The final countdown... and a newbie in the DFSD house!

Chocforever

Sorry you were feeling down. I think a lot of us can relate. Although job-wise, the situation is now looking better for me than it was 2 years ago, it has caused much anxiety and very much slowed down my progress because I had to take a significant pay cut which, as well as the short term implications, meant I could not increase my mortgage very much. This then put my house move on hold and I am still stuck in the flat that makes me unhappy.

Now my personal situation has improved, the house market has died in my area! The prices of flats aren't great at all and it is hard to contemplate bridging the gap to buy a house. I don't feel I am being unduly greedy. But to trade up from my flat (which is basically paid for, so all equity) to a 2 bed house will involve me taking a £200k mortgage and raiding my savings which were really meant to be pension. I can see a long struggle ahead, particularly when interest rates rise.

I have thought long and hard about moving area, either back "home" or to somewhere cheaper. But, like you, the problem is that these are not the areas with the jobs that I am skilled for and that would pay for the house. In any case, "home" is now more expensive for housing than where I am now so definitely missed the boat there.

Sorry, this has turned into a bit of a rant . I am tired which does not help. I know that really, the answer is not to worry about it all because it does not achieve anything and things probably will turn out OK in the end. It's just that for planners, like you and me, it goes against the grain!

I don't have any bright ideas with regards to the money making. As you say, you have done the obvious stuff. I know there are threads with various self employment ideas but I think a lot of these things are very time and energy consuming and now would not seem like the right time to be testing them out. I would enjoy the time with the baby and just try to be sensible on the spending side .

Last full week at work before Xmas. Hurrah

debtfreesomeday

dreamdreamer wrote: »

Hope you don't mind I've just subscribed to your diary - I'm debt-busting with the hope of starting a family in 2012 so this thread has been an inspiration to me! Saw you'd joined the SPC4 thread - I love it there.

I'm also in the public sector, where morale is also at rock-bottom in the current climate. I heard this week there was talk of shutting us down and "consolidating" us into the Essex office - some 100 miles away and not viable as we've just bought a house here. It's all worrying but I suppose we should thank our lucky stars that we HAVE jobs these days.

Look forward to reading more

Dreamer xx

Of course I don't mind Dreamer, the more the merrier!
Sorry to hear you're going through the public sector woes too at the moment, it's not nice is it. As you said, morale is non existent at the moment. I'm counting the days until I start maternity leave, but am worried about whether I'll have a job to come back to when I return with the way things are going.

Good luck with the debtbusting x

debtfreesomeday

Chocforever wrote: »

Sorry you were feeling down. I think a lot of us can relate. Although job-wise, the situation is now looking better for me than it was 2 years ago, it has caused much anxiety and very much slowed down my progress because I had to take a significant pay cut which, as well as the short term implications, meant I could not increase my mortgage very much. This then put my house move on hold and I am still stuck in the flat that makes me unhappy.

Now my personal situation has improved, the house market has died in my area! The prices of flats aren't great at all and it is hard to contemplate bridging the gap to buy a house. I don't feel I am being unduly greedy. But to trade up from my flat (which is basically paid for, so all equity) to a 2 bed house will involve me taking a £200k mortgage and raiding my savings which were really meant to be pension. I can see a long struggle ahead, particularly when interest rates rise.

I have thought long and hard about moving area, either back "home" or to somewhere cheaper. But, like you, the problem is that these are not the areas with the jobs that I am skilled for and that would pay for the house. In any case, "home" is now more expensive for housing than where I am now so definitely missed the boat there.

Sorry, this has turned into a bit of a rant . I am tired which does not help. I know that really, the answer is not to worry about it all because it does not achieve anything and things probably will turn out OK in the end. It's just that for planners, like you and me, it goes against the grain!

I don't have any bright ideas with regards to the money making. As you say, you have done the obvious stuff. I know there are threads with various self employment ideas but I think a lot of these things are very time and energy consuming and now would not seem like the right time to be testing them out. I would enjoy the time with the baby and just try to be sensible on the spending side .

Last full week at work before Xmas. Hurrah

Hi Chocs

Hope you had a good weekend.

I feel for you regarding the housing/moving situation, I really do. I know how frustrating it can be to work hard, only for someone to move the goalposts. With regards to the affordability of property in your area, I guess the best thing you can do is to sit it out and wait. At least you are still saving and it will put you in the best possible position to sell/buy when the time is right and, hopefully, will mean you won't have to run the risk of using your pension savings towards buying a house. I know it's frustrating and, as you said, it doesn't help if you have a mind for 'planning' when the 'doing' seems so far off, but it will be worth it in the end.

I hope the new year brings more luck on that front for you.

x

debtfreesomeday

Well it turned out to be quite a costly weekend for us, or more expensive than I'd have liked, anyway. The maternity and hospital bag supplies cost a bit more than I had anticipated, even though I went for the cheapest nightwear etc that I could throw away after if necessary. Unfortunately it had to go on the credit card. Still, at least it's all done now.

We also needed some grocery bits which I'd forgotten about and didn't realise we'd run low on, so just over £10 was spent on that. We're also out of de-icer so I need to pick up some more this week before the freezing mornings return. I also need to buy stamps - I bought two books on Saturday but have used all these on Christmas cards already!

It was MIL's birthday and we covered the meal, together with other family members, costing us £55. We had the cash put aside but I was still hoping it would be a bit cheaper than that.

On a positive note, hubby managed to get the laptop working on Saturday so it doesn't look like a lost cause. :T I'll have a proper look at it one night in the week and see if I can speed it up a bit and make it slightly more reliable than it is at present.

I completed a £3 survey this morning which will hit the paypal account sometime this week. It'll stay there for now until there's more in there to transfer to the bank account.

The sealed pot challenge is now underway in our house and change has been added over the weekend. There's loads of coppers in a pot in the car which I'll turn out and add to it sometime in the week too.

We still didn't buy that last present we have yet to buy. :mad: I have no idea what to get and am struggling for ideas. Next year this friend will also have a baby, so I have decided we are not going to be buying for the adults then, just something for the little one which will be much easier (and probably cheaper!).

I received our landline and broadband bill today and it's much cheaper than the last few months. It's about £10 less than it has been and that I'd budgeted for. That's great news, but I have no idea what they are playing at as the usage is pretty much the same!

DFSD

debtfreesomeday

A pretty rubbish Monday all in all. I've been a little worried about baby all day as movements seemed to have decreased greatly overnight. I rang the antenatal ward today and they told me to come in for monitoring at 5pm, but the little wriggle monster then started kicking and fidgeting like normal again for a couple of hours so I phoned and cancelled! Now its gone quiet again in the last couple of hours, so I'm worried sick again. If it's still like this in the morning I'm going to phone the hospital again.

So, concentrating on other things to keep my sanity at the moment, and dinner is made for when hubby gets home from the gym. There'll be enough leftover for him to take to work for lunch tomorrow too.

My M&S half price christmas gift bargain I ordered for someone last week has arrived today, but is broken :mad: so hubby is going to take it back to the store tomorrow and see if they have any more in stock - I hope so - or I'll have to think of something else to buy this person.

The ebay baby sleeping bag purchase has also arrived today, as well as the hoover bags I ordered cheap online. There's also two more packages to pick up from the post office in the morning.

I'm going to attempt to free up some space on the laptop now and hopefully it will work better...

Chocforever

What a stressful day . I hope the baby has started moving around again.

I have much to do but CBA today. It can all wait!

debtfreesomeday

I know the feeling - I felt the same last night and tonight will be much the same, I'm sure!

We've had an eventful morning so far today... baby refused to move all night so finally phoned and went in for monitoring at 5am this morning. All is fine thank goodness, but needless to say I'm pretty shattered! I came into work a bit early as I was up and, well, may as well get on with the day, but am struggling to focus on my screen this morning already! Boy, it's going to be a long day!

Moneywise, I've transferred a £50 'buffer' over from one of the e-savers temporarily just until payday as I don't want to run the risk of being overdrawn. There's no reason why we should be, but when the bank balance gets down to under £100 I start to worry! I'll put it back over to the e-saver once pay day is here.

Not planning on doing anything too testing today!

DFSD
X

fizzypops

glad the baby is ok.
kids dont realise how much they make you worry about them, even when their still cosy in your tummy!!!

debtfreesomeday

fizzypops wrote: »

glad the baby is ok.
kids dont realise how much they make you worry about them, even when their still cosy in your tummy!!!

Thanks Fizzypops. Yep, this one is already giving us (even more) grey hairs!

debtfreesomeday

Typical, the damaged gift item from M&S is out of stock everywhere! They've refunded cash to the card, bit of a shame as it was a nice gift at a great price. No idea what else to buy now...