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

sarahevie

KolaKube wrote: »

Today I'm focussing on NOT buying a load of rubbish to take to work, the cravings are calling! My absolute weakness is cans of diet coke. £2 a day, more if I go to the vending machine by the chocolate one *ahem* (which I know is stupid as I should just buy multipacks and take them in, but we end up drinking it all within a few hours - what we need to invest in is self control!)

This is something my OH is trying and he's rubbish at anything money saving. He absolutely will not take things from home insisting that buying his lunch daily is his 'special treat.' However, he has cut his daily budget from £6 to £3 by buying bottles of squash, multi packs of coke etc.

I'm no saint at this either when I go walking it's my 'treat' to buy a choc bar, bottle of drink, mag etc but I've started going out without the change to do it (it's not worth breaking a fiver is then my mindset) has worked twice so far this week so prob saved £6.

KolaKube

mennie wrote: »

I saw a good deal on rbs website which made me think of you


If you save with RBS for your deposit and then take on one of their mortgages, they give you £5,000 cashback

might be worth a look

Good luck

Thank you so much for this! I'm off to work now but will have a good look tomorrow!

KolaKube

sarahevie wrote: »

This is something my OH is trying and he's rubbish at anything money saving. He absolutely will not take things from home insisting that buying his lunch daily is his 'special treat.' However, he has cut his daily budget from £6 to £3 by buying bottles of squash, multi packs of coke etc.

I'm no saint at this either when I go walking it's my 'treat' to buy a choc bar, bottle of drink, mag etc but I've started going out without the change to do it (it's not worth breaking a fiver is then my mindset) has worked twice so far this week so prob saved £6.

I think you're right, I might go to work with just a fiver - also that means I can't put it in the vending machines! Great idea! :T

KolaKube

Morning all!

Last night tonight then I'm back to the land of the living with 10 days off! Not buying junk went well last night... there was loads there already lol! :beer: Hopefully tonight can continue to avoid the vending machines, however there is zero 'ready' food in the house (e.g. yoghurts, milk etc) so may need to make a small trip to the shops this afternoon.

I put our [seldom used] bread machine on before going to sleep earlier but with a new recipe and the bread has finally turned out lovely! All soft and bready and not hard as a rock with the texture of 3 week old cake inside lol as per previous attempts! I'm going to tweak it a little because its come up a tiny bit 'damp' on the bottom, but now that its made a nice loaf I can see this becoming a regular thing. It makes amazing foccacia (?sp) bread and pizza dough too, I've not tried any of the other recipes. Need to start using it more and think up a few interesting breads. I used to love an olive oil and sea salt bread from borough market when I lived in London, I was all crusted with sea-salt on top and tasted lush! I wonder would that be hard to re-create [thinking cap goes on]. Also we have some sesame and poppy seeds in but I wonder how you would get them to stick to the top of the bread in a bread machine? Bread machine bread seems quite a cheap thing to make - I think the bag of flour was 60p or so in sainsburys [possibly on offer, I can't remember] and it does around 3 loaves?

Now, do I head to the shops, or do I 'face off' the fridge (like they do in shops pulling everything forward to make it look full), take a few bits out of the freezer, make up some skimmed milk powder in a jug in the fridge, knock out a few scotch pancakes and scones, make up some little bowls of angel delight and try to fool OH that we don't need to shop? :rotfl: That way I can stay in bed and no money gets spent!

Kola

SmlSave

My absolute weakness is cans of diet coke.

Hi hun Have you tried buying a large bottle and then emptying it into small bottles for work - it may save a few pennies.

Now, do I head to the shops, or do I 'face off' the fridge (like they do in shops pulling everything forward to make it look full), take a few bits out of the freezer, make up some skimmed milk powder in a jug in the fridge, knock out a few scotch pancakes and scones, make up some little bowls of angel delight and try to fool OH that we don't need to shop?

I take it your OH is like mine and if there's nothing they can make a sandwich out of (i.e. cheese or ham) then obviously there's no food in the house and we're going to starve to death

I'd do the face off

KolaKube

SmlSave wrote: »

I take it your OH is like mine and if there's nothing they can make a sandwich out of (i.e. cheese or ham) then obviously there's no food in the house and we're going to starve to death

I'd do the face off

:rotfl: LOL that's him in a nutshell :rotfl:

LilacPixie

a 20k deposit on 100k is fine. Quite a few bank are offering better rate regular savers if you listen to their mortgage advisers whn the time comes and you are first tim ebuyers.

Scary me i'm in the middle of selling and buying with a slightly bigger motrage and a slightly smaller deposit and it's fine

KolaKube

LilacPixie wrote: »

a 20k deposit on 100k is fine. Quite a few bank are offering better rate regular savers if you listen to their mortgage advisers whn the time comes and you are first tim ebuyers.

Scary me i'm in the middle of selling and buying with a slightly bigger motrage and a slightly smaller deposit and it's fine

That's good to hear - we don't have much of a clue about these sorts of things but had heard that around 20% is about right. We've looked around and seen quite a few places that would suit us well for around 100K, which is where the 20K figure comes from! Glad to know we might be able to put down less, although we'll keep the 20k target for now :cool:

LilacPixie

I'm putting down 10% which TBH I wish was closer 25% but needs must so we are moving onward and upwards (fingers crossed about mortgage) at the moment 10% deposit rates are poop, 15% are quite a bit better but 25% deposite rates are a million times better. I was aiming for 25% but hey life gets in the way and my interest rate is 6.5% which i find a bit scary. If we had the 25% it would of been 3.59%

KolaKube

LilacPixie wrote: »

I'm putting down 10% which TBH I wish was closer 25% but needs must so we are moving onward and upwards (fingers crossed about mortgage) at the moment 10% deposit rates are poop, 15% are quite a bit better but 25% deposite rates are a million times better. I was aiming for 25% but hey life gets in the way and my interest rate is 6.5% which i find a bit scary. If we had the 25% it would of been 3.59%

25% eh - I didn't realise that the amount you put down has a bearing on the rate! <god am I really clueless about all this?> Will need to investigate. Hmm.

Been on a bit of a night out to celebrate finishing nights. £30 spent between OH and I and not to bad as have had a good old dance and seen some of my friends! :T

No further savings until next Wed - pay day!

I have a job interview coming up (got word of it today!) so am a bit nervous.

xx