Matt & Victoria

We no longer worry when our bills arrive, as we have money put aside to pay for them

My husband and I started seeing Phil and the Grandmas Jars team less than 12 months ago.

We are both on reasonably good incomes, but our problem was that we spent money without being able to actually account for what we spent it on, as we used to call it ‘money seepage’. We were not making any progress on paying off our mortgage faster. We did not budget for upcoming bills, and often when the credit card was paid off, we would allow ourselves to make expensive purchases on it and then would use money from our mortgage offset account to pay the credit card off.

Since our first meeting with Phil, we no longer use our credit card. We no longer worry when our bills arrive, as we have money put aside to pay for them. Our lifestyle has not changed; we have just gained control over our finances. Our mortgage offset account does not get touched, and we have been putting our monthly savings onto the mortgage, making good progress in paying off our loan quicker.

We recently have experienced two major annual financial events that have been very different for us this year, firstly when we received our tax return, which we have previously used to pay off our credit cards or buy something that we wanted but never saved up for, was all put towards our mortgage. Secondly, Christmas 2014 was our first Christmas in 11 years, where we did not use our credit card. Everything we spent during this festive season, including some clothes bought during the sales we had budgeted for.

The only regret we have is that we wish we met Phil a few years earlier. We are extremely grateful to have met Phil, as he has enabled us to gain control over our finances, we no longer live from paycheque to paycheque, however we look forward to the savings we make at the end of each month.