£195,000 mortgage for a single mum!

pollyanna24 · 1 December 2016 at 1:18PM

So, the start of another month. And another month where I won’t be doing any overpayments. Ho hum.

However, I think I will have saved up enough to put a £500 overpayment on in January.

This will be done by the savings I put by each month for overpayments:-
£42.72 x 4 = £170.88
I should have £267.05 left at the end of this month if I stick to my budgets.
Hopefully, I will get £100 in my Xmas card from the boss.

£170.88+£267.05+£100 = £537.93.

This will hopefully make my mortgage payment go down from £372.92 to about £370 odd.

Cos then I can save £45.64 monthly for an overpayment instead of £42.72.

Haha, that’s the plan anyways.

So, an analysis of November.

Petrol - £46.43. Reasonable. What I expect it to be. Not really a lot I can do about it anyways.

My girls - £135.07. Over by £35.07. I had a look to see if there was anything that was excessive or a one off or that can be cut back on this month. There was the a pantomime that I paid for (school trip in a week or two) and a runaround place for my younger daughter’s birthday.

£66 was stuff re said daughter’s birthday party and various Xmas presents, so I suppose I won’t be spending that again this month.

Groceries - £195.61. Good. Slightly under budget, but mainly cos Mum buys a lot of the things we eat for dinner things (as she cooks the days I’m at work).

Me - £181.89. I went over by £31.89 and I don't have to look at my spreadsheets to find out where most of this went. £109.41 of this was on alcohol. Isn't that terrible? So the savings are obvious. Thinking about it, if you take alcohol out of the equation, I only spent £72.48 on myself in November. Sometimes, I think to give myself a break. I don't have loads of clothes or makeup and drink is my thing. But £109.41 a month is £1,312.92 a year! Yeesh! And yes, I am on the alcohol cutting down thread. So much for giving up!

Again on the me spreadsheet, £28 on Christmas presents and £17 on takeaways. Well, that's not bad, is it?

So wonder how December will pan out.

Already spent £4.79 on groceries (stuff bought in November, but they haven't been opened yet) and £2.30 on me. Felt like I needed a treat to start December and bought a baguette for lunch (plus my older daughter only had three slices of salami for her lunchbox left and in case Mum can't get any today, I couldn’t eat it, could I? Who am I kidding? I just wanted a nice baguette).

So £492.91 left in December budget. Can’t think of any unusual expenses this month. Just the usual Christmas stuff. I won’t be going out any more than usual, so shouldn’t be spending there. Think I’m done with presents, wouldn’t mind finding something else for my Mum though.

Oh and I owe Dad £20 for school pictures that he paid for and Mum for my Avon order (£24 odd).

daisy_1571 · 1 December 2016 at 2:48PM

hi Pollyanna

you are doing so well but I totally understand how frustrating it is when you want the payments to go down. I used to spend hours looking at the spreadsheets as if i had somehow missed another £1000 a month that would make all the difference but you are doing so well.

It is normal to flag in the middle cos it is a marathon not a sprint, we all get fed up but the important thing is to just keep going and you will get there eventually and the snowball effect really will be helping you leap forward.

Not sure if it helps or not but do you get the two "free" months of the council tax in feb/mar ? Maybe you have already allocated that money already, if so sorry.

I also think it is generally accepted that you can only cut expenses so much, the other step is to increase income. If it is really getting you down is there any way you could take in a lodger as that can be tax free money? I believe there is a website for people just looking for weekday lodgings so they go home at weekends so you would still have a bit of privacy ? Maybe thats a step too far but is there anything else you can think of to up your income ? A change of job to get more wages or less travel costs (sorry if this is clear on your SOA that you don't have travel costs) or even perhaps looking into childminding or something similar to lower any childcare costs.

I think you are doing really great, take comfort from all the steps you have been doing and one of these days it will all be a bit easier every month.

take care
daisy xx

pollyanna24 · 1 December 2016 at 3:09PM

Aw, thanks Daisy for replying to my moaning, haha!

I'm not sure there is anything at the moment that I can do to help things along, but I'm hoping the snowballing effect will make things seem a bit better say, this time next year.

I could work an extra day at work (at the moment I work 4), but I like having that one day a week where I can drop the girls off at school and pick them up. Plus if I worked the 5 days, I'd have to pay my mum more, pay more tax, and pay more travel. So I'm probably better off as I am.

Not sure about the lodger idea. I have a reasonably sized 3 bed house in Zone 7. I like the area, but it's a bit remote, so not sure anyone else would. And I can't see a lodger wanting to share with me and two small girls who, after finally getting rid of my brother earlier in the year, really live in the house as we all want to now! Not saying it's a total tip, but we enjoy it and it's lived in, shall we say, haha!

I'll get there. I just like having my diary to moan to. I've come a long way from even where I was this time last year, I just have to keep telling myself that.

I think it boils down to, by the age of 35 (where I am now), I thought I'd be more comfortable and not struggling so much and if my ex hadn't left me, we would be comfortable as in able to afford more (there would be the extra wage coming in and only half the mortgage as I had to get another one for £95K to pay off my brother).

But it is what it is. As it stands, the house will eventually be mine and I don't have to share it with anyone, yay! :rotfl:

pollyanna24 · 6 December 2016 at 12:39PM

Pink Sproglettes born 2008 and 2010
House Worth (approx) - £386,000
Mortgages (3rd November 2016) - £189,076.63
Equity - £196,923.37

Pink Sproglettes born 2008 and 2010
House Worth (approx) - £392,000
Mortgages (4th December 2016) - £188,677.16
Equity - £203,322.84

EDIT: Think these figures are wrong, but hey ho. Have since corrected.

Frugaliza · 6 December 2016 at 7:40PM

I'm a single mum too, with a whopping big mortgage. I've been letting out my tiny box room now and again on Airbnb and the extra (tax free) income has been a god send and totally made the difference between struggling and being able to afford things like holidays etc... So I recommend it - also as they are all short term let's (from a couple of nights to a couple of weeks) there isn't enough time to tire of the guests. Just an idea you might like to consider.

pollyanna24 · 7 December 2016 at 1:59PM

Frugaliza wrote: »

I'm a single mum too, with a whopping big mortgage. I've been letting out my tiny box room now and again on Airbnb and the extra (tax free) income has been a god send and totally made the difference between struggling and being able to afford things like holidays etc... So I recommend it - also as they are all short term let's (from a couple of nights to a couple of weeks) there isn't enough time to tire of the guests. Just an idea you might like to consider.

Hmm. I'm not sure. Part of me likes the idea and the other part just thinks, eeek!!!

My girls are 8 and 6 and the younger one seems to have a fear of sleeping by herself at the moment, so the two of them sleep in the younger one's bedroom as there are two blow up beds on the floor and they want to sleep together (go figure, when they had to share a room before my brother left, they hated it!).

So I guess I kinda do have a spare bedroom at the moment (full of the older girl's things even though she is never in it).

Where do you live that this works for you? I live on the outer skirts of London (Hertfordshire - but in Zone 7 on the tube map).

chelseablue · 7 December 2016 at 2:41PM

I'm considering doing Airbnb on our spare room

Need to look into how it all works, plus our spare room needs redecorating and furnishing first! (its currently full of junk!)

pollyanna24 · 7 December 2016 at 2:48PM

I've just looked up AirBnB. I think I've heard of it before, but just never really looked into it before.

I'm not really sure I can get my head around the whole idea. Sharing your house for odd nights here and there. They could be lunatics (we could be lunatics!). Hmmm.

Frugaliza · 18 December 2016 at 9:57AM

Hi Polyanna sorry for the delay. I can see Airbnb isn't for everyone but it works for me. I'm careful who I choose and mostly only have ladies stay - I feel more comfortable that way. I choose those who are verified on the site and come with good references. All this combines to make me feel comfortable with my guests. They also have the same concerns when choosing hosts - by now I have a stack of good references though so I think people feel good about that. I can PM you a link so you can see my listing if you like. To answer your question though I live in zone 4 (London). I think anywhere with good public transport does okay though.

pollyanna24 · 1 January 2017 at 10:35PM

Made another overpayment today which I'm proud of. Haven't made one since August or thereabouts.

Saved up to £500 over the last few months so that I will get a lower monthly payment from next month.

Also still saving £42.72 a month which is the monthly saving on the original monthly payment if I hadn't made any overpayments.

So there is £213.60 set aside for that aswell and it will be more next month as it will be about £44.72 that I will be putting aside when they put the monthly payment down.

Trying to get optimistic about it all.

£195,000 mortgage for a single mum!

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