"I was a champion of the checks"

Anat’s story and life

“I was a champion of the checks”, says she Anat Ben-Eliyahu, Tel Aviv “give post-dated checks and credit cards. We had to pay? I said, ‘Never mind’ and gave a check. At the first meeting with bells sat five hours just to write down all the checks and H. Payment by credit card we scattered out. When we agreed it all I got dizzy. We were in debt of over 100 thousand shekels “.

Ben Eliyahu came bells case. Following sharpened awareness of her TV show “Family goes” she found out about the show, but she realized that participation is costly and therefore waived. They told her about “bells”.

And thus began the classic process of filling out forms, and meeting with a representative of the organization.

The couple Anat (32), a secretary at a law firm by profession and currently on maternity leave and life (35), a garage mechanic began work cuts. Had to pay cash instead of a credit card or by check and think of every dollar that comes out of his pocket. “As food or alcohol rehab, I would call my supervisor just before I was about to fall, and buy something that is not in my notes,” laughs Ben Eliahu. The cigarettes she would not give up, but economic pressure and pregnancy caused her to reduce the amount five cigarettes a day.

“Once I bought in advance quantities of oil or tomato paste, ‘would’,” she says. “Today I buy only what I need really. We used to go into minus just to go for a walk. Today not. Nothing will happen if we give up.”

Mobile phone costs are reduced by choosing the program in which a predetermined monthly amount (“do not want to be surprised at the end of the month”) and they limit the number of calls in order not to deviate from the plan.

The pair have a car (“why we went for a loan from the bank”), but live today on a bus traveling from Tel Aviv to work in Rishon Lezion and saves it to 600 dollars a month. The car is designed primarily for transportation of children in the city.

More recently the big girls aged 8 and 5 new Brother 3 months old. “We made a pact in, but we covered the expenses with checks received as a gift, and we went in,” says Anat “I did not buy clothes, but I got family, so I feel I was able to keep a balance.”

Older girls partnership task of saving: “keeping the money actually strengthened the family,” says Ben Eliyahu “has always been a big girls my very modest about money. And now they understand the situation further and say about anything they ask, if there is money then .. . ”.

A year and a half after the first meeting with the “bells” Ben Eliyahu concludes: “Today we returned loans we took friends. Thank God, we have already debts at the grocery store, where I was used for debt of NIS 2,000 and more. We are still at minus months, but despite brought us the frame I do not deserve credit framework “.

Despite the achievements Ben Eliyahu know still a long way, especially given the starting point of the debts then on more than 100 thousand shekels. The couple currently one loan in the amount of 60 thousand shekels, and minus of NIS 6,000.

“The main thing is that now there is a home setting,” says Anat “There is no stress and no nerves. We control spending and our life. Will take time to pull out of debt, but we feel we are on the right track.”