My first Mortgage, want to be MF ASAP!

gymsalesjames

Hello all, long time lurker of the forums and just registered. First post is going to be a long one so stay with me

Me and my girlfriend of 3(ish) years are in the process of buying our first house (both 1st time buyers formerly living with parents) and we are looking to get the mortgage paid off ASAP!

We are nearing the end of the buying process (offer accepted about 5-6 weeks ago, waiting to recieve contracts, got mortgage sorted) and we are both keen to get it paid off ASAP. The stats for the mortgage are:

Loan 97750
5 year fixed 4.39%
=£537 per month
The total to repay, inc. interest is £161,172 (assuming the 4.39% rate continues for 25 years, which it wont)

Plan is to overpay as much as possible (with a 500/mth limit for the first 5 years in the mortgage contract). If we do manage to overpay the full 500 every month for the 5 year fixed interest term we will only be left with 52,120 of debt instead of 85,722 when we remortgage

We aren't planning to have kids any time soon but probably will be by the end of the fixed term so that should fit in nicely.

I have completed a budget on this site as best I can. I have asked the current residents and a friend who lives very close about most of the household bills and there are other bits and bobs I'm not 100% sure about. I've posted it a couple posts down

Plan is to update here every so often with budgets and keeping it up to date with how much we are overpaying and generally get some advice.

Wish me luck

Froggy-G

Good luck James! :j

You can find the SOA link at the top of the Debt Free Wannabee board.. Fill it out and post it on your thread, and we will help you out!

Cheers
Froggy

RTNI

Welcome to the board- good luck on your journey! We all started from scratch at one stage!

gymsalesjames

Froggy-G wrote: »

Good luck James! :j

You can find the SOA link at the top of the Debt Free Wannabee board.. Fill it out and post it on your thread, and we will help you out!

Cheers
Froggy

Brilliant, thanks:

Statement of Affairs and Personal Balance Sheet
Household Information
Number of adults in household........... 2
Number of children in household......... 0
Number of cars owned.................... 1
Monthly Income Details
Monthly income after tax................ 2166
Partners monthly income after tax....... 1000
Benefits................................ 0
Other income............................ 0
Total monthly income.................... 3166
Monthly Expense Details
Mortgage................................ 1037
Secured/HP loan repayments.............. 150
Rent.................................... 0
Management charge (leasehold property).. 0
Council tax............................. 100
Electricity............................. 35
Gas..................................... 35
Oil..................................... 0
Water rates............................. 40
Telephone (land line)................... 15
Mobile phone............................ 20
TV Licence.............................. 14
Satellite/Cable TV...................... 0
Internet Services....................... 20
Groceries etc. ......................... 500
Clothing................................ 100
Petrol/diesel........................... 110
Road tax................................ 12
Car Insurance........................... 40
Car maintenance (including MOT)......... 50
Car parking............................. 0
Other travel............................ 0
Childcare/nursery....................... 0
Other child related expenses............ 0
Medical (prescriptions, dentist etc).... 20
Pet insurance/vet bills................. 0
Buildings insurance..................... 20
Contents insurance...................... 0
Life assurance ......................... 0
Other insurance......................... 0
Presents (birthday, christmas etc)...... 100
Haircuts................................ 10
Entertainment........................... 0
Holiday................................. 125
Emergency fund.......................... 0
Total monthly expenses.................. 2553

Assets
Cash.................................... 2000
House value (Gross)..................... 145000
Shares and bonds........................ 0
Car(s).................................. 2000
Other assets............................ 0
Total Assets............................ 149000

Secured & HP Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Mortgage...................... 97750....(1037).....4.39
Secured Debt.................. 15000....(150)......3
Total secured & HP debts...... 112750....-.........-
Unsecured Debts
Description....................Debt......Monthly...APR
Total unsecured debts..........0.........0.........-

Monthly Budget Summary
Total monthly income.................... 3,166
Expenses (including HP & secured debts). 2,553
Available for debt repayments........... 613
Monthly UNsecured debt repayments....... 0
Amount left after debt repayments....... 613
Personal Balance Sheet Summary
Total assets (things you own)........... 149,000
Total HP & Secured debt................. -112,750
Total Unsecured debt.................... -0
Net Assets.............................. 36,250
Reproduced on Moneysavingexpert with permission, using IE browser.[/i]


It seems like we will have quite a lot of spare cash but I'm sure my budget isn't 100% accurate. I'll find out all the expenditures exactly over the next few months I guess

The 15k secured loan is my student loan.

RTNI: Thanks for the welcome

LilB_3

Hi James,

I've just posted my SOA too - fun isnt it?

Do you really spend £500 per month on groceries?

Good luck with it all anyway!

gymsalesjames

LilB wrote: »

Hi James,

I've just posted my SOA too - fun isnt it?

Do you really spend £500 per month on groceries?

Good luck with it all anyway!

Thanks!! I'm a 17 stone weight lifter so I do get through the food!!

That is however 1 thing we will be looking to cut down on. I think living together will make this mroe viable as we aren't back and forth to 2 different houses, forgetting food from 1 fridge that may then go off. Ideally we would like to get it to £400 a month. The new house is a 10min walk from Tesco (and I work 5min from asda). Shopping is usually done daily and we take advantage of the reduced section as much as possible!

LilB_3

gymsalesjames wrote: »

Thanks!! I'm a 17 stone weight lifter so I do get through the food!!

Ok, enough said!

ViolaLass

Even then, you're proposing to spend over 3 times what we spend on food per month (and we're not skinny little things who eat nothing).

You should be putting something in your emergency fund and do you really need £1200 a year for presents? Maybe you do (need/want), but make sure of it.

gymsalesjames

The foods I eat tend (unfortunately) to be expensive though. Things like chicken, steak etc are costly if you eat the amounts I do (I get through about 1/2-1kg of meat a day). I do buy in bulk whenever there is a special offer on (or I find loads in the reduced section) but it is certainly something we are going to cut down on as much as possible, and try to waste as little as possible. Or maybe I can go down a weight class

£1200 for presents was a top end estimate and kind of a "worst case scenario". Main ones are eachothers birthdays and christmas (about 200 for each x4 = £800) then miscellaneous family/friends. I think you're right, somewhere between 800-1000 would be a better budget.

We have a little pot of savings (2000ish) and the plan is to add any left over money to that each month.

What kind of emergency fund is sensible to have?

ViolaLass

gymsalesjames wrote: »

What kind of emergency fund is sensible to have?

Opinions vary but most people agree that you should have somewhere between 3-6 months living money so for you two, that would be a minimum of £6k (ignoring overpayments) and up to £15k (with overpayments). £2000 won't keep you going long if you lose your jobs.

£200 on presents every birthday and Christmas?! Lordy. That's an 'each to their own' thing but if you want to reduce your spending, that would be a good place to start.

I don't know about weightlifting but do you have to eat lots of meat? Could you eat more veg? (I assume you need lots of protein)

gymsalesjames

ViolaLass wrote: »

Opinions vary but most people agree that you should have somewhere between 3-6 months living money so for you two, that would be a minimum of £6k (ignoring overpayments) and up to £15k (with overpayments). £2000 won't keep you going long if you lose your jobs.

£200 on presents every birthday and Christmas?! Lordy. That's an 'each to their own' thing but if you want to reduce your spending, that would be a good place to start.

I don't know about weightlifting but do you have to eat lots of meat? Could you eat more veg? (I assume you need lots of protein)

Ok, thank you very much for the advice RE: emergency fund. I'll pass this on to the OH and we can make arrangements for it.

RE: Presents, its because I'm worth it lol. We do like to treat eachother but if we ever do start struggling this will be our first port of call for savings.

I basically have to eat a lot of healthy foods, especially meat and vegetables which is where it becomes expensive. Carbohydrates are fine, they are cheap as anything (oats, potatoes, rice) but anywhing with protein in is costly (meat, fish, cheese, nuts). We like to live very healthily (this is more important to me and my OH than money) so it's one place we aren't really looking to cut down on too extensively.