Mortgage Free ASAP

MoneyQueen

Hi Queen-Bee,

Regarding the Santander 0% card.. Has the account finally been closed for you?

DH has got the credit card account closed but still get a statement as he still has £2 in credit.. He has phoned them 3 times to issue him a cheque as he has already shredded the card after closing the account and everytime they say they will but never do...

I don't think I would be banking with them again.. they just seem so unorganised..

Good luck with the DIY jobs

MQ

Queen-Bee_2

MoneyQueen wrote: »

Hi Queen-Bee,
Regarding the Santander 0% card.. Has the account finally been closed for you?
Good luck with the DIY jobs
MQ

Hi MoneyQueen - it proved very difficult to close my Santander accounts. They wouldn't do it over the phone - I had to go into the branch with two forms of ID... I hope it's been done, but now I am thinking I might call tomorrow, just to make sure!

Re the DIY, I had a very productive day today - hoping to do the same tomorrow... I'm looking forward to being able to report good progress on this front shortly.

Not quite so good re the E-bay auctions however, another watcher has de-listed! Never mind, there's still time for a last minute rush on Sunday evening
QB

pammyj74

I am always in awe of how much diy you do, I wouldnt know where to begin or even have the slightest inkling to even want to know

Queen-Bee_2

Hi Pammy, thank you for the complement! And I see you've done well against your own target for this year

Unfortunately, I don't have the pleasure of little ones , which means I have more luxury of time...

I've learned everything I know through trial, error and the internet. Plus I have a fabulous DIY store down the road which has very helpful staff.
QB

Queen-Bee_2

Well, I've given myself a kick start and the current position is as follows:
1. Sand, undercoat and paint the downstairs sitting room window frame - done
2. Repair and paint the sitting room window sill - done
3. Repaint the cement rendering at the bottom of the house - done
4. Revarnish the wooden plaque with the enameled house number on it - pending, do tomorrow!
5. Hire an industrial carpet cleaner and shampoo the carpets- 3/4s done, not helped by the fact that I got the cleaner home from the hire company to discover a big hole in the suction lead (but only after I'd sprayed the carpet with cleaning fluid..). I'm finding it very tiring and time consuming moving all the furniture around to do the cleaning and waiting for everything to dry out before I move it back again... Still, nearly done
6. Re-painting the outside of the conservatory. I'll think about this next week.

I was also intending to put a whole heap of stuff on ebay today, but a friend turned up for coffee at 11am and was still here at 4pm, which put a dampener on the carpet cleaning and meant my clutter didn't get listed. Ah well... tomorrow's another day!
QB

Queen-Bee_2

This month's figures are as follows:
Actual payments: Jan, £3,980; Feb, £3,980; Mar, £3,980; Apr, £8,900; May, £4,058; Jun, £3,980; July, £3,980 (Total = £32,880)
Original scheduled payments: Jan, £645; Feb, £645; Mar, £645; Apr, £645; May, £645; Jun, £645; July, £645 (Total = £4,520)
Payment over/above original estimate: Jan, £3,338; Feb, £3,338; Mar, £3,338; Apr, £8,254: May, £3,338; Jun, £3,980; Jun, £3,980 (Total = £28,360)
Interest per day: Jan, £6.55; Feb, £6.13; Mar, £5.47; Apr, £4.37; May, £3.88; Jun, £3.39; July, £2.90
Mortgage balance: Jan, £51,230: Feb, £47,430; Mar, £43,620; Apr, £35,260; May £30,919; Jun, £27,050; July, £23,145
% of mortgage now paid off: Jan, 48.77%; Feb 52.57%; Mar, 56.38%; Apr, 65.41%; May, 69.08%; Jun, 72.95%; July, 76.86%
% of house now owned outright: Jan, 91.74%; Feb 92.35%; Mar, 92.97%; Apr, 94.31%; May, 95.01%; Jun, 95.64%; July, 96.27%

Comments: Now I’m into July, the impact of my overpayments during the course of this year is really starting to bite.

In January, my daily interest charge was £6.55, whereas it’s now £2.90. This represents a 55% fall, which I am happy with, given I’m on a fixed interest rate of 4.59% until March 2011.

During the same period, the % of the house I actually own (based on a January 2010 estimate derived from Zoopla), has risen by 4.53%, which might not sound very much, but equates to just over £28,000.

I’m unsure as to whether I should continue the current rate of overpayment, as I’m now at the point where I’m going to have to start dipping into my cash ISAs. Consequently, the tax-exempt status of these funds will be lost forever.

Balanced against that is the fact that at present, all savings accounts are, once inflation is taken into account, actually loosing money (at least in real terms).

Who knows what the future holds? My thinking at present is to hang on in there making maximum mortgage repayments at the expense of my cash ISAs. Given the state of the economy, now would also be a sensible time for me to start putting more into my index tracking (ie stocks and shares) ISA. However, a choice needs to be made between this and my mortgage, and for the time being, the house wins hands down.
QB

Queen-Bee_2

Well, one of my four items on E-bay has sold , and for a reasonable price, so it's down to the PO tomorrow to send it off and re-listing for everything else.

I've also got some more clothes and a couple of unused bottles of nice perfume to add to my next batch of goodies, as well as a portable air conditioning unit - the last is virtually new but quite large - I wonder if E-bay is the right place to sell it? Plus I have a couple of parts of a Denon midi system - they are old, but again, I wonder if there is any market for such items?

Otherwise, I have revarnished my wooden house number plaque and finished shampooing my carpets with the industrial cleaner I hired. When I moved my sofa however, I had a shock - moths have EATEN holes in the carpet :eek: not huge ones, but big enough to leave a couple of 10p sized bald patches and several smaller ones. The carpet is only a couple of years old and came from John Lewis - I was under the impression that carpets these days were moth-proofed so I am very, very surprised, plus more than a little pi**ed off. I saw the carpet as an investment, so I'd bought a nice one.

Other news? Mr. Fox has returned with a vengeance! On Friday night, I woke to a commotion downstairs and on investigating (I thought the cat had got her flap jammed) discovered that a young fox had barged its way in and was careering round the conservatory causing chaos. Meanwhile, kitty was marooned on the kitchen cooker with a tail like a bottlebrush.

The moment the light went on, Mr. Fox went beserk, jumping at the windows to try and get out and tipping everything off the window sills as he ran along them in panic. All I could hear was the sound of crashing plant pots and breaking glass. I managed to shoo him back out the flat and surveyed the damage - snapped off plants, nearly everything tipped out of pots, a lot of smashed terracotta, china and glass, and a number of small, very unpleasant smelling 'presents'.

Everything is now scrubbed and back to normal, and I've been able to salvage most of my precious plants.

Fortunately, it didn't run amock on my newly washed carpets... otherwise I might have gone for it with a rolling pin instead of chasing it out the door!
QB

DansMum_2

QueenBee :eek:

All I have to say. Are you really wonderwoman in disguise???:cool::D

Queen-Bee_2

Thank you DansMum.. I love my lists!!!

Today I rang John Lewis to ask about their carpet and the moth damage. They said that NO carpet was moth resistant and that I'd have to get my house fumigated. I'm not at all convinced that this is necessary - or indeed desirable, as I suffer from Hayfever and my skin is allergic to lots of chemicals. I'd run the risk of treating my carpet with spray or something but not having chemicals wafting through the entire house...

I've posted on the old style board to see if anyone there knows how to deal with moths and carpets, but if anyone here has any ideas, please let me know!

Earlier today, I retrieved my portable air conditioning unit from the shed, washed it down and plugged it in. It's in perfect working order, and produced such a lovely gust of cool air that for a moment, I was sorely tempted to trundle it into the bedroom and leave it there. However, it MUST go, especially as I was tempted by a lovely Hobbs bag, shoes and dress on ebay yesterday. Really, it's one step forward, two steps back sometimes, but on this occasion, I just couldn't resist the temptation!
QB

Queen-Bee_2

Just made the first of this month's overpayments. For some reason, my building society's Faster Payment system was having a glitch last night and said it would not process my requests for three days! :mad:

The call centre staff didn't seem to be able to identify any good reason why this should have been the case and suggested that if the payment was urgent, I go into a branch in person and arrange two CHAPS payments at £25 each. :eek:

Hmm... so today, I went into the BS to withdraw £2,000 from two of my accounts in cash and walk six shops along to deposit it into my building society... So more interest saved and more importantly, I think that I should decide when I want to move my cash, not an automated system that doesn't seem to work properly!
QB