i never had that much luck with money, really.
to give you some examples of how well i did:

* got a summer job while at uni in malvern. unfortunately, it paid me less than the living costs, meaning that every summer i ended up losing money, and that sucked.
* managed to convince my bank to up my overdraft to almost 3k while at uni.
* first job, got a student loan, and started renting an unfurnished house. which meant that having taken out one loan to cover my already existing debts, i now needed more money to buy furniture.
* first job paid well - massive monthly bonuses. so i started spending a bit, took out a short term loan to cover all existing debts, paying back large sums each month, and then the company killed the bonus scheme. and started making people redundant. which left me with massive loan payments to cover and little to no income to do it on as the basic wage wasn't great.
* end up using credit cards to pay off debt before reshuffling to get to a reasonable monthly outgoing level. manage to convince student loans that i can't afford to pay them back at the moment, so things start looking up.
* need to rent a new place to live. housemates on dole, the only way forward is to pay six months rent up front. bugger.
* end up needing transport, so end up with a car. and all associated debts to do with that.
* reverse car into post within six months of buying it.
* get girlfriend. in another city. cue lots of transport costs.
* she drives car into back of someone else.
* add repair costs to debt.
* find another job just before company permanently closes. slight increase in wages, so all is good. until i move nearer to girlfriend, and house gets raided by police looking for drugs, which means moving all over again at more and more expense.
* at this point, i reshuffle debt, take out a long-term loan, and things look a bit smoother.
* get engaged. so i have to buy an engagement ring. and those buggers aren't cheap.
* she moves in. bit later, she wants a house. so we buy a house.
* cue another debt reshuffle, and things look a bit more balanced.
* new company makes me redundant.
* drunk driver comes wrong way down motorway and writes off my car. and buggers up my back.
* house needs decorating.
* boiler dies a death and needs replacing.
* while that's being replaced, find a leak in the bathroom which means that the bathroom needs to be gutted and replaced.
* on the bright side, i do find another job on more money.

not exactly the best situation to be in. put on top of that the usual 'being clueless with money' and the odd unnecessary purchase here and there, and my current debt stands somewhere in the region of 35k or so, not including the 80k mortgage. on the upside, though, after covering my debts each month, i now have a bit of money left over, so that's nice.

when i realised this, i treated myself to a full sleeve tattoo ;)
(blades is looking for a brain, any brain, at, Fri 24 Nov 2006, 10:18, Reply)