2nd hand bookshop & both enjoyed choosing some books & CDs - all expenditure from our Spends - so no need to do any budget sums or feel we shouldn't have bought stuff.
At the same time, of course, the amount of Personal Spends each month (while never lower than £60 each) is set as part of our main monthly budget & as such, the amount is set at a level we can afford.
It may not be a method for everyone, but it's certainly stopped the incessant frittering that went on pre-LBM. I know some people do a similar system but allow more money which also has to include clothing. I considered that, but could envisage mr f walking round in rags while building the best CD & craft beer collection in town, lol.
Well, that's today's debtisode.
Best wishes all,
F x

Hello readers,
Today was my monthly Big Budget Day so there's been a lot of sitting at my desk with the calculator & caffiene supplies. I have a routine now & always proceed the same way:
1. Reconcile previous month's budget.
2.Set new budget for month ahead taking into account outgoings total for the month in question from my Excel spreadsheet & other regular budget pots i.e Grocery budget, travel & personal spends.
3. Pay credit card in full. Since LBM, we have 1 CC each but we only use them for planned spending such as petrol, to maximise loyalty points for vouchers.
4. Decide how much to pay the Savings Piggies. I do have target amounts, but once there's a reasonable amount in there, I re-allocate the money to another piggy or to loan pay down fund as thst feels more sensible.
5. Once I've worked all my sums through on paper, the new month's budget gets written up in my Money Book.
6. Withdraw cash for paying our personal spends & other cash 'pots'.
7. Big filing session as I like to be able to lay my hands on paperwork easily.
I don't know how I EVER thought barely looking at bank statements before shoving them in a drawer was a system!!
This time, I also had a look at the outstanding amount to pay on our loan.
It's just £3206 now. We've successfully managed to pay off £30k more than that in the past, all be it on 2 salaries back then. Anyway, I worked out that by Dec this year, we will owe around £2k. If we keep putting money in our Loan Pay Down Fund, I'm hoping we will be close to requesting a settlement figure by then. We both feel so motivated now.
It feels daft really - when we owed thousands, we barely cared. Now we owe just £3k or so & it feels massively irritating & we want shot of it. I guess our heads are just in a different place these days.
Anyway.....a nice day of Easter baking planned for tomorrow, instead of calculators, bank statements & sums!
Love to all,
F x