MFin5 - my diary to make it happen

craftingmad

Hi everyone,

Well my OH and I decided to start making overpayments on our mortage as soon as we had cleared our £25k debt (which we did with massive thanks to this site) so have been making OP's for approximately 3 years.

We currently have £91,400 outstanding over a term of 22 years. We are currently OP by £500 a month but I am now determined to pay off the mortgage by the time I am 40 (just under 5 years time).

So here we go Mortgage Free in 5 years - my adventure.............

craftingmad

OH is in full time work and earns approx £39k a year and I am a stay at home mum to 2 beautiful children so have no salary coming in. I do however deliver a local magazine in the small village where I live and the neighbouring village so earn £50 every other month.

I already have another diary thread - 2010 Resolutions - My crafty diary which is charting my personal challenge to not spend any money on craft items for as long as I can (I was spending on average £320 a month!!!!!!!!) but have also decided to keep this one for everything which I am doing to achieve my goal so as to hopefully even more support to keep me on the straight and narrow!

So this is my plan for April:-

Savings:-

No craft spend at all from joint account - saving £220!!!!!!!
No craft spend from my account (Child benefit account) - saving £132!!!!
Nothing to send back to QVC as not spending anything so save on postage - £28
No Craft Mag spends - saving £20
Food Bill Cuts - £100

TARGET SAVED IN APRIL - £500

Earn:-

Delivering local village magazine (bi-monthly) - £50
Ebay - £20 (going to list like made over the next few days)
Quidco - £10
Card and Craft Sales - £5

TARGET EARN FOR APRIL - £85

TARGET TOTAL AMOUNT FOR APRIL FOR EXTRA OP - £585!!!!!!! (in addition to £500 already being made)

craftingmad

OK I've got the bit between my teeth and decided that every day I am going to do a few little and larger things to help boost the OP.

So for today I have:-

Little Things

1. Turned on gas fire this morning instead of central heating to save heating whole house
when not needed
2. Unplugged Wii so is not on standby continuesly and using electricity all the
time.
3. Earned 20 points with clickthroughs via Pigsback (plus had a further 75
points validated today)
4. Daily clicks from Quidco which has tracked at 8p.
5. Walked to doctors to collect & order prescriptions saving petrol and phone
bill.

Larger Things

1. Made a packed lunch for OH which I intend to do every day to save him
buying lunch from supermarket. Worked out this should save us at least £20
a month.
2. Posted 2 ink cartridges to cash 4 cartridges which when minimum amount is
reached should hopefully be worth £6.00.
3. Registered with fatcheese.co.uk and done my first daily clicks to start earning cashback.

I have also decided to set myself a mini challenge each day to keep me motivated and provide some extra money/ways to add money into the mortgage OP pot.

Today's challenge was:-

Find one thing from every room in the house which can be sold on Ebay/Amazon or at a Car Boot (this amounts to 12 items including the garden/sheds counting as 1). Completed

Tomorrows Mini Challenge is:- Find 24 items from around the house to be sold via the above methods

Money added to mortgage pig today:- 31p (found whilst finding car boot items)

If any one has any other ideas on possible challenges, ways to do little or large things to help boost OP's, etc, etc I would love to hear them.

Thanks for reading x

Glamazon

Hi

good luck with this! I list quite alot of[STRIKE] junk[/STRIKE] stuff on eBay and really need to do a car boot.

Have you thought about doing surveys?

Also, what about Avon/Betterware/Kleeneze? You could deliver when you take your local magazine

craftingmad

Glamazon wrote: »

Hi

good luck with this! I list quite alot of[STRIKE] junk[/STRIKE] stuff on eBay and really need to do a car boot.

Have you thought about doing surveys?

Also, what about Avon/Betterware/Kleeneze? You could deliver when you take your local magazine

Hi Glamazon,

Thanks for your ideas. They are much appreciated.:beer:

I'm just about to sign up with some survey sites such as Lightspeed, Ciao and YouGov. Are there any more that you know of? One of my jobs tomorrow is to look at the up your income thread so hopefully I might find some more on there as well.

Unfortunately with regard to Avon I did try this a while ago when I first moved to the village but because where I live is such a small village it was not successful as the area has had a long standing Avon lady who covers the whole area and is very well liked so nobody ordered from me. :mad:

We also already have about 3 Betterware and Kleeneze brochures come round from different people regularly so again I think this idea may be a non starter as well.

Sorry don't mean to be so down on your ideas - they really are appreciated - I promise - the joys of living in a small village in the middle of nowhere hey!!!

Thriftyknickers

Do you like animals at all? I did a bit of pet sitting when I was on mat leave in our village. I also did mystery shopping which I enjoyed. Like me, you might have to travel in to town but I used to combine it with other trips. Good luck on the quest!

craftingmad

Thriftyknickers wrote: »

Do you like animals at all? I did a bit of pet sitting when I was on mat leave in our village. I also did mystery shopping which I enjoyed. Like me, you might have to travel in to town but I used to combine it with other trips. Good luck on the quest!

Hi Thriftyknickers (love the name!),

I love pets so thats a really good idea. I'm going to look into this one as everyone around here seems to have a pet of some sorts so that could be a really good idea. :T Did you bring the pets into your house while the owners were away or did you pet sit them their own premises? How much did you charge etc? Also did you offer just dog walking services? Sorry to bombard you with questions but I am knowledge hungry at the mo.

I also like the mystery shopping idea and like you said if I can combine this with a trip into town already needed it would be even better. Do you know of any good companies to register with? I had registered with some when I was clearing our debts but used an email address which I can no longer access - do you think I could still access these accounts or would I have to start from scratch again do you know?

Thanks again.

craftingmad

Firstly before I forget again I meant to say that yesterday was a no spend day - wahooooo!!!!

OK, heres my list of little (and large) things done today:-

Little

1. Turned off laptop rather than leave on which drains battery and uses electricity to charge back up.
2. Turned off printer rather than leaving on standby.
3. Turned off desktop monitor to save energy.
4. Had a shower whilst the kids were in the bath so as to not have heating & hot water on for longer period.
5. Quidco daily clicks - 8p.
6. Renewed library books online as due back today so as to save overdue fees & petrol to travel to library.

Large

1. Applied for all free mobile sims available via Quidco - tracked at £6.10
2. Sorted through food cupboards & fridges/freezers to check what food already had & then planned meals for rest of this month (and beyond) and shopped accordingly (saving approx £50 this week).

Todays Mini Challenge - Find 24 items from around the house to be sold via the above methods - 12 items found - lots more to get but got invited round a friends for a BBQ so on the bright side I did save on food for tonight!

Money added to mortgage pig today:- 1p (found whilst finding car boot items)

Tomorrow's mini challenge - Sign up with 5 mystery shopping companies together with finding remaining 12 items missing for Sat's challenge

cha97michelle

You can join lightspeed with a small amount of quidco cashback. About 70p but every little helps. Also, can you once you register with a survey site use the friend referral to set your DH up doing surveys? My DH often does them in his lunchtime at work or on an evening here.

Pigsback is ok for longer term. I did quite well when it first started a few years ago but it is much harder now. I also do ipoints, and toluna. Ipoints some people use to order there online food shopping and get points back on every delivery. Ipoints has just changed to maximiles but it is the same company.

craftingmad

cha97michelle wrote: »

You can join lightspeed with a small amount of quidco cashback. About 70p but every little helps. Also, can you once you register with a survey site use the friend referral to set your DH up doing surveys? My DH often does them in his lunchtime at work or on an evening here.

Pigsback is ok for longer term. I did quite well when it first started a few years ago but it is much harder now. I also do ipoints, and toluna. Ipoints some people use to order there online food shopping and get points back on every delivery. Ipoints has just changed to maximiles but it is the same company.

Thanks for that cha97michelle.

Will have a look later and I love the idea about refering OH. I might even try and get my mum, family & friends involved too. :beer:

I know what you mean about pigsback. I remember a few years ago when we were clearing our debt that I regularly got vouchers from them which I used for presents etc but as you say I think those days are long go. Every penny counts so I'll keep clicking in hope that one day I get another voucher!

alfiesmum

craftingmad wrote: »

Today's challenge was:-

Find one thing from every room in the house which can be sold on Ebay/Amazon or at a Car Boot (this amounts to 12 items including the garden/sheds counting as 1). Completed

Now THIS I lurve!:T Permission to pinch?! What a brill idea. It's things like this I need to keep the motivation up.