KolaKubes Crazy Rags to Riches Mortgage Challenge! Part One - Saving a deposit!

museumworker

Sharing money - always a tricky one! OH and I pay all of our wages apart from £150 each into our joint account. This is used to pay the mortgage, house bills, childcare, food - basically everything apart from personal spends which comes from our £150pm 'pocket money'. That way if either of us want to buy a book, dvd, go out for dinner or drinks etc, as long as it comes from that personal money the other can't really complain. It gives us both enough freedom so that we don't feel deprived, but means we have enough going into the joint account.

We have a 50-50 say on what happens with the joint account. We try and check the account together a few times a month, and we do pull each other up on any spends. OH was a bit nervous when we started on our £10k challenge last year, but once we started seeing the savings pile up we were both really motivated to continue. Without OH fully on board we would not have done so well with our finances. We talk about money quite a lot and celebrate our little successes.

KolaKube

So, I have a cunning plan to push things forward.

OH and I have taken the decision to move back nearer home this year (late summer) - we're too homesick after so long in England. I will have a job as mines a moveable feast, but he may not have one for a while - my parents have offered us their converted garage flat for a while (so a *little* more private than a room in the house itself!) - its little but free - would be a great opportunity to save up / not erode our savings whilst OH finds a job.

Not sure what to do with our house full of stuff however - we're going to need to downsize big style

Would save us rent, council tax, TV licence, bills... even though they're not asking for anything, we would contribute to the household by doing all the grocery / household shopping, and cooking etc.

Anyone got experience of selling on ebay? Need to start getting rid of some stuff..!

Kola x

museumworker

Only just caught up with your cunning plan! A very generous offer from your family, and sounds like will really help you financially.

How's the downsizing going? Have you taken the plunge with ebay yet?

Just wondering whether home is foreign climes, or still somewhere in the UK.

KolaKube

Hello all!

Long time no see. I'm afraid I've been a bit AWOL from our MFW journey for quite a few months Can I come back please?

As it stands, OH and I are definitely moving in with my folks, next month! (Home is Ireland btw and we currently live in England!). I've got a job in our home town, OH hasn't found work yet but has a bit of breathing room as we won't have very much expenditure. Downsizing is going well, but currently the money I've made selling bits and pieces on ebay has all had to go on the move (£750 to hire a van and for the ferry for that and our cars also!)

I am unbelievably excited. Not only about being close to friends and family, and feeling more settled and like we're finally starting on the rest of our lives, but also about the total material and financial shake up!

It's so nice going through our stuff and deciding which stuff actually matters to us, and getting rid of the rest. Like a proper spring clean!

This is going to sound crazy too, but I'm a bit 'bored' of our current financial situation. It flows relatively well, but theres not much room for manoeuvre and I find there's not a lot I can make changes to at the minute. When we move back not only is the cost of living considerably less, but a lot of our fixed outgoings will be changing, giving us a lot more scope to save. I'm all excited!

Typical to us, we've had quite a few unexpected costs since my last post (cars breaking down, expensive stag / hen dos / expensive work related courses / funding the move home etc etc) - so the savings currently stand at £5000, £500 down from Feb but thankfully (as far as I'm aware!) no big spends on the horizon between now and next month... fingers crossed everyone!

If we made it home with the full £5000 I'd be happy. Then it's onwards and upwards..!

Going to have a good sit down with our finances this evening and work out exactly which costs will be going and what we'll need each month. OH would quite like to do a masters he's spotted so will have to see if we can afford it if he doesn't find work straight away. Planning to buy the household groceries (6 people) as a contribution rather than paying my folks rent etc (their plan, not ours!) so will have to factor that in too.

:T