Danielle24
Registered User
- Messages
- 209
The question was very relevant. I am sure that pj111 was only trying to find out if you are paying high interest on your credit card debt before advising you to re-finance this part of your debt at a lower rate of interest. Maybe he could have advised you how to go about this?
Flights to Australia - €943. Going for 3 weeks could live off my wages and maybe bring a few hundred extra.
Flights to New York - €465. Not sure how long for.
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Hi,
I have quite a few bills and money can be tight so i'm looking on advice where I can make cut backs. I want to visit friends in Australia this year if possible and I have an important birthday for which I need to New York. I also need to get 3k together for college fees for next September/October and would rather not borrow if possible. I'm not living in the clouds and I am aware that I might not be able to do all if any of these things this year with my income. . I posted here a while back and my debts were 16,500k so i've done a good bit of work on them. It's now €11,905 because I borrowed for college. So in total I paid over €7000 off them. I know I still borrowed more but the €200 a month had already been going off on a loan I since cleared and it's for my education. Any advice or tips are appreciated.
Income - €2116 per month (after tax)
Bills
AIB - 4,521.03: €134 per month
Car - 2595: €180 per month
R&S - 1780: €50 per month
Credit Union - 2520: €200 per month (college)
Ulster Bank OD: 624: Not clearing at the moment
Expenses
Rent: €370 per month
Cable: €30 per month
Car Insurance: €52 per month
Tax: €80 every 3 months
Bins: €70 every 6 months
VHI(Dental Insurance): €10 per month
Medication: €30 per month
ESB: €50 per month approx
Savings
Credit Union: €500
Sharesave: €1100
Thanks for that.
Just on the ESB we don't have Gas/Oil etc so this is for all our heating, cooking, water, TV etc. Everything is plugged out religiously when we're out, going to bed etc.
So two far flung destinations for 1.5K. Holiday of a lifetime and all that and two in the one year. You have the money saved already so have a great time. Many moons ago I flew to New York to work and it cost me more than €465 and had to get working immediately. Didn't realise how cheap Oz and NY were. Fair play to you if you can do New York on less than 500 Euro, never mind Oz on less than 1.K but as you said yourself you want to live a little.
Op from what I can see you list costs for the month and then the difference between these and your income is 971 approx. I assume some of this is going on the likes of petrol and food, phone perhaps and entertainment as you don't list those expenses. Are you saving 500 per month? Can you please clarify?
My advice having been to both Oz and NY (4 times) is you will need to have more than just the cost of your flight and bare essentials. I had accommodation in both Oz and NY but it still costs a lot of money. You don't want to go all that way and not to get to see anything. Example possibly - friend living in Sydney but you want to go up the west coast to the barrier reef - you will need travel expenses, accommodation, food, expenses etc. Go on a dive on the reef of white water rafting or sky dive. While in Sydney Climb the Bridge, head on a trip to the blue mountains, wine district other. You might want to go to Alice Springs to experience the outback or head down to Melbourne or over to Perth. There will also be expenses to heading out be it for food or drink.
Like wise in NY although it is more expensive to do things there. Even going for a drink you have to tip them. You'll want to do the Liberty Island ferry or empire state or r
Rockefeller centre or some of the museums. Travel in from the airports is a few bob and then getting around the city - not to mention that one can not go to NY without going shopping and given the seeming bargains one can spend a lot.
I had big debt years ago ran up from spending on things I didn't want to wait to do, but which I should have waited to do.
I am now debt free (mortgage excepted but it's small). Despite taking several pay cuts in the last few years and spending 10k on further ed I am still taking as many holidays as I love them and live for them but I save and money is never a problem when away.
There is no point going so far away and not doing all there is to do thus having to go back to do the them again when you can afford them - as this is waste.
My tuppence worth from experience.
Money savers - cut cable, phone, eat basically on about 25 euro a week. Good luck with it. If you do decide to do the two look into getting a round the world ticket with a number of stops built in and stop in NY on the way to or back form OZ. I did this on my trip out there.
When you say "we" I assume that a number of you are renting together? Why is your cable TV so expensive?
My basic package with UPC is coming in at just over €30 per month. Are you paying the full bill?
I'm confused. Can you clarify how much you actually owe as it is very unclear from your posts. In this post you say your debts were 16.5k, but now you owe €11905. Then you say you have paid back 7k. Then in a later post you have paid back 11k? Are you saying you've paid debt back and then taken it out again, if so then its not debt repaid.
I was referring to how much i've paid since a thread I had a while ago and a how much i've paid in total.
Also you are asking advice on how to budget to afford these trips, yet you are refusing to give details like interest rates. Its really hard to see what you want people to say to you, and you do come accross as pretty rude to people who are freely giving advice. I say to you again I spent like a mad fool in my twenties, when I finally wised up it took me several years to get myself sorted, and man did I kick myself at getting into debt. And I had a very well paid job too! Still, it was a lesson well learnt, I enjoy having savings and no debt, it was worth the hard work. I pay cash for everything now. People here are trying to give you the benefit of their hard won experience, but maybe its something you need to learn for yourself.
Incidentally if you are interested in strategies to pay down your debt moneysavingexpert has some great tools and advice fora. I recommed the snowball debt calculator, its a real eye opener. Good luck.
This is only the cost of my flights. I was only seeing what my options were or if anyone had any suggestions I never said i'm definitely going to these 2 places this year.
There is 2 of us renting together. It's €30 each a month.
I don't spend like a fool I shop in Penneys, rare occassion these days, my nights our are about my only luxury at the moment and even they are being knocked on the head. I have 3 spreadsheets to calculate my debt, one with snowball built in. I shop in Tescos.
Basically you want to go, you feel you're entitled to go and why on earth you asked any of us on here if it makes financial sense eludes me.
That's over €700 a year on cable. Have you been serious when you said that you have cut everything back. In your other thread you said that you couldn't even afford to visit the dentist, yet you spend this amount of money on cable television. (Only the best for Danielle). Why have you not moved to a cheaper provider before this?
If you look at the list of outgoings that was provided there really was nothing left to "cut". Yet there was no mention of other outgoings on this list where cuts could have been made. Why?
Because this was done on purpose. She didn't want to list those areas where cuts could have been made. Danielle is going on this trip but feels guilty about it. It's as if she is looking for some sort of approval.
She needed to be "given out" to for even contemplating these holidays. Well that's happened and now feeling sorry for herself she is going to treat herself for all of the aggro. To what? A holiday of course.
I didn't say you spent like a fool, I said I spent like a fool, and that it took me quite a while to get over the resulting debt. I was trying to point out that you don't want to be making the same mistakes I made as you will regret it. And actually, as others have pointed out, taking such expensive trips would be foolish in your situation, especially as you don't know how you are going to fund these trips and also another 3k in tuition fees. So, how much do you owe, and how much did you pay off, you bolded the question in my post but didn't answer it?
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