Sorting out my life - Part 2!

copperjar

Started the £500 a month pretty late in Jan. Had put £200 away from savings, and so far managed an extra £94.73 since 17th Jan. Not bad but could be better. have rejoined TopcashBack and already got £30+ in pending payments, just about to post off my old phone to o2 so that's another £90 hopefully. probably won't come in before the end of Jan though.

Aim to get at least to £300 saved in Jan, then the aim will be £518.18 a month until Dec :eek:

Quite enjoying being back on the money saving wagon though

copperjar

Hmm, well the last return didn't last long did it?! Almost a year has passed and still haven't paid off the big loan! Do have over £4k in savings though...but something strange has happened. I just can't bare to spend it!!

However, I'm back (again) and have signed up to a couple of challenges. First is to save £6k this year. It will be tight but I think if I stay focused (and keeping up with the diary is part of that!) I can do it. I also need a huge decluutter of the house because 1) it's bursting at the seams and 2) my other half is moving in!

There is very little space just for little me, so I do need to get rid of some of the rubbish I hate throwing away (...I mean, what if I need it?!) and make room for her arrival. Long term, we will look to buy a place together, so that's part of the reason for the £6k challenge, but at the moment our jobs mean we both have a pretty big commute from here and this is the most central place! So it also means that one of us will probably have to get a new job...which is unfortunate as I've only just got one

Long story but another restructure at work meant that I had to apply for a new job at work and I also applied for a few outside of my current company. I ended up getting offered two and stuck with current company (big promotion, nice pay rise, but not the best for potential move to new house). So I'm thinking that in 18 months to 2 years, I'll probably look for new jobs again and we'll see where that takes us.

Just been thinking about some NYRs both money saving and others, and have come up with:

1. Save £6k
2. Declutter the house
3. Sell the declutter!
4. Go to NYC for my 40th (flights paid for )
5. Plan some more travelling adventures
6. Move Mrs CJ in
7. Plan our next move and save for it!
8. Lose 3 stone :eek:
9. Exercise 4 x per week
10. Be happy

copperjar

Spent the morning sorting out my monthly totals for January and setting up payments to my two new savings accounts. well, one savings and one is a TSB current account. Feeling very nervous switching money between accounts - I've always banked with HSBC and had all of my money in one bank, with a couple of savings accounts attached.

I'm having a slight panic because the £20 test payment went through straight away, but the big transfer of £1980 hasn't :eek: It's still not showing as credit, but of course has been taken out as debit! Eek. Will try not to obsessively check every minute - all this for a bit of additional interest!! Is it worth it?

NYR #11 -stop worrying

copperjar

The money went into the account so panic over! I don't know why I thought it wouldn't - really not used to having accounts all together where transfers happen immediately!

Had a MSE stroke of luck today as well. Have been using YNAB and was looking to purchase it, when I saw on another thread that it has been reduced for today only to £7.49 on Steam. Quickly snapped it up, saving me £20+

copperjar

Well it's all happening in 2015 so far. A bit sooner than expected, the OH has bought a car which means that she can move in! We're officially saying end of Jan so we can get everything sorted with Council Tax etc, but I expect it will be within the next couple of weeks! Very excited, with a few nerves thrown in!

I'm so proud of my money management since this diary first started. All debts apart from the Big One gone forever and savings are rising very nicely! So nicely that I was able to lend the OH some money towards her car (she's too independent just to accept it as a gift...wants to pay it back when her savings scheme at work cashes in next year). I feel very chuffed with myself that I can do that and still have savings left.

It got me wondering about our finances when we move in together though (well, more when we buy our own place). We've been together 2 years now and have seperate financial arrangements. I have additional expenses of the mortgage and associated costs plus big loan and car loan, but my salary is substantially more than hers. She has a DMP she is paying towards and the new car expenses and general living costs. I'm not expecting her to pay anything when she moves in but I will still have more disposable income. What do other people do? I'm wary of joint aco!!!!s due to past experiences, but it also wouldn't be fair to split everything 50/50 because she just couldn't afford it.

Decisons decisions. I definitely want to treat us both to a holiday this year though - but how Ms Indepednent would accept me paying is another matter!

copperjar

Done a few more things to get my finances in order over the past couple of days. Have finally mastered YNAB which is a bit addictive now! I'm enjoying playing round with the figures and sorting out how to add to my savings and play about with my monthly spends. It's only 6th Jan but I've made some good inroads to the savings challenge this year!

The bad news financially is that I was finally able to sign up to Tesco online banking and have seen that I still have 3 years exactly left on the loan. I always think I'm in the final year! Bit down about that because the way they work out the interest payments, it won't actually save me very much to get it paid off early.

However. If I pay my monthly payments as usual this year, it will leave a balance of approx £4000. So I could potentially pay it off if I make the £6k savings target I set myself...leaving some over for the holiday I'd like us to take next year (or the new house savings...). Decisions, decisons.

Other bad news is my boiler is about to give up the ghost. Looking back over this diary, 4 years ago the same happened and boiler man patched it up for £300! I'm hoping he can do the same this time but maybe my luck has run out!