Happy New Year all !!!!! Hope you all enjoyed the holidays. At our last workshop attendees committed to the 2020 savings challenge. The idea is over the next year we will save, so that for 2021 we will all be in a better financial position than the previous year. For those who attended last week who have committed to save £1.00 per day initially, I hope you have all started saving!!!! Let us see who finishes the challenge.
Please encourage your children to take part - the younger the better. The idea is to start saving money on a daily basis for children; it is not the amount but getting them in the habit of putting money aside. For young children it can start with just a penny a day. I have started this for my grand-daughter who is almost two and now has her own money box and is now collecting money wherever she can find it to save.
I was speaking to a friend recently who reminded me that many people are still unaware of the impact of debt in our own community or the numbers who are affected by debt and the link to depression. It is still a subject that many feel unable to speak about. So here goes, below is some startling facts about debt in the UK 2020.
Welcome to 2020 spending Britain
⦁ 5 million Britons are already heading into the new year with debts of more than 10K
⦁ 9 million owe between 20K and 10K this does not include mortgages but focuses on credit cards, personal/car loans
⦁ London is the most indebted city for 2020
⦁ 40% of debt is due to normal living expenses.
⦁ 21% have had to take out a new loan to pay off smaller loans
⦁ 38% owe money on credit cards
⦁ 19% have a bank over draft
(info from Money.co.uk)
Information from digital Bank Bo analysed 750K customers from Nat West Bank alone and found the following:
⦁ Borrowers aged 35-44 owe approx £4K
⦁ Borrowers aged 16-24 owe approx £1.7K
More facts:
⦁ 14 properties re-possessed everyday
⦁ 1283 reported redundancies per day
⦁ 336 people are declared bankrupt everyday
There is help and support out there if you are struggling with debt. The important thing to remember is that you are not alone, as the above data has shown. The Citizens Advice Bureau have dealt with 2.6K debt cases. Please see below agencies who are able to support and help anyone experiencing debt.
https://stepchange.co.uk
https://www.moneyadviceservice.org.uk
https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk
Finally, on a lighter note one of my followers who shall remain nameless contacted me recently after collecting a Saving box from me. Now remember the purpose of the savings challenge is to put aside your money for a year. Now I receive a call from Mr Nameless who states that he is unable to open the Saving box he has collected from me, and is surprised that he is unable to do so. I then explain that this is the reason why he was given a Saving Box that cannot be opened and he had proved this within 48 hours of receiving the Box. Please note this is not the way to begin the Challenge I have the consent of Mr Nameless to include this in this blog, as he also is able to see the funny side of this.
But seriously this is the norm for many of us we all plan to save at times but then decide to borrow some of the money we had planned to save just as spending can become a habit, so can saving.
Happy Saving for 2020
