Guys, there is no need to be harsh, Teacher24 is here looking for help and we can give a bit of advice and steer him in the right direction easily enough.
So you are giving bits of info already which is great.
Age 37
Income, take home €1700 per fortnight.
Rent €0
Mortgage €0
Living rent free with partner who owns their house debt free.
Groceries €300-€400 per fortnight?
Phone €? - not paid in time every month
Clothes/personal spending €500 per month.
Car Insurance €?
Car tax €?
Subscriptions, Netflix, Disney plus €?
Petrol/Diesel €?
Hairdresser €?
Nails/beauty €?
Nights out €0 Not a going out type
Gym €?
Gifts/birthdays €?
Holidays €0 - not a holiday person
Car service €?
Household bills, insurance, repair, upkeep, bins, heating, electricity, cleaning, decorating, TV licence, gas, wi-fi, TV subscription etc? €0 - partner pays.
Pension €?
Doctor/ prescriptions €?
Dentist
Charity
Games/books/kindle/podcasts etc.,
Union subscriptions?
Health Insurance?
Saving potential €500 per month.
So can you copy this and correct, fill in blanks, add in anything else you spend money on regularly, even with a guess of how much it is.
Your Question - what can I do to get a car loan with a poor credit score and a poor history of saving?
Advice to date,
Don’t buy a car - is your current car still suitable for your needs for the next 12/18 months?
Start regularly saving with bank and credit union
Take the €500 and open a saving account with BOI - call it car saving fund or something fun and put €450 in every month
Reactivate your credit union account and add €50 per month.
Then don’t take any money out of either account for 12/18 months and watch the money grow. You say it does not bring you any pleasure, but perhaps focus on the car you want and how much of it you might be “buying” each month.
What do you spend your money on?
I am guessing you tap/spend electronically rather than cash each fortnight? This is great because you will have a record of all your spending. So print out your last few monthly statements, (you will find the on the BOI app somewhere).
Start from September - the start of the school year, or else work backwards from the most recent one.
The sit down with notebook and pen and try to sort the outgoings into categories. Put all the groceries together, try and separate food/alcohol/cleaning from each other if you can, coffee, petrol, clothes (again try to separate them out, into work, shoes, coats, leisure wear, etc if you can), gifts, household items (lightbulbs, cushions, etc,). This will take some time but it is really useful as it tells you to the penny where all your money is going. And for Jan, every time you spend money just write it down in a notebook.
Then at the end of January fill out the list above again and you will have a lot more accurate picture of what you spend your money on. It may be very eye opening to you that you are spending money you really don’t want to spend in a particular area and you can stop that and save the money. If you come back and tell us all about what you find it would be very helpful.
Are your taxes and allowances correct.
The great thing about being a teacher is that there is someone in the staff room who can help you understand your payslip and figure out from your my revenue information if you are on the correct wages, getting the right allowances and not leaving money behind you. They can show you how to claim the special tax allowance for teachers. Another job for you in January.
Get Married
I know it sounds boring, but being married to your partner offers you a lot of protection with regards to housing, inheritance etc. if you are in a long term committed relationship then pop down to the registry office, fill out the paperwork, you have to give 3 months notice, and it costs around €200 in total. You don’t need the big wedding ceremony you can do that any time, this is just a formal marriage for peace of mind, etc. Then make wills to cover what happens on death.
Long term financial planning
Again boring stuff but worth thinking about. Are you in a pension scheme through work? Will it be sufficient for when you retire, You have 25 years to go to retirement so figure out where you are, & where you want to be at retirement. I know nothing about teachers pensions so can’t help you there.
All-in-all you are at a good starting point - you have a good salary & you have no debt and you have a medium term goal of buying. a cae.