Can Edinburgher be debt free and a mortgage holder by 30?

edinburgher

Yawn - was up early today and managed to make it into work for before 8 Planning on taking an early lunch to try and beat the Post Office rush as I have an Amazon Marketplace order to send.

Have had a few sales on Amazon recently, which has made me another £30 to add to the ~£13 that I withdrew from Ciao last month. Sorely needed, as I have a three day work retreat in a couple of weeks and always seem to end up spending more than I intend to while travelling... No expenses to be claimed, so I will need to keep the airport coffees to a minimum

Another few quid to go in the sealed jar and my emergency fund tonight (currently putting all coins that I receive of 50p or lower in the sealed jar and putting 10% of any cash I withdraw into the emergency fund). This might seem like an odd thing to do, but I think it's my subliminal tribute to the book 'The Richest Man in Babylon' (a well known allegorical tome on sensible finances, saving and investing).

Interesting 'lessons' put forward by the book that I agree with and will be trying to follow in 2010 (in summary):

• Save 10% of what you earn: I hope to save £175 a month from my net salary of ~£1300 (about 13.5%)
• I'll also be saving 10% of any cash I withdraw from the ATM. Assuming that I spend roughly 1/4 of my wages in cash, that should be another 2.5% of my wages, total wages saved 16%
• Budget: 2009 was my first year where I've used a realistic budget right through and it's been good. 2010 will see more of the same
• Make your savings grow: I haven't been able to save much this year, as I paid off a fair bit of debt and had a lot of significant one time expenses to bear. I'll try to behave better next year and will become the best rate tart possible to try and grow my savings!
• Insure a future income: 2009 was quite a sensible year. I moved into one of the Civil Service pension schemes, transferred in £3k from an old employer and am currently making 1.5% additional payments too. Will up this to 3% if I get a pay rise!
• Increase your ability to learn: Will be sticking with my current employer for at least another year, as I've come to realise that switching jobs every time I'm bored is counter-productive. Hopefully this means I'll go up a pay grade next March.

2010 - here's hoping it'll be a good one!

edinburgher

Aiming for NSDs today and tomorrow (on a training course all day tomorrow, buffet lunch and coffees included).

Transferred a tiny amount into my savings, as I've come up with another new way to save. Will be rounding off my bank account to the nearest pound each night if it's not a whole number of £s. This should hopefully help build my rainy day fund, as the minimum I can transfer from my current account is £1. So, if it's £251.90, I need to transfer out £1.90 and so on....

Only £12xx to go 'til I've banked a months wages!

*Edit: Updated sig with a new motivational tool

edinburgher

Productive evening

Opened a Natwest Step account (comes with a debit card and lets me set up Standing Orders online). I'm currently using two basic bank accounts for these facilities, so it will be nice to be a normal person with one bank account and one credit card (prepaid!)

Have decided to switch over my own DDs gradually, as the only time I let the bank do this in the past they fluffed it up.

The new Natwest account only took me 5 mins to open online and some of the guys in the basic bank account thread said it was a decent account to use day to day.

Excellent!

edinburgher

Gah - can somebody find me a training course that isn't boring?

Spent the day in WC1 learning about the legal vagaries of copyright legislation and application - less than fascinating. One of those sessions where you come away with more questions than answers.

Ah well - got to continue my trend of being the 'youngest librarian in town' (odd, as I'm now pushing 27 - has nobody graduated in the last 4 years?)

Lunch was included (and lots of cheap coffee, so I'm now feeling sick from caffeine). At least it was a LSD, with just a couple of pounds for breakfast and some gum at the station.

Little_Maya

lol that sounds like it was fun... mind you as a photographer, I know a fair bit about the copyright thing so I know how you feel

edinburgher

Little_Maya wrote: »

lol that sounds like it was fun... mind you as a photographer, I know a fair bit about the copyright thing so I know how you feel

Wanna swap jobs for a few weeks? You can advise on copyright policy and I'll hang out with your kitty?

Little_Maya

well only if you want to try to explain licensing to people, you know, why they can't use low-res proofs (with "proof only" watermarked all over) on their company website without paying... or that if they've paid for a licence for web use, they only get low-res not the full size file and that they can't complain cos they've tried to make a print off it and it doesn't look right :rotfl: ... or that if they've licenced for a print run on leaflets they can't use the picture on all their other marketing material... drives me nuts lol

edinburgher

drives me nuts lol

It's for those reasons that I like our internet policy... no, you can't use that... no, you can't use that... that's not even a photo, it's a coaster.

edinburgher

So.... sleepy

Picked up a bag of tasty looking coffee on the way into work, so will be making myself a very strong mug shortly... Never quite sure why some of Sainsbury's organic Fairtrade coffees are their cheapest, but I'm certainly not complaining!

Saw Martin Lewis on TV this morning - much as I love the community aspect and advice to be found on the MSE site, he doesn't half talk a load of nonsense at times. I don't really think that a lesson in anthropological history and dowries are going to dissaude us from giving as many gifts for Christmas this year, especially not in the light of reports which suggest that UK consumer confidence is the highest it's been in 18 months :santa2:

I can't help but feel that his message was very blurred - it seemed to be 50% 'people used to get presents when they married' and 50% 'Christmas is too commercial'. Discounting the anthropological guff, faith leaders of all denominations have been trying and failing to get the public to get back to basics for decades now...

Have done by bit for the economy today by transferring some money onto my prepaid credit card (a few gifts to pick up this weekend). Also put another quid in my savings, a couple of quid in my sealed jar/s and sold a Wii game on Amazon, which should net me another fiver. Signature updated (and now it's one less working day 'til Christmas!)

Slow and steady wins the race

edinburgher

I have to go to Glasgow for work purposes next Monday/Tuesday (copyright presentation) :eek:

Much as I enjoy last minute trips, I'm a total wuss when it comes to presenting and my boss has co-opted me despite a specific request not to present. Ah well - breathe in, breathe out