(Another guest post from Ms Silver Screen Suppers*)
I am not a very well groomed woman. I rarely paint my nails for example but somehow or another I seem to have accumulated over 40 bottles of nail varnish. This is a tangible example of the fact that I am a total impulse-buy junkie. I must stop being such a spendthrift.
This month has been all about fact finding and I have given myself quite a scare over the state of my finances. Michael’s book arrived in the nick of time and it has given me faith that I can tackle things head on rather than continuing to live beyond my means and get deeper and deeper in debt. I am ON IT.
As Michael suggests in his book I sat myself down and worked out the extent of what I owe and decided on my goal. I am going to try and reduce my debt by 50% by the end of 2013. This will involve me doing two main things:
1 – Living within my means – using my salary to cover my living expenses and not overspending.
2 – Bringing in some extra money to pay down the credit card and overdraft debt.
I made myself a little spreadsheet showing everything I spend monthly on rent / bills / travel and things that are “must do” items. When I subtract these from my salary I am left with £550. So weekly that’s only £126. Gadzooks – this isn’t much for a clothes-horse like myself who likes pretty things to wear and nice food and drink…
It has shown me that there is no way I can put my head in the sand over my impending rent rise of £87. If I just carry on regardless, spending willy nilly and having a fine old time that would leave me with £39 a week to live on. Impossible.
My debt is going to grow and grow unless I take massive action right now. I need to bring some money in, fast. I also need to cut back on my spending somewhere. As I seem to be spending over £100 a week on groceries this is the place I am targeting first. There are about 1500 pasta shells in my food cupboard so I am going to use up the cheap staples that are stockpiled – pasta, rice, bulgar wheat and some strange green stuff called freekeh. I’m going to get organised about taking lunch to work so I’m not spending a fiver on something that would cost me a pound to make myself. I’m going to stop buying so much booze, and I decided last month not to drink at home on my own. (see note ** below)
I will need to bring in at least £87 a month to even maintain the status quo once the rent goes up in May. Ebay here I come – I am planning a blitz.
Luckily this month has been a bountiful month. My figures will be skewed as I got a a bonus from work and some money for DJing but I’m pleased to see that my overdraft and credit card debt has gone down by £1,398 to £5,107. Not really of my doing, but the next month is the NEW FRUGALITY!
Aims for next month are:
1 – Start ebaying with a view to making at least £100 a month.
2 – Reduce groceries bill.
3 – Work through all the fact finding and goal setting steps in Back to The Black chapters 1-4.
4 – Paint my nails once a week to whittle down the nail varnish mountain.
Signing off now!
Ms Silver Screen Suppers
Editor’s notes:
* Many thanks to Ms Silver Screen Suppers for being so open in her posts. We’re very grateful for this.
** Our guest blogger’s resolution to avoid drinking at home – see last month’s guest post – reminds me of the old joke. “My doctor has told me to stop having intimate dinners for four, unless there are three other people present.”)
WANT TO KNOW MORE?
For Ms Silver Screen Suppers’ last post on this site, click HERE.
For a link to her own wonderful website and blog, about the favourite recipes of the movie stars of yesteryear, click HERE.
For info about my book “Back to the Black: how to become debt-free and stay that way”, click HERE.