My First Step into the scary world of MFW

clearing_out_my_pockets

gallygirl wrote: »

:rotfl:oh great, another mad woman :rotfl:, welcome to the club, there's lots of us around

I may be mad, but at least it's encouraging me to pay the debt off!

Last night's salsa lesson was free and was brilliant! Although my calves are aching today, I can really feel the benefit. Since the class is normally £5, I have therefore made an overpayment of £5.

I think, in a way, OH & I are lucky that we've settled into the routine of paying bills & budgetting quite quickly. Before we bought our house, neither of us had lived away from home, so neither of us had any idea what level of energy bills we'd be expecting, how much food we'd be eating and so on.

None of our friends have mortgages, and both sets of parents had mortgages due to run until they retire (although my parents have just paid theirs off at ages 55 / 48). I'd like to think that by then we'll be mortgage free (or minimally mortgaged, if we trade up from a mortgage free house).

gallygirl

clearing_out_my_pockets wrote: »

I may be mad, but at least it's encouraging me to pay the debt off!

It was meant as a compliment by the way!

Well done on the salsa, too much like hard work for me!

clearing_out_my_pockets

gallygirl wrote: »

It was meant as a compliment by the way!

Well done on the salsa, too much like hard work for me!

I took it as such - probably should have used a smiley! I kinda got my small overpayments idea from the Payment a Day thread.

Salsa is really good fun. I'm generally a shy person and on my first week, there was a group dance at the end which is really complicated but the more advanced dancers were really friendly and patient. There's a freestyle session after the class and almost every week at least one stranger gets me up on the dance floor to help me practice.

katsu

Hello clearing,

We tried salsa but could not yet the hang of the rhythm/steps. Would love to get DH back into a dance class...

Good luck on your MFW journey

clearing_out_my_pockets

As of yesterday, daily interest has reduced to £19.77 per day. Not bad! Today's overpayment is 78p, again to round down the bank account.

Now, some of you may have noticed in my first post that I have credit card debt. Let me explain my reasoning for overpaying the mortgage rather than clearing the cards first. I am VERY fortunate to have one of the old Capital One No Hassle Platinum cards, which tracks the base rate. The debt on my card (which is an annual travel card for work) is being paid at a rate of 2.48%, compared with the mortgage of 4.63%.

clearing_out_my_pockets

Another small OP of 94p this morning. It's funny - my mum asked me what I want for my birthday last night and I was tempted to ask for money so I can put it towards overpayments!!!

delmar39

clearing_out_my_pockets wrote: »

Another small OP of 94p this morning. It's funny - my mum asked me what I want for my birthday last night and I was tempted to ask for money so I can put it towards overpayments!!!

Well done. Where do your overpayments come from? Wouldn't you be better setting up a monthly direct debit for a set amount? Or do you do this and then just make odd payments here and there. I'll keep up to date with your target via the MFW spreadsheet update.

clearing_out_my_pockets

When we were doing the 'household budget' I budgeted for a monthly train ticket of £185. I had also been saving towards this year's ticket already, so my train ticket is actually only costing £110 a month. The 'spare' £75 goes as a standing order on pay day. The little extras I'm reporting here are coming from rounding down bank accounts to keep the OCD at bay. Or where I was expecting to pay for something but got it for free (as with the salsa class).

delmar39

clearing_out_my_pockets wrote: »

When we were doing the 'household budget' I budgeted for a monthly train ticket of £185. I had also been saving towards this year's ticket already, so my train ticket is actually only costing £110 a month. The 'spare' £75 goes as a standing order on pay day. The little extras I'm reporting here are coming from rounding down bank accounts to keep the OCD at bay. Or where I was expecting to pay for something but got it for free (as with the salsa class).

OK, so similar to what I do with biking to work (put the 73p each way petrol savings towards the mortgage on top of my £75 direct debit). It a good way of doing it..

delmar39

clearing_out_my_pockets wrote: »

When we were doing the 'household budget' I budgeted for a monthly train ticket of £185. I had also been saving towards this year's ticket already, so my train ticket is actually only costing £110 a month. The 'spare' £75 goes as a standing order on pay day. The little extras I'm reporting here are coming from rounding down bank accounts to keep the OCD at bay. Or where I was expecting to pay for something but got it for free (as with the salsa class).

P.S. don't forget to update your target via the MFW spreadsheet. As you are close to me in number I noticed that you haven't updated, but yet you've made a few OP posts, so worth updating the main form..!